Task Force Concepts of Operations: transforming the USAF - Features - U.S. Air Force

Air & Space Power Journal, Summer, 2003 by Larry Weaver, Anthony C. Cain

Editorial Abstract: Lieutenant Colonel Weaver and Colonel Cain provide an insightful description of the seven operating concepts for transformation--the Air Force approach that complements the Department of Defense initiatives. The concepts work well in the new strategic environment, help codify the expeditionary mind-set, and provide a methodology by which leaders can determine capability requirements and assess shortfalls and risks. The authors also explain why change was needed, the implication of that change, and its progress.

IN FEBRUARY 2001, the United States Air Force began to develop a new operating philosophy to complement Department of Defense (DOD) transformation initiatives. Originally couched under the rubric "Task Force Concepts of Operations (CONOPS)," the philosophy continues its evolution under the slightly revised heading "Operating Concepts." (1) Seven organizing components impart structure to the transformational approach that will ultimately guide Air Force capability-based procurement and operations. Information about the philosophy and its components is slow to filter to service members because of what one staff officer termed the "preexperience and predoctrinal" nature of the concepts. However, after two years of thought and development, outlines of the philosophy are becoming clear enough to merit discussion and explanation among Air Force members.

Rationale for Transformation

Operating concepts appear at this moment because senior Air Force leaders realized that traditional planning and programming methods were inadequate for Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld's transformation emphasis. Before the 11 September 2001 attacks that brought American security policy into sharp focus, the services struggled to understand why they should transform what was arguably the most effective and capable military in the world. The secretary of defense's Office of Net Assessment led the effort to devise the transformation road map until the debate within DOD--about the need for transformation, the scope of transformation initiatives, and the direction that transformation should take--erected an impassable roadblock.

After 11 September 2001, Air Force leaders realized that the conflict spectrum included tasks that their service was ill prepared to accomplish without new procurement practices and force presentation models. Ironically, as the Air Force got on the transformation bandwagon, it found itself engaged in a global war on terrorism, historically unprecedented homeland-defense efforts, and the potential for major contingencies in the Middle East and Northeast Asia. Thus, airmen should rightfully expect that any official statement regarding transformation should reflect the initial reluctance to tamper with an effective and successful combat formula, the urgency of defending a formerly invulnerable homeland, and the anticipation of the most significant and challenging combat mission to come our way in more than a decade.

One compelling imperative for transformation stems from the continually evolving strategic environment's uncertain character. Strategists maintained for nearly a decade that no peer competitor would emerge to challenge US regional or global hegemony until at least 2025--if then. Analysts first suggested that Russia's strategic power-projection capabilities could be revitalized and challenge US interests in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. As Russia continued its decline, however, the likelihood of that possibility became less and less plausible. Gradually theories about a potential clash with an emergent China replaced fears of a revitalized Russia. China's vast territory, equally vast population, and unrealized economic and military potential appealed to those in search of an enemy. A more thorough look at China, however, reveals the distance that country must travel to achieve peer-competitor status in any strategically significant dimension. The next closest candidates for peer competitor status are the democracies of India (with a growing population and a high-tech economic base) and the European Community (with its dramatic economic surge). However, planners are almost required to employ the science-fiction realm to devise a credible scenario that leads to military conflict between either of these candidates and the United States.

Just when consensus seemed to congeal around the realization that American dominance--"reluctant hegemony" as some characterize it--appears set to prevail for the long haul, a host of challenges and a dramatic change in strategic focus emerged. The global war on terrorism seemed to violate deeply held beliefs among US military professionals about how to employ military power. Throughout the 1990s, experience appeared to confirm that short, decisive campaigns, overwhelming military power, and unwavering public support worked together in an almost algebraic way--certainly in an axiomatic way--to produce battlefield success. The war against terrorism violates nearly all of these principles. First, national leaders agree that this conflict has no clearly defined end state or end time. We have no obvious metric for strategic success against enemies with a mesmerizing message that convinces followers from all economic classes to abandon family, money, country, and even life to strike at US ideals and substance. Sec ond, the front lines of the war on terror involve combating ideologies; and ideologies are notoriously immune to the core competencies that soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen so proudly nurture. Special operations forces (SOF) most effectively occupy the front lines of counter-terrorist campaigns to the extent that they are subject to military force at all. Third, public support for such campaigns is notoriously fickle, and may fade if no more terrorist attacks reach American soil. American notions of justice and fair play can drain the energy from a SOF-centric campaign if the public perceives that tactics used to achieve tactical or operational goals--no matter how worthy those goals may be--threaten to tarnish our ideals of justice and honor.