As the Army transitions to the future, the Maneuver Center of Excellence (MCoE) aims to ensure the future force is prepared to accomplish national missions as part of a joint, interagency and multinational force, the commanding general said.
At Ft. Benning, Ga., the MCoE works to ensure future maneuver forces are ready, trained and equipped to fight and win in a complex future environment. The MCoE is part of Army Training and Doctrine Command.
The top priority for the center is leadership development because “soldiers follow a good leader anywhere under any conditions of battle,” said Maj. Gen. H.R. McMaster, MCoE commanding general, at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Other top priorities include training, doctrine, and combat developments.
McMaster yesterday spoke at the Ground Forces Dialogue, an initiative of the Harold Brown Chair in Defense Policy Studies aimed at expanding the policy dialogue about challenges facing U.S. ground forces over the next decade.
With the squad as the foundation of the force, McMaster wants to lighten the load soldiers carry to restore a high degree of mobility. This would allow soldiers to conduct dispersed, dismounted fire and maneuver.
Soldiers also need better connectivity to bring to bear all the assets of combat arms available if needed, he added.
What is required is reaching the “right balance” of firepower, protection and mobility, he said.
Pointing to specific programs, McMaster said operating effectively means the service needs to modernize vehicles to stay ahead of the enemy. For example, the BAE Systems Bradley–that he said he “loved” and has used extensively–needs underbelly protection, has limited mobility and also needs a bigger gun. Vehicles need reduced signatures and to be able to carry the nine infantry squad members.
The modernization effort has to be more than just looking to the Ground Combat Vehicle, he said, so the Army is looking at all its armored vehicles. One program, the proposed Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicle (AMPV), would replace the 1950s-era M113, originally made by BAE. McMaster would like to see it reach the force sooner than the current 2021 date. “I think we could probably do this faster,” he said.
Considering the past 12 years of conflict, McMaster said while there have been lessons learned, the Army relearned some things and also saw continuities.
At the highest level, security problems are land-based because that’s where people live and clash for power and survival, he said, so war continues to be an extension of politics. What the Army brings to the joint force is the ability “to set security outcomes for sustainable political outcomes consistent with our national interests,” he said. “Otherwise, we’re stirring up the pot and leaving.”
Another continuity is that wars are fought by people. Thus, the Army must understand the human elements of war.
Also, war is uncertain and can’t be predicted. U.S. war-planning and force development at times can be described as almost “narcissistic,” he said. “We can’t decide what we would like to do and then assume it will be relevant,” making an “unrealistic project that creates vulnerabilities.”
Additionally, he said, war is a contest of wills. These are enduring characteristics that can’t be ignored.
Bad habits, or drawing the wrong lesson, are perhaps equally important to remember, he said. For example, some advocates of the attrition-based approach believe raiding enemy assets can win a war swiftly, cheaply and efficiently. However, this is a “fundamentally unrealistic” way to solving future war problems.
“Raiding and attrition did not solve the problem in Iraq or Afghanistan,” McMaster said.
Another wrong lesson: “We have exaggerated what we can accomplish through partners.” Fiscal constraints lead some to consider outsourcing efforts to other armies, but U.S. interests may not be congruent with those of our partners, he pointed out. Similarly, with building partnership capacity, thought must be given to “whose capacity are we building,” and how it relates to who holds power and what they might do with this added capacity.
For the future, McMaster said over the decade-plus of conflict, some skills need to be regained. They include the ability to fight campaigns with large formations in austere and complex environments.
That brings up questions such as how to get to the area of operations if the Army is mainly based in the United States; how to sustain high-tempo operations at extended lines of communication and sustain freedom of movement and action at those distances, he said. Also, how to conduct command and control across such wide areas.
Other skills need to be sharpened, including how to conduct effective reconnaissance and security operations, as large formations at division and higher today can’t integrate intelligence and operations because those assets have been pushed down to lower command echelons such as the brigade combat team.
MCoE is also rewriting its doctrine. “Army doctrine is a page turner,” McMaster said, recommending it to all despite skeptical laughs from the audience, who are very familiar with the older, jargon-dense and often convoluted doctrine manuals of the past.