The Neon Green Thong

When I said that my Maintenance Test Pilot was standing around in Iraq in a Kevlar, body armor, boots and a neon green thong, I was not kidding. Much like discovering a laser ranger finder designator in a 20’ MILVAN in my motorpool, I cannot make this sh*t up.

We were walking back from the flight line. Dawn was breaking, allowing shimmering morning light to slowly creep across the sh*thole we called FOB MacKenzie. The scents of the burn pit and the blackwater pond behind the oft-broken shower trailer wafted delicately through the air. In the morning haze, our 1SG was arriving in our trusty 5-ton with a homemade breakfast of rubbery powdered eggs, Grade-E meaty sausage patties, instant grits, and a gluey concoction that was either cement aggregate or oatmeal. We were lucky to have such a delicious fare prepared for us by men who’d probably been on patrol a few hours prior in Ad Daluyiah. It was one of those rare mornings when we’d been stuck out in Ba’qubah all night because of a massive fog bank that had rapidly descended upon Diyala before we could make the run for the drier Salah ad Din province area. We were groggy. We were eager for breakfast and bed. We were not expecting to see the maintenance test pilot, taking in the majesty of the rising sun over Iraq, while enjoying a morning smoke and cup of coffee. As the threat of indirect fires was always present, he was appropriately dressed in his Kevlar, body armor, and boots.

And a neon green thong.

Only the thong.

Warrant officers.

*le sigh*

Well, at least he was wearing his Kevlar and body armor.

Have guns? Will evac?

ATTENTION IN THE TOC: This is a serious post. If you don’t like serious posts, please check back tomorrow when I will have likely written a blog post about the one time when my maintenance test pilot got in trouble for not wearing his Kevlar and body armor outside the safety of our reinforced hangar in Iraq… and was found the next morning, enjoying a smoke on the hangar’s make shift patio, wearing his Kevlar, body armor, boots… and a neon green thong. Only the thong. Seriously. That’s the cavalry for you though.

Mostly I write aviation doctrine. Mostly.

Mostly I read other branch's doctrine. Mostly.

Mostly I stick to debating Close Air Support versus my beloved Close Combat Attack. Mostly.

As a little background, I’m a scout pilot by trade, a former company commander by the grace of amazing soldiers, a one-time battle captain by sheer coincidence, and a current doctrine writer by happenstance. I’ve done all these things in combat, with the exception of doctrine writing. The forces that got me into these jobs were nothing more than right-place-right-time.

Since I’m not an assault pilot, and I didn’t really learn how to spell Air Assault until I had to help write the book about it (literally), I looked at the MEDEVAC issue from the perspective of a scout pilot. I hate it when people get all up in my cockpit with me. There you are, trying to develop the situation by scouting for gaps, flanks, and enemy weapons systems and you have a Battle Captain b*tchin’ in your ear about SITREP-this and BDA-that. I was hired to the aviation battalion battle captain job after two and half years of company command, and because I wanted to see that other side of the radio for the remaining three months of my Afghanistan rotation.  I have no idea what I was thinking. 

So, what happened with SPC Chazray Clark? I don’t know. I can only speculate that something went wrong regarding the launch authority and the escort requirement. According to some reports, the launch was delayed because there were no AH-64 Apache aircraft to escort the unarmed MEDEVAC aircraft to the point-of-injury as per the risk mitigation requirements for a pick up zone where enemy contact was likely. Given the nature of the risk of enemy engagements on the HLZ, you need that coverage sometimes. Even two M240B-armed UH-60s need an escort sometimes, especially when going to locations on the battlefield with a high likelihood of enemy contact. Reporter Michael Yon has ferociously championed the fight to remove the red cross from our MEDEVAC HH-60s and arm them, much in the manner of the Air Force’s combat search and rescue teams, known as Pedro. I don’t know if it will solve the problem. But I’m not a Whackhawk pilot, so I can’t cogitate on the airframe changes or weight restriction or space in the crew area. I do know that there would be some serious lag time between getting that approval to remove the cross and add the guns though, between air worthiness certificates and crew training. I tend to think that part of the problem can be solved by examining the criteria we use to examine and mitigate risk for launch. We have to ask ourselves whether or not we want to solve an aviation problem in five years, in this case once the debate on removing red crosses and replacing them with M240B door guns and gunners is completely done, or solve the issue tonight by realigning the way we fight.

So I’m throwing down the gauntlet and staking a claim in the fight. I think my beloved Battle Captain Mafia (BCM) should embrace this mission to shave those minutes off ourselves!

One of the best methods of solving the problem is addressing the warfighters directly, the crews and battle captains in the aviation force that handle the mission daily downrange. In embracing the difficulties and making honest small strides toward streamlining the launch process, we ensure the crews we send have the most accurate information and best coverage. With this, we can knock precious minutes off our clock, saving lives, limbs and eye sight. BOOYAH! When examining the issue from the platform of an aviation task force battle captain, the small fixes that can streamline the process become things that a unit can quickly add to its battle drills and daily battle rhythm.

What is the mythical “Golden Hour,” when does it start, and why is it even important to an aviation battle captain?

A battle captain is the manager of resources, of which time, people and equipment are categories. In understanding the start and stop point of the Golden Hour for MEDEVAC, we can examine the way that we efficiently prepare and launch our assets. As aviation is a limited resource on the battlefield, careful monitoring will ensure that the right resource goes to the right place at the right time, like MEDEVAC.

In this, we have to understand the “Golden Hour.”

First of all, it’s not in Doctrine. Anywhere. At all. It’s an informal concept that has taken root in the collective conscious of the Army and bloomed. Because it is not doctrinal, and the medical proponency has not blessed off on it, do yourself a favor and throw it away… especially if you’re an aviation battalion S3, battle captain, or air mission commander.

It does brief well though. Sixty minutes to ensure that an Urgent or Urgent Surgical patient is transported from the point of injury to a trauma center that can provide lifesaving procedures, typically a Level II or III Trauma facility. In fact, this is a common practice in the civilian aviation medical evacuation community: a strict adherence to time limits and time lines that ensure the timely transport of critically injured or ill patients to the resource best suited to care for them. It was studied by the medical proponency as a way to expedite the transport of urgent patients to. This is a good thing. Due to the application of strict time constraints on the transport of patients, survivability rates have increased. In the interest of being transparent, there is debate about the inflation of rates or the truth behind what air transport has accomplished in reality, but one cannot debate the importance of what air MEDEVAC crews have managed to accomplish to date!

Aerial MEDEVAC begins in a completely different place from where you would typically imagine: the senior medical advisor to the commander. In the case of Afghanistan, this is at CJTF. In order to preserve the medical evacuation assets, which are owned by the Army’s Medical Service branch, the employment of an air or ground evacuation asset to a MEDEVAC rests with the senior medical advisor. They are best suited to know the nature of the injury, the type of support and equipment needed during transport, and how long the injury has before it worsens. These are medical considerations that drive the selection of either air or ground methods to remove an injured soldier from the field of battle.

In other words, the choice to use a helicopter to accomplish a specific mission is a doctor’s choice. From that point, the 9-line is given to an aviation force to the fill requirement.

From that moment, when the approval message is received by the supporting aviation force, the clock starts ticking to fill the order. The current standard for notification, approval, and launch of MEDEVAC aircrews (and their escorts) is 15 minutes. This is all delegated and tracked digitally by the way, so it’s all broadcasting in real-time in everyone’s TOC. Because this whole process has been made digital through the convenience of modern things like mIRC and CPOF (or CPORN, command post of right now, if you’re so inclined and slightly cav-ish), we all share the same situation understanding across the TOCs. Whether you’re the IBCT Battle Captain or the CAB Battle Captain or the aviation battalion task force battle captain, everyone knows when the clock starts because we all see it in the chat windows. So, long before approvals are granted or leadership is being hunted down for launch authorization, the digital spider web of the BCM is hard at work getting crews spun up and coordinating for escort assets, if they were needed.

Launch Approval versus Mission Approval

The approval to launch an air asset rests with the senior aviation commander based on the level of aviation related risk. This is critical to highlight: mission approval authority and launch approval authority is not the same person. They don’t even have the same background. The ability to launch an aviation asset for an assignment has several critical considerations, which may be enemy threat, rules of engagement, weather, fighter management, escort requirements, and the overall tactical situation. These are things critical to consider for any aviation mission, let alone the launch of a MEDEVAC aircraft. Because these considerations cross the spectrum of aviation risk, the choice to launch the asset is given to the aviation commander, who understands these factors intrinsically. Furthermore, the staff of the aviation task force will have the optimum planning tools available to both identify and mitigate those aviation specific risks, which can include Air Force weather observation teams, aviation specific intelligence tracking and development, flight mission planning tools and software, and armed escort aircraft.

So, as the mission approval authority has the decision to use an air medical evacuation asset, the launch approval authority has the decision of whether it is safe and proper to launch the air asset. In sharing these decisions, the asset is both guarded and protected for use at the right time and place without risking the crew or loss of the airframe.

An Aviation Battle Captain’s Approach to MEDEVAC and Managing Assets throughout the Mission Period

In Afghanistan, aviation battle captains have a plethora of digital assets at their disposal to monitor the process of announcing and commencing the process of air MEDEVAC. Digital battle nets enable immediate posting, transmission, and acknowledgement of missions. This is followed up with standardized reporting to know when a launch has been approved, executed, arrived at the point of pick up, departed the point of pick up and arrived to their destination treatment facility. These digital announcements are critical to situational awareness for both aviation leadership and ground forces, anxious to know the status of their in-bound medical asset.

Part of being a battle captain is knowing how to manage resources in the immediate fight. While future operations and current operations fall under the purview of the S3 in total, and there is a high degree of interaction between these two cells within one shop, the there is a distinct difference between them. One plans for the future. One plans for the next couple of hours. So, how can the battle captain plan for MEDEVAC readiness when the fight varies? If I could offer the aviation BCM some nuggets, it would be this:

Preparing for the worst: Getting yourself postured as a battle captain to do MEDEVAC

                1. Examination of the ground force CONOPS daily. As the links between fellow battle captains cross unit boundaries in the digital world, frequent contact with the battle captains in the BCT and battalion tactical operations centers offers insight into the missions currently underway and those planned for the future. This information, when synthesized properly, becomes a window into knowing which patrols or missions are likely in end up in contact with enemy forces and lead to the launch of a MEDEVAC (or even a quick reaction force of attack reconnaissance aircraft), especially when paired with the constant stream of intelligence from an aggressive and proactive S2.

2. “Watching” the fight; “Knowing” the critical points. During the course of a deployment, as familiarization grows with both an area of operations and the coalition ground forces, critical points in a mission will unfold on the digital network to the people who pay attention to them. This is best accomplished at times by simply opening the right windows on military internet relay chat (mIRC), Command Post of the Future (CPOF) or even Blue Force Tracker (BFT) and watching. The key is to know what windows to open, who to talk with, and what to look for. In planning the day’s operations, review of CONOPs and discussion with the future operations cell will gives perspective on who should be chatted up digitally on the mIRC net. The first place the digital transmission of the 9-Line will be seen prior to the division or CJTF mission approval authority will likely be in the mIRC window of the battalion in contact. This garners a battle captain the ability to alert crews, gather critical information (such as weather or threat situation), posture attack aircraft as escorts, and start planning for launch authority notification, if needed. Once the rose is pinned to the unit to launch, the battle captain will already have the crews briefed and on their way to the aircraft. This saves valuable minutes in the launch process and provides time to react to changes. It is vastly easier to turn an asset off than it is to turn it on.

3. Alerting the Boss. There are times when the risk associated with launching an asset will exceed the approval authority of the aviation battle captain, and the leadership will need to be notified for approval. By watching chatter on nets and monitoring the fight as it develops, a battle captain can posture themselves to know how to quickly reach out to the right launch approval authority at the right time. This saves valuable time in the debate of knowing what risks may be associated with sending an asset into an area, especially considering the threat situation. This enables the commander to have the critical situational understanding he or she needs to put the right assets on the job. This also limits stalls in response time due escort requirements, premature launches, and “territorial” debates about missions. The more information that a battle captain can give to both the ground and air commander will ensure that tactical trust is present. When there is tactical trust in the ability of an aviation battle captain, the commander will also trust their judgment and suggested solutions to problems during the launch sequence.

4. Communicating with the Flight before the Flight happens. Prior planning prevents piss poor performance. Daily mission briefs need to be made available and given to any and all aircrews that are preparing to fill mission sets for the day: attack reconnaissance pilots (which includes unmanned aircraft systems crews), ring route or air movement crews, and the MEDEVAC teams on call. Every aircrew needs to know what a battle captain  has been watching and discussing with the ground forces via the digital networks, and any additional information that a battle captain can give quick reaction force personnel helps them to stage themselves in a position to launch or dynamically retask to assist ground forces. The link between the MEDEVAC crew on shift and their escort needs to be made in order to ensure that battle drills, limitations and considerations are shared.

                5. Dealing with the launch restrictions. Inevitably there are limitations to the use and application of any air assets on the battlefield. Air ambulances are no different in this matter. Between an aviation commander’s years of experience and intuition and the planning conducted by his or her staff, limitations are balanced with the need to safely meet mission. Restrictions aren’t bad unless they aren’t reexamined for poignancy every now and then. As a battlefield changes during the course of a deployment, and the need for security increases or decreases. Consequently, the needs of the unarmed air ambulance to have a standard UH-60 chase aircraft or attack escort for launch will also change. As an example, if an AH-64 is necessitated to escort an air ambulance to a point-of-injury pick up, units will determine whether weapon sight systems for the attack escort must be completely optimized prior to departure from the FOB or allow for optimization in flight. This is a trade-off for the commander. Does he allow for immediate take-off and system optimization in flight, risking the inability of the attack escort to provide immediate suppression of enemy fire once the berm is crossed? Or does he wait for optimization, allowing precious minutes to tick by on a soldier’s life? These are difficult considerations that are managed by frequent and careful examination of both the risks and the mitigation measures in place.

                6. How to instruct the ground force on using their asset. Whether serving a ground force commander in a direct support or general support relationship, air ground integration goes beyond just sharing the ground force scheme of maneuver or the effects of the AGM-114R from an AH-64D. The ability of a battle captain to articulate limitations to the ground force staff about air MEDEVAC is every bit as critical as discussing weapons effects. Much of this is air ground integrations is accomplished through a competent and proactive brigade aviation element prior to leaving the home station. Even with comprehensive air ground integration, the highly charged and emotional atmosphere of an urgently needed MEDEVAC can cause rifts in the shared understanding that ground and aviation units have. Having a well thought and well crafted plan ready for the ground force commander is every bit as vital as having one ready for the aviation commander. This is where a battle captain can preserve an asset from being misused prior to it even being needed or requested.

SPC Clark was a tragic loss. I don’t know what happened. I can’t help but wonder that, if he’d been injured during my watch as a battle captain, maybe things might have been different. I wonder if I would have planned my asset allocation differently . I wonder if I would have recognized a fight brewing, posturing both MEDEVAC and escort assets in a better fashion. I wonder if I would have had a better solution to the delays for my commander.

Mostly I just wonder. Mostly.

I'm going "organic." And you?

Ahhh, Center for Army Lessons Learned handbooks. Love them. Hate them. It matters not. You should still read them. Sometimes you find gems, lessons that you can use later to build better systems in your own organization. Sometimes you don’t find gems. You find The Army’s “Organic” Unmanned Aircraft Systems: An Unhealthy Choice for the Joint Operational Environment, an AGI article by Major Travis A. Burdine of the US Air Force (originally printed in the Summer 2009 issue of Air & Space Power Journal).  Now, I will admit that is CALL Handbook (11-29) was from June of 2011, but it had Air Ground Integration on the cover. I was a proverbial moth to a flame.

Application for organic UAS as part of Army Aviation concerns me because I have, in the most poetic way possible, drank deep the kool-aid of cooperative employment and teaming between unmanned aircraft systems and rotary wing assets. I believe in organic UAS. I also know that UAS will eventually replace me as a reconnaissance platform, and I’ll be out of job some day. Acceptance is the first step to admitting you have a problem, right? Major Burdine’s article was of particular interest to me as it shares space on my desk at the moment with the notes from the 101st Combat Aviation Brigade’s combat training center rotation. 101 CAB is the first CAB to boast organic ownership of UAS, specifically the RQ-7B Shadow. If the Air Force has good ideas or suggestions for making this process of good integration better, I’m all ears.

Except it didn’t.

Major Travis A. Burdine, a graduate of the Air Force Academy, was both an E-3 AWACS senior pilot and has strapped himself into the control station of a MQ-1B Predator for 750 hours at the time he penned his opus Air & Space Power Journal. He was also the subject matter expert on Predator and Reaper systems on the Air Force Unmanned Aircraft System Task Force, assigned to the Air Staff in Washington DC. He was also a Standardization Pilot for the 432d Wing at Creech AFB, where large Air Force UAS come and go, raining doom down upon the doomed heads of our doomed enemies. It all makes me wanna sing The Doom Song. The man has street cred though; I’ll give him that.

Two themes kept creeping back in my head as I scribbled with a Sharpie marker all over the article: who is the customer for airpower and what happens when we separate the airpower customer and supplier by thousands of miles?

There is little that compares between the RQ-7B and its bigger brothers, the Air Force’s MQ-1 Predator and the Army’s MQ-1C Gray Eagle. They are all UAS, yes, but the Shadow is unarmed, save for a laser designation payload. It’s eyes, without teeth. Yet, it shares the same dilemma as the larger, armed versions owned by both the Air Force and the Army: who asks for it, who gets it, and who controls it. These are things that concern me as a doctrine writer for aerial reconnaissance, and as scout pilot who will work with these systems in combat operations.

It all opens with a scenario… naturally. The Air Force loves f*cking vignettes after all.

Grunt 21, an Army ground unit in the combat zone, replies, “Cyclops 55, this is Grunt 21. Go ahead with check-in.”

The pilot, located in a ground control station in Las Vegas, Nevada, says, “Cyclops 55 is a single MQ-1B Predator, currently overhead at 12,000 feet, armed with two Hellfire missiles, 21 hours of playtime, with infrared-pointer and laser-designator capability. Sensors are on the target house, ready for situation update.”

 “Cyclops 55, Grunt 21 copies all. Situation update is as follows: the ground commander has been waiting two days to get Air Force UAS support over this target house. We plan to execute a raid in two hours. We are looking for a high-level insurgent commander and a weapons cache.”

“Cyclops 55 copies all.”

Direct from Las Vegas, Nevada, folks! It’s your very own low density, high demand unmanned asset, complete with ample playtime for all your mission needs!... focus, Doctrinatrix.

Just prior to the planned raid, the UAS crew hears a call for help from Alpha 6, an Army special forces team located 15 miles away from Grunt 21. “Alpha 6 is being engaged. Multiple friendlies killed in action. Requesting immediate CAS [close air support]!”

Knowing that troops in contact (TIC) are the joint force commander’s (JFC) highest-priority objective, the UAS crew immediately conveys the TIC information to the combined air and space operations center (CAOC) and the special forces operations center. The CAOC informs Cyclops 55 that, at three minutes away, it is the closest asset.

I suppose I should have had my doubts about the article with the opening scenario. By the time I reached the end with CAOC dynamically retasking the UAS, I was justifiably pissed off… on behalf of the fictional commander for Grunt 22.

As the missile destroys the target, the Predator liaison officer in the CAOC receives a message from the original Army unit that was supposed to have Predator coverage all day: “Cyclops 55, there is an Army colonel on the phone with the joint force air component commander [JFACC], screaming about how you botched the entire operation by leaving his unit without his permission. He cancelled his entire ground operation because you failed to support him by departing your orbit . . . again.”

I’ve often said that the quick reaction force (QRF) mentality will get you in trouble, and it did in this scenario. When you have a mission, you have an assigned master. Obey your master until released from your mission or retasked to another mission by your master.

Who really controlled that UAS? The CAOC or the ground force commander to whom coverage and operational control had been given for that time period? Then again, the scenario lacked crucial details too. Was the UAS aircrew briefed on the ground scheme of maneuver for Grunt 22? Had they been part of the mission planning process for the ground scheme of maneuver? What was the established dynamic retasking order? Who was the approval authority for changes to mission? Who was the priority for support? Was everyone briefed on those priorities and authorities? What do you mean by “departing your orbit… again” anyway? Who is in charge of this little canine and equestrian extravaganza?

This is what Army pilots think about all the time. Well, that… and porn.

The first sections to the body of the article felt like fluffity fluff fluff to me, so much Air Force self-pandering and aggrandizing that I found myself scribbling the same question in the margin over and over again: Who works for whom here? I’m dangerous with a Sharpie, people.

“The primary purpose of Army Aviation is to support ground-maneuver commanders and their objectives,” Maj Burdine quoted that from just about every piece of Army Aviation doctrine that has ever been written. With the absence of a need to establish air supremacy in the regions we currently fight in, the customer is the ground force commander to whom the asset has been assigned. After all, who actually clears and holds physical terrain? I’ll give you a hint. It’s not anyone who wears flight suit.

Well, then. Fly to Afghanistan and get it yourself.

I choked through the article, which lacked grist on the cooperation between air and ground forces, favoring instead the Air Force method of asset control via the CAOC, centrally parceling out support from on high. Meh. I gutted through the discussion on rated pilots versus operators as a significant risk factor in the safety of combat airspace. I agreed with Major Burdine about the need to return to a better common operating picture in preparing to face an enemy with a significant air defense threat. I also agreed with him that the constant reliance on the restricted operating zone (ROZ) as an airspace control method is disorganized and inefficient at best. It was also nice to see the admittance that the “CAOC has little situational awareness of air operations below the coordinating altitude” since the “Army’s organic aviation assets such as helicopters and UASs take off, land, and fly at the discretion of the ground-maneuver commander.” Hey, admitting you have a problem is a good start, right?

Finally I got the part I was hoping to find: the zen-like, Big Lebowski-style lesson I was hoping for… kinda!

“Army leaders argue that organic CAPs [combat air patrols] of Sky Warriors [MQ-1C] supporting the division commander will be more effective than RSO [remote split operation] CAPs. An Army publication notes that ‘dedicated UAS at brigade level will increase effectiveness of operations by providing more responsive and more detailed reconnaissance.’ The Army contends that requesting UAS support in the Air Force’s method of centralized control is too slow and carries too much risk of having the asset diverted to other priorities. It also believes that RSOs negatively impact effectiveness due to the communication degradation caused by the 8,000 miles between crews and ground commanders. Finally, the Army argues that in order to fight as a cohesive unit, the aircrew needs to deploy with the units it supports, so as to ‘feel’ the intensity and tempo of the day-to-day fight.

These concerns are warranted; however, it is unlikely that the ground commander will be colocated with the UAS crews due to Sky Warrior’s runway-length requirements. The Army will use UAS communication methods similar to those the Air Force uses today, such as radio, chat, phone, and e-mail.”

The Army argues that it wants to fight as a cohesive unit? The aircrew needs to deploy with the units they support? Aircrews should ‘feel’ the intensity and tempo of the day-to-day fight? Okay, the last question is a little too touchy-feely, we-all-fight-this-war-and-suffer-together-ish. I’ll admit to that.

Anyway, there are more important questions to retort with anyway. Shouldn’t aircrews and ground forces be capable of constant and daily interaction to ensure that missions and battle drills are commonly understood and shared? Shouldn’t air and ground staffs be cooperatively involved in the planning process, from mission conception through the rehearsal and execution?

More importantly, what happens when the 30K generator that supports the command post takes a big ol’ dump in the middle of planning or executing your operation, and all your precious digital systems are gone in one nasty power surge? So much for air ground integration, I guess. 

So, now what?

Admittedly, the Army has not cracked the nut on dealing with airspace. We’re a disaster. Dropping restricted operating zones (ROZ) on the battlefield is a band-aid to a larger problem: the need for comprehensive airspace tracking and management, especially when crossing brigade boundaries. The ROZ is an inefficient method, especially when altitude and time separation can create a more seamless airspace if used properly. While a snap, or immediate, ROZ is ideal for company-controlled UAS, a Gray Eagle is a little hefty for such things. This is not to say that we should run back to the arms of the CAOC to solve this problem, but perhaps we should be looking to improving our communications with the Brigade Aviation Element and the Air Defense and Airspace Management cell of the brigade combat team. Just sayin’…

The reason Army Aviation was taken out of corps-level of control and placed down at the division-level of command is to increase access for the tactical commander, specifically the brigade commander. If the tactical units at brigade and below cannot get access to their aviation support due to dynamic retasking at higher, we have bigger issues… something Major Burdine’s opening scenario depicted. The decision to place large armed UAS at the combat aviation brigade and the smaller RQ-7B in the cavalry squadron was to increase the access and integration, just like we do for our rotary wing assets.

There is no right solution to the problem, but the problem continues to exist. Perhaps Major Burdine closed it the best way possible.

“Airmen and soldiers alike must put service rivalries aside, think creatively, and work together to solve today’s problems.”

Just like in anyone else’s private kitchen, the choice of organic or nonorganic assets is personal preference, but it’s the user who ultimately makes the choice, not the supplier.

Engaged?

The most difficult task any planning staff in an aviation task force can do right now is engagement area development. Honestly. It is. I dare you to walk up to any new pilot on Mother Rucker and ask them about EA development, and they would give you the same blank stare that they typically reserve for an instructor pilot who asks them about the requirements to enter Class B airspace. There might even be a ribbon of drool coming from their mouth after a second or two. It's not their fault though. This is part of the insidious nature of the quick reaction force mentality of today’s attack reconnaissance aviation. Engagement area development has little to no place in the QRF world of gimme-grid-freq-call-sign-and-we’ll-figure-it-out-enroute because it requires more than just using what you have on the rail to achieve an effect that you may not be totally sure of. There is little planning in QRF planning. Let’s be honest. It requires highly adaptive and responsive leaders who have a high level of shared situational understanding with the ground force commander to really get any semblance of mission success… without causing unforeseen area of operations lunacy later.

First of all, what is an engagement area, and how does one develop it?

An engagement area is an area in which the commander intends to contain and destroy an enemy force with the massed fires of all available weapons. The size and shape of the engagement area is determined by the relatively unobstructed visibility from the weapon systems in their firing positions and the maximum range of those weapons. Sectors of fire are usually assigned to subordinates to prevent fratricide. An EA should have four things:

1.) multiple battle positions from which to attack

2.) obstacles to channel the enemy and permit use of direct and indirect fires

3.) standoff from the enemy, to minimize enemy counter fire while maximizing the friendly probabilities of kill

4.) continuous visibility of the targets

The two most significant things to me would be items 3 and 4, and I’ll tell you why. It focuses the planning staff and the training of young pilots in the formation. But more on that in a second.

This has practical application in many different facets of everyday life. Have you ever gone genocidal on a hill of fire ants with a big stick and a can of Raid? Yeah, THAT is EA planning and execution. You massed all available weapon systems to achieve the desired effect, minimizing your own exposure to counterattack through standoff and a fire distribution plan. Look at you… all tactical. That's hot. 

EA development is simple when you know what it is, but the subtle nuances can lead unforeseen difficulties. Let’s go back to items and 3 and 4 now.

Number 3 is simple. If you don’t know what a system looks like on the sensor you’re  using, how can you engage it?

I have to know how to find and kill what the ground force commander wants dead. This means two things: I have to know how to use the systems on the aircraft to fix the enemies disposition and then I have to know what effect I want to have on the enemy, based on what the ground force commander really wants.

Item 4 is a little tougher. There is a subtle difference “dead,” you know.

In order to achieve “a high probability of kill,” I have to know what kind of kill the ground commander wants. Does he want a mobility kill? What about a personnel kill? A firepower kill? Or does he want a total kill… the infamous K-KILL? All of these have different requirements for individual weapons and targets. While one AGM-114P+ (our UAS brethren’s missile of choice) can be enough for a sedan full of Haqqani fighters, one AGM-114R (your standard HF radar missile) is not going to  even make a dent in a reactive-armored T-72 main battle tank, the preferred tank of all good communist oppressors and soviet-backed warlords the world over.

In short, one Hellfire missile does not equal one dead tank. 

Despite the increase in knowledge on the part of our ground forces on what varying weapons may be hanging from the racks of an AH-64D, this hasn’t gotten us back to positive effects based planning. We, as aviation specialists, have to ask the right questions. “What effect do you need?” Not “what weapon do you want.”

So, this is important to note because the ignorance of real weapon effects is an epidemic across the Army today. This is because we neither understand how to predict them, nor how to train for them. We’re still focused on the need for grid-freq-call sign-use-what-you-got. In the effort to return the Army to standards and effective training for the next war, we have an obligation to young pilots to foster tactical curiosity about the enemy they will face in the future.

At some point, we will hand the young LTs and WO1s a can of Raid and a stick, pointing them in the direction of a former soviet-funded nanny state to do their worst. We should probably engage that issue now. 

Additional Doodies

I promise! No air ground integration gripes today. Today we are going to let the company commanders of the Army Aviation community breathe a collective sigh of liberating relief. We're going to talk about something near and dear to your hearts: additional duties. And then we're going to say all the things you always wished you could say to the people who gripe about them…

Catharsis, my fellow signers of the commander’s hand receipt. It's healthy.   

Ahh, additional duties. We’ve all had them. The AER officer, the Aviation Life Support Equipment dude, the voting assistance officer, the snack-o… all of these duties are assigned for three reasons:

Additional duty orders dating to the Civil War. And you
thought you had it rough when you were getting ready
for the Command Inspection Program!

1. Provide diligent oversight and management of critical tasks within the company or troop that one person cannot manage alone to ensure accountability, safety, good performance, and standardization.

2. Provide a school-trained or certified point of contact for issues or concerns regarding the maintenance or management of a specific program, who is also a user of their own program and thereby provides a sense of “ownership” to ensuring that systems function smoothly.

3. Give the commander something to discuss on your OER… other than your self-proclaimed awesome skills at flying. Which really? You’re not as awesome as you think you are, especially when you’re a CW2 with 310 hours and you’re six months out of flight school.

The positive side of additional duties is the benefit of being able to give a diligent officer a measure of additional responsibility... one that extends beyond their primary duty of sitting around the pilots’ office, telling dick and fart jokes, and pretending to study emergency procedures and limitations in order to avoid the wrath of the company’s standardization pilot. The commander, 1SG, and platoon leaders cannot hold down all the jobs associated with a functioning line aviation company, and still effectively manage the primary task of leading that company. If they attempted this, they would be huddled under their desk, nursing the hidden fifth of Jack Daniels in their desk drawer and chain smoking.

In embracing the fact that, if you’re an untracked warrant officer, you’ll probably have an additional duty, you will realize that this is part and parcel to being an officer in Army Aviation. Suck it up. Drive on. Get over yourself.

With that said, don’t write an Observations, Insights and Lessons Learned paper about why your additional duty blows. In the subversive wording, we didn’t find a single viable solution to any of the problems you posed that would benefit the Army. An OIL paper is supposed to propose a viable Army-wide solution to problems. Your paper proposed one underlying theme: that you didn’t really want to do your assigned duty.

I’m sorry you got stuck with that additional duty (not really). I’m sorry that you had several additional duties to manage, along with being a competent pilot in command (also not really). Seriously? Everyone has to do that. Your whines, gripes, and general malaise about your pitiful situation in life while deployed to a large and well-furnished base in Iraq don’t impress me.

Well, if your additional duties are really that difficult to manage, I guess we can make them your primary duties… and you can enjoy the remainder of your deployment watching your buddies “act as a combat multiplier for the commander by moving parts, people and things throughout the southwest part of Iraq.” If you really believe that your job is to “get things done,” then part of that means that you might have to say no to the occasional game of Call of Duty with your buddies at their CHU or B-hut while you’re deployed, and buckle down, and get your chores done.

And anyway, everything we do in aviation supports the GROUND FORCE COMMANDER, not the aviation commander. Perhaps a little perspective is in order…

PERSPECTIVE. Now you have it.

… Well, okay… maybe a little AGI. Come on. Can you blame me?

Okay, now for an actual “lesson” for Aviation Company and Troop commanders:

In preparation for deployment, you’ll have to ensure that your night vision goggle (NVG) program is functioning smoothly because your goggles will break the moment you get downrange and take them out of their stylish, padded purse. Part of this program is completing period inspections for adequate function and safety. You don’t have to go off the FOB to find a certified inspector. Inspections can be done internally to the unit, provided you have inspectors assigned and trained with orders. Link in with your CECOM LAR and the Army Material Command and to have several people in your company attend this one-day training. Do it before you deploy, if you can. Get your fellow company commanders on board and make it a group thing (kinky). You can even have your trainer to come to you (help Uncle Sugar get his money’s worth from their services). This limits having to take your NVGs off-FOB for inspection and keeps your resources in the fight.

Field San(-ity)

So, as you know, we are rewriting aviation’s doctrine up here in the Penthouse. Part of sorting and rewriting manuals is figuring out what is really critical to retain and what you might be able to delete. It’s like cleaning out the fridge, but without finding something moldy in the back that growls at you when you pick it up. During this process, we have all really come to enjoy evaluating the things that are important when conducting operations, like movement to contact, and the things that are REALLY important to conducting operations, like field sanitation.  

And, really, there is only one part of field sanitation that anyone in the field truly cares about.

I couldn’t hold this back from the field any longer. Technically you cannot conduct planning and operations using draft doctrine or publications. It all has to be provided to the field (in Big Reveal style) by the Army Publishing Directorate. Consider this critical piece of technique (which is a method that is non-prescriptive in nature, as defined by JP 1-0)… like a “best practice,” as my boss is so fond of saying.

Actually, this was inspired by that same boss. He’s pretty smart, that boss of mine.

Take a good, long look, kiddies. This is what happens on a Friday in TRADOC.
We have cocktails... and write doctrine.
Don't say that "it will never happen" to you...





If you like this, then you'll love the rest of the chapter and the manual that covers it for Army Aviation: ATP 3-04.15, Aviation Sustainment. 

Helicopters in COIN: Quality versus Quantity



MAJ Crispin Burke.
He wants YOU to help rewrite the COIN manual.

Carl Prine penned a missive called A Strategy for the Birds back in November of 2011, and it’s been stuck in my craw ever since. It also got me involved (albeit, inadvertently) with the counterinsurgency crowd, even though I have my doubts about aviation’s positive impacts on COIN, especially in Afghanistan. But, whatevs. Strategy is not my bag. I leave that up to much smarter men than I.

Aviation tactics and techniques? Now those are my bag.

There is no doubt that helicopters are a critical tool for the ground force commander. This is doubly so in a nation where vast stretches of land have little or no infrastructure to aid in the penetration of what would typically be seen as insurmountable terrain. Afghanistan needs helicopter support to advance the efforts of ground tactical commanders in securing both physical and human terrain in the fight against Taliban insurgency.

Unfortunately, it’s not a panacea like some might have you believe.  Some… like most aviation battalion, squadron and brigade commanders. Now I love me some CAB and BN task force commanders, don’t get me wrong. My heart is wedded to the idea that commanders must advance the efforts of their formations, especially when that formation is part of the Movement and Maneuver Warfighting Function.

But when it comes to the assessment of our effects on battlefield, ADP 5-0, The Operations Process, should have us taking a step back and considering how we, in aviation, measure our effects when it comes to nesting our aviation tactics with the national strategy of winning a nearly unwinnable conflict.

I know. I knoooooow. Today, as I write doctrine, I feel impotent and not important. But my goal is to get planning staffs to make their assessments of their success more important… and less impotent.

Flaccid?

Flat?

Yeah. Flat. Sounds less smutty that way. 

So, anyway, back to the aviation doctrine stuff.

The American military loves technology. The way the ground force commanders fetishize (great word, Carl) aviation technology is unparalleled in today’s fight. Unmanned aircraft, attack helicopters, air assaults… we rely on rotary and fixed wing aircraft to do nearly everything that we once relied on pack animals, 5-tons and tanks to do in previous wars. We use Whackhawks to keep guys off roads that are riddled with ambushes and improvised explosive devices, but why? It comes back to the idea of helicopter-as-tactical-panacea when we should be addressing the strategy of breaking the IED network to make the roads safer for travel and transport. When we fly over the terrain, we miss the fights that we should be getting into: those critical counterinsurgent activities that connect the coalition to the weapon system of choice in a COIN-centric fight, the civilian population.

At best Army Aviation is a pusher to addicts, junkies strung out on the use of rotary wing to accomplish the missions that haven’t been enabled by political and national strategy to accomplish. Strategy has created a dependence on the helicopter, and then hamstrung the ways that we can use it. I’m not talking about the rules of engagement, which already embed multiple (and sometimes unnecessary) control steps in the process of engaging enemy targets during troops-in-contact, but use of modularity: the plug-and-play nature of aviation into the brigade combat team fight.

Yeah, it’s an Air Ground Integration b*tch-fest again.

Carl is right about application of air power as a curative to the ills of a gapping strategy, void of good assessment tools that are both qualitative and quantitative in nature. Since modularity cuts us off from the ground forces that we could organically deploy with, we don’t get the chance to develop the shared understanding of capabilities, limitations, and mission as an air and ground team. We can’t reach the point where our shared understanding of using helicopters transcends the simple application of technology in a fight. This leaves aviation leadership wondering what metrics are critical to assessing their battlefield successes. They ultimately go back to the old reliable ones: number of missions flown, people and cargo transported, air assaults completed, hellfire missiles launched, and bad guys killed.

In ADP 5-0 we see that “effective assessment incorporates both quantitative (observation-based) and qualitative (opinion-based) indicators. Human judgment is integral to the assessment.” It also concludes that “a key aspect of any assessment is the degree to which it relies upon human judgment and the degree which it relies upon direct observation and mathematical rigor.” Rigors offsets bias. Human judgment helps us to reach past mathematics of success and see that intangibles factor in the situation, especially in the highly fluid nature of COIN. There is a balance between quantity and quality of results. This is why Vietnam’s focus on the body counts failed its leadership as a good metric for success. It’s why we should avoid defining our success metrics in aviation by the same measure.

So, back to Carl. Whole fleets today can’t make Karzai’s regime more legitimate or puissant. I agree with that. Don’t you? But I want to take another approach at this statement and thought process. Negativity does not educate. 

Army Aviation cannot legitimize governments. Bombers in WW2 could not legitimize the allied efforts against the nationalist socialist party. Linebacker II was never going to succeed in giving the government in South Vietnam the legitimacy it deserved. Aviation cannot legitimize things. We delegitimize efforts through the failure of development of good success metrics and mission assessment tools that nest with the ground force commander’s intent.

Carl was right. Strategy of the ground force mission isn’t for the Birds after all. But the ground force’s tactics are. Let’s recage our instruments, get back to good air ground integration, and prove him wrong.