Changes in Army structure from brigade division units to units of action

¶ … Army Structure; from 3-Brigade Division Units to Units of Action

At the Pentagon, briefings routinely begin with the old adage that

"the only thing constant today is change." Since the age of the Cold War, the United States Army has faced change at home and abroad, experiencing not only a massive transformation in technology and infrastructure, but also in the worldwide approach to warfare. As the end of front-line battles gave way to urban streets and insurgency, the Army transitioned its structural paradigm to mirror the rapidly shifting needs, abandoning the Three Brigade Division Units for Units of Action.

This organizational shift had roots in Capitol Hill politics and dissent internal to the Pentagon, but was a desperately needed restructuring to meet the needs presented by the Iraq War, vastly different than those experienced during the Cold War history. In the early 1950s, the Soviet forces overwhelmed many of the Western nations, and the U.S. Army planners decided that, if American forces were to gain strength with ground forces in the future, they would have to exhibit superior mobility and increased firepower.

This firepower would come from atomic weapons, which provided superior tactical and logistical mobility that would allow for the defeat another army even numerically greater. This new tactic, which began in early 1953 and 1954, brought the first delivery of atomic weapons to Europe. Only two years later, in 1956, two infantry divisions were replaced by one airborne unit and one armored division; this first happened when the 11th Airborne Division replaced the 5th Infantry Division in early 1956, and was followed by the replacement of the 4th Infantry Division in Frankfurt in May of 1956 by the 3rd Armored Division.

Later that same year, the Department of the Army proposed a plan of reorganization, adapting infantry, armored, and airborne divisions to atomic warfare. The new plan, called the Pentomic Concept, was approved for Army-wide implementation as designated in November by the USEUCOM, which first allowed for the transformation of the Seventh Army divisions. The 11th Airborne was accordingly restructured into five major battle groups, all "completely air transportable," to fall in line with the new organization pattern.

Of the other four divisions in Europe, the 2nd Armored Division and the 10th Infantry achieved restructuring by the first of July 1957; the 8th Infantry Division by the first of August, and the 3rd Armored Division by the first of October of the same year.

The new structure of the Pentomic Concept meant the loss of one 155-mm and two 105-mm battalions in the infantry division, but some units gained. The infantry division also lost a regimental tank company, but with more than 100 tanks, the blow of the loss was cushioned well; additionally, the reconnaissance company was replaced with an armored cavalry battalion. Strongly on the receiving end of the transformation was the single composite unit, comprised of one 8-inch howitzer, an Honest John, and two 155-mm howitzer batteries, increasing firepower capabilities. Additionally, six 90-mm antiaircraft artillery battalions switched to Nike missile systems, and the USAREUR reorganized their honest John batteries into well-maintained battalions.

The massive overhaul of the system achieved a near victory in concept. Ultimately, the restructuring success meant that the Pentomic units, capable of fighting a nuclear war, would also be a fearsome enemy in a conventional battle as well.

The 1960s brought a changing political scene with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the birth of Vietnam; as a result, the military was forced to proactively adapt to the changing marketplace of battle. The fast-moving sea of international politics precluded a static concept of combat division, and the preemptive restructuring of the Pentomic system still demanded further attention. "Although the pentomic divisions were effective combat units," military historian D.J. Hickman provided, "experience, as well as examination of the world situation and of military requirements, disclosed areas in which significant improvements could be made."

The refocusing lens provided by world events shed light on the improvements that could be made in the American military organization. "By the early 1960's, world events focused attention on the fact that Army combat forces faced a wide range of possible situations."

Among these, the emerging strategy of "flexible response" was proving not only to be the most popular but also the most viable. If combat units would have to be tailored to meet the demands of specific situations, their tactical mobility and firepower would have to match the environment, enemy, and shifting technological structure. As discussion gave way to actualization, the Reorganization Objective Army Divisions (ROAD) strategy was designed, allowing for specific and varied strategic requirements.

Despite ongoing efforts to pursue development of American nuclear capability, the new emphasis on the requirements of limited wars proved wise. The Seventh Army divisions were reorganized under ROAD in 1963, after a vast amount of preparation to reequip it with stronger technology. The ROAD concept required the complete mechanization of combat units in major equipment, outlining a major mechanized overhaul of the Seventh Army, which had an M48 tank, M59 armored personnel carrier, and M74 and M. 51 tank recovery vehicles.

While many of these machines were still functionally useful, they were also developed during and before the Korean Campaign and technologically hackneyed in modern battle.

The new equipment began arriving by the load two years before the USAREUR was able to incorporate it fully. The September of 1961, the Seventh Army units were issued their first shipments of the M-14 replacing the M-1, the carbine, Browning automatic, and Thompson submachine gun.

The additions of the M60 battle tank and the M113 armored personnel carrier supplanted their earlier prototypes; they were faser lighter, and where necessary, more accurate. A shoulder-fired M70 grenade launcher provided for a medium-range capability left open by the maximum-range hand grenade and the low-range mortar. The units were outfitted in ways that further protected the soldiers and providing a more fearsome enemy in battle; previously discovered holes were augmented, and the army brought its units up to the modern-day needs, even adding a nuclear-capable Davy Crockett.

During 1962, the new supplements continued to arrive in Europe and undergo extensive tests gauging viability and utilization specifics. The USAREUR troops put the new machinery under scrutiny and added to their ranks the new French-designed Entac anti-tank missile, Iroquois helicopters, and Mohawk aircraft. In 1963, the physical aspects of the ROAD divisions were complete, and the time for conversion arrived; the USAREUR was forced to complete this process seamlessly so as not to jeopardize its combat readiness, and as a result, most of the machinery was not only on-hand but largely already issued.

The total conversion, which began in February, was converted in 30 days, marking a new era for the structure of the Army, a timely standard for expedience, and a burgeoning epoch of highly technical battle.

The ROAD organization provided USAREUR with a modern and flexible with which to equip the forces. Each new division now consisted of a base and a varying mixture of combat maneuver battalions, either tank, mechanized infantry, or airborne, while in Berlin, the straight infantry battalions saw their final days. The new bases contained all the elements that would be required by any division, including command, control, artillery, a support command, and the three brigade headquarters. These units were identical in base structure, while their equipment, organization, and methods of operation were now capable of varying by mission. Likewise, the battalions all had a basic structure organized and equipped to provide mobility, firepower, and combat capabilities in shifting environmental variables.

The need for change was exaggerated in this massive transformation, totally shifting the terrain of American-executed warfare. The new mechanics mixed with old needs to provide a coherency to the military unit; the mechanized infantry battalion equipped with was a source of lightweight, armor-protected, cross-country mobility and the air borne battalion was adaptable to a wide range of environments. The overall effect was the tactical mobility suited to the European and other international environments that provided a near-match to the Soviets, other enemies, and the NATO nations.

The Army, looking seriously at its military capabilities, began funding introspective critical analysis of their provisions. By 1982, the analysis of the combat existed inside the AirLand Battle concept and evolved into the Division-86 force structure.

At this point in time, the Army still focused its efforts in Europe, which both the government and voting public viewed was key to national security. The rising Division-86 structure focused on standardized heavy division, combining both armored and mechanized infantry divisions, and making the maximum use of new equipment.

The Division-86 proposal maintained much of the flexibility so valued in the ROAD structure. The biggest change occurred within the new heavy division, which totaled about 20,000 officers and enlisted soldiers. The system changed with the new structure, switching the basic composition of the structure to include one Headquarters and Headquarters Company and3 Brigade Headquarters. Additionally, it mandated one Military Police Company, one Signal Battalion, one Air Defense Artillery Battalion, one Engineer Battalion, one Air Defense Artillery Battalion, one Engineer Battalion, one Military Intelligence Battalion, one Reconnaissance Battalion, one Division Artillery, one Air Cavalry Brigade, and one Division Support Command, in addition to many maneuver elements.

With the Division-86 system change, the Army also published a Training and Doctrine Command guide in order to execute successful implementation. On October 1, 1982, the Command published tables of organization and equipment in order to implement this second attempt at achieving the heavy division concept. The tables, which outlined both armored division and mechanized infantry, set out five variations for deployment. The different cases involved the assignment of either five or six armored and four or five mechanized infantry battalions to an armored division; additionally, each mechanized infantry division was regimentally equipped with both five armor and five mechanized infantry battalions.

Institutional variations also covered the integration of varying equipment, including M60 tanks, M113 armored personnel carriers, the new M1 Abrams tanks, and Bradley infantry fighting vehicles; these manipulations of the basic concept would allow for heavy division ranges comprised of 19,000 to 20,500 officers and enlisted men.

The published tables conformed largely to the originally proposed ideas with very few changes. In the actualized plan, cavalry vehicles replaced tanks in the reconnaissance squadron, which now consisted of two ground and air troops, leaving no motorcycles and making it part of the aviation brigade. This development in organization was key to the nascent brigade structure, in which the finance unit was transferred corps level. In a bow to modernization, the Army reorganized its intelligence battalion to field electronic warfare, surveillance, and service companies. The final changes included the return of the medical command, meanwhile, the target acquisition element was reduced to a battery and the chemical company was returned to divisional level.

In a trend that would affect the military as it changed from the Three Brigade structure implemented by Division 86 to the Iraqi-necessitated Units of Action, the Army encountered a series of problems fielding Division-86.

The system was overloaded by the sudden permutations with which it had to operate, including over forty major weapons or new pieces of equipment that needed to be procured, and some were still in developmental stages. Doctrinal literature and training programs required revision, and budgetary limitations had to be considered. The solution approved by the Army Staff mirrored those of the past, adopting the heavy division concept but with interim organizations using obsolete equipment until new weapons and equipment were available. Delivery of many new items was expected to begin in 1983. Therefore, organizational and equipment modernization was to begin in January of that year. The number of maneuver elements for a heavy armored division was set at six armor and four mechanized infantry battalions, while that for a heavy mechanized infantry division was placed at five armor and five mechanized infantry battalions.

While the Army was struggling to implement the new system, it was faced with another trouble: personnel shortage.

The Training and Doctrine Command predicted that a strength of 836,000 was required to field Army-86, 56,000 more soldiers than the Army could feasibly provide for any foreseeable future.

Accordingly, the Army deactivated Germany's 4th Brigade and the 4th Infantry Division among others in 1984; the cut backs throughout the forces were immediately felt, and not long thereafter, the modernization plan went awry. Additional problems in deployment, funding, and procurement caused the Army to push the date for modernizing heavy divisions to the mid-1990s, by which time, the Gulf Crisis, Kosovo, and other interventions completely changed the face of the American military.

The Army continued to battle a series of problems in modernizing the divisional forces inside the Three Brigade system, and the problem of a "hollow Army" became readily apparent in military examination. General Edward C. Meyer was the first to successfully address this problem, tackling the insufficient personal and equipment in the forward-deployed army with unit cohesion.

Playing on the success of the Combat Arms Regimental System, the new Regimental System assigned each regiment with an overseas and continental assignment variation, as well as necessary armor, air defense artillery, cavalry, field artillery, infantry regiment, aviation regiments, and ultimately special forces. While the plan helped assuage many of the technical difficulties the army had been recently saddled with it, it achieved the far more important success of creating a new sense of community within the army, in which a soldier was capable of associating with a regiment for his whole professional career.

The previous disconnect between overseas and continental forces was restrung with Meyer at the helm, who supported the idea that unit cohesion was more important than had been previously valued. In order to realize his plan, he excelled at tying his regimental organization theories to the idea of modernizing the force. The troubles in implementing the plans did not cease, and by 1985, the regimental system had returned to the back burner, separate of the modernization force as a result of untimely production delays, unit rotation, and internal concern over its affects on the readiness of the force overall.

While slow to take hold, his ideas remained an ever-present part of the military, and as quickly as Philadelphia could produce new U.S. Army Support Activity flags, battalion designations changed.

The Division-86 reorganization called for a radical change in the division support command, particularly in its address of the forward area of the battlefield.

The new plan included a material management center, adjutant general, finance companies, a supply and transport battalion, a maintenance battalion, and three support battalions, allowing one to be administered to each brigade. Army planners struggled over the placement of the chemical company at corps, division, or division support command level, and ultimately tendered its responsibility to the supply and transport battalion.

Very quickly, the Army also had to learn to reshape its burgeoning new organization according to the enemy, and t o counter the Soviet Union's high density of artillery and improved weapons, Division-86 was forced increased its division artillery much like its predecessor. To do so, it fielded three battalions of 155-mm. self-propelled howitzers, organized into three batteries with each one having eight piece; additionally, each consisted of one battalion with sixteen 8-inch howitzers, nine mounted multiple launch rocket systems, and a target acquisition battalion.

The new an air cavalry attack brigade, the offspring of the 1st Cavalry Division and the 6th Cavalry Brigade at Fort Hood, provided its first anti-tank role in the division. The air cavalry brigade, which fielded 134 aircraft, consisted of two attack battalions, each with four companies, six helicopters each, a combat support aviation battalion, aircraft maintenance, and a reconnaissance squadron.

While the transformation proved difficult, the settling into the Three Brigade structure was a key moment in modern army history; it was representative of the acceptance of old, engendered officers with the compatibility of a brand new-system constantly in flux. The Three Brigade structure allowed for dislocated connectivity as well as heavy machinery, all geared toward fighting a specific enemy. While that enemy saw the end of the iron curtain, the lessons learned did not dwindle in importance, nor in the memory of the leadership. "Quietly," Thomas McNaugher discussed, "a new defense debate is taking place, prompted by widespread recognition that the stable budgets Republicans and Democrats have promised the Defense Department cannot keep current forces ready to fight while financing a major round of weapons buying to replace the services' aging arsenal."

In addition to a changing enemy, the significant gains in technological capabilities that turned the world into an up-to-the-minute hyper-technological marketplace also revamped the world of warfare. McNaugher attributes the growing problem to an additional debacle on the military horizon: the "defense train wreck." The basis of the fiscal metamorphosis to a Units of Action structure, the problem was based in two separate categories of defense spending. The first was high spending on current readiness, which was aimed to prepare the U.S. For two nearly-simultaneous "major regional contingencies" that the Bottom Up Review of 1993 outlined and coded for another decade of military procedure.

At the same time, this high-paced spending was being matched nearly dollar for dollar on amassing new weaponry, compatible with the burgeoning age of technologically augmented warfare. According to McNaugher, "Barring an unexpected [financial] increase, the defense budget cannot afford both readiness and weaponry. Something has to give."

William Perry, then the Secretary of Defense, idealized only mild cuts, while Senator John McCain, whose military history prompted his own close analysis of the system's finer details like fiscal planning, recognized a much deeper need. He lamented "the alarming practice of postponing essential modernization programs," offering the nation instead a plan to meet one single major contingency while aggressively pursuing modern and high-tech weaponry, which he presumed would not only increase firepower but, eventually, require minimal ground force commitment.

McNaugher appeals with scrutiny to both these spending plans, particularly the latter. By visualizing the spending habits of the Army as geared well into the future, he says, is equivalent to "treating the future as if we knew it."

Nevertheless, the requisite fiscal planning to which the Department of Defense most hold itself accountable demands foresight in expenditures, while critics are justified in asking why one would be so committed to spending vast amounts of money on the most high-tech weapon available today that may take years to build that, once implemented, will be almost immediately outdated.

Why this happens is a temporal enigma, explained only by the previous military obligations to which the Army had to succumb.

"The answer lies less in a vision of the future than in habits and commitments linked to the past. We got used to treating the future like an advanced version of the present during the Cold War, when Soviet forces provided a well-understood, slowly advancing focal point for long-range planning. We are still doing that, even in the absence of any firm vision of the future."

Ideological engagement with the present as emblematic of the future is clearly evident in the establishment of the ROAD structure and the transition to the Division-86, Three Brigade system. While BUR set forth a new set of admirable standards for the Army to attain, the Cold War habits of the military laid embedded in its practice.

Even before the September 11th attacks that spurred the docile American nation into action, a new meaning of risk was developing. BUR was the direct result of the wars with North Korea and Iraq, and meeting the needs to battle both enemies at the same time was at the heart of the military planning. Nonetheless, by the mid 1990s, it was criticized for ignoring the value of air power in the Persian Gulf, the South Korean contribution to its north, and the power of the U.S. Reserves.

The concept of "risk" was not lowered at the end of the Cold War, although it changed from the cataclysmic world separation that colored the era of communism to a very real threat of individual agency and nuclear or chemical warfare. Army extensions into "peace operations" in Bosnia, Haiti, and Somalia also further stretched the thinning army across more terrain than BUR recognized officially in planning, and, to the dismay and rejection of the Pentagon, the General Account Office warned in 1995 that should anything happen, troops "stuck" in those areas would be largely inaccessible in the Gulf or Korea. Regardless, " ... It is hard to imagine the First Armored Division withdrawing quickly from Bosnia, not only because only one active unit (the 7th Transportation Group) is available to pull it out (no easy task), but because it may make more strategic sense to leave it there."

Growing concerns about the Army's capabilities in terms of planning for the new age of warfare were of timely concern, and many critics of the status-quo rejected BUR for its inability to measure a new form of balance between realistic needs for conventional war, peace, and stability operations. While BUR would consistently spend millions of dollars in the Cold War cemented paradigm, it would concentrate on major wars that, in all likelihood, were doubtful to be experienced to the same extent history teaches ever again.

War, albeit doubtful, would be devastating no matter the source; a defeat in North Korea would precipitate major guidance by the U.S. troops to support massive-scale humanitarian relief.

If a war in Iraq, 1996 discussions continued, were to happen, Iraq would most likely attack its neighbors and America would go to assuage the problem by going to its source, Saddam Hussein.

"Removing Saddam," McNaugher analyzed, "could create anarchy inside Iraq, inviting U.S. forces to impose order, perhaps even provide for the country's external defense."

No one -- McNaugher included -- took into account a plan of action in which the United States would be the ones attacking Iraq, nevertheless imposing order and supporting the road to democracy.

After September 11th and failed missions to the United Nations to garner the requisite support the international governing body wanted, the United States set into Iraq to locate both weapons of mass destruction in the forms of armor and dictator. With a dwindling group of allies to tackle the "Axis of Evil," America was forced to exert and maintain more military control than hoped in the fledgling democracy.

To such an end, the military required not only a financial backing unsecured by the budgeting strains in Washington, but also a new system of approach that left the Cold War strategy behind and took into conceptual reality the brutality of modern urban warfare.

By January, 2004, the U.S. Army had one third fewer soldiers than it did during the 1991 Gulf War, adding a great staffing strain to the long-term commitments in both Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention the troubling situation posed by Jihad in the international context.

While debate in the Pentagon and Congress continued to heighten over the size of the Army (and the funds with which to pay, supply, and deploy it), the January tally for troops last year 499,00 on active duty, with an additional 700,000 National Guard and Army reservists.

There were only 130,000 troops in Iraq in the 1991 Persian Gulf.

Pentagon officials had hoped to reduce the number for 2004, but the perpetuation of the insurgency far exceeded their anticipation and precluded it; at the same time, 3,000 troops were in Bosnia, 9,000 in Afghanistan, and 37,000 in South Korea. Lt. Gen. John Vines reported then, "currently, we are stretched extraordinarly thin."

A thinly staffed, all-volunteer Army puts phenomenal drain not only on the system but also on the individual soldier, who faces year-long deployment and many on second tours. In the first week of 2004, the Army issued a "stop/loss" order, the sixth in over three years, prohibiting soldiers from resigning or retiring during deployment or before 90 days once home. An increase in size was, at the start of 2004, nothing short of blatantly obvious.

Responsively, 128 members of the House called on President Bush to increase the overall size and strength of the Army, with Republican Heather Wilson (NM) at the helm of the effort. In her approach to Congress she said, "I think all of us are concerned we are going to see back-to-back combat deployments for American military personnel. And you can't sustain that for very long without acknowledging forthrightly that we need to increase the end strength of our active duty people in order to meet the needs of the continuing war on terrorism."

On the other side of the argument, however, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers reported, "One of the most expensive things you can do in the department of defense is hire somebody. Sixty percent of our budget is in the personnel line. So with health care, all that ... all those pieces, it's a very expensive solution, and it's not a solution that comes online right away."

Like upgrading machinery in the 1990s, the problem of immediacy is of the utmost importance when examining possible solutions to the shortage of army personnel and funding in a warfare situation still unfamiliar to the planning committees, tacticians, and troops.

The army estimates that each 10,000 soldier addition will cost the Army $1.2 billion a year, and while Rumsfeld reports a willingness to discuss a growing Army, he is not sure of the need. The problem of need is at the crux of the debate, and while it extends as far as Capitol Hill, it is also one among ranks. Retired Gen. Theodore Stroup, a former deputy chief of staff for personnel, believes quite the opposite, and says that, simply, "the Army is too small to do its current missions."

This relation is not only about the size of the Army, but the growing needs of the troops and the areas they serve.

"You really don't have the resiliency to provide either strategic balance -- what you need if some other thing flares up -- or to be able to give a respite as the troops rotate back from overseas areas where they've been in combat. And so, a notional figure I've maintained is about 520,000 is about the right size."

If Stroup and his supporters were correct, the Army would need a financial augmentation of $62.4 billion yearly, not to mention an increase in enlistment, already low and clouded by recent ethical scandal.

Lawrence Korb, former Assistant to the Secretary of Defense, suggests that while the troops are absolutely too low in number, the core of the issue is that the Army's structure does not make the best use of the people it has. According to Col. Douglas MacGregor, many troops are deployed in bureaucracies where, when compared with the crisis in Iraq, they are no longer needed.

Examining the structural program of the military, MacGregor demonstrates that the old paradigm consisted of many headquarters, designed to be spread across the European continent in Division-86 Cold War style. Additionally, with seven echelons of command, the pace of instruction is bogged down immensely. "Seven echelons of command," he quips, "seven levels in order to make the fellow that's out there actually doing the killing effective."

In early 2004, MacGregor made public his opinions for better deployment and military structure. Because battle in Iraq is not mirrored on the toy soldier, front-line model, but is instead a fluid, 360-degree battlefield. MacGregor suggested flattening the pyramid structure into a smaller, more mobile unit tailored to the needs of every specific situation, because not only does urban warfare demand a constant preparedness and smaller cohesion, but "bureaucratic structures do not voluntarily reform and restructure themselves very well."

He anecdotally correlates the life in the military to that of politics: they are each points of survival, he told Jim Lehrer: "Their principle concern is survival. And you've got to keep in mind that Washington is one in which risk-taking is not generally rewarded."

While his vocal advocacy for a restructuring garnered support among mid-level officers, its support from the top was slow until Gen. Peter Schoomaker was selected as the Army's new Chief of Staff last year. While he noted with caution that it is difficult to change such a deeply entrenched and firmly established structure, he advocated a new plan for Units of Action, enabling the kind of quick decision making and functioning unit for which MacGregor had called; by September, the National Guard was undergoing sweeping changes.

The restructuring was geared at a more versatile and relevant force, with slightly fewer brigades, new roles for personnel, and the rise of formalized units that would close the gaps between active units and the Guard by fulfilling the needs of specific threats with well-trained and specialized forces. The changes were a direct result of not the Washington debates, but instead of a grounded need to solve the extreme stress in deployments. Lt. Gen H. Steven Blum reported the new policies with typical pragmatism, "there's a perception we won't walk away from our old structure," he said. "Wrong. I'll walk away from anything that doesn't make sense."