Kill box: the newest FSCM

FA Journal, July-August, 2005 by Karl E. Wingenbach

During the last year, the doctrine community, led by the Air, Land, Sea Application (ALSA) Center, Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, tackled the development of kill box doctrine. ALSA brought together service and joint doctrine developers with subject matter experts (SMEs) from the combatant commands, including personnel with recent experience in Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF).

The result of that effort, Field Manual 3-09.34 Multi-Service Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (MTTPs) for Kill Box Employment, introduces the kill box as a new fire support coordinating measure (FSCM). The FM gives it the following definition: "A kill box is a three-dimensional FSCM used to facilitate the expeditious air-to-surface lethal attack of targets, which may be augmented by or integrated with surface-to-surface indirect fires."

For the first time, the services have one definition of kill boxes and agreed upon MTTPs for employing them. As of June 2005, the kill box became the first new FSCM to be recognized by all the services in more than three decades.

The kill box is primarily applicable at the operational level. The target audience for the new publication includes commanders as well as the operations sections (current operations, fires and future plans) and intelligence sections of service components and their main subordinate elements (i.e., Army corps, Marine expeditionary force, Navy numbered fleet and Air Force wing) and their counterparts on the joint force commander's (JFC's) staff.

FM 3-09.34 was signed 13 June and is being printed as this magazine is being printed. The Air Force pub number is AFTTP(I)3-2.59, the Marine pub number is MCRP 3.25H and the Navy pub number is NTTP 3-09.2.1.

This new FM 3-09.34 facilitates air-to-surface attacks, recognizing the increasing demands for rapid joint fires integration, deconfliction, responsiveness and component coordination while, at the same time, minimizes the risk of fratricide. It standardizes and codifies the kill box as a coordination measure, multiple versions of which have been developed in standing operating procedures (SOPs) and combat operations during the last 20 years and used by virtually all combatant commands.

Kill Box Basics. The primary purpose of a kill box is to allow air assets to conduct interdiction against surface targets without further coordination with the establishing commander and without terminal attack control.

Kill box boundaries normally are drawn using an area reference system, but they could follow well defined terrain features or may be located by grid coordinates or a radius from a center point.

The kill box is a permissive FSCM; however, it also restricts the trajectories and effects of surface-to-surface indirect fires.

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There are two types of kill boxes: blue for facilitating the air-to-surface attack of targets and purple for facilitating air-to-surface attacks while integrating surface-to-surface indirect fires. The purple box employs altitude, lateral or time separation techniques for limiting surface-to-surface indirect fires, protecting friendly aircraft.

When integrating air-to-surface and surface-to-surface indirect fires, the kill box will have appropriate restrictions. The goal is to reduce the coordination needed to fulfill the support requirements with maximum flexibility while preventing fratricide.

In a linear battlespace, kill boxes can augment use of traditional FSCMs, such as fire support coordination lines (FSCLs) or coordinated fire lines (CFLs). They can help the commander focus the effort of air and indirect fire assets. Typically, within the land component's area of operations, kill boxes will be established short of the FSCL to eliminate the coordination required by air assets when striking interdiction targets to support the land component's concept of operations.

In a nonlinear battlespace, when traditional FSCMs are not useful or are less applicable, the kill box can be another method for identifying areas to focus air and indirect fire assets.

The kill box is a unique FSCM that may contain other measures within its boundaries. For example, a kill box may include no-fire areas (NFAs), restricted operations areas (ROAs) and airspace coordination areas (ACAs). Restrictive FSCMs and airspace control measures (ACMs) always have priority when established in a kill box.

No friendly ground forces should be within or maneuvering into established kill boxes. If circumstances require otherwise--such as long-ranges surveillance patrols (LRSPs), special operations forces (SOF) teams, etc.--then NFAs must be established to cover those forces, or the kill box must be closed.

A kill box won't be established specifically for close air support (CAS) missions. However, this does not restrict CAS missions from being executed inside kill boxes if all the CAS requirements are met.

The JFC normally delegates the authority to establish and adjust kill boxes to component commanders responsible for the battlespace. The component commander establishes and adjusts a kill box in consultation with superior, subordinate, supporting and affected commanders; the kill box is an extension of the existing support relationship established by the JFC. (See the kill box responsibilities figure.)