:
competition short of conflict,
conflict itself, and the
return to
competition, The Army sought joint approval for MDB from the other services; instead, the Air Force recommended
multi-domain operations (MDO). Multi-domain operations cover integrated operation of cyberspace, space (meaning satellite operations, from the Army's perspective), land, maritime, and air. The
1st Multi-Domain Task Force was stood up in 2018 in I Corps for the Pacific, built around
17th Field Artillery Brigade. Multi-domain battalions, first stood up in 2019, comprise a single unit for air, land, space, and cyber domains to ensure integration of cyber/EW, space, and information operations in more levels of command. Expansion of Army MDO activities to Europe was planned for 2020. By 2020 the Army's programs for modernization were now framed as a decades-long process of
cooperation with allies and partners, for
competition with potential adversaries who historically have blurred the distinction between peace and war, and who have been operating within the
continuum (the gray zone) between peace, cooperation,
competition,
crisis, and
conflict instead. When meeting a
crisis, the Army's preference is deterrence. The need for deterrence
against ballistic missiles is shifting to the need to deter or defend against attack by
hypersonic weapons. ;Multi-domain task forces (MDTFs) MDTF is a brigade-sized theater-level unit designed to synchronize precision effects and precision fires in all domains against adversary
anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) networks in all domains. A MDTF includes two batteries of long-range missiles. One battery, called Mid-Range Capability (MRC), which can fire further than 1,100 miles, has
Typhon missile system. The other battery should have the new
Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon, whose classified range is likely several thousand miles. A MDTF also includes a
HIMARS battery plus air defense battalion, Intelligence, Information, Cyber, Electronic Warfare and Space battalion and support battalion The first MDTF was an experimental brigade-sized unit which was tailored to its theater; taking existing capabilities, as well as building on
new capabilities, which have been deployed in new and networked ways, all tailored to the security landscape of the respective regions, in order to
deter the antagonists. (but now the 3rd MDTF in INDOPACOM),
Note: the following training scenario, to gain relative advantage, is only one of the possible paths suggested by following the 5 red numbered bullet points in the illustration. • Competition— No overt hostilities are yet detected. Blue bar (force projection) is in standoff against red bar (threat). • Strategic Support area— National assets (blue) detect breaching of standoff by adversary (in red). • Close area support— blue assets hand-off to the combatant commands, who are to create effects visible to the adversary (in red). • Deep maneuver— blue combatant actions dis-integrate adversary efforts (per TRADOC pamphlet 525-3-1: "militarily compete, penetrate, dis-integrate, and exploit" the adversary); —Operational and Strategic deep fires create effects on the adversary. Adversary is further subject to
defeat in detail, until adversaries perceive they are overmatched (no more red assets to expend). • Adversary retreats to standoff. The populations perceive that the adversary is defeated, for now. (Compare to
Perkins' cycle, 'return to competition', in which deterrence has succeeded in avoiding a total war, in favor of pushing an adversary back to standoff (the red threat bar). Blue
force projection still has overmatched red threat.) In 2019 the 27th Secretary of Defense ordered the four services and the
Joint staff to create a new joint warfighting concept for All-domain operations (ADO), operating simultaneously in the air, land, sea, space, cyber, and the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS). In 2021 the 28th Secretary of Defense approved the Joint warfighting concept (JWC), which remains classified. • the Air Force takes the lead for
command and control (C2). The Joint services each have a C2 concept to be scaled —for the Army, C2 requires thousands of connections with the sensors and shooters, as compared with hundreds of connections with the sensors and shooters for the Air Force
Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS); • the Navy will lead concept development in Joint fires: In February 2020, voices at the tactical level were supporting cross-domain, cross-role, cross-service interoperation: "
Any sensor should be able to link to
any shooter and
any command and control node". The combination of F-35-based targeting coordinates, Long range precision fires, and Low-earth-orbit satellite capability overmatches the competition, according to Lt. Gen. Eric Wesley. A
Space sensor layer of satellites (at 1200 miles above earth) • the Army will lead concept development for
contested logistics. briefs
Kathleen Hicks, 35th
United States Deputy Secretary of Defense about the mission of her
combatant command • the service to lead concept development in 'Information advantage' is not yet determined by the
Joint Staff J-7 as of 16 September 2020. --> Build a
kill chain faster than the adversary's
OODA loop.
See Fog of war AI is one such initiative. • By 11 August 2021, the
Joint requirements oversight council (JROC) identified a 5th functional capability—
Integrated air and missile defense (IAMD). of
C2BMC as well as the
Nuclear Posture Review. In late December 2019, the Air Force, Army, and Navy ran a
Joint all-domain command and control (JADC2) connection exercise of Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS) for the first time. This exercise is denoted
ABMS Onramp, and will occur at four month intervals. The December 2019 exercise used a
NORTHCOM scenario. The April 2020 test of ABMS was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System (IBCS) engaged in a Limited user test in August–September 2020 as preparation for the Milestone C acquisition decision. IBCS is a critical building block for JADC2; On 11 August 2021 JROC had identified a 5th functional capability (
Integrated air and missile defense —IAMD) in addition to the 4 functional battle efforts, or competitive advantages already identified. In August 2020 a Large force test event (LFTE) was completed at Nellis AFB; the test event demonstrated the ability of F-35s to orchestrate SEAD (Suppression of Enemy Air Defense) using F-22s, F-15Es, E/A-18Gs, B-2s, and RQ-170s. ;Project Convergence (PC20) In fall 2020, Futures Command is testing the data links between the Army's AI task force and its helicopters —Future Vertical Lift (FVL), its long-range missile launchers —Long range precision fires (LRPF), and its
combat vehicles —(NGCV); in fall 2021 and going forward, the links between ABMS and Multi-domain operations are invited when the Army's Air and Missile Defense capabilities (AMD's IBCS and MSHORAD —Maneuver short-range air defense) have undergone further testing. In September 2020, an ABMS Demonstration at WSMR (
White Sands Missile Range) shot down cruise missile surrogates with hypervelocity (speeds of Mach 5)
projectiles jointly developed by the Army and Navy. The Army interceptor stems from an XM109 Paladin howitzer; the Navy interceptor stems from a deck gun. The data feeds used both 4G and 5G, as well as cloud-based AI feeds, to form the
kill chains. In October 2020 the DoD Acquisition chief completed an extensive redesign of the Adaptive acquisition framework (AAF) including software acquisition, middle-tier acquisition, defense business systems, acquisition of services, urgent capability acquisition and major capability acquisition. AAF now adheres to the updated DoD 5000.01 policy approved in September 2020 by her lead, the Deputy Defense Secretary. ;PC21 :
See PC22 In March 2021,
XVIII Airborne Corps hosted a
Project Maven (
DoD AI-based) live-fire experiment which shares targeting data among
F-35s,
A-10s,
HIMARS, and satellites. In June 2021 the 28th secretary of defense issued a classified memorandum directing the Services to engage in more joint
experimentation and prototyping, in support of the All-domain operations (JADO) concept (the Joint warfighting concept). a
Joint Force (Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and Special Operations) used Project Convergence 2021 (
PC21) to simulate the distances in the
First island chain of the Pacific Ocean, which Army Long-Range Precision Fires (LRPF) are to cover. A Multi-domain task force (MDTF), and Special Forces took the lead during the Competition phase of the exercise. In June 2021 the 35th Deputy secretary of defense announced • the RDER (Rapid defense experimentation reserve, "Raider") to fund those defense organizations which successfully institutionalize experiments to exercise joint warfighting capability. • One example might be, say an end-to-end flow of data, say in a
kill chain from an
intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance detection of an enemy hypersonic weapons launch, to interdiction of the threat, to battle damage assessment. • Note that exercises to deepen a service silo have a disadvantage in a competition for RDER funding. • DoD is attempting to fund 8 CHIPS hubs.
Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System (IBCS), an IAMD Battle Command System, is an Army project which unifies its disparate anti-missile systems (such as the
THAAD, and
MIM-104 Patriot missiles) and their radars/sensors (such as THAAD's
AN/TPY-2 radar,
AN/MPQ-64 Sentinel, and Patriot
AN/MPQ-65 radars). IBCS was exercised in Fall 2021 (
Project Convergence 2021) to experiment with its connection to JADC2 and ABMS. JROC is appending IAMD capability (IAMD interoperability) to the JWC (Joint warfighting concept) The test created terabytes of data to be queried. i.e., "connect any sensor to any shooter and any command and control node" —Eric Wesley) In a review of Project Convergence 2021 (PC2021) the director of the Network Cross-functional team (CFT) was able to state 5 takeaways for the Integrated Tactical Network: • "the importance of a data fabric"— • "the need for a joint operational common picture"– In August 2023 the Navy's
§ Live, Virtual, and Constructive environment simulated joint operation across multiple domains. This involved 22 global time zones, and simulated Joint Staff, civilian leaders, and non-navy personnel.
Crisis By September 2020 the joint modernization efforts to retain
overmatch in a
crisis were visible in the press reports covering the joint level (DoD and the military departments). operating under a unified command and control structure, The
potential capability exposed by the use of AI in September 2020 posed a choice for the
combatant commanders, who needed to select their top priority, by answering "What do you want and how do we do it?" in November 2020. In FY2021, TITAN (Tactical Intelligence Targeting Access Node) was to undergo an Analysis of Alternatives (
AOA). TITAN is part of the network to integrate sensors and shooters in Multi-domain operations (MDO), in seconds. By FY2022 TITAN was meant to be a
Program of Record, for
CJADC2; additional Soldier touchpoints will assess capabilities of two prototype satellite ground stations for downselect in 14 months by FY2023, and follow-on phases III and IV.
Return to competition By 2020 the Joint all-domain concept was converging on the need for the allies and partners to convince the adversary that it is in everyone's interest to
return to
competition, well short of
conflict between near-peer adversaries.
Army Transformation Initiative In May 2025, the
United States Secretary of the Army directed the Army to begin the "Army Transformation Initiative." It "will reexamine all requirements and eliminate unnecessary ones, ruthlessly prioritize fighting formations to directly contribute to lethality, and empower leaders at echelon to make hard calls to ensure resources align with strategic objectives." It is planned that long-range missiles will be aquirred and modernized UAS into formations formed, the
M1E3 and
MV-75 fielded and the Counter-UAS gap be closed.
United States Army Futures Command and
United States Army Training and Doctrine Command will merge into a single formation. Likewise,
United States Army Forces Command,
United States Army North, and
United States Army South will merge into a
Western Hemisphere Command. The number of general officers will be trimmed. One Aerial Cavalry Squadron per active Combat Aviation Brigade (CAB) will be reduced, and all
IBCTs will restructure as
Mobile Brigade Combat Teams equipped with
ISVs, equipped with the
M1301 infantry squad vehicle to enhance mobility. == Alliances and partnerships ==