Global Strike Task Force - military preparedness

Aerospace Power Journal, Spring, 2001 by John P. Jumper

A Transforming Concept, Forged by Experience

Editorial Abstract: Reviewing recent history and anticipating future needs, General Jumper calls for action to capitalize on technology with new operational concepts and a new organizational tool to fight more effectively in the future. Specifically, with the F-22, B-2, and a constellation of access-granting platforms,. the Global Strike Task Force promises to complement the Air Expeditionary Force to create dominant, immediate, and sustained aerospace power.

HISTORY IS REPLETE with battles, campaigns, and wars that were lost because fundamental changes in the nature of warfare went unrecognized. The Maginot Line provides the backdrop for one such example. According to post--World War I French conventional wisdom, the defensive strength of barbed wire and trenches during the Great War suggested that a permanent system of trenches, fortifications, and barbed wire would be even more effective during the next war. This misinterpretation and overreaction led to a "permanent" defense system extending from Switzerland to the Ardennes in the north, and from the Alps to the Mediterranean in the south. In contrast, the German Wehrmacht, realizing that technological and industrial advances had altered the nature of warfare, synergistically exploited new weapons such as the Panzer I and Junkers Ju-87 Stuka to develop a new concept of operations--the blitzkrieg. [1] Packaged in powerful, combined panzer-air armies, later called Kampfgruppen on the eastern front, Wehrmacht fo rces cut large swaths around the determined resistance and drove deep into enemy territory. Nations that had the means to defend themselves with tanks, aircraft, fortifications, and manpower clung to outmoded ideas of positional warfare while the Wehrmacht flew over or maneuvered around permanent defenses. The results were devastating and immediate. The German onslaught quickly moved through Poland and overwhelmed numerically and often technologically superior forces in the Low Countries and France.

Today, we stand on the brink of technological advances that can prompt a new concept of aerospace power employment. Stealth applied to bombers and maneuverable fighters, all-weather precision-guided munitions (PGM), and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) will allow us to maneuver over, around, and through--or to stand off outside advanced defensive systems and networks already available to potential adversaries. Even more startling advances in information technologies are enabling new dimensions of command and control ([C.sup.2]), allowing horizontal integration of air and space intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms. With the application of valuable lessons from conflicts of the past decade, these technologies will provide the means to master persistent difficulties that continue to plague efficient planning and execution of aerospace power at the operational and tactical levels: time-critical targeting, all-weather precision, restrictive rules of engagement (ROE), collateral-damage contr ol, and--perhaps most importantly--access issues. How well we capitalize on these advancements will depend largely on our ability to develop useful concepts of operations (CONOPS) that can deliver the right capabilities and produce profound effects in any scale of conflict. The Global Strike Task Force (GSTF) is just such a concept, one that springs from schooling of the past 10 years of conflict.

Present for Duty: Lessons of Warfare in the 1990s

The fall of Communism and the end of the cold war brought about sweeping changes in the way our nation and Air Force fight wars. Relatively stable international relations for over 50 years have given way to a long series of geographically localized crises--political, ethnic, or religious unrest; humanitarian disasters such as famine; outright regional military aggression; genocide on a horrific scale; and hurricanes, earthquakes, and other natural disasters. In many ways, the "small scale" contingency (SSC) has become our first priority--driving demand for force structure and personnel more than the strategy-based two-major-conflicts scenario. These SSCs often continue indefinitely and should not be considered a "lesser included case" of our strategy.

Regardless of the nature or location of the crisis, aerospace power has played a significant role. From 1990 to 1997, the US military conducted 45 SSCs--an average of one every nine weeks, as compared to 16 during the entire cold war. [2] The US Air Force has been present for duty in all major conflicts of that defining decade, and we have learned in the classroom of combat.

Operation Desert Storm was a watershed event for the US Air Force. We advanced the role of the joint force air component commander (JFACC) into joint doctrine, demonstrated the power of stealth, and implemented unprecedented integration of space into air operations. There can be no doubt that aerospace power played a significant role in reversing the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait--our stated objective in that conflict.