Americas Defense Meltdown - IT Acquisition Advisory Council

Col. Douglas Macgregor & Col. G.I. Wilson • 85Figure 1.The problem: too many single serve C2 echelons, too slow to decide,too expensive to modernize, too vulnerable to WMDSix Echelons of C2 to direct the soldiers who fightXXXX XXX XX X II IArmyHqtsCorpsHqtsDivisionHqtsConduct Operational ManeuverBrigadeHqtsBattalionTaskForceCompany-TeamPlatform(tank)Conduct Offensive OPNSin Joint Operational AreaNOTE: U.S. Military Transformationtreats WWII single service legacystructure as a constantConductTactical ManeuverIn the years since World War II, the greatest institutional obstacle to this understandingand the emergence of a new integrated, joint warfare paradigm is the divisionechelon, a formation that is undeserving of its sacred status as Brig. Gen. RichardSimpkin pointed out 30 years ago.Before looking at future force structures in any detail, we need to rid ourselvesof a sacred cow – the division. This is in fact no more than another step downan evolutionary path marked out by technological advance. The “division” isan ancient and important tactical concept, but the idea of the division as thekey organizational formation ... does not seem to go back much beyond themiddle of the nineteenth century ... the more recent the tradition, the hotterand more irrational the defense of it. 14Many of the changes in the structures and decision-making processes found inthe American commercial sector have reached similar conclusions about the role ofmanagement and the locus of decision-making. 15 Business and military theorist, JohnBoyd, contended there is a direct relationship between strategy and change. Thus, thepurpose of strategy is to improve our ability to shape and adapt to circumstances, sothat we (as individuals or as groups or as a culture or as a nation-state) can surviveon our own terms. 16 In business, changing shape and perpetual fluidity in responseto market demands is vital to survival. 17