SGT Siwinski, Jon
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Over the past 18 years the army has been involved with two ongoing insurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq, because of our lengthy involvement the Army has changed its structure as well as mindset to fighting and winning against an insurgency. It has been a long and difficult road but with both conflicts winding down we can now see the bigger picture. That the Army is not at its most optimal structure to fight peer or near-peer opponents. I say that because over the last 18 years we have put most of our resources into combating insurgencies, which is the outcome when fighting two of them in different countries. The unfortunate outcome of all of this is that our rivals around the world have not been idle but have taken advantage by using the last 18 years to modernize their militaries in an effort to catch up with the United States. One of our rivals is China, and over the last 18 years have increased their defense budget. In 2019 the People’s Liberation Army’s annual defense budget was $177.5 billion, a 7.5 percent increase over last years (Frangopoulos, 2019). Another rival that has been watching us closely is Russia. With Russian officials seeing that their military is not up to speed with the United States and have also increased military spending and have come up with their own program to modernize their military. Their plan is called The Russian State Armament Program (SAP) for 2018-2027 (Gorenburg, 2017). With our rivals modernizing and the world changing the US Army has come up with the Multi-Domain Operations concept in order to meet and combat our rivals on the modern battlefield. Multi-Domain Operations (MDO) is the Army’s concept of combating war across all domains, which include land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace. In order to achieve this the army has set forth six modernization priorities: long range precision fires, next generation combat vehicles, future vertical lift, network, air and missile defense, and soldier lethality. The next war will be a modern war fought between two forces with equal or near equal capabilities. That means that the cost of war on the human solider is going to be high. The war will be the size and scope of World War II or the Korean War but fought with modern more lethal weapons. A war that will be fought over extended periods of time, six to nine-month deployments will be a thing of the past. A war that the only break you could get is a week of rest and relaxation off from the front line in order to reset and refit your element before being sent back to the front. Now more then ever soldier lethality will and should be a top priority for all leaders across our formations. Soldier lethality to the Army means providing our soldiers with the cutting edge of equipment to increase their lethality, precision, and survivability. Another area that we as leaders need to focus on is improving fitness, nutrition, and resiliency. As I said earlier the next war is going to be a long war that could see us being in far corners of the world for extended periods of time. It will come down to an individual’s fitness, nutrition and resiliency to keep them going in a modern conflict. As leaders if we do not take those three elements serious, it will not matter what equipment the army fields because we will not have capable or ready soldiers to use it.
As a leader my biggest thing I try to teach my subordinates is critical thinking and independence. When I give my soldiers a mission, I want them to expend every option that they have before coming to me. When they do not expend all their options and give up on the first try, I remind them that I am not always going to be there to help. An idea that will be put to the test soon with my units upcoming deployment which will see my two soldiers and myself spread across two countries. I am hoping this approach will be a good foundation in which to help modernize our soldiers for future conflicts.
Frangopoulos, A. (2019, September 19). Modernizing the Military: China’s Path to Hegemony? Retrieved June 27, 2020, from https://harvardpolitics.com/world/china-modern-military/
Gorenburg, D. (2017, December 18). Russia’s Military Modernization Plans: 2018-2027. Retrieved June 27, 2020, from http://www.ponarseurasia.org/memo/russias-military-modernization-plans-2018-2027
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