The lag between the fielding of systems and the development of conflict-winning employment doctrine is a historical fact we dare not neglect. Nonetheless, too many people within the Department of Defense (DOD) and Congress seem to believe systems are ready to go to war when they are first delivered to our fighting forces. This paper addresses the crucial role numbers of weapon systems and time play in developing conflict-winning employment doctrine during peacetime. Additionally, this paper will strive to demonstrate that years are required to develop matureemployment doctrine

Why is this important? Driving the problem of employment doctrine developmentto the...

My interest in this topic has literally been accumulating over ten years. Several personal experiences were crucial to stimulating it and may assist your understanding of the rest of this paper. These motivating encounterswere two fighter “war stories” and two history books.

The first fighter story of note was related to me in the early 1980s. I observed to a former Aggressor F-5 pilot that flying against the F-15 must have been a humbling experience. His retort was, “It was, but for the Eagle drivers.” I was surprised, as the Aggressor explained how the then-new F-15 was often poorly employed,...

Doctrine is important to militaries because it is crucial “. . . guidance for conduct of battle approved by the highest military authority.”¹ In the “winner-take-all” game of combat, a marginal advantage due to such guidance may mean the difference between a mission accomplished or not. Maj Gen I. B. Holley, Jr., captured the essence by observing that employment doctrine is what enables armed forces to capitalize upon available technology, “Napoleon had no better weapons than his adversaries, he merely took better advantage of them.”² Employment doctrine matters for three reasons: (1) the better the doctrine in peace the lower...

We must strive to develop an employment doctrine in peace that requires the minimum of combat adjustments in war, lest human and materiel costs become unnecessarily high. To requote historian Sir Michael Howard, “. . . it is the task of military science in an age of peace to prevent doctrine frombeing too badly wrong.”¹ What does matter, Howard continues, “. . . is [our] capability to get it right quickly when the moment arrives.”² While we mayvery well overcome a future foe due to superior technology, mass, or both, the political imperative for few casualties is not likely to...

Before concluding, it is important to focus on why this “doctrinal lag” phenomenon is so vital to us today. We have seen the minimum of 30 months beyond IOC it takes to truly develop a minimally lethal capability for a new system. Theoretically, if one had unlimited time to prepare, the Yockey policy might make sense. I submit it does not because its fundamental assumptions about strategic warning andthe predictability of war are highly suspect.

Deterrence of a global aggressor, heretofore the Soviets, has always relied upon forces in-being. The new reconstitution portion of US national security strategy is different,...

A thesis that documents what has happened in the past may be informative but has limited utility in helping us cope with the future. Since it’s likely we’ll see continuing pressure to cut defense spending, I offer two solutions to this vexing cost-benefit problem. Within this context of scarce funding, we can adopt two innovative approaches designed to give us the real-world experience needed to prepare a lethal and war-winning doctrine in peacetime. The first is to capitalize on the use of interactive simulation to help develop employment doctrine throughout the life cycle of new systems. The second is by...

Headlines like, “Is Clinton Cutting Twice As Much From Defense?” indicate defense cuts growing from the campaign’s $60 billion pledge to $122.6 billion.¹ With cuts this large there is likely to be increased pressure to forego producing new weapons. In my opinion, this would be a short-sighted mistake. This paper has tried to highlight the interaction of time and numbers in developing a lethal employment doctrine during peacetime; one that is capable of winning at the lowest cost in wartime. The argument hangs on I. B. Holley’s assertion that a concept is only a hypothesis and can never become a...