The Army’s vision seizes upon opportunities made possible by rapidly advancing technologies, with particular emphasis on information-related technologies. The Army’s vision of “See first, understand first, act first and finish decisively” is truly transformational. This warfighting concept would eclipse the combined arms, mechanized, heavy forces that have dominated land warfare since the advent of blitzkrieg in favor of far more dispersed, yet highly networked, forces that fight the decisive battle not at close range but at extended ranges.
The Army’s transformation is designed to proceed along multiple force-structure paths. It plans to upgrade a portion of the Current (formerly Legacy) Force as a hedge against its transformation proceeding more slowly than anticipated, and to deal with near-term contingencies. The Army also is fielding an Interim (now referred to as Stryker) Force not only to support near-term requirements, but also to serve as a bridge to the fully transformed Objective, or Future Force.
The Army’s vision, while revolutionary, is also to a great extent circumstantial; that is to say, it is focused primarily on what might be termed the conventional, or “open” battle—engagements between regular, or conventional, forces in relatively unrestricted terrain. To this is added the ability to deploy forces from the Expeditionary Army very rapidly, in an anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) threat environment. This is a desirable characteristic. By demonstrating that it is not only dominant in open battle against conventional forces in this era, but that it intends to maintain this dominance in the post-transformation era, the Army may dissuade enemies from creating ground forces to challenge the US military directly.
Moreover, by seeking to field a dominant ground force that can deploy and operate in an A2/AD environment, the Army is trying to ensure that the current US dominance in power-projection operations is sustained in a post-transformation conflict environment. Indeed, the Army, because of its potential ability to disperse its combat capability more widely than any of its sister Services, is potentially the force most capable of operating underneath an enemy’s A2/AD threat umbrella.