Army Chief of Staff Gen. Raymond Odierno yesterday said while reducing the active force by about 14 percent through 2017, combat power will be sustained by a smaller force well able to meet the Defense Strategic Guidance, even as it also copes with budget cuts and the rebalance from conflict to peace.
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| Army Chief of Staff Gen. Raymond Odierno |
The Army’s reorganized brigade combat teams (BCT) “will sustain as much combat capability as possible,” Odierno said. The changes are aimed at making soldiers “more lethal, flexible and agile.”
The Army is “increasing the tooth to tail ratio,” Odierno said. While reducing BCTs from 45 to 33 and likely to 32, “we will add a third maneuver battalion,” as well as adding more engineer, route clearance, and fires capability.
As Maren Leed, senior adviser with the Harold Brown Chair in Defense Policy Studies and Ground Forces Dialogue at the Center for Strategic and International Affairs, noted in a short analysis of the plan, there will be fewer BCTs, but the service “will maintain 95 of today’s 98 maneuver battalions.”
The changes are based on the lessons of 12 years of combat and extensive analysis.
The brigades are now expected to be broken out as 10 armor, 14 infantry and 8 Stryker BCTs. This is not set in stone, he said, and will likely be adjusted, based “on an analysis of what might be needed in contingency plans” and for other activities.
For now, the 13 combat aviation brigades will remain intact as analysis showed the need for Army aviation.
Increasing combat power with each reorganized BCT–which will be comprised of some 4,500 soldiers–sends a clear signal outside the building that there is plenty of land force support to meet increasingly complex threats, to build partnership capacity and regional capability around the world and in support of activities in the Asia Pacific region.
However, this reorganization was planned as part of the 2011 defense cuts agreed as part of the Budget Control Act, of which $170 billion was the Army share of a decade’s worth of $487 billion for the Defense Department. Odierno warned repeatedly if full sequestration kicks in even more soldiers could be back in civilian life. Full sequestration could mean further “significant reductions, as much as 100,000” he said.
This concern was echoed almost immediately by House Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-Calif.), who said in a statement: “As damaging as they are, these cuts don’t begin to reflect the crippling damage sequestration will do to our Armed Forces and National Security.”
McKeon said HASC will “carefully examine the implications” of the initial restructuring.
HASC Ranking Member Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) also raised concerns over sequestration and deeper cuts: “Given the drawdown in Afghanistan, the Army can manage this reduction in end strength, but the real hazard to military effectiveness will persist as long as Congress fails to act on sequestration. If sequestration is not removed, then more extensive force structure changes will need to be made to accommodate the severity of the sequester cuts.
“We’re getting rid of a lot of the headquarters,” said Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. John Campbell at a roundtable following Odierno’s presentation.
While the Army will shrink from 570,000 down to 490,000 soldiers, to date much of the reduction has come from what Odierno called “natural attrition.”
However, this year the service will “selectively release” some colonels and lieutenant colonels, and next year, some captains will be released.
Not discussed is the impact the force structure decisions have on acquisition, programs and on the defense industry itself.
“We’re still working through it,” Odierno said. But he agreed that fewer BCTs and soldiers means less equipment and fewer systems are needed. However, “as we submit the ’15-‘19 budget you’ll see some of those (decisions.)” That budget is in the works right now.
This could potentially mean increased emphasis on mission command and the network connecting soldiers to their equipment and other units as well as training and simulation tools.
Additionally, Campbell pointed out that millions in equipment is coming back from Afghanistan and much could be redistributed where needed in the reorganized BCTs.