Multidomain Operations: The latest Evolution of Operational Doctrine

Doctrine is the guide by which Army forces conduct operations. As our environment and the world in which we operate have grown ever more complex and transparent over the past 40 years, Army doctrine has evolved and the focus of the Army has changed to support U.S. national objectives.[1] To keep pace with the growth, the Army has continuously sought to improve its operational concept and has codified those improvements in doctrine. The new 2022 edition of Field Manual (FM) 3-0, Operations,[2] introduces a new Army operational concept that retains the focus on large-scale combat operations, builds on the importance of integrating joint and multinational capabilities, and expands on the combined arms approach—with an emphasis on creating complementary and reinforcing effects with capabilities from multiple domains.

Multidomain operations refer to the combined arms employment of capabilities from all domains that create and exploit relative advantages to defeat enemy forces, achieve objectives, and consolidate gains during competition, crisis, and armed conflict. Multidomain operations constitute the Army contribution to the joint fight. All operations are multidomain operations, regardless of joint force capabilities contributed at each Army echelon. This is because Army forces employ organic capabilities in multiple domains and continuously benefit from capabilities that they do not control; examples include benefits gained from the Global Positioning System and from combat aviation support from the U.S. Navy or the U.S. Air Force. Multidomain operations demand a mindset that focuses on how Army forces view their operational environment (OE), threats, and roles within any operation.

Why is all of that important to you? As Army engineers, we are masters of the terrain (land). In Prisoners of Geography, Tim Marshall states, “The land on which we live has always shaped us. It has shaped the wars, the power, politics, and social development.”[3] But while we maneuver and operate in the land domain, we also enable forces that operate in the other domains. This is because all things that are man-made are controlled by a force that resides on the earth. According to FM 3-34, Engineer Operations, “Engineer operations are unique because, regardless of the intended purpose, they are directly aimed at affecting or improving the understanding of the terrain. In this context, the terrain includes natural and man-made terrain features. As a result, the terrain is central to the three engineer disciplines.”[4]

So, what does the modern OE look like—and how do the domains fit in? An OE is a composite of the conditions, circumstances, and influences that affect the employment of capabilities that bear on the commander’s decisions. Within the context of an OE, a domain is a physically defined portion of the OE that requires a unique set of warfighting capabilities and skills. The OE includes portions of the land, maritime, air, space, and cyberspace domains as impacted through three dimensions (physical, human, and information). The land, maritime, air, and space domains are defined by their physical characteristics, and cyberspace—a man-made network of networks—connects them, as represented by the dots shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. The Operational Environment (OE)

To be successful on the modern battlefield, leaders at all echelons must understand how these three dimensions impact the OE. From a small reconnoitering team action to a major offensive campaign, all operations affect the physical world, the humans residing in it, and the information it conceptualizes. Additionally, multidomain operations aim for Army leaders to think beyond previous planning considerations and emphasize the integration of the Army capabilities across the five domains to compound effects with sister Services and create multiple dilemmas to deter and defeat peer threats at the lowest cost.

An additional change to the updated version of FM 3-0 is the introduction of the strategic situation, which stems from the competition continuum introduced in Joint Publication (JP) 3-0, Joint Campaigns and Operations.[5] The strategic situation describes how the Army conducts itself across the range of military operations in three strategic contexts—competition below armed conflict, crisis, and armed conflict. Together, these three strategic contexts form a progressive continuum along which the Army must be prepared to proceed to match an adversary’s escalating violence and increases in U.S. national interest. Proceeding along this continuum is an acknowledgment that Army forces do not simply operate and create effects during conflict but can deter or defeat threat intentions or actions in competition below armed conflict. Below armed conflict, nation or nonnation states with unaligned interests use various peaceful and malicious methods to compete with one another and gain the upper hand. After all, according to Marshall, “All great nations spend peacetime preparing for the day war breaks out.”[6]

The traditional Army contribution to unified action during this strategic context of competition below armed conflict consists of military engagement and security cooperation while preparing for armed conflict. As events or incidents that threaten U.S. national interests occur, the strategic context gradually moves toward crisis; this may require Army intervention, and Soldiers may be deployed to forward locations to deter conflict and prepare for war. If all else fails, nation or nonnation states may use lethal force to achieve their goals. In response, the Army conducts combat operations, exploiting its preparations from the competition and strategic crisis contexts to defeat the adversary. Competition below armed conflict, crisis, and armed conflict are not foreign concepts. Still, the strategic situation helps leaders better conceptualize operations as the Army operates in different strategic contexts worldwide.

Along with the previously mentioned updates to the current edition of FM 3-0, additional significant updates and changes include—

• Establishing the dynamics of combat power—leadership, information, mobility, and survivability—which are generated by the warfighting functions.
• Identifying the four tenets of operations—agility, convergence, endurance, and depth. These tenets are attributes that should be built into all plans and operations, and they are directly related to how the Army operational concept should be employed. The new FM 3-0 introduces convergence as the concerted employment of capabilities from multiple domains against combinations of objectives to create effects against a system, formation, capability, or decision maker.
• Describing the nine imperatives as actions that Army forces must take to defeat peer enemy forces and succeed in operational environments extended through all domains.
• Providing an update to the operational framework. The update—
  • Expands assigned areas, introducing and defining zone and sector areas.
  • Removes consolidation area, as the consolidation of gains now occurs throughout the entire operation, regardless of location.
  • Reintroduces main effort, supporting effort, and reserve, which replaces decisive, shaping, and supporting efforts.
• Adding informational considerations to the mission variables, which are aspects of the three dimensions (physical, human, and information) that affect how humans and automated systems derive meaning from, use, act upon, and are impacted by information.
• Introducing influence as a ninth form of contact.
• Adding the strategic theater level as the fourth level of war.
• Adding chapters on Army operations in maritime-dominated environments and leadership during operations.

As in the past, the 2022 version of FM 3-0 will prompt the force to update other Army doctrine to nest with the new concept and framework. As the Army doubles down on its focus on large-scale combat operations, FM 3-0 serves as a reminder that the three engineer disciplines of combat engineering, general engineering, and geospatial engineering exist to provide the necessary support to commanders to assure mobility, enhance protection, enable force projection and logistics, build partner capacity, and develop infrastructure among populations and nations. Additional publications that are in the process of being updated to align with the newly published FM 3-0 include Army Doctrine Publication (ADP) 3-37, Protection[7], FM 3-34[8], Army techniques publications (ATP) 3-37.34, Survivability Operations[9], and various engineer ATPs. Engineers also uniquely cross among combat, combat support, and combat service support assignments. Engineer leaders play a critical role in analysis and planning at echelon. They must lean forward, understand the new FM 3-0 (to change their mindset), and use the information contained within when communicating with senior leaders and Soldiers.

As engineers, we are no strangers to the three dimensions, as we work throughout the competition continuum to constantly play a part in setting conditions; seeing the threat (and terrain); and enabling through construction, the building of partner capacity, geospatial analysis, and more. The five domains are trickier. Initial thoughts are that, as a ground force, we can only affect the land domain; but with some additional critical thinking, it is evident that we complement the others. For example, through mobility, countermobility, and survivability tasks, engineers provide critical endurance and agility to other forces, enabling them to gain depth on the battlefield. Engineers can enable all of the other domains by repairing infrastructure or enabling survivability at seaports of debarkation/embarkation (maritime), airfields and air defense batteries (air), antiballistic missile launch facilities (space), and satellite communication uplink sites (cyberspace). Although each of these critical sites is within the land domain, power is projected through the others. These are just a few examples; I challenge everyone to think critically when reading the updated version of FM 3-0 and to come up with other examples.

As a result of the new version of the FM 3-0 publication, engineer doctrine will be updated and sent to leaders within the Regiment for review. As drafts of the various publications appear in leaders’ e-mail inboxes, I implore you to read them and provide feedback; this is the only way to improve our doctrine. FM 3-0 is a critical piece of doctrine that leaders must read in order to understand Army operations and how each branch of the Army contributes to the fight. The U.S. Army Combined Arms Doctrine Directorate has developed multiple means of complementing and reinforcing the information presented in FM 3-0, including an audiobook, available at <https://rdl.train.army.mil/catalog-ws/view/FM3-0Audiobook/index.html>; an introductory YouTube© video, available at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFYjO3XHd3Q>; the FM 3-0 mobile training team video playlist, available at <https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPbbRw97BH2tcvslBqUGpuol9JzVxsgjM>; a series of Doctrine Digest videos, available at <https://usacac.army.mil/organizations/mccoe/cadd>; and the “Breaking Doctrine” podcast, available in both Apple© and Google© formats. You can also get involved by following the Combined Army Doctrine Directorate on Facebook©, at <https://www.facebook.com/combinedarmsdoctrinedirectorate/>.