Mission Command: Stepping Away from the Brink

Mission Command is simply the idea that competent leaders can be empowered/entrusted to execute tasks within the Commander’s (Boss’s) intent with minimal supervision to accomplish the mission. It relies on trust and competence, at echelon. The Commander must be able to communicate a clear vision of the mission and the desired end state. The US Army is capable of real time, or near real time, communication anywhere in the world using a multitude of different systems and technologies. However, Rotational Training Units (RTU) completing a National Training Center (NTC) or Joint Readiness Training Center (JRTC) Decisive Action Training Environment (DATE) rotation can attest to the difficulty in executing mission command under stress both for technical and tactical reasons. Recent training experiences indicate that well-intentioned leaders have been conditioned by both the pace and style of the Global War on Terror (GWOT) to undermine Mission Command. We can do better, and we can do more, by doing less — much less.

JRTC and NTC after action reviews make for interesting reading and are widely available. This past October (2019), the NTC Operations Group released observations that identified five main ‘challenge areas’ for RTUs. Two of those relate directly to Mission Command: “progressing from conceptual to detailed planning at the pace required in a DA, contested environment” and “arraying command posts to enable effective C2 throughout the depth of the battlefield.” As I read this, it transported me back to my Brigade Combat Team’s AAR following our 2018 JRTC rotation. On average, our brigade staff consumed 66% of the available time, from receipt of mission to execution, to issue the brigade’s Operations Order (to say nothing of all the meetings and “rehearsals” that came after). One result of this inversion of the well-known “one third, two thirds rule” was that there was no Operations Order (OPORD) at the company level for 90% of missions. The mission order is central to how we disseminate information and synchronize operations across our formations. Commander to Commander dialog will certainly drive visualization and planning, but translating that information and disseminating it to the junior leaders and war fighters responsible for its execution is critical. This is largely the function of the staff. At the heart of that effort must be simplicity.

The “One Third, Two Thirds Rule”

The “one third, two thirds rule” (OT3R from here out) is genius when you unpack it. Consider an operation where a division level headquarters issues the order 72 hours out. When the brigade receives that order, OT3R dictates they must publish their own in 24 hours. The battalion receives it 48 hours from execution and publishes its own 32 hours out. The company publishes its order to the platoons with just over 21 hours until execution. If you’ve attended a school focused on small unit tactics and leadership, you might have just done the math and realized that seven (7) hours to produce a platoon OPORD is familiar to you. If we truly want to execute detailed rehearsals and reconnaissance prior to combat operations, strict observation of the OT3R is essential. That is especially true because a unit in the field is rarely free to focus solely on planning. The more compressed the timeline, the more important OT3R becomes. Shared understanding, reconnaissance and rehearsals set the conditions to win in combat — not slides and appendices. “A good plan executed now is better than a perfect plan next week.”

If you reference the order from the Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force for the invasion of Normandy during World War 2, you will quickly note several things relevant to a discussion of Mission Command. First, the order was issued on 10 March 1944, well in advance of Operation Overlord. Second, the plan consisted of just two phases using a concept of the operation that was previously disseminated. Third, the order itself is just 14 pages long and the signature block is on page five. It is a masterpiece of simplicity. In contrast, before my last JRTC rotation, my brigade issued an operations order with over 60 pages and no less than a dozen annexes and appendices. A JRTC rotation is a complex beast, no doubt, but it is not anywhere near as complex as Operation Overlord. An order like that is a cumbersome, ponderous thing to produce and understand. It only gets worse with a heavy reliance on numerous, minutely detailed slides containing graphics and imagery. It is this style of OPORD production that so handicaps a brigade’s ability to progress “from conceptual to detailed planning at the pace required.” Not all detailed planning should occur before the order is published, nor should all detailed planning be published in the order. “The value is in the planning, not the plan.” There is a tendency for a staff, at the behest of the Commander, to try to tie up every loose end and produce something that reads like a finely choreographed script. This creates inevitable delay, an invitation to miss the forest for the trees, and an assurance that the unit will be off plan soonest. The NTC observations reiterate a lesson many already know: simply maintaining the ability to communicate in a tactical environment is challenging. The risk to mission created when leaders at echelon must attempt to synchronize an overly complicated, poorly disseminated plan in real time is both substantial and avoidable.

As a former brigade Commander said: “Fight complexity with simplicity.” What a simple operations order that speaks broadly, conceptually to subordinate Commanders and staffs enables is the basis for a Common Operating Picture that can be created and maintained not just on the latest Battle Command Systems, but in the minds of the Soldiers who actually execute the mission. It can be reproduced on acetate overlays and in green books. The company Commander on the move, with no operations center and no staff, can understand what you are asking of her — and so can her Soldiers. The clear delineation of responsibility allows for point to point coordination (i.e. adaptive, flattening of the organization) to synchronize resources. Commanders at echelon thusly empowered to make decisions at their level shorten the decision cycle by solving problems at the lowest level (i.e. agile). Critically, it allows a headquarters to observe the OT3R — and that means more time for reconnaissance, pre-combat checks and inspections, and rehearsals. In other words, it means more time for synchronization, coordination and the condition setting to actually win the fight (rather than just describe it in painstaking detail).

Albert Einstein is credited with saying “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” That certainly applies to mission command; a Commander who cannot visualize and describe the plan simply puts his mission at risk. High intensity ground combat is an inherently complex undertaking — any number of things can, and will, go unexpectedly. The job of a staff is to fight that complexity and work ceaselessly towards simplicity — not the reverse. A unit that works from a simple plan is far more likely to keep up with the pace of operations demanded by a DATE (or HIC). Timeliness and simplicity will, in turn, empower Leaders and Soldiers to begin the real work of making the Commander’s vision a reality in a complex, changing environment in which the enemy gets a vote. As uncomfortable as it might be to forgo the excruciatingly epic orders production the GWOT has accustomed us to, concise plans will enable Mission Command and yield something far more valuable than shiny slides: effectiveness in combat. We should train our Commanders and staff to that end now, rather than waiting for a “near peer” adversary to teach us the same lesson at far greater cost.