Diamond Saber, a U.S. Army Reserve-led annual exercise, took place at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst from June 1 to 15, 2024, bringing together finance and comptroller Soldiers from all components — active, Guard, and Reserves. Soldiers, Airmen, and Marines from across the country — came together to train on warfighting functions such as funding the force, payment support, disbursing operations, accounting, fiscal stewardship, auditability and data analytics during this annual exercise. (Photo by Steven Roussel)
The Army-wide shift to focus on large-scale combat operations (LSCO) forced all sustainment proponents to reexamine anticipated support to the warfighter. In 2023, the Finance and Comptroller Branch sought to meet this challenge through a significant force structure redesign. While this change was intended to adapt the corps to LSCO, it built on underlying assumptions learned during counterinsurgency (COIN) operations. Failing to align finance force structure with the violent reality of LSCO not only jeopardizes mission success but needlessly risks the lives of finance Soldiers.
One of the primary tasks of deployed finance units is cash management, known within the corps as disbursing. COIN both required and enabled disbursing officers (DOs) to directly support Soldiers across the theater through geographically dispersed disbursing agents (DAs). While this practice contributed to mission success during COIN, it will not be operationally sound in a LSCO environment. To better understand the assumptions that contributed to current finance doctrine, it is necessary to take a retrospective look at finance operations during COIN.
COIN: The War that Shaped Disbursing
Like many leaders in the Finance Corps, I deployed to the Middle East to support the Army’s COIN operations by serving in a disbursing position. These deployments had common themes and constraints that shaped a generation of finance leaders’ understanding of finance’s role in war. DAs remained static on relatively secure forward operating bases (FOBs) with large vault balances intended to meet all cash requirements in a region. From that central point, financial management support teams traveled out to less secure FOBs to provide individual Soldier support. This support included currency exchanges, casual payments, and collections. Pay agents from supported units traveled to the DA to draw funds to make purchases for their units and returned when those purchases were complete. DOs operated in the joint security area and provided cash resupplies to the DAs as needed. This system was refined throughout the COIN era and enabled finance units to support an entire theater with limited manpower.
Finance planning assumptions for deployments during the COIN era included finance offices operating within areas of relative security, the presence of a local economy capable of supporting Army operations, and the need to foster strong local national support. Survivability and mobility concerns for finance units were often addressed through coordination with external units. To address survivability risks, finance units relied on the security provided on their FOB. Mobility limitations were mitigated by leveraging aviation assets or existing combat arms convoys. Additionally, FOBs created islands of safety for the local populace, allowing local vendors to bring food and goods to sell to Soldiers. These factors justified large cash-holding authorities and provided a steady requirement to disburse funds to customers. These same conditions cannot be assumed for LSCO.
Challenging Assumptions: Disbursing During LSCO
The first assumption from COIN that must be considered is the safety of finance offices in the theater. From the short- and medium-range ballistic missiles being used in current Middle Eastern conflicts to drone swarms destroying assets more than 600 miles away in Europe, it is apparent that safe zones in LSCO are not as readily available as in COIN. Geographically dispersed DAs who hold large cash balances in their vaults will become targets for drones and long-range fires if their positions become known. Furthermore, without the safety of established FOBs, finance units will be required to provide their own security or to integrate into a mobile defense conducted by the division they support. Large vault balances increase the survivability risk of positioning DAs forward, and the sheer weight of the currency and required physical security equipment add to mobility concerns.
One of the most impactful changes to the way finance units operate between a COIN environment and LSCO is in the domain of mobility. Per Field Manual 4-80, Financial Management Operations, which was released in April 2025, corps finance companies are embedded within the division support area in the close area, and their finance support teams (FSTs) periodically advance into the deep area to provide services to brigade combat teams. While this design mirrors successful employment of finance operations during COIN, it introduces a major planning consideration for finance leaders: these divisions are not expected to remain static. This means that DAs will be required to conduct their business within strict regulatory requirements while also being constantly poised to account for all cash and displace to another location. Alone, this is a serious planning factor, but the problem is compounded by the organic equipment available to a DA. Each finance company can only move their issued equipment and personnel without consideration for the increased requirements of war. Mobility concerns are amplified by the lack of anti-armor weapons available to the unit, tying mobility and security concerns together during movement. Prudent acceptance of risk is a principle of mission command. However, potential benefits must counterbalance these risks.
Local economies in the close and deep areas will not be able to provide the same capabilities that were the norm during COIN. Civilian evacuations and degraded digital and physical infrastructure will limit both the number of vendors in these areas and the quality of the goods or services they are able to sell to the Army. Thus, it is unlikely that civilians in the deep area could meet the local purchasing demands of combat units in the area. Similarly, there will be limited or no ability for Soldiers to make personal purchases in these areas like the purchasing opportunities that existed on established FOBs in the Middle East. While demand for these disbursing services may exist in the deep and close areas, it is extremely unlikely that the vendor supply to meet these demands will extend farther than the support area.
With demand unable to be fulfilled in the deep and close areas, the most impactful assumption from COIN must be considered: is cash needed that far forward? Under current doctrine, corps finance companies are expected to provide support in the close and deep areas, creating survivability and mobility concerns for supported units without the benefit of enabling rapid local purchasing or Soldier support. Survivability and mobility outweigh the need for persistent forward presence of disbursing operations. Therefore, rather than positioning finance units where they would have had the greatest impact in previous conflicts, leaders must instead determine where mission success can be enabled in LSCO.
Beyond the FOB: Adapting Finance to an Uncertain Future
The Finance Corps cannot wait until the next major conflict to challenge the underlying assumptions that fuel current doctrine. Change must be made now. Positioning under-equipped finance units in the deep areas is not a prudent risk; it is a failure to adapt to the lethal reality of LSCO. To provide maximum support to commanders while retaining manpower throughout an extended engagement, finance units cannot simply replicate the practices that supported COIN.
Repositioning finance units farther to the rear and reserving FSTs to situational events alleviates the survivability and mobility risks associated with disbursing in the close and deep areas. Furthermore, it provides cash capabilities in areas that are more likely to have active local economies. Cash-holding authority and resupply timelines must also be considered due to the enemy capability of long-range fires. Finance units located in the joint security area face the same threat of drone and missile strikes as units farther to the front. Maximizing electronic payments, limiting Soldier access to personal cash, and coordinating paying agent activity to align with existing logistic resupply convoys will mitigate the perceived impact of these implementations.
To be clear, this is not an argument that finance does not have an important role within LSCO. The capability to pay local contracts in the joint security and rear areas will provide commanders with flexibility to make local purchases that support their end state. Furthermore, Soldiers moving through these areas will benefit from the morale associated with purchasing needed items and sundries when local vendor support allows. The current force structure, built to support the COIN era, will not survive the initial phases of LSCO. Leaders must recognize that the Finance Corps will not be judged based on proximity to the front lines but rather based on contributions to achieving overall success.
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CPT Reuben R. Burnley II currently serves as a Basic Officer Leader Course instructor at the Finance and Comptroller School. He was commissioned into the Army from the University of North Georgia in Dahlonega, Georgia. He has experience serving as a disbursing agent in U.S. Central Command and an armored brigade combat team S-8 in Europe following the start of the Russia-Ukraine War. His military education includes the Finance and Comptroller Basic Officer Leader Course, the Finance and Comptroller Captains Career Course, and the Advanced Data Analytics Course. He holds a Master of Professional Accounting degree from Colorado State University.
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This article was published in the fall 2026 edition of Army Sustainment Professional Bulletin.
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