• Online Exclusive Article Archive

Trust the Process

A Deliberate Approach to Capturing Lessons Learned from the Russia-Ukraine War in U.S. Army Doctrine

 

Lt. Col. Aaron Anderson, U.S. Army

 

Download the PDF

 

In 2013, the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers popularized the phrase “trust the process” as it pertained to the team’s attempt to build a championship-caliber organization.¹ Since then, the phrase has found its way into mainstream culture to express feelings for any process that takes a long time and challenges the patience of the intended audience. Like many government and Army processes, this is a fitting term for doctrine. Doctrine moves slower than some desire, and this speed (or lack thereof) can be frustrating. As the world and the information in it seems to move at a faster pace than ever before, it can seem that deliberate processes risk becoming obsolete and outdated. But is a deliberate process a bad thing? What if the doctrine development process defines itself as capturing broad principles and applications that stand the test of time? How does the Army ensure that we remain timeless while at the same time not becoming obsolete as the technology and characteristics of the modern battlefield evolve? The answer lies in the deliberate approach to updating Army doctrine, which is a strategy that ensures the Army remains relevant and effective in responding to evolving challenges.

The Russia-Ukraine War has captured the world’s attention over the past two years, and rightfully so. The battles and technology employed by both sides are providing real-time information on what large-scale combat operations in the present and future may entail. Images of drones, artillery strikes, tanks, urban warfare, failed convoys, and failed gap crossings immediately come to mind for anyone following the war. Military professionals in the United States look internally and question whether Army doctrine is where it needs to be to fight the next big war. Is the doctrine leading the way in how our units train so that we will be prepared from the onset of the fight to win, or is it already antiquated and obsolete for today’s fight? While these are good questions, the broader question any professional should ask themselves is whether the occurrences on the battlefields of eastern Europe represent a change to the nature of warfare. As stated in the U.S. Army’s Field Manual (FM) 3-0, Operations, is war still “the threat or use of violence to achieve political purposes” that is “a human endeavor and inherently chaotic and uncertain”?² Most would argue that it is, and if students of the profession can come to a consensus on this point, the discussion then dives deeper into how the Army views the conduct of war itself, namely its principles and tenets. What are those common threads among the “chaotic and uncertain” even as technology and the characteristics of war evolve? If the principles and tenets (and even fundamentals) of Army doctrine are still valid, given the role of doctrine as an authoritative yet descriptive source, then there is no reason to change doctrine based on the war in Ukraine. This article will argue that while capturing lessons learned from the conflict is essential, the Army should be deliberate and cautious about overreacting to the Russia-Ukraine War. Instead, we need to continue to invest in ways to educate the force on doctrine so they understand it holistically versus a cherry-picked reference guide.

What Is Doctrine?

If the nature of war has not changed, and the Army derives its principles from studying war over time, what does that say about Army doctrine and whether the Russia-Ukraine War requires the Army to change it? One cannot answer this question without first understanding the purpose and reasoning of Army doctrine, not from what soldiers think or want it to be, but how doctrine and Army leadership officially define it.

First, doctrine is descriptive and not prescriptive.³ If one is looking for doctrine to explain precisely how to perform a task, they misunderstand the purpose of Army doctrine. Army doctrinal publications (ADP), FMs, and Army techniques publications (ATP) aim only to broadly describe our profession’s principles, tactics, and techniques.⁴ Look at the introduction of the majority of Army doctrinal publications and find that the intended audience is operational-level commanders and staff.⁵ The Army does not write doctrine for soldiers in the act of occupying a foxhole at an observation post. If one needs a step-by-step procedure, consult technical manuals or training circulars, which are not doctrine as defined by the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).⁶ Another excellent resource are the training and evaluation outline reports for all Army tasks that soldiers can access through the Central Army Registry.⁷ These sources are prescriptive and will teach soldiers in detail, unlike descriptive doctrine that leaders understand but then apply against mission variables.

The descriptive theme continues with the official Army definitions for principles, tactics, and techniques. A principle is “a comprehensive and fundamental rule or an assumption of central importance that guides how an organization approaches and thinks about the conduct of operations.”⁸ Tactics are “the employment and ordered arrangement of forces about each other.”⁹ Techniques are “non-prescriptive ways or methods used to perform missions, functions, or tasks” (one example of a technique is bounding overwatch).¹⁰ These definitions are broad enough not to constrain commanders when applied during training and operations. Being prescriptive makes doctrine rigid to the point the enemy can adjust their techniques to address specific U.S. Army methods. At the same time, soldiers and leaders lose the ability to think freely. Hence, there is no one solution for counter-unmanned aircraft systems (c-UAS) in Army doctrine because the technology continues to evolve, and the Army has not yet validated c-UAS concepts. However, the Ukrainians and the U.S. Army are learning the similarities that apply in many scenarios and using those lessons as applications for new solutions. If these lessons produce principles and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) applicable to all c-UAS operations, then a case exists to update the doctrine.

Second, the Army writes doctrine for application in all locations and across the conflict continuum.¹¹ Having doctrine specific to a single geographic location is dangerous, and the Army has resisted such doctrine in the past. Before the development of AirLand Battle in the 1970s and 1980s, the Army shifted from Vietnam-era counterinsurgency with the advent of Active Defense.¹² Doctrine developers, including TRADOC’s first commander, Gen. William DePuy, designed Active Defense explicitly for the fight against the primary Cold War threat of the Soviet Union in Europe.¹³ It shortly received numerous critiques, one of which implied a heavy focus on defense. Another was that it was not globally applicable to wherever the next battle may lie. In response to the doctrine of Active Defense, the next TRADOC commander, Gen. Donn Starry, and his planners worked diligently to ensure the collaboration of the Air Force and combatant commands to develop AirLand Battle from a concept to the official doctrine. Numerous wargames and feedback from the force informed the new doctrine. Developing AirLand Battle did not happen overnight nor was it informed by a single conflict or created by a single entity. It involved studies and lessons from Israel and Europe, incorporated the concepts from numerous wargames, and the feedback from many of the Army’s schoolhouses and leadership.¹⁴ The Army “trusted the process” to ensure its capstone doctrine was correct and would build a champion despite a persistent Soviet Union Cold War threat. Reading too much into the Russia-Ukraine War could lead the Army down the same road as the Active Defense, a hazardous proposition considering that we do not face a single peer threat as during the Cold War. With Russia as an acute threat, and China defined as a threat “with both the intent to reshape the international order and … power to do it,” now more than ever, we need doctrine that is flexible in its application.¹⁵

Third, doctrine is about what the Army has today and in the near future. History and experience inform doctrine, as do validated concepts and lessons learned.¹⁶ In this case, validation is vital. Doctrine is concerned with what is possible for the fielded, trained, and equipped force of today and up to five years in the future. As seen in Ukraine, concepts are ideas for a significant change based on proposed new approaches to operations or technology. These ideas propose how the force might do something significantly different in the future, usually six to eighteen years from now.¹⁷ Using an engineer capabilities example, doctrine does not address the XM204 or XM343 Standoff Activated Volcano Obstacle.¹⁸ These are not programs of record (as of the publication of this article), so they do not meet the criteria for inclusion into doctrine as defined in TRADOC Pamphlet 25-40, Publishing Program Procedures for Army Doctrinal and Training Publications. Legally, the Army does not want to indicate endorsement of trade or brand-name products.¹⁹ Validating concepts and lessons learned before they are included in doctrine is essential to ensure that leaders synchronize the entire DOTMLPF-P (doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership and education, personnel, facilities, and policy) enterprise so that doctrine does not outrun the material solutions or the training that units can feasibly conduct. Therefore, while everyone recognizes that drones represent a change to the threat environment from past wars, the Army needs to validate solutions in battle labs, war games, and combat training centers. That way, once the Army publishes authoritative doctrine, it is achievable and will capture the TTPs, and principles to remain relevant for the foreseeable future.

Principles and Tenets

So, what principles and tenets does the Army subscribe to, and are they relevant to the lessons learned from the Russia-Ukraine War? To add context to the definition of a principle described above, FM 3-0 further states,

The principles of war capture broad and enduring fundamentals for the employment of forces in combat. They are not a checklist that guarantees success. Rather, they summarize the considerations that commanders and their staff members account for during successful operations, applied with judgment in specific contexts. While applicable to all operations, they do not apply equally or in the same way to every situation.²⁰

Specifically, the principles listed are maneuver, objective, offensive, surprise, economy of force, mass, unity of command, security, and simplicity.²¹ While armies have experienced and studied these principles in combat worldwide for centuries, their codification is popularly referenced from Henri-Antoine Jomini’s 1862 work The Art of War based on the Napoleonic Wars.²² Jomini uses the term maxims rather than principles while still citing maneuver, objective, mass, and economy of force in the section titled “The Fundamental Principle of War” within chapter III.²³ In this case, Jomini (who ironically has a reputation for being prescriptive) was undoubtedly descriptive, and his maxims directly translate to today’s U.S. Army principles. Given the time these principles have existed, does one genuinely believe that today’s war in Ukraine departs from these time-tested ideas? Is not a swarm of drones just an application of the principle of mass in a different form? Do forces still require security, unity of command, and surprise to successfully execute a deliberate gap crossing? While cyber technology and cell phones may be new to the battlefield, they do not detract from the basic principles outlined in Army doctrine. As the Ukraine examples in the next section demonstrate, understanding these principles is more important than ever to remain flexible about fast-changing technology and weaponry.

In addition to the principles, the operational tenets outlined in Army doctrine are just as essential and time-tested. For example, from FM 3-0,

The tenets of operations are desirable attributes that should be built into all plans and operations, and they are directly related to how the Army’s operational concept should be employed. Commanders use the tenets of operations to inform and assess courses of action throughout the operations process.²⁴

These tenets are agility, convergence, endurance, and depth.²⁵ Like the principles, they are intentionally descriptive, and one must ask if these apply today the same as they have in the past. While convergence may not look like the multiple corps of Napoleon marching dispersed but coming together at Austerlitz for a decisive battle, it could still mean division-level indirect fires (whether drones, artillery, or shoulder-fired rockets) coming together with national-level space assets and brigade electronic warfare formations to achieve opportunities at a decisive point for a brigade or battalion to defeat a Russian armored column.²⁶ Additionally, as the Ukraine war moves past its second year into its third, endurance is playing an essential role in operations in real-time. How do the Russians continue to fill their ranks in the face of significant losses, and how will the Ukrainians continue to fight at a numerical disadvantage? While these questions provide broad applications of the principles and tenets, it is worth diving deeper into three specific and highly publicized war events for further study.

Examples from the Russia-Ukraine War

Three examples from the Russia-Ukraine War illustrate how the principles and tenets still apply in today’s warfare. The first is the failed Russian gap crossings at the Siverskyi Donets River. The Siverskyi Donets crossing, or Battle of the Siverskyi Donets, occurred 8–13 May 2022.²⁷ The Donets is a predominant terrain feature in eastern Ukraine, a 650-mile river and tributary of the larger Don River.²⁸ As such, it represents key terrain to both the Russians and the Ukrainians, and it was inevitable that the Russians would have to cross the obstacle if they wanted to push their advance further into Ukraine. Over five days, the Russians attempted to construct four separate bridges across the Donets. The Ukrainians destroyed each bridge while inflicting heavy losses on the Russians. By one count from the Institute for the Study for War, at the Bilohorivka crossing alone, 485 Russians were killed or wounded out of an initial 550 soldiers, with an additional eighty pieces of Russian equipment lost.²⁹ Some reports list that two Russian battalion tactical groups were either destroyed or routed for a total of more than seventy T-72 tanks, T-80 tanks, Boevaya Mashina Pekhotys (BMPs, or Russian infantry fighting vehicles), and much of the bridging equipment.³⁰ These numbers are staggering even for a mission as complex as a wet-gap crossing. Where did things go wrong for the Russians, or where did they go right for the Ukrainians? How do each side’s actions compare to current Army doctrine, and should it alert the U.S. Army to the point of changing gap-crossing doctrine?

Open-source material and analysis from sources covering the war daily confirm several aspects of the battle. First, the Russians did not appear to push out security, attempt to secure near or far side objectives, or mass their forces on the near bank of the river.³¹ This is a failure to achieve surprise, as stated in either FM 3-0 as a principle of war or in ATP 3-90.4, Combined Arms Mobility, as a fundamental of gap crossing.³² It is also an apparent failure of the principle of security. Second, the Russians only attempted to construct a single bridge at a time and thus ignored the gap-crossing fundamental of flexible planning. The single-crossing sites limited their ability to exercise the principle of maneuver and the tenet of agility. They constrained themselves to a single route and became easily targeted (see image on next page). Conversely, the Ukrainians could detect and target the Russians at each crossing using their reconnaissance. In this sense, they achieved convergence, bringing to bear multiple echelons of assets on land with numerous tanks, artillery, mechanized units, with intelligence assets in the air domain through drone reconnaissance to create amplified effects at the battle’s decisive point at the river.³³ While drones represent a newer technology on the battlefield, ignoring or adhering to the principles and tenets of warfare still remain essential, as does the gap-crossing lessons learned from previous wars. Even with the deadly drones, the gap-crossing fundamentals of surprise, extensive preparation, flexible planning, traffic management, organization, and speed hold weight.³⁴ Additionally, the control mechanisms and elements still apply, as units must ensure the crossing is not congested with masses of assets. What may require a tactical update is the size of the crossing area. Units may likely need to disperse more than ever before. Army doctrine may suggest a crossing area size but does not prescribe one. This is a decision for commanders to make through staff planning and the application of mission variables, and therefore, the doctrine remains valid as written.

The second example is the failed Russian convoy on Kyiv during the war’s opening days in late February 2022. During this period of the war, Russia planned to send ten battalions directly to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv to apply pressure in an attempt to quickly and decisively end the war. What transpired was a thirty-five-mile traffic jam of Russian military vehicles that did not move for weeks.³⁵ Stalled by logistics, maintenance, Ukrainian resistance, and a lack of command and control (and even outdated maps), the Russians failed to achieve the endurance or operational reach to get to and take the Ukrainian capital. Eventually, the Russians would retreat to where they came from in a massive embarrassment to their military.³⁶ Without flexible plans, the Russians stalled each time the Ukrainians destroyed a bridge or created an obstacle along the single route. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who so desired secrecy that he did not inform some of his own commanders of the plan until twenty-four hours out, created an imbalance in the principles of war.³⁷ U.S. Army doctrine states that commanders and staff must consider all the principles during operations. One cannot sacrifice maneuver and unity of command for surprise without accepting risk to mission or force, precisely what happened in Ukraine. Russian soldiers lacked food, fuel, and maps and did not have proper preparation time. They lacked adequate communication tools and ammunition, and their vehicles got bogged in the mud. There was no unity of command without appropriate communications, and columns stopped. Nowhere in Army doctrine, including the tactical convoy publication, ATP 4-01.45, Multi-Service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Tactical Convoy Operations, does the Army prescribe how long or short a convoy must be or how many routes a commander should or should not order.³⁸ However, it certainly does not call for a convoy of thirty-five miles long to sit for weeks on the side of the road. All of this is to say that the Russians’ failure demonstrates the perils and costs of ignoring descriptive U.S. Army doctrine where the principles and tenets are still true.

The third and final lesson occurred early in the war and centers on the discussion of whether tank warfare had become obsolete. This example helps paint the picture of why, although frustrating at times, Army doctrine is cautious to react too quickly to changes in the characteristics of warfare. Following the initial six months of the conflict, some individuals following the war began to speculate that the age of the tank, and possibly the fighter jets and warships, was past. Instead of large, expensive combat systems, smaller and cheaply made systems in mass would define the next age of warfare. Civilian-produced drones and shoulder-fired rockets would be the death of combat platforms more applicable to World War II than the battlefields of today.³⁹ These comments sparked debate within the military community, with counterarguments vouching for the tank in response. As the war continues to drag on past its second and third year, the tank and other large platforms, such as cannon and rocket artillery, are still in use in Ukraine.⁴⁰ This is evidenced not only in the continued use by the Russians but also in how the Ukrainians have incorporated their organic systems with systems from the U.S. and other NATO powers to counter Russian combat power.⁴¹ The war is also experiencing the renewal of tactics dating back to World War I and the American Civil War.⁴² As the war continues to grind on, trench warfare is again a scene on the battlefield, with each side looking for new and innovative ways to break through prepared defenses.⁴³ All this shows that deciphering the lessons of a war in progress is a challenge, and determining what is an enduring change to war versus what is unique to Ukraine is an important facet when considering what to include in doctrine.

Regardless of how the debate over expensive weapons and capabilities plays out, the critical aspect is that Army doctrine must not overreact. Trying to capture the pace of technological and tactical changes occurring in Ukraine would have several impacts. First, proponents assess and review most doctrinal publications every eighteen months for relevancy.⁴⁴ Each book takes one and one-half to two years to republish based on the revision process and the ability of the Army community to review and provide feedback.⁴⁵ See the figure for doctrine timelines as published in TRADOC Regulation 25-36. Additionally, each staff at the various headquarters and centers of excellence manages their publications while giving input on others’ doctrines. Regulation allocates eighty hours for each integration review; in the past year, for example, engineer doctrine conducted 177 such reviews of Army, joint, and allied doctrine. The system is not set up to change doctrine on a whim every few months, and for a descriptive doctrine, there is no requirement to change at a higher frequency. There is also the time and resource effects required following publication. Once complete, the different branches and schoolhouses receive the doctrine to begin writing new training tasks and evaluations, change the schoolhouse’s programs of instruction, and push their latest products to the force. Given the time it takes to revise or develop doctrine plus the time for the force to read and implement it, it can easily be several years from the start to the end of the process to see the full effects of a doctrinal change in the force. Army-wide, multidomain operations began its introduction into doctrine in 2017 before official publication in FM 3-0 in 2022.⁴⁶ This followed the introduction of full-spectrum operations in 2001 and unified land operations in 2011.⁴⁷ The Army’s operating concept has changed three times in less than twenty-five years. In many ways, the force and the Army are still learning and training to understand what it means to operate as a multidomain force. The lengthy timeline reinforces the importance of doctrine remaining descriptive and ensuring that the Army correctly validates concepts and lessons learned incorporated into new doctrine. It also addresses the need for stability in that doctrine so that the professional force understands and can apply it.

Recommendations

An Army doctrine that touts itself as descriptive remains relevant and accurate if the principles and tenets of war remain unchanged. Is there room or a need to update anything? Yes, but not solely because of the Russia-Ukraine War. While the Army must study the ongoing war as a professional organization to learn as many lessons as possible and include them in concepts and understanding of future conflicts, the proper and immediate fix to doctrine is purely internal. The Army must be like the Philadelphia 76ers and “trust the process” of developing talent internally, for there is no free agency or trade deadlines to acquire talent and build championship teams.⁴⁸ The Army needs a professional force that consumes and understands doctrine from a holistic perspective and does not treat publications as checklists, hoping they will prescriptively solve problems. ADP 3-0, Operations; FM 3-0, Operations; and ADP 1-01, Doctrine Primer, are essential documents for commanders and staff at all echelons. They are also the gateways into all other doctrinal publications. Without understanding these documents, one cannot understand how the Army operates and how doctrine defines itself to conduct operations. A descriptive doctrine intends to give soldiers the tools necessary to think and succeed in all situations. It is not a playbook with set plays that any opponent can scheme against. Preaching mission command, the Army needs leaders to exercise creativity and disciplined initiative within the authoritative left and right limits doctrine sets. Making these doctrinal publications a mandatory reading at various professional military educations, emphasizing unit-level leadership development programs, and validating officers and NCOs through methods similar to those we use to certify leaders for live-fire exercises or range operations is a start. While the doctrine is not about rote memorization, there is a baseline standard leaders must hold everyone accountable to if the Army is to call itself a profession. Perhaps it is time to get fewer briefs about China’s Belt and Road Initiative from the battalion intelligence officer and ensure leaders can fight the way the Army intends. Ensure leaders can think how the Army intends them to think, with flexibility and creativity. What good is studying the other team’s playbook if one cannot run their own plays on offense or defense?

Besides the draconian measure of requiring and testing people on doctrine to ensure compliance, another question is how to make doctrine attractive. The Combined Arms Center continually promotes outside-the-box ideas such as e-books, the Breaking Doctrine podcast, YouTube videos, and interactive modules for select publications.⁴⁹ While these efforts help take doctrine outside its traditional avenues to audiences who may prefer alternate mediums, are there other options? One method may be a doctrine tactical exercise without troops, where units concern themselves less with executing a mission and instead work through doctrinal considerations at all echelons and phases of the problem set. Building on the live-fire exercise certification idea previously mentioned, units may incorporate doctrine scenarios using the ranges and locally available facilities to bring doctrine to life. For more extensive exercises such as a division deliberate wet-gap crossing, pooling enabler resources found during a combat training center rotation present the opportunity to train more significant large-scale combat operations doctrine. These opportunities allow leaders to talk principles and TTPs in a live setting and work through the decisions a commander must make. It will also enable commanders and staff to embrace the time and distance considerations required for large-scale combat operations that are difficult to appreciate through the written word. Even though most people think of a wet-gap crossing as the bridge itself, the crossing and bridgehead areas can extend over twenty-five miles long with multiple control mechanisms.⁵⁰ Understanding these aspects in time and space gives leaders an appreciation for the complexity of more extensive operations while incorporating dialogue on other considerations like sustainment and medical. A doctrinal tactical exercise without troops would capture these important aspects without getting caught up in seizing an actual objective.

Finally, if the descriptive doctrine, with its principles and TTPs intact, is still valid, then one must address the other letters of DOTMLPF-P. Just because doctrine is the easiest target to try and update when capturing the outputs of the Russia-Ukraine War does not mean solutions can remain in a doctrine stovepipe. Are our training circulars where they need to be, and are the tasks associated with them current? When was the last time the Army conducted a full-scale division deliberate gap crossing under enemy pressure (not just the bridge, but all the aspects involved in a gap crossing area as defined in ATP 3-90.4, Combined Arms Mobility)? How can one expect the U.S. Army to change its doctrine based on the Russia-Ukraine War when it cannot validate how it would apply to its forces? Are the lessons captured in Ukraine included as concepts for validation? Are leaders prioritizing these observations and implementing them? Do the material solutions even exist to train and lead while applying these lessons learned? Changing words in publications is relatively easy, but it is nothing more than an academic exercise if the other aspects of DOTMLPF-P are not working harmoniously. Doctrine cannot serve as a catch-all where every time something comes along, writers put it in a book that grows thicker and thicker while collecting more and more dust. Descriptive doctrine is not intended to be written, read, or applied this way. Capture the lessons, but scrutinize whether it changes the principles, tactics, and techniques. Let the process to validate concepts work; when it does, the doctrine will incorporate the changes. Teach people the principles and tenets so leaders can apply them as free-thinking forces that truly exercise mission command. If one needs to learn and practice a task, that is training. If one needs to know how the U.S. Army fights, that is doctrine.

Conclusion

Doctrine is authoritative yet descriptive, built on experience and validated concepts to capture principles, tactics, and techniques that apply in all situations while giving commanders and staff flexibility. While the lessons learned in the Russian-Ukraine War are valuable to our understanding of modern conflict and future warfare, the Army must avoid overreacting by incorporating these new aspects into concepts and properly validating them into complete DOTMLPF-P solutions. Only then should doctrine change. Until then, the Army must take a two-pronged approach that first uses the Russian-Ukraine War to validate that the principles, tenets, and TTPs are still valid in their broad and descriptive sense. Second, we must continue to find ways to reach and educate the force on what doctrine is, its development, and how it is meant for application by commanders and staff. As the 76ers learned, bringing in young talent is only good if one has the people and processes to develop them into a champion. The Army needs a force of professionals who understand beyond niche paragraphs from doctrine and do not use doctrinal publications as reference books to cherry-pick. Instead, they approach doctrine as a holistic, dependent, and intertwined system at all echelons. Only then can leaders appropriately apply the doctrine in any situation while remaining flexible and exercising mission command to win wars. If there is any lesson not discussed here that validates the need for an educated force, it is that, above all, the losses experienced by Russia are most directly attributed to a force unable and unwilling to think and act on its own accord, and that incompetence is far deadlier than any drone or artillery strike.⁵¹ Simply put, it is not a proven method for building championship caliber organizations.

 

---

Notes

1. Max Rappaport, “The Definitive History of ‘Trust the Process’” Bleacher Report, 23 August 2017, https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2729018-the-definitive-history-of-trust-the-process.
2. Field Manual (FM) 3-0, Operations (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Publishing Office [GPO], 2022), 1-6.
3. Army Doctrine Publication (ADP) 1-01, Doctrine Primer (Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 2019), 2-2.
4. Ibid., 2-1.
5. FM 3-0, Operations, v.
6. ADP 1-01, Doctrine Primer, 2-3–2-4.
7. U.S. Army Central Army Registry, accessed 1 October 2024, https://rdl.train.army.mil/catalog/#/dashboard.
8. ADP 1-01, Doctrine Primer, 2-1. Italics added.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid., 2-2. Italics added.
11. Ibid., 5-1.
12. John L. Romjue, From Active Defense to AirLand Battle: The Development of Army Doctrine, 1973–1982 (Fort Monroe, VA: U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command [TRADOC], 1984), 13, https://www.tradoc.army.mil/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/From-Active-Defense-to-AirLand-Battle.pdf.
13. Ibid., 5.
14. Ibid., 57–61.
15. The White House, National Security Strategy (Washington, DC: The White House, October 2022), 23–24, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Biden-Harris-Administrations-National-Security-Strategy-10.2022.pdf.
16. ADP 1-01, Doctrine Primer, 2-5.
17. TRADOC Regulation (TR) 71-20, Concept Development, Capabilities Determination, and Capabilities Integration (Fort Eustis, VA: TRADOC, 2013), 10, https://adminpubs.tradoc.army.mil/regulations/TR71-20.pdf.
18. “Terrain Shaping Obstacles (TSO),” in FY2022 Annual Report for the Office of the Director, Operational Test & Evaluation (Washington, DC: Office of the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, January 2023), 135–37, https://www.dote.osd.mil/Portals/97/pub/reports/FY2022/army/2022tso.pdf.
19. TRADOC Pamphlet 25-40, Publishing Program Procedures for Army Doctrinal and Training Publications (Fort Eustis, VA: TRADOC, 2023), 215–16, https://adminpubs.tradoc.army.mil/pamphlets/TP25-40.pdf.
20. FM 3-0, Operations, 1-7. Italics added.
21. Ibid., 1-8.
22. Henri-Antoine Jomini, The Art of War, trans. G. H. Mendall and W. P. Craighill (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippencott, 1862), 70–71, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/13549/13549-h/13549-h.htm#CHAPTER_III.
23. Ibid.
24. FM 3-0, Operations, 3-2. Italics added.
25. Ibid.
26. Mike Rapport, The Napoleonic Wars: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 43–45.
27. Sophie Williams and Olga Pona, “Bloody River Battle Was Third in Three Days – Ukraine Official,” BBC News, 13 May 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61399440.
28. Britannica, s.v. “Donets River,” accessed 1 October 2024, https://www.britannica.com/place/Donets-River.
29. Kateryna Stepanenko and Frederick W. Kagan, “Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, May 14,” Institute for the Study of War, 14 May 2022, https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-may-14.
30. David Axe, “The Russians Lost an Entire Battalion Trying to Cross a River in Eastern Ukraine,” Forbes (website), 11 May 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2022/05/11/the-russians-lost-nearly-an-entire-battalion-trying-to-cross-a-river-in-eastern-ukraine/.
31. Aditya Iyer, Bridging Through Time: From River Crossing in World War II to Wet-Gap Crossing Today and in the Future, Land Warfare Paper 157 (Washington, DC: Association of the United States Army, February 2024), https://www.ausa.org/publications/bridging-through-time-river-crossing-world-war-ii-wet-gap-crossing-today-and-future.
32. Army Techniques Publication (ATP) 3-90.4, Combined Arms Mobility (Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 2022 [CAC required]), 4-5.
33. Shweta Sharma, “Russian Army ‘Lose Entire Battalion’ Trying to Cross Ukraine Bridge,” The Independent (website), 12 May 2022, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-putin-soldiers-siverskyi-donets-b2077244.html.
34. ATP 3-90.4, Combined Arms Mobility, 4-5.
35. Claire Press and Svitlana Libet, “How Russia’s 35-Mile Armoured Convoy Ended in Failure,” BBC News, 22 February 2023, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64664944.
36. Ibid.
37. Ibid.
38. ATP 4-01.45, Multi-Service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Tactical Convoy Operations (Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 2021), 1.
39. Phillips Payson O’Brien, “War Will Never Be This Bulky Again,” The Atlantic (website), 26 May 2022, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/ukraine-russia-putin-war/638423/.
40. David Rising and Lorne Cook, “NATO: Ukraine Allies Sent 1,550 Combat Vehicles, 230 Tanks,” Associated Press, 27 April 2023, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-nato-china-8a901ab7f56b3c16ea71914c5c5e9ea6.
41. Curtis A. Buzzard et al., “The Tank is Dead … Long Live the Tank: The Persistent Value of Armored Combined Arms Teams in the 21st Century,” Military Review Online Exclusive, 17 August 2023, 1–9, https://www.armyupress.army.mil/journals/military-review/online-exclusive/2023-ole/the-tank-is-dead/.
42. “Training for Trench Warfare: Petersburg National Battlefield,” National Parks Service, accessed 2 October 2024, https://www.nps.gov/articles/training-for-trench-warfare.htm.
43. Vitalii Hnidyi and Thomas Peter, “Ukraine Builds Barricades, Digs Trenches as Focus Shifts to Defence,” Reuters, 11 January 2024, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-builds-barricades-digs-trenches-focus-shifts-defence-2024-01-11/.
44. TR 25-36, The U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command Doctrine Publishing Program (Fort Eustis, VA: TRADOC, 2023), 30.
45. Ibid., 78.
46. FM 3-0, Operations, ix.
47. Cornelius Granai, “A Complex and Volatile Environment”: The Doctrinal Evolution from Full Spectrum Operations to Unified Land Operations (Fort Leavenworth, KS: School of Advanced Military Studies, 2015), 4–5, https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/AD1001386.pdf.
48. Rappaport, “The Definitive History of ‘Trust the Process.’”
49. “Combined Arms Doctrine Directorate (CADD),” U.S. Army Combined Arms Center, accessed 2 October 2024, https://usacac.army.mil/organizations/mccoe/cadd.
50. ATP 3-90.4, Combined Arms Mobility, 5-12.
51. Ian Stubbs, “Astounding Levels of Incompetence in the Russian Military Leadership Have Eroded Russia’s Military Reputation: UK Statement to the OSCE” (speech, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Vienna, 29 March 2023), https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/astounding-levels-of-incompetence-in-the-russian-military-leadership-have-eroded-russias-military-reputation-uk-statement-to-the-osce.

 

 

Back to Top