Military Review English Edition May-June 2016 | Page 101

FORCE AGILITY

or (2) create agile systems to speed decision making for
Even if the Army could know where conflicts would
successful operations. The historical record of predictoccur and why, the knowledge would be insufficient
ing the military future has shown that the chances for
to design, plan, and lead an effective military operafailure are high, and the chances for success are slim.
tion. Generalized prediction of the conditions where
On the other hand, agile systems like FA-CDT could
forces would be likely to fight and the causes of conflict
help the Army accomplish missions that it might not
in certain geographical areas are also insufficient for
be able to predict.
force-generation activities intended to ensure deployed
Prediction. The failure of the French Maginot
forces are equipped, resourced, and trained to achieve
Line, built during the pre-World War II years along the
military success.
French and German border, offers a warning on the
To fulfill its mission, “to fight and win our Nation’s
shortcomings of military prediction. The French built
wars,” the Army must determine how it can rapidan extensive static defense, based mainly on experience
ly understand, learn, adapt, and execute military
and old technology. This approach did not predict or
operations to defeat future threats.8 The objective of
anticipate the rapid advance of technology (such as faster technological approaches like FA-CDT is to meet the
tanks and glider infantry) and new tactics (such as blitzArmy’s goal for agility, “the ability of friendly forces to
krieg) that rapidly neutralized static defense.4 During
react faster than the enemy.”9
the German invasion
of France and the Low
The Combination of
Countries at the start
Crowdsourcing, Big
of World War II, the
Data, and Mobile
Nazis outflanked the
Gaming
Maginot Line and renFor success in future conflicts,
dered years of effort
the Army needs to rapidly unuseless.5
derstand, create, test, revise, and
Agility. The path
implement new tactics and plans
of trying to learn
that will have the best probabil(Image courtesy of WIkimedia Commons)
quickly how to defeat
ity of success. The FA-CDT techVainglory, a mobile multiplayer online battle arena game by Suthreat tactics also
nology offers the combination
per Evil Megacorp being played on an iPad, 5 September 2014.
is challenging. For
of crowdsourcing, big data, and
example, the Army discovered in Iraq that defeating
mobile gaming to help achieve these goals. Additionally,
the threat