Today’s military organization, staffing, training and equipment is force oriented, or more accurately, career oriented. Hitler once said that a nation needed to be “blooded” every generation to remind the nation of the sacrifices and of the skills needed to defend the state. Unlike Hitler’s dogma, which was victory oriented, ours isn’t oriented on victory but fighting without regard to any notion of victory. Or, of what sort of mission our nation must be prepared to do in order to preserve the nation and it’s goals, however defined.
And that is the first step. What are the missions needed for what purpose. Each new administration will have their own concepts and an enduring effort to stay ahead of the great game, the military must be engaged in a continuing process of mission analysis followed by contingency planning through the Military Decision Making Process.
It is clear that a wide variety of missions will evolve from said continuum of analyses, knowing that whatever contingency is planned for will require revision before implementation. That is the nature of military planning and execution, from Fire Team to Field Army or Fleet.
Mission analysis, like intelligence analysis, uncover repeated eventualities, requirement and course of action that once isolated can be lumped into groups of missions, actions, events, and course of action. The planning for the defense of the Fulda Gap transferred quite well to the Gulf, for it is the planning that matters more than the plan.
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