Improving the Decision Making Abilities of Small Unit Leaders (2012) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction: The Operational Environment
1 Introduction: The Operational Environment
Pages 10-28
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From page 10... ...
has evolved its approaches to supporting small unit leaders in making decisions and taking action in the operational environments of Iraq and Afghani stan. As the chapter emphasizes, the challenges that Marine small units face in those theaters are not entirely novel, nor are they specific to Iraq or Afghanistan.
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From page 11... ...
For example, the National Defense Strategy of 2005 identified "irregular, catastrophic, and disruptive methods" as the hallmark characteristics of war in the 21st century.4 Lacking the resources to match the military capabilities of the United States, adversaries were likely to pursue "complex irregular warfare" instead.5 Similarly, the Marine Corps has asserted the importance of "midrange threat": violent, transnational extremism and irregular warfare, fueled by economic, political, and social dis enfranchisement among growing populations of young adults throughout North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia.6 Interestingly, however, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO)
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Air Force views hybrid warfare as "more potent and complex" than more traditional forms of irregular warfare, whereas the U.S. Special Operations Command, the U.S.
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military leaders have recognized that effective prosecution of the enemy in a hybrid warfare environment requires "a highly adaptable and resilient response from U.S. forces."14 1.1.1 "The Strategic Corporal" at the End of the Cold War Over the past decade, USMC leadership has invested significant resources in a rethinking of the conceptual underpinnings of expeditionary warfare and meanwhile has enhanced the operational capabilities of the Marine Corps to meet the conditions of hybrid warfare.
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From page 14... ...
During the Cold War, the Marines had been called into action once every 15 weeks; in the 1990s, operational demands nearly tripled, and by 1998, Marine units were being deployed roughly once every 5 weeks to locations around the world.16 Most prominently, Marine units supported humanitarian missions in Rwanda and Zaire, played a key role in stabilizing Bosnia after the 1995 Dayton Accords, and responded to the terrorist attacks in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The Marines drew significant lessons from these experiences, recognizing that operational environments of the post-Cold War era would challenge 20thcentury approaches to expeditionary warfare.
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in Quantico, Virginia, the MCWL was given responsibility for developing and evaluating new operational concepts, including the performance of "Service Oriented Conceptbased Experiments" to "test training, organization, and equipment innovations associated with emerging warfighting concepts."23 As discussed below, the MCWL has played an important role in developing and evaluating new concepts for expeditionary warfare, including "distributed operations" and "enhanced company operations" (ECO) , concepts that reflect the significance of Krulak's "strategic corporal" in today's hybrid conflict environments.
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From page 16... ...
,27 while The Long War: Send in the Marines describes a "generational struggle against fanatical extremists; the challenges we face are of global scale and scope."28 These and various USMC concept papers detail the evolution of the Marine Corps's foundations and capabilities for ensuring success in the irregular envi ronments of Iraq and Afghanistan. In order to gain a better understanding of how the Marine Corps is positioning itself to address these challenges, the National Research Council's Committee on Improving the Decision Making Abilities of Small Unit Leaders reviewed some of the publicly available literature in which the USMC leadership describes the steps being taken to ensure that Marines can succeed in hybrid environments.
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At the other end of the expanded continuum, the new "Phase 5: Enable Civil Authority" directed the military to ensure that civil institutions in conflict zones are properly organized and resourced so that civilian populations have access to functioning public services.30 As the Government Accountability Office pointed out, this expanded opera tional guidance is playing an important role in articulating types of operations that the U.S. armed forces will be required to pursue in the context of stability operations.
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To enhance SC MAGTF capabilities further, the Marine Corps Training and Advisor Group was created to be deployed in teams of trained advisers, including as part of an SC MAGTF, to provide ongoing security assistance and training and to establish productive rela tionships among United States, coalition, and local security forces. SC MAGTF staffing requirements also call for officers and noncommissioned officers (NCOs)
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See Gen James T Conway, USMC, Commandant of the Marine Corps, "Marine Corps Vision and Strategy 2025, Commandant's Update to the Marine Corps Council," Powerpoint presentation, April 18, 2009, Slide 21.
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2009. "Distributed Operations and Enhanced Company Operations: Experimentation and Marine Corps Capability Development," presentation to the Zvi Meitar Institute for Land Warfare Studies, Latrun, Israel, September 2.
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2009. "Distributed Operations and Enhanced Company Operations: Experimentation and Marine Corps Capability Development," presentation to the Zvi Meitar Institute for Land Warfare Studies, Latrun, Israel, September 2, Slide 4.
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Moreover, small unit leaders and their Marines would need training to ensure access to at least some of the technical, organizational, medical, and linguistic skills that are normally provided by spe cialists embedded in higher levels of command.52 Under the rubric of distributed operations, the Marine Corps made headway in addressing the types of gaps described above. Training was one important area in which the Corps focused resources, to ensure that small units and their leaders had access to the requisite knowledge and skills to pursue important nonkinetic missions, such as conducting training and professionalization activities with local security forces.
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2009. "Distributed Operations and Enhanced Company Operations: Experimentation and Marine Corps Capability Development," presentation to the Zvi Meitar Institute for Land Warfare Studies, Latrun, Israel, September 2, Slide 4.
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improved command and control, intelligence, logistics, and fires capabilities" and further changes to "training, manning, and equipping."66 The concept paper itself identified intelligence, maneuverability, fires, logistics, information operations, command and control, and expanded training, including new simulations for small units to "rehearse" missions prior to execution. Importantly, the Marine Corps has rec ognized that increased emphasis on the company as an independent operational unit implies significant potential changes to the MAGTF, including the possible development of "company sized MAGTFs."67 Evolving the MAGTF to address company operations can include "provision of fires, mobility, logistics, communications, intelligence, information operations, foreign internal defense, and civil-military operations capabilities"68 similar to the capabilities provided at the battalion level, and arguably difficult to source adequately at unit levels much smaller than the company.
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In addition, the Corps has continued to leverage resources developed under distributed operations, such as cultural training and language programs and updated equipment. 1.3 CHALLENGES FOR MARINE SMALL UNITS AND THEIR LEADERS The Long War is indeed a small unit leader's fight, and we have to make sure our young warriors, operating sometimes with little sleep and in 120-degree heat, are up to the task of making rapid tactical decisions that may have strategic impact.
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From page 26... ...
As discussed in Chapter 2, Marine small unit leaders must respond to situ ations that evolve rapidly and unexpectedly from being calm and productive to being kinetic and extremely destructive. The presence of international news media in the battlefield further complicates matters: not only is 24-hour coverage normal, but also the Internet ensures that news stories about Marine engagements with insurgents and reports of collateral damage to civilian populations can rapidly and easily "go viral" with little warning.
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From page 27... ...
forces will no longer be sized to conduct large-scale, prolonged stability operations." 72 Moreover, the strategic guidance continues, counterinsurgency remains important although its emphasis appears to be shifting; however, the complexity of environments in which Marines are likely to find themselves will remain, and improving the deci sion making abilities of small unit leaders is a long-term proposition regardless of the mission emphasis. The committee recognizes that these two challenges -- preparing the small unit leader for the complexities of an expanding, rapidly changing, and highly uncertain mission space while at the same time maintaining the USMC traditional strengths in expeditionary warfare -- are interdependent.
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From page 28... ...
In addition, the committee was deeply inspired by the professionalism, dedication, and expertise of the Marines whom committee members met, particularly the small unit leaders with whom the committee had the opportunity to interact. As these women and men perceive, adapt, and very effectively shape the dynamics of complex and dangerous adversarial environments, they demonstrate as small unit leaders why the Marine Corps remains the best expeditionary force in the world.
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