WASHINGTON, D.C. (Oct. 4, 2009) - Gen. Martin Dempsey, commanding general of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, delivered the keynote speech for the Association of the United States Army Chapter Presidents Dinner tonight in Washington, D.C.
Highlights from the speech are below.
Gen. Dempsey: Tonight I want to share with you some thoughts about the challenges confronting our Army as it moves into its ninth year of war and discuss a few of the major initiatives weAca,!a,,cre undertaking in [U.S. Training and Doctrine Command] to address them.
I want to begin by establishing why what we do is so darn important. IAca,!a,,cd like you to meet 1st Lt. Rick Rescorla:
British by birth, Rick Recorla moved to the U.S. in the early 1960s after service in the British Army. He lived at a YMCA in Brooklyn until he was able to enlist in the Army in 1963, and after basic training at Fort Dix [N.J.], he attended Officer Candidate School and airborne training at Fort Benning [Ga.]. Upon graduating Rescorla was assigned as a platoon leader in the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile).
Sent to Vietnam, Rescorla participated in the 1965 Battle of Ia Drang, described in the book and movie We Were Soldiers OnceAca,!A| And Young, and is the Soldier pictured on the book jacket cover. Co-author Lt. Gen. Hal Moore described him as "the best platoon leader I ever saw." Rescorla's men nicknamed him "Hard Core" for his bravery in battle, and revered him for his good humor and compassion towards his men.
Rick stayed in the Army post-Vietnam as a Reservist until his retirement in 1990 as a full colonel. In his professional civilian career, he eventually wound up as director of security for Morgan Stanley, the investment company headquartered in the World Trade Center.
Rescorla was supposed to be on vacation on Sept. 11, 2001. But as well as covering a shift so one of his deputies could go on vacation, he was also scheduled to attend a lunchtime meeting to discuss the lawsuit Morgan Stanley was filing against the Port Authority about the security lapses that led to the 1993 unsuccessful attack on the World Trade Center.
At 8:46 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 struck World Trade Center Tower 1. Rescorla, following his evacuation plans, ignored building officials' advice to stay put and began the orderly evacuation of Morgan Stanley's 2,700 employees on twenty floors of World Trade Center Tower 2, and 1,000 employees in WTC 2. Rescorla reportedly reminded everyone to "... be proud to be an American ... everyone will be talking about you tomorrow.Aca,!A?
Rescorla had most of Morgan StanleyAca,!a,,cs 2700 employees as well as people working on other floors of WTC 2 safely out of the buildings by the time United Airlines Flight 175 hit WTC 2 at 9:02 a.m. After having led many of his fellow employees to safety, Rescorla returned to the building to rescue others still inside. When one of his colleagues told him he too had to evacuate the World Trade Center, Rescorla replied, "As soon as I make sure everyone else is out". In Amanda Ripley's words:
Aca,!A"Moments later, Rescorla had successfully evacuated the vast majority of Morgan Stanley employees out of the burning tower. Then he turned around. He was last seen on the tenth floor, moving upward, shortly before the tower collapsed.Aca,!A?
According to Stephan Newhouse, chairman of Morgan Stanley International, Rescorla was seen as high as the 72nd floor evacuating people, clearing the floors and working his way down. He was last seen heading up the stairs of the tenth floor of the collapsing WTC 2. His remains were not recovered. As a result of Rescorla's actions, all but six of Morgan Stanley's 2,700 WTC employees survived. Four of those six were Rescorla and three deputies who followed him back into the building.
WeAca,!a,,cre going to discuss a lot of things this week. WeAca,!a,,cll review lessons learned from our on-going conflicts. WeAca,!a,,cll be introduced to new concepts. WeAca,!a,,cll consider current and emerging technologies. As we do, remember that itAca,!a,,cs got to make sense for our present day Rick RescorlasAca,!"when he scrambles out of the relative safety of his foxhole to close with and destroy our enemies, heAca,!a,,cs got to know weAca,!a,,cve got his back.
I want to talk with you tonight about four emerging trends in the operational environment and how we must address them in our concept development, leader development, and modernization strategy.
Trend #1: The Certainty of Uncertainty
If youAca,!a,,cre a closet fan of the Weather Channel, you might know that weAca,!a,,cve just passed the peak of hurricane season. Having spent the past couple of years based in Tampa, Fla. and living now at Fort Monroe [Va.] just a stoneAca,!a,,cs throw from the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, this fact provides me only a limited measure of relief. Because, as Yogi Berra said, Aca,!A"it ainAca,!a,,ct over till itAca,!a,,cs over,Aca,!A? and there are still two more months to go. YouAca,!a,,cve got to feel for the folks down in Miami who try to predict the path and intensity of those big storms with peopleAca,!a,,cs lives hanging in the balance. YouAca,!a,,cve probably seen how they always place a Aca,!A"cone of uncertaintyAca,!A? in front of the projected storm track. The farther out the forecast goes into the future, the wider the cone. ThatAca,!a,,cs because the atmosphere is such an incredibly complex and unpredictable system.
The computer models they use canAca,!a,,ct even begin to account for all the variables. So it goes, the farther they project into the future, the greater their uncertainty about their forecast.
The analogy here is probably pretty transparent. I find the challenge of the weatherman to be analogous to the challenge we face in predicting a constantly changing security environment. Stated another way, the complexity and uncertainty of the current and future operational environment is very similar to that of the physical atmosphere. As the number of variables increases, we grapple with the future by making assumptions. The more assumptions, the less certainty. The fact is the only thing certain in our future operational environment is uncertainty. If you havenAca,!a,,ct read Joshua Cooper RamoAca,!a,,cs book entitled, The Age of the Unthinkable, I recommend it to you. Near the conclusion of the book, Ramo challenges us to think differently about how we react to uncertainty.
He says the right approach Aca,!A"requires a psychological shift from being certain about our future to being uncertain, a transformation that is as stressful as it is productive.Aca,!A? He also introduces the idea that the more connected we become, the more stable but less resilient we become.
Trend 2: The Pace of Change
As an institution, weAca,!a,,cre coming to recognize that the pace of change also requires us to look at the future differently than we have in the past. Rather than trying to leap ahead decades into the future and design a force adequate for any task and for many years, we need to design a force that is adequate for the tasks we know we must accomplish and that can adapt much more quickly than in the past. Because the situation today is changing so rapidly, we need a force that is agile and adaptive enough to redesign itself frequently. This suggests that we should reconsider how we define the military instrument of power during this century.
I think we can make the argument that military power in this century will be defined not by throw weight or the number of artillery pieces, tanks, and helicopters we have but by our ability to adapt from the army we have to the army we need.
In the near term, we know what the most likely threats will be: non-state actors, insurgents, criminals and terrorists. But make no mistake about it. These threats have the potential to be as dangerous as any state actor or near-peer competitor because of their access to state of the art weapons, training, and advanced information technologies.
Trend 3: Competitiveness
This produces a trend of competitiveness. We now live in a competitive security environment where advanced military capabilities are no longer the exclusive purview of nation states. This competitive security environment requires many things of us.
Notably, it means that when we are committed to any mission along the spectrum of conflict, we must be prepared for all forms of contact. That is, we must be prepared for full spectrum operations. This requires an unprecedented degree of versatility among our leaders. Importantly, it also requires us to dominate in what we describe as the competitive learning environmentAca,!"for it is in this dimension of conflict, in our ability to learn, where victory will be decided.
A more competitive security environment means that we have to put processes in place to deliver the Army we need today but be adaptive enough to redesign ourselves as things change, technology produces opportunities, and trends become threats. Yogi was right: Aca,!A"the future ainAca,!a,,ct what it used to be.Aca,!A?
Trend 4: Decentralization
My good friend [Gen.] Stan McCrystal often says that it takes a network to defeat a network, and I think heAca,!a,,cs absolutely right. Our adversaries are becoming much more decentralized and networked and we must find ways to Aca,!A"empower the edgeAca,!A? to address this evolving reality in the operational environment. In short, we too need to become more decentralized and Aca,!A"networked.Aca,!A? Fortunately, we have a network. That is, our network of Joint, Interagency, Intergovernmental and Multi-national or JIIM partners. In response to this trend we need to decentralize capability and authority to the edge, but we also need to recognize the requirement to aggregate information and intelligence from the edgeAca,!"it is a reality of operations against decentralized, networked adversaries who operate among populations that the best information and intelligence comes from the bottom up not from the top down.
The challenges of decentralization are not unique to the military. IAca,!a,,cm sure a few of you remember a music sharing website a few years ago called Napster where you could download free music. At first it operated as person to person shareware. No surprise that the music industry took offense to that since revenue was passing beyond their reach.
Because Napster started out as both decentralized and largely unstructured, they were difficult to attack. But as it started to make money they actually formed their own server farm and created a headquarters. After that the record industry finally sued them and won.
A few months ago, I had the chance to speak with the lawyer who represented the record industry against Napster at a leadership seminar at Duke University. He shared that experience and we discussed how to compete with decentralized organizations. His insights were enlightening to say the least.
He said the victory against Napster was like dropping a bowling ball into mercury. When you think about it, thatAca,!a,,cs really what happened. The outcome had no impact on the supply of free music over the internet as websites proliferated to meet the demand. When attacked, a decentralized organization further decentralizes.
WeAca,!a,,cve learned that lesson. We are increasingly an organization that is empowering lower and lower echelons of command. Yet we have to figure out how to balance decentralization while retaining the ability to aggregate the information from the empowered edge. As IAca,!a,,cve stated, but worth repeating is that the best information and intelligence---the best contextAca,!"comes to us from the bottom up.
The Strategy Paradox
We are very adeptAca,!"one could argue that no one has ever done it betterAca,!"at preparing and adapting to the threats we have faced as a nation. Yet there is a Strategy Paradox and a Paradox of Preparation that should cause us pause.
In The Strategy Paradox by Michael E. Raynor, the author notes Aca,!A"The prerequisites of success today are the antecedents of failure tomorrow.Aca,!A? Moreover, organizations have learned the lesson that over preparedness for one possible contingency almost guarantees that they will be unprepared for all the other possibilitiesAca,!"a risky proposition in an era of uncertainty. And potentially even more troubling, over preparedness for one possible contingency can create paralysis. We must understand and account for these paradox in our strategies.
The Foundation: The Army Capstone Concept
The Army Capstone Concept, scheduled for publication in December, will articulate how the Army thinks about future, armed conflict under these conditions of uncertainty, change, competitiveness, and decentralization. It provides a grounded projection to describe the broad range of capabilities the Army requires to overcome a combination of hybrid threats and adaptive adversaries in an increasingly competitive operating environment. It will describe how the Army conducts operations on land as part of a Joint, Interagency, Intergovernmental and Multinational team to attain strategic objectives consistent with national policy.
One of the central themes of the concept will be the idea of developing the situation through action. If the last eight years have revealed anything, they have revealed that some of our assumptions about the ability of technology to provide situational understanding and to Aca,!A"lift the fog of warAca,!A? were not entirely achievable. For example, the assumption that information superiority would allow the joint force to economize on manpower and trade-off protection and firepower for stand-off and precision has not been realized in an environment where our adversaries adapt, decentralize, and operate among the population. Our concept revises this assumption and several others.
In addition to describing how we will fight in the future, the capstone concept will also address important aspects of institutional adaptation in the Army. When we adopted the [Army Force Generation] model as a way to provide cyclical readiness and support extended wartime requirements, it had significant implications for how the Army organizes, mans, trains and equips the force. Similarly, the precepts and ideas contained in the capstone concept will provide the rationale and logic for other significant changes in the Army. Revisions to doctrine, training, leader development, and modernization will derive from the vision of future conflict outlined in this document.
Finally, the capstone concept will guide future force development by establishing a conceptual foundation for subordinate concepts, experimentation, and capabilities integration. These will enable the Army to apply its finite resources in a way that develops the most needed capabilities with an emphasis on integrated and resource-informed outcomes.
At this point, I want to return to the idea of the competitive learning environment. We have to learn more quickly and understand more fully than our adversaries to prevail in the future operating environment. As part of implementing the Army Capstone Concept, we have embarked on a campaign of learning in TRADOC. Based on the Capstone Concept, we have identified a number of warfighting challengesAca,!"22 currentlyAca,!"and we are leveraging our Centers of Excellence (Maneuver, Fires, Maneuver Support, Battle Command) to answer them. This work will inform functional assessments, Total Army Analysis, experimentation, and our Leader Development, Collective Training, and Modernization Strategies.
IAca,!a,,cd like to update you on two of these tonight: the Army Leader Development Strategy and the ArmyAca,!a,,cs revised Modernization Strategy.
Leader Development
We have to develop leaders who understand that context matters.
The complexity of todayAca,!a,,cs challenges and the uncertainties of tomorrow require a much broader approach to leader development and a clear understanding of the operating environment. ItAca,!a,,cs for this reason that we recently published a new leader development strategy for a 21st Century Army.
As the nationAca,!a,,cs campaign-capable force, the Army must prepare its leaders to execute missions over extended campaigns. Campaigns mean time, time means change, and change requires leaders who can anticipate change, create opportunities, and manage transitions. Stated another way, our Leader Development Strategy describes a shifting balance of tactical and operational art as our adversaries decentralize, network, and operate among the people to overcome our technological advantages and as we string together actions and activitiesAca,!"some kinetic and some non-kineticAca,!"to produce campaign quality outcomes.
This demands that we develop leaders who can lead increasingly decentralized organizations, who can understand complexity, and who can manage uncertainty.
Many aspects of leader development are timeless, and these will not change. Our strategy builds upon these characteristics to better prepare our leaders for the future. The Army Leader Development Strategy requires a balanced commitment between the three pillars of leader development Aca,!" training, education, and experience Aca,!" and considers the development of leaders to be a career-long process.
The strategy builds on our ArmyAca,!a,,cs eight years of combat experience but documents the need to broaden leaders beyond their demonstrated competency in irregular operations toward proficiency in full spectrum operations. There are gaps in our current leader development strategy, and we will close them.
For example, even our most junior leaders today have access to capabilities while deployed that are not replicated in the [continental United States] training base and we are working hard to resolve that through the implementation of our Leader Development Strategy.
Our leader development enterprise is comprehensive. It encompasses officer, noncommissioned officer, warrant officer, and civilian components, and synchronizes each of these into an integrated whole. Speaking of NCO development, IAca,!a,,cm sure you all know the Chief has designated 2009 as the Year of the NCO. [The Association of the United States Army] has done its part by dedicating this convention to our NCOs and recognizing them as the Aca,!A"Strength of the Army.Aca,!A? In TRADOC, we have established an Institute for NCO Professional Development. This organization, led by NCOs, will provide direction and oversight of noncommissioned officer education and development across the Army. In addition, this year we designated the first noncommissioned officer commandant in the history of the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy.
The intent is to give both responsibility and accountability to NCOs for their professional education.
Our leader development strategy doesnAca,!a,,ct define a specific end state. Rather, it seeks to be as adaptive and innovative as the leaders whose development it will guide. Our objective is to deliver the leader qualities defined in our capstone doctrine, FM 3-0, and described in the Capstone Concept for Joint Operations. The strategy does this by cross-walking these broad leader qualities with specific outcomes to be achieved over the course of a career.
In the coming months, the Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth [Kan.] will complete its revision of our planning doctrine, FM 5-0. My direction to them last spring was to integrate the concept of Aca,!A"designAca,!A? into FM 5-0 to ensure all leaders develop the ability to understand and frame complex problems to complement our traditional Military Decision Making Process.
This revision supports our leader development strategy by growing leaders who know how to think, not what to think. In addition, it will provide commanders with a cognitive tool to reframe problems as conditions changeAca,!"a skill that is critical to anticipating and managing transitions over time in a campaign-capable force.
Modernization
The second major initiative is how we will adapt our modernization strategy. I discussed the idea of Aca,!A"designAca,!A? just a moment ago. Design emphasizes the idea that Aca,!A"contextAca,!A? matters. ItAca,!a,,cs about applying a cognitive tool to anticipate change and manage transitions. In this context, our force modernization strategy must respond to a Aca,!A"new normAca,!A? of complexity, uncertainty and rapid change. This era of persistent conflict requires more than just small course corrections in how we view modernization Aca,!" it requires a completely new approach within an entirely new Aca,!A"contextAca,!A? for an Army of the 21st Century.
Let me elaborate a bit and outline a new course and mindset that will allow us to be innovative in how we provide enhanced capabilities across our formations.
In the past, we viewed modernization programs predominantly and narrowly as a material expression or a change in an organizational structure. While those material adaptations remain an essential component of our modernization effort, this alone is not adequate to respond to the pace of change in a manner that is not only timely, but comprehensive. An integrated and holistic look at modernization must include and recognize the interdependence of all our adaptations across the [doctrine, operations, training, materiel, leadership, personnel and facilities domains]. If we consider power in the 21st Century to be less about throw weight and more about adaptation, then we should seek to provide capability Aca,!A"packagesAca,!A? to deploying units that provide not only material improvements but also complimentary doctrinal, organizational and other adaptations.
In short, we should now seek to provide a suite of Aca,!A"incremental capabilities packagesAca,!A? across the DOTML-PF, synchronized to ARFORGEN, as a constantly adapting Army.
With that in mind, let me discuss briefly how weAca,!a,,cre revising our modernization strategy. As you all know, last spring the Chief tasked TRADOC to develop a new strategy for Brigade Combat Team Modernization following the [Secretary of DefenseAca,!a,,cs] decision to cancel the Future Combat Systems manned ground vehicle program. Task Force 120Aca,!"so named because we had 120-days to come up with a new planAca,!"set out to define the resource-informed balance of capabilities the Army would require to remain versatile enough to confront future uncertainty. The plan they produced describes the characteristics and key performance parameters for a new ground combat vehicle.
The task force began by reviewing the lesson learned over the last eight years of war and comparing them to the set of assumptions that drove much of our FCS thinking. We then sought to align our approach with both the program objective memorandum and ARFORGEN cycles. The result was a set of two-year capability packages that could be fielded to units as they move through their respective readiness and deployment windows. These form the basis for our recommended modernization priorities, which are intended to close the highest priority capability gaps first.
As I discussed earlier, whatAca,!a,,cs become apparent during this effort is the compelling logic for a shift from the long-term, leap ahead approach of the FCS program to an incremental BCT modernization plan that uses shorter time horizons aligned to ARFORGEN. Such an approach preserves our focus on the requirement to provide a versatile mix of networked BCTs that can leverage mobility, protection, information and precision fires. It also acknowledges the reality of the resource constraints we face. In this way, Task Force 120 has provided the Army an opportunity to adapt its acquisition processes by using an approach that accommodates and responds to the speed of technological change while sustaining readiness.
Looking ahead, TRADOC will work with the department to refine and complete a comprehensive modernization and vehicle strategy in the near future. By applying the grounded projections of the Army Capstone Concept to guide the way we prioritize, develop and integrate capabilities, weAca,!a,,cll address our most pressing needs and close the most significant capability gaps while improving our ability to adapt as new threats emerge and become clearer. ThatAca,!a,,cs the true spirit of institutional adaptation in my view and is more than just a bumper sticker.
The Role of Leadership
The two initiatives IAca,!a,,cve shared with you tonight represent a major investment of intellect and resources from across TRADOC and the Army. All of them are important, but if I had to prioritize them, I would tell you that leader development is the thing I pay the most attention to. I say that because I know our organizational design wonAca,!a,,ct be 100 percent right. Our material solutions wonAca,!a,,ct be completely right either.
Our doctrine will need revision, our training will need adjustment, and the guidance will never be completely clear. To close the gaps, our nation needs adaptive and innovative leaders who know how to think through complex problems and find integrated solutions.
Conclusion
Last April, I remember reading a headline about the upcoming NFL draft that appeared on the front page of the sports section of USA Today. It read: Aca,!A"As pro football evolves, hybrid players step up. Wide-open offenses, prospect of longer schedules fuel demand for versatility.Aca,!A? It seems many of us face the same challenge. The difference is that in our line of work, the stakes are much higher.
When I leave DC later this week, IAca,!a,,cll return to Fort Monroe where weAca,!a,,cll continue to monitor the closing months of the hurricane season.
And just like disaster officials up and down the coast who have to prepare for the widest range of situations depending on where a hurricane might make landfall, we in TRADOC will work to build an Army that is adaptive and innovative enough to handle the Aca,!A"cone of uncertaintyAca,!A? presented to us by the future operational environment. In so doing, weAca,!a,,cll also build an institution thatAca,!a,,cs agile enough to redesign itself on a compressed timeline. ItAca,!a,,cs the certainty of uncertainty that captures most accurately why we need to strive for balance and versatility in developing a campaign-capable Army for the 21st Century. TRADOC is out in front and meeting this challenge head-on.
Victory starts here!
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