Doctrine provides a common frame of reference across the military. It helps standardize operations, facilitating readiness by establishing common ways of accomplishing military tasks. Doctrine links theory, history, experimentation, and practice.
What is military doctrine?
Military doctrine is the fundamental set of principles that guides military forces as they pursue national security objectives. RAND examines these principles, which can range from the policies and procedures put in place by a particular military branch to the tactics and techniques taught to new members during training. Report.
Why do we need doctrine?
First and foremost, doctrine provides fundamental principles. These principles reflect the Army’s views about what works in war, based on its past experience.
Why is the US Army so obsessed with doctrine?
It enables the Army to communicate quickly even when there is a language barrier such as military international, multinational, non-government partnerships. So the next time someone uses “doctrine” in a negative context, or states “that’s not doctrine,” push back and tell them they are wrong.
Which branch of the military is responsible for developing Army doctrine?
The United States Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) is responsible for developing Army doctrine. TRADOC was developed early in the 1970s as a response to the American Army's difficulties in the Vietnam War , and is one of the reforms that improved Army professionalism.
What is the role of doctrine?
Doctrine is a belief, or set of beliefs, held by an organization about the best (or right) way to do things. Doctrine reflects the culture of an organization and staffs' understanding of how those beliefs relate to their roles and responsibilities.
What military doctrine does the US use?
Joint doctrine presents fundamental principles that guide the employment of US military forces in coordinated and integrated action toward a common objective. It promotes a common perspective from which to plan, train, and conduct military operations.
What is Army doctrine definition?
Doctrine consists of fundamental principles by which military forces guide their. actions in support of national objectives. It constitutes official advice but requires. judgment in application.
What role does doctrine have in accomplishing the Army mission?
Doctrine provides the ability to take a sketch like the figure below to transfer a massive amount of information. It enables soldiers to quickly identify the units involved, the main effort, all the missions, the exact tasks to be completed and much more. The importance of this common language cannot be overstated.
Why is airforce doctrine important?
Doctrine offers an agreed upon, operationally relevant body of best practices and principles that articulates how we fight, captures our airpower experience, and guides how we operate within a joint force.
How does Army doctrine define a problem?
“A problem is an issue or obstacle that makes it difficult to achieve a desired goal or objective.”4 To identify the problem, ATP 5-0.1, Army Design Methodology, calls on commanders and staffs to ask two questions: “What is the difference between the current state of the [Operational Environment] and desired state?” ...
How many Army doctrines are there?
Army Doctrine Publications There are currently 16 ADPs which cover broad topics including each of the six warfighting functions, military terms and symbols (save this one to your desktop), and training.
Which of the following best defines basic doctrine?
Which of the following best defines basic doctrine? Basic doctrine states the most fundamental and enduring beliefs that describe and guide the proper use of air and space forces.
What is defensive doctrine?
Military doctrine describes the way in which the armed forces perform their tasks. In recent years, the Netherlands armed forces has focused less on the protection of the national borders than was the case in the past.
How does Army Doctrine address decision making?
Doctrine describes how decisions ought to be made. The process is logical, scientific, and sequential. Doctrine recognizes the importance of the commander. It implies that the genius of the commander in applying operational art within the decision-making process is the essence of decision making.
What types of information can be found in doctrine?
Doctrine is validated principles, tactics, techniques, procedures, and terms and symbols that the force can apply.
What is the importance of mission command?
Mission command builds effective teams and nurtures command climates in which leaders encourage people to take risks and exercise disciplined initiative to seize opportunities and counter threats within their commander's intent.
What is military doctrine?
Military doctrine is the expression of how military forces contribute to campaigns, major operations, battles, and engagements . It is a guide to action, rather than being hard and fast rules. Doctrine provides a common frame of reference across the military. It helps standardize operations, facilitating readiness by establishing common ways ...
What are the two aspects of military doctrine?
Military doctrine has two aspects: social-political and military-technical.". The social-political side "encompasses all questions concerning methodology, economic, and social bases, the political goals of war. It is the defining and the more stable side.".
How does Israel's military doctrine work?
Israel's military doctrine is formed by its small size and lack of strategic depth. To compensate, it relies on deterrence, including through a presumed nuclear weapons arsenal. It tries to overcome its quantitative disadvantage by staying qualitatively superior. Its doctrine is based on a strategy of defense but is operationally offensive, by pre-empting enemy threats and securing a quick, decisive victory if deterrence fails. Israel maintains a heightened state of readiness, advanced early warning systems, and a robust military intelligence capability to ensure attackers cannot take advantage of Israel's lack of strategic depth. Early warning and speedy victory is also desired because the Israel Defense Forces rely heavily on reservists during major wars; lengthy mobilization of reservists is costly to the Israeli economy. Israeli doctrine is constructed with the assumption that Israel would be largely self-sufficient in its war-fighting, without nearby allies to assist.
What are the factors that determine the doctrine of the military?
Factors to consider include: military technology. national geography. the capabilities of adversaries.
When was the Prussian doctrine published?
Prussian doctrine was published as Regulations for the Instruction of the Troops in Field Service and the Exercises of the larger Units of the 17th June, 1870. The doctrine was revised in 1887 and published in English in 1893 as The Order of Field Service of the German Army, by Karl Kaltenborn und Stachau, and once again in 1908 as Felddienst Ordnung ("Field Service Regulations").
What is the purpose of doctrine?
Doctrine links theory, history, experimentation, and practice. Its objective is to foster initiative and creative thinking. Doctrine provides the military with an authoritative body of statements on how military forces conduct operations and provides a common lexicon for use by military planners and leaders.
When was the British military doctrine first published?
The first edition of British Military Doctrine (BMD) was published in 1988. It led to the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force developing their own maritime and air-power doctrines. However, in 1996 the first edition of British Defence Doctrine (BDD) was published, drawing heavily on the BMD.
Why is doctrine important in the military?
This is particularly important under fire when information must be quickly and accurately transferred —and universally understood.
What is the Army doctrine?
As a military term, Army doctrine is defined as the fundamental principles by which the military forces or elements thereof guide their actions in support of national objectives. But doctrine is more than just principles.
What did Fredrick the Great say about war?
Fredrick the Great once said, “War is not an affair of chance. A great deal of knowledge, study, and meditation is necessary to conduct it well.”. Doctrine is the collective wisdom of our Army and the common language of our profession. It provides the lessons from generations of soldiers learned during hard fought battles, campaigns, and wars.
What is a prescriptive procedure?
Procedures are prescriptive; regardless of circumstances, they are executed in the same manner. They are often based on equipment and are specific to particular types of units. A common set of procedures in the army include individual unit Standard Operating Procedure (SOPs).
Why are military symbols important?
Military symbols are our way of providing common graphical understanding of a myriad of information and provide another way to quickly transfer information. Establishing and using words and symbols with common military meanings enhances communication. It makes a common understanding of doctrine possible.
Why is the Army's language barrier important?
It allows people from completely different backgrounds (social, regional, commissioning sources, etc.) to quickly learn a universal language. It enables the Army to communicate quickly even when there is a language barrier such as military international, multinational, non-government partnerships.
Who said doctrine is the last refuge of the unimaginative?
Doctrine is frequently discussed in a negative way. A quote attributed to Marine General Jim Mattis is illustrative of this view: “Doctrine is the last refuge of the unimaginative.”. But quotes like these view doctrine as a set of rules that soldiers must follow. This again is a misunderstanding of what doctrine actually consist of.
When did Japan change its military doctrine?
These developments were accompanied by a redefinition of Japan’s military posture. Japan modified its military doctrine and approach to defence spending in 1995, when it approved a new version of the National Defence Program Outline that modified the previous 1976 NDPO. The new NDPO stressed the complementary status of US and Japanese forces and the paramount importance of the alliance for Japanese security. The new document reaffirmed traditional security principles, such as the standard defense force, and new post–Cold War priorities as necessary to improve Japanese readiness to participate in peacekeeping operations.
What is the policy of deterrence?
A policy of deterrence can be direct ed at preventing an armed attack against a country’s own territory (direct deterrence), or that of another country (extended deterrence). In addition, deterrent threats may be issued in response to a pressing or short-term threat of attack (immediate deterrence), or a deterrent policy may seek to prevent a crisis that threatens armed conflict from arising (general deterrence). If we combine these two dimensions of deterrence policies we have four situations in which deterrence can be pursued by states: (1) direct-immediate deterrence; (2) direct-general deterrence; (3) extended-immediate deterrence; and (4) extended-general deterrence. In each of these four situations of deterrence, state leaders may threaten the use of conventional military forces or nuclear weapons. While it is common to equate deterrence with the threat of nuclear weapons, the fact is that conventional military forces are the primary means of deterrence for most states. Only for a small number of countries, since 1945, have nuclear weapons played a deterrent role in military doctrine and foreign policy.
Doctrine, Military
Doctrine, Military. In any modern army's hierarchy of professional concerns, military doctrine is ranked near the top. Theoretically, a nation's grand strategy sets the terms of reference for its military strategy, which in turn dictates the character of its military doctrines.
MILITARY DOCTRINE
In late Imperial Russia, a common basis for joint military action; in the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation, an assertion of military posture and policy.
What holds the structure together in the military?
Although combat is in many ways more like blue- collar plumbing or carpentry than white-collar professional work, sound military theory is the cement that holds the structure together. In the end, pipes have to hold water, walls have to stand — and troops have to move, ships have to sail, planes have to fly.
What was the most important output of the American military reform movement of the 1980s?
After the rediscovery of basic principles, probably the most useful output of the American military reform movement of the ’80s to planners was the discovery, or rediscovery, of the levels of war. In American doctrine, the “strategic” level of war determines national or multinational security objectives and develops and uses resources (ends, ways and means) to accomplish the strategic objectives. Campaigns and major operations at the operational level of war connect battles and engagements at the tactical level to ensure that they lead to accomplishing the strategic goals.
What was the result of the Cold War?
The result has been the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System, a bureaucratic nightmare based on a capstone joint operating concept and layers of operating, functional, integrating and joint enabling concepts, due to be reviewed every two years, the existence of which is forcing the services to develop their own, similar systems in response. What staff sections, joint or service, can maintain that pace as an integrated, effective process? As Van Riper says, Pentagon leaders cannot simply mandate the development of effective concepts; “for every concept, there has to be a problem in search of a solution.” To take Van Riper’s thought further, the idea that effective forces can be designed without reference to enemy threats — the problem — was difficult to sustain even in the ’90s, and today that seems hollow indeed. One flag officer commented recently to the author that the use of war scenarios in force design and experimentation exposes the hollowness of “capabilities” planning; there’s a threat hidden down there after all. Certainly, war plans have long been statements of national priorities and requirements, and war plans (thus far, anyway) address concrete threats. Additionally, the U.S. has not lacked for real enemies — not theoretical ones — for the past several years. The challenge is not to pile concept paper atop concept paper but to decide — correctly — what kinds of threats the U.S. is likely to face in coming decades, then build forces sufficient to deter or defeat those threats.
Overview
Military doctrine is the expression of how military forces contribute to campaigns, major operations, battles, and engagements.
It is a guide to action, rather than being hard and fast rules. Doctrine provides a common frame of reference across the military. It helps standardize operations, facilitating readiness by establishing common ways of accomplishing military tasks.
Defining doctrine
NATO's definition of doctrine, used unaltered by many member nations, is:
"Fundamental principles by which the military forces guide their actions in support of objectives. It is authoritative but requires judgement in application".
The Canadian Army states:
"Military doctrine is a formal expression of military knowledge and thought, that the army accept…
Development of doctrine
Before the development of separate doctrinal publications, many nations expressed their military philosophy through regulations.
Field Service Regulations were issued by the War Office in 1909, 1917, 1923, 1930, and 1935. Similar publications under various names were subsequently published. Formal British Military Doctrine was first published in 1988 and in 1996 became British Defence Doctrine applicable thr…
Relationship between doctrine and strategy
Doctrine is not strategy. NATO's definition of strategy is "presenting the manner in which military power should be developed and applied to achieve national objectives or those of a group of nations." The official definition of strategy by the United States Department of Defense is: "Strategy is a prudent idea or set of ideas for employing the instruments of national power in a synchronized and integrated fashion to achieve national or multinational objectives."
Military doctrine by country
Chinese military doctrine is influenced by a number of sources including an indigenous classical military tradition characterized by strategists such as Sun Tzu and modern strategists such as Mao Zedong, along with Western and Soviet influences. One distinctive characteristic of Chinese military science is that it places emphasis on the relationship between the military and society and views military force as merely one part of an overarching grand strategy.
See also
• Strategy
• Grand strategy
• Naval strategy
• Operational level of war
• Military strategy
Sources
• Chapman, Bert (2009), Military Doctrine: A Reference Handbook, ABC-CLIO, ISBN 9780313352331, retrieved 2021-04-16
• Austin Long. The Soul of Armies: Counterinsurgency Doctrine and Military Culture in the US and UK. Ithaca–London: Cornell University Press, 2016.
• NSA, (NATO STANDARDIZATION AGENCY) (2013), AAP-6(V) NATO Glossary of Terms and Definitions (pdf), retrieved 2021-04-16
External links
• Joint Electronic Library
• UK Development, Concepts and Doctrine Centre
• Navy Warfare Development Command (NWDC)
• Military Analysis Network