fm 44-100 us army air and missile defense operations

FM44-100
COMMANDER
5-6
5-27. The commander is the key to concept formulation, planning, and
executing at each level of command. The commander's personal responsibility
is formulating a single unifying vision and expressing it in the commander’s
intent. Commanders must understand the intent of the commander two
levels up and understand the intent and concept of operation of the
immediate senior commander. Commanders must also understand the battle
from the perspective of adjacent units and subordinate commanders who
must execute the decisions. The commander's estimate and assessment
process helps decide how to accomplish the assigned mission.
5-28. Commanders must determine and specify the commander's critical
information requirements (CCIR) that are needed to understand the
battlefield and the flow of operations. CCIR consists of three types of
information: priority intelligence requirements (PIR), friendly force
information requirements (FFIR), and essential elements of friendly
information (EEFI). The commander must focus the organization and battle
command systems to give the information needed to conduct the estimate and
refine the assessment driven by time or event. The commander must,
however, still be prepared to make decisions and accept risk without
complete information, recognizing that waiting for complete information may
result in lost opportunities to act. Too much information can paralyze a force
as quickly as too little data if the commander is hesitant to act in ambiguous
situations. The commander must tell the staff what information is important
to collect. Whatever factors are present, the commander is personally
responsible for establishment of the commander's critical information
requirements.
5-29. Once the commander has the necessary information, he must possess
the creativity and intuition to visualize the flow of events toward a future
state. The commander formulates a concise expression of how elements of the
command will operate together to accomplish their operational
responsibilities and missions.
5-30. Commanders must be able to convey to subordinates a clear, concise
statement of the commander’s intent for future operations, which includes
the purpose; what tasks and when they want those tasks accomplished; and
the desired end-state. Their concept of the operation must include an overall
scheme of operations, the necessary interfaces and coordination, the sequence
from one phase to another, and the priorities and risks the commander is
willing to take. Connectivity must exist between current operations and the
branches and sequels of the future plan. While a portion of this future state
may be directed by a higher level commander's intent, the commander must
possess the ability to envision the organization's future state within its battle
space.
5-31. Techniques and procedures may vary, but planning and executing
operations are continuous and concurrent activities. Commanders must
master time-space-resource-purpose relationships and understand the ways
they affect friendly and enemy capabilities to achieve success in battle. They
must be able to orchestrate all functions affecting their battle space:
intelligence, fires, forces positioning, resources, deception, and timing. In