MAGAZINE
SPRING 2021
READINESS AND BEYOND
By British Army Lieutenant General Sir Edward SMYTH-OSBOURNE , COM ARRC
Late last November Commander LANDCOM presented
ARRC with the Warfighting Corps ‘ guidon ’, a totemic recognition of our role as the NATO Warfighting Corps at Readiness . We are the first NATO Corps since the Cold War to occupy such a role . Consequently , we were asked to provide LANDPOWER with a short think-piece on the journey to readiness . I set out below some of our more pertinent observations .
Warfighting is the core of the Corps From its origin , ARRC has been a multinational warfighting corps . Our forebearers in Wellington ’ s Army fought at Waterloo under the command of King William II of Holland – the ‘ Prince of Orange ’ – as part of a force comprised of British , Dutch , Belgian and Hanoverian troops . At one stage during the Second World War the Corps commanded divisions from the UK , US , Canada and Poland . By our nature , therefore , warfighting and multi-nationality is in our DNA . Our character , however , shaped by the course history and the demands of the day has morphed several roles .
Recalibration When ARRC commenced its recalibration under my predecessor , General Tim Radford , it was an organization optimized for counter insurgency operations ( COIN ). Given their experiences and those of this Headquarters , our people , processes and structures were imbued with the lessons and practices of Afghanistan . In short , we had specialized for high-intensity counter insurgency , at cost to the basics of corps-level warfighting .
A return to the basics is not a pejorative statement on the simplicity of warfighting . Rather , it is a comment on the need for a solid foundation of standard operating procedures that are fit for the modern age . The challenge for NATO forces therein is to vector evolution onto the path of emerging technology , this being a period of profound and exponential technological change . At the tactical-operational seam there are number of significant issues that we will need to address in the land domain . For simplicity , one might group these issues : factors ( common to all ), threats ( emanating from our adversaries ) and opportunities ( via concept development and experimentation ).
Rescaling We shall need to address the advent of extended range munitions and the impact that these have on how we synchronize and deconflict across the geographic framework . We have seen in recent years the influx of a new lexicon around the ‘ deep-deep ’ and ‘ close-deep ’ battle . Such terminology is as ill-fitting as it is clunky in adapting old models to new capabilities , given the need to develop a higher-tactical doctrine that accounts for multi-directional battle ; one
12