Decision-Making Process May Need Update
By Lt. Gen. James M. Dubik, U.S. Army retired
T he Army’s Military Decision Mak-
ing Process has remained relatively
unchanged, at least from the time that
I first studied it in the early 1980s. Is it
time for a major update?
At its heart, the Military Decision
Making Process is a process that blends
activity of the seven battle operating
systems into a coherent plan that has a
good probability of success. The systems,
however, have shifted at least twice in
the past 25 years. Perhaps more impor-
tantly, a third change, one likely to alter
the MDMP dramatically, is happening.
The first shift occurred when the Army
introduced, then gained proficiency at
using, digital technologies in tactical
operations centers. This shift was an or-
ganizational one, going from an indus-
trial-age model to a network model. The
industrial model, below, is primarily hi-
erarchical. In this model, the battle op-
erating systems are more like stovepipes
integrated by the commander and staff
through the steps of the MDMP. Mak-
ing decisions, taking coherent action
and adapting is predominately sequen-
tial in this model.
This is the model I learned, then used
through battalion and most of brigade
command. Even in the latest doctrine,
Field Manual (FM) 5-0: The Operations
Process, the MDMP reflects this model.
Under this model, leaders within each
battlefield operating system are encour-
aged to coordinate with each other and
with other echelons within their func-
tional area. Final coordination, integra-
tion and synchronization of the battle
operating systems, however, remain a
function of commanders and staffs.
This model started to change in the
mid- to late 1990s as the Army intro-
duced digital technologies into unit tac-
tical operations centers during a series
of Advanced Warfighting Experiments.
10 ARMY n November 2018
The Army then used what it learned to
make changes to the force struc-
ture called Force XXI. Slowly,
a new network model, right,
emerged.
While the commanders
retain final decision au-
thority, the process that
feeds their decision is
much less hierarchical
and provides for more
simultaneity. The way
commanders and their
staffs can make deci-
sions, take coherent ac-
tion and adapt as a battle
unfolds—among echelons
of command and within
echelons of each battle oper-
ating system—shifted dramati-
cally as digital tools and methods
became routine. The tools allow much
more integration and synchronization worked model for its Stryker brigade
among the battle operating systems, combat teams. It became the basis
breaking down stovepipes and reducing upon which teams were trained and
the requirement for directive leadership its commanders and staffs were devel-
from commanders and staffs. This was oped. The current U.S. Army Training
the model I learned when my brigade and Doctrine Command (TRADOC)
in the 10th Mountain Division (Light commanding general, Gen. Stephen
Infantry) was selected to conduct one J. Townsend, and the commanding
of the Army’s Advanced Warfighting general of U.S. Army Pacific, Gen.
Experiments. Robert B. Brown, for example, mas-
tered the use of this model as Stryker
Digital Tools Create Changes brigade combat team commanders and
In a 1996 Land Warfare Paper, “Creating then at higher levels of command. Re-
Combat Power for the 21st Century,” I tired Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s My
described a first cut at some of the effects Share of the Task is a description of
that adopting a networked model may how his special operations command
have. Some writers at the time talked shifted from a hierarchical to a net-
about “self-synchronized” staffs. I still worked organization. Leadership and
think that was a bit of a stretch, but with- corporate action change, as Townsend
out doubt the digital tools began to change and Brown found and McChrystal
the way staffs served their commanders describes, in a unit that adopts a net-
and commanders made decisions, directed work model. Organizations are a net-
action and adapted. work of networks, or team of teams, in
Ultimately, the Army used the net- McChrystal’s parlance.
Some form of hierarchical leadership re-
mains and always will, but much dissolves
as the network of commanders and staffs
do their work. Mission Command and
intent predominates rather than directive
command, staff work is more simultane-
ous and continuous than sequential and
episodic, and overall the organization is
more decentralized than centralized—all
without loss of coherence in execution.
The Army has captured this change in its
leadership doctrine, but not yet in the doc-
trine that describes the MDMP process.
The second shift is one of substance.
Parts of the seven battle operating sys-
tems themselves are changing. The ma-
neuver system, for example, routinely
includes consideration of military and
nonmilitary “forces.” The intelligence
system has expanded beyond its origi-
nal enemy, terrain and weather consid-
erations.
Additionally, it now includes more
open source material than it had. The
fires system has expanded as well, in-
cluding not only kinetic fires but also
nonkinetic fires associated with the in-
formation sphere. The protection sys-
tem, initially primarily the arena of air
defense and military police, includes
protection against electronic warfare and
cyberattack.
Further, units find they must protect
themselves against false news stories—
a phenomenon I first experienced in
Bosnia in 1998 is a common occur-
rence. The mobility and countermobil-
ity system had been the realm of ensur-
ing freedom of action through combat
engineering: putting in obstacles that
impeded the mobility of the enemy
while taking action that ensured the
mobility of the friendly force. Now,
commanders and staffs must also think
in terms of ensuring their freedom of
action in the cyber and public informa-
tion domains as well as in the physical
domain.
Emergence of Cyber
Perhaps the biggest change is the emer-
gence of an eighth battle operating system:
cyber—which is emerging as a separate
system and an aspect of each of the other
systems.
These changes have been gradual, and
the Army has adapted in practice. That
adaptation would be apparent if one
could compare how my infantry battal-
ions used the battle operating systems
and the MDMP in 1988 to an infantry
battalion today. Practice has changed,
but less so doctrine. The stability of
doctrine is understandable, even de-
sirable to a certain extent. Institution-
ally, the Army doesn’t want to radically
alter one of its core processes—the
MDMP—without significant reason.
But that reason may be upon us: the
ongoing shift to incorporate artificial
intelligence.
Using Artificial Intelligence
FM 5.0’s Steps 4 and 5 of the MDMP,
Course of Action Analysis and Com-
parison, seem like natural areas in which
to use artificial intelligence. Assessing
relative combat power, analyzing force
ratios and providing a rough troop-to-
task analysis seem likely opportunities
for artificial intelligence tools. Creating
the synchronization matrix associated
with wargaming as well as the charts
comparing courses of action and at least
the initial decision matrix also seem like
potential artificial intelligence enhance-
ments.
An artificial intelligence-enhanced
wargaming function, however, is likely
to affect the MDMP beyond these two
steps. Step 2, mission analysis, is also
one that would likely benefit from arti-
ficial intelligence. Artificial intelligence
tools could easily help the staff update
running estimates and the intelligence
preparation of the battlefield. These
tools could also assist in producing
drafts of the commander’s critical in-
formation requirements, essential ele-
ments of friendly information and risk
analysis. Artificial intelligence search
engines could scan appropriate doctrine
as well as orders and policies of senior
and adjacent units for information af-
fecting the mission at hand.
These search engines could even
conduct an initial assessment of time
allocation, provide the initial draft of
commander’s guidance and produce a
first cut at the list of stated and implied
tasks as well as essential tasks and a re-
stated mission. Artificial intelligence
tools could provide the common grist
for the multiple boards and synchroni-
zation meetings necessary in the orders
production process.
Properly designed artificial intelli-
gence tools might even be able to sound
an alarm when changes in one battle
operating system within the unit, at
higher headquarters or with adjacent
and supporting units affect the courses
of action being considered—an es-
pecially important function between
course of action approval and orders
production, or between orders produc-
tion and execution, Steps 6 and 7.
Finally, in Step 7, artificial intelli-
gence tools could increase the speed of
production and distribution of warning
orders and the final operations order.
None of the above would change the
essential roles of the commander and
staffs, but would change how those roles
are executed. Much of the “nug work” of
the MDMP would be allocated to artifi-
cial intelligence tools, while the “thought
work” was left to the commander and
staff. Doctrine will be key to describing
the proper use of artificial intelligence
and the rightful domain of commanders
and staff.
Change Takes Time
Such dramatic change, however, needs
time. While one may be able to posit leap-
ahead technologies, there are few leap-
ahead people and even fewer leap-ahead
corporate processes. Rather, new mindsets
and processes of human beings and the
organizations through which they act
emerge over time, usually through ex-
perience, trial and error, and painful as
well as insightful learning.
I am sure the Army is experimenting
with an artificial intelligence-enhanced
MDMP—and if it’s not, it should
be. In the interim, TRADOC should
consider updating FM 5-0 to include
modifications to the MDMP resulting
from the first two shifts in the battle
operating systems and publishing a
525 pamphlet to provide nondirective
guidance and information as it contin-
ues to develop the appropriate doctrine
for an artificial intelligence-enhanced
MDMP. These adjustments would be
essential in slowly changing the mind-
sets of commanders and staff and pro-
viding the grist for professional debate
and an experimental campaign with
which the Army could learn its way
to an artificial intelligence-enhanced
MDMP future.
Lt. Gen. James M. Dubik, USA Ret.,
a former commander of Multi-National
Security Transition Command-Iraq, is
a senior fellow of the Association of the
U.S. Army’s Institute of Land Warfare.
He is the author of Just War Reconsid-
ered: Strategy, Ethics, and Theory.
November 2018 n ARMY 11
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