The Army Joins AirSea Battle

As AirSea Battle moves ever closer to a "void of meaning buzz-phrase" rather than the substantive approach to A2AD challenges that it is, there is news here of the US Army getting onboard with the concept, soon to sign on to an MOU and presumably provide full-time staff at the requisite level within the ASB Office.

This is excellent news, but not an unconditional good.

If the Army is joining in as a means of bureaucratically monitoring and potentially impeding the progress of the effort, then obviously this is not a good thing.  I don't believe that is their aim, but stranger things have happened, and declining budgets create opportunities for mischief.'

If the Army is joining in as a means of finding a means to marry a vision of increased maneuver battalions in each Brigade Combat Team (BCT) to the DoD "latest thing", then I fear bureaucratic stalemate and inefficiency.

But if the Army is joining in order to truly advocate for and understand better the role of ground forces in Joint Operational Access, then this is a very positive development.  Essential to putting this foot forward however is recognition at the very top of the Army that there are many Army capabilities of great value to AirSea Battle and Joint Operational Access--but the BCT writ large is not necessarily among them.

Army Air Defense Artillery--probably the part of the Army in greatest demand from the Joint force in countering A2AD capabilities--must rise in Army priorities if the Army's participation in ASB is to be taken seriously.  Put simply, Army ADA capability and capacity to defend critical assets in the "pre ASB/JOA" world was questionable; in order for ASB and JOA to succeed, more, better and different ADA will be required.  It must become more mobile--not just able to move quickly with land forces on the march, but in its ability to be tactically useful in the maritime environment of the Pacific (this point applies to the entire Army, but especially to ADA).  It must develop new interceptors, so that expensive missiles are not wasted on modest targets. It must work with the other Services toward fielding effective directed energy weapons.  It must begin to think more deeply about cover, concealment, and deception in order to make the interceptors it has go farther against opponents that outgun us--concepts that ADA has moved away from in the post-Cold War Era. It must re-evaluate its hostility to elevated, netted sensing (JLENS).  And it must think about C2 approaches in comms denied environments and across vast expanses of maritime space. 

None of this will occur if the Army does not recognize the moment.  If the Army fails to see the strategic value of this under-valued and under-resourced capability, it will be incumbent upon the Joint community and OSD to point this out.  This is an area where the AirSea Battle office can be influential.

Bryan McGrath