Force Design, the Airmobile Concept and Operational Art

Download or read book Force Design, the Airmobile Concept and Operational Art written by Francis J. Huber and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Force Design is the process of designing the organization of army units. The process involves building unit structures, including combat support and combat service support capabilities, and then validating those structures through testing and analysis. Historically the criteria for validating and testing those structures have focused on the tactical effectiveness of the unit. This monograph evaluates the design process to determine if it is capable of producing units oriented on operational effects. An organization designed to serve as an operational unit must have different competencies and capabilities from a unit that is a purely tactical formation. In order for the design process to produce a unit competent as an operationally oriented force the evaluation process must have an understanding of operational art and the characteristics of forces intended to support operational art. The 1962 Tactical Mobility Requirements Board, also known as the Howze Board, provides an instructive historical case study of the force design process. The Howze board was unique in that it was given the opportunity to design an entirely new formation, the Air Assault Division, to produce a new kind of effect on the battlefield. The Howze board also illustrates the current design process in that computer simulations and live field trials validated the decisions of the board. Finally, the validity of these results can be examined by looking at the operations of the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile)in the Pleiku campaign of 1965. This case study concludes that the elements of the force design process can be adapted to evaluate the operational effectiveness of a unit. To achieve this result the designers and evaluators must change their mental model of the test criteria. This will require test designers who understand operational employment and can design tests and criteria that support that understanding.