Military Review English Edition March-April 2015 | Page 20

The Army’s Missions and Contributions to Joint Operations
The 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review identified 11 enduring Armed Forces missions in which the Army
plays a substantial role:
●● Provide for military defense of the homela nd
●● Defeat an adversary
●● Provide a global stabilizing presence
●● Combat terrorism
●● Counter weapons of mass destruction (WMD)
●● Deny an adversary's objectives
●● Respond to crisis and conduct limited contingency operations
●● Conduct military engagement and security cooperation
●● Conduct stability and counterinsurgency operations
Provide support to civil authorities
Conduct humanitarian assistance and disaster response

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of regionally aligned Army forces as well as the
foundational capabilities that Army forces provide to the joint force set “favorable conditions for
commitment of forces if diplomacy and deterrence
fail”.32 Because future enemies will attempt to deny
access to the joint force, future Army forces must
be prepared to conduct expeditionary maneuver,
“the rapid deployment of task-organized combined
arms forces able to transition quickly and conduct
operations of sufficient scale and ample duration
to achieve strategic objectives.”33 Highly mobile
combined arms air-ground formations will see and
fight across wider areas, operating widely dispersed
while maintaining mutual support and the ability to
concentrate rapidly.
Regional engagement as well as the Army’s ability to conduct expeditionary maneuver and joint
combined arms operations are critical to demonstrating U.S. resolve, deterring adversaries, and
encouraging allies and partners.

History and Lessons Learned
Sir Michael Howard warned that we should
not study history to make us “clever for the next
time,” but instead to help make us “wise forever.”34
Similarly, Clausewitz, observed, the study of war
and warfare “is meant to educate the mind of the
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future commander, or, more accurately, to guide
him in his self-education, not to accompany him
to the battlefield; just as a wise teacher guides and
stimulates a young man’s intellectual development,
but is careful not to lead him by the hand for the
rest of his life.”35 In short, history can help military
leaders ask the right questions, but leaders must
consider the unique context and local realities of a
particular conflict to develop answers. History does,
however, amplify many of the lessons relearned in
recent and ongoing conflicts.
On the need to consolidate gains or integrate
efforts of multiple partners, for example, the father
of the Army War College, former Secretary of War
Elihu Root, commented in 1901 on “the wide range
of responsibilities which we have seen devolving
upon officers charged with the civil government
of occupied territory; the delicate relations which
constantly arise between military and civil authority.”
To cope with the complexity of war in the early
twentieth century, Root highlighted the “manifest
necessity that the soldier, above all others, should be
familiar with history.”36
Our Army pursues lessons of recent and ongoing
operations enthusiastically but often has difficulty
applying these lessons. It is for that reason that
the AOC (Appendix B) establishes a framework
March-April 2015  MILITARY REVIEW