The JFACC Supporting Function AUTHOR Major Gordon B. Habbestad, USMC CSC 1993 SUBJECT AREA - General OUTLINE Thesis: The Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC) inappropriately retains predominant decision-making authority in the joint target selection process which rightly belongs to the Ground Component Commander(GCC). Yet, the solutions to the problems between the services remain focused on cosmetics such as fair staff representation and internal procedures I. The JFACC Concept A. Success in War B Shortcomings C. Sea, Air, Ground Supremacy II. Service Differences A Strategic Targeting, Battlefied Shaping B. Organizational Solution C. deference to the Ground Component III. Supporting and Supported Agencies A. CINC's Objectives B. JFACC Authority and Responsibility C. One Person in Charge IV. The Commander's Needs A. Competing Requirements B. Honest Broker V. The Solution to Differences A The CINC's Targeting Duty B The JFACC's Supporting Role C. Today's Yardstick VI. Service Duties A. Land Forces B. Air Forces VII. Service Differences A. Perspective B. An Outside View C. Service Air Arms The JFACC Supporting Function As the services seek consensus on the function of the Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC) and work towards joint doctrine, we can challenge assumptions about the JFACC's authority and offer solutions to joint force targeting priorities which more effectively solve the difficulties surrounding supporting and supported forces. Current proposals offer cosmetic solutions to joint air integration and focus on internal efficiency and representation while neglecting the more basic problem. The single major problem about the JFACC concept for joint force air integration has not been properly identified. Meanwhile, solutions remain embroiled in controversy and JFACC issues wear the emblem of an intractable problem inherent in service organization. The JFACC inappropriately retains predominant decision-making authority in the joint target-selection process that rightly belongs to the Ground Component Commander(GCC). Most of the joint integration issues being addressed by the services are unrelated to the power of the JFACC, but focus on cosmetics like commander or coordinater, sufficient service representation, and Joint Targeting Coordination Board (JTCB) procedures. In reality a supporting commanders the JFACC, is making decisions on targeting which belong to the supported commanders the ground component. The JFACC concept remains the most effective use of U.S. air power during conflict. Operation Desert Storm is a superb example. Two years after the war with Iraq authors are still struggling to codify how the terrific successes of air supremacy were either successful, or unsuccessful , in influencing the outcome of the war. Further, they struggle with how the superior technological advantage of the United States, when converted to aircraft delivery of military power against an enemy, might influence the future conduct of war. True, these are important searches in the continuous effort to understand what happened so we might more effectively fight in the future. At the same time, we can also be led to a misunderstanding that a revolution in warfare is underway. It is sufficient to make a simple, yet defining, observation to keep us on our feet as we take a closer look at some important, and not so important, aspects of joint air power. The use of United States armed forces to implement political objectives is rightly focused on influencing, by force or intimidation, the political heads of state of opposing nations, which can be defined by a land mass encircled by a political boundary. The operative word is land mass. We do not fight for control or influence over the surrounding seas or the airspace above the earth's land masses for two major reasons. First, the U.S. retains world sea supremacy and can, in all liklihood, achieve air supremacy over any land mass and political boundary at issue. Second, and more importantly conflicts are defined by control of the earth's land masses described by political boundaries, commonly termed "nations". This is an important backdrop to developing the proposition that joint warfare joins supporting and supported forces together, much as the National Command Authority joins supported and supporting CINC's in pursuing national objectives.(14:3) In considering the use of force to achieve political objectives, the U.S. can postulate control of the sea and air. There remains only control of the ground to achieve strategic objectives. Yet it is the very control of the ground which brings forth the nature of the conflict in the first place. So, both by the nature of U.S. sea and air capability. and by the requisite control of the ground as the single remaining task, we find sea forces and air forces acting to achieve an end to conflict by helping ground forces achieve control on the ground. Air and sea forces support ground forces. Despite the many postulates regarding levels and generations of warfare, and the various foci of effort in the prosecution of the CINC's campaign plan, there remains this one long-standing principle which has held fast throughout history. In addressing the focus of the targeting issues surrounding the JFACC, we must remember the ultimate requirement for land force victory. The service differences towards aircraft employment and how best to serve the CINC--through strategic targeting or battlefield shaping, each in an effort to prepare for a ground offensive--is not a black and white issue, nor is it easily addressed by prescriptive methods inflexible to the situation facing the commander. Using the Desert Storm example, strategic targeting will give way to a focus on battlefield shaping as the date for commencement of the ground offensive approaches. How soon and in what proportion targeting priorities would transition from strategic focus to battlefield shaping caused great concern for the ground commanders of Desert Storm facing Iraqi forces. (4:2) Ground force commanders sought to maximize the destruction of the offensive capability of the enemy preparatory to an offensive. The JFACC targeting tendancy was to also continue strategic targeting in addition, each mission detracting from battlefield-shaping missions.(3:3) The current solution to balancing the differences between targeting priorities is through the correct application of basic organizational principles, namely, creating a balanced JFACC staff proportionately represented by all services(16:4). Yet, someone, from some service, remains in charge--the JFACC. Thousands of man-hours have been expended by the services in an effort to organize fairness into the JFACC organization. The results to date include a pending decision on whether the JFACC is a coordinator or commander, pending doctrine on how to handle airspace beyond the Fire Support Coordination Line (FSCL) in a mobile battle within the Marine's AOR, lack of Air Tasking Order (ATO) responsiveness, and a host of other issues. Even Fleet Marine Force Atlantic (FMFLant) and Fleet Marine Force Pacific (FMFPac) don't agree on basic organizational concepts.(13) Complex military organizations are structured around a simple idea--determining the strength, location, capability, and intentions of the enemy force, and fielding forces to attack his weaknesses in order to defeat him in the field. The monumental human effort is not so much an issue of victory, as it is victory at minimal cost in blood. The technological advantage of the United States was critical to maintaining air and sea supremacy in Desert Storm. The sophisticated and technologically advanced human containers called ships and aircraft were used to conduct missions with a relatively small threat to their safety. However, the land-based counterpart in Bradley's and M1A1 tanks contained only a small percentage of the force, leaving the preponderance of the ground forces vulnerable to enemy offensive action. The great advantages of aircraft speed or ship distances in avoiding enemy fire are not enjoyed by ground forces preparing for an offensive. It is sufficient to observe that duty in war carries risk, but risk is not evenly distributed. Military and civilian personnel who serve during conflict are due the greatest respect for carrying their duty despite the risks involved. Yet we all know the frontline ground forces face the greatest risks to life and limb. Who should determine the priority effort for destruction of the enemy but the very commanders who must lead ground forces into enemy-held territory? The ground forces stand to gain the most in resolving the complex problem of properly balancing strategic targeting and battlefield shaping. Without fixed-wing assets, the Army is completely dependent upon the JFACC for long-range air interdiction and long-range armed reconnaissance. In conflicts such as Desert Strorm, where a massive air assault precedes the ground offensive, having a greater influence in target selection will better place the Army in control of its destiny. Harold Winton, Professor of military history at the School of Advanced Airpower Studies at Maxwell AFB, wrote about the Air Force's new AFM 1-1, and compared the manual with emerging Army concepts. Airmen and soldiers have significantly different perspectives on how to conduct war. While air doctrine emphasizes the flexibility of aircraft power, land doctrine assumes the eventual need to assume some degree of control over the ground and views air power as a useful supporting force to achieve that aim.(17:29) Mr. Winton addresses important differences of how the services might approach warfare. The differences discussed should be considered when approaching the critical issue of what to destroy or neutralize in the effort to achieve the CINC's objectives. Current methods for target prioritization improperly grant deference to units flying aircraft--to the detriment of ground combat units. Despite the tecnological progress of modern warfare, there remains the inviolate principle of supported units and supporting units. Units flying aircraft are supporting units. Units executing offensive or defensive ground operations are supported units. The Goldwater/Nichols Act of 1986 developed responsibilities incumbent upon supporting and supported CINC's and provided for the commanders of supported commands to call the shots.(7:2-21) This decision-making power should apply internally to the CINC's command, moderated solely by his capability to provide it. The CINC as theatre commander seeks to integrate the full military capabilities of forces assigned. In an effort to efficiently utilize his aircraft in-theatre, the CINC centralizes control of air assets as the most effective way to achieve this end. For aircraft, it is the JFACC's duty to execute this integration. When services come together under a combatant commander to fight a war as a joint force, one of the CINC's important decisions is the selection of the JFACC. The measure of authority the CINC accords the JFACC and how the JFACC fulfills his responsibilities impacts high-level commanders throughout the theatre In joint warfare today, individual services retain some aircraft sorties to execute missions in accordance with their warfighting doctrine. The percentage of aircraft sorties apportioned from each service for joint missions is determined by the CINC. The JFACC then allocates the apportioned forces to specific missions. The 1986 Omnibus Agreement, combined with current joint and service doctrine, provides the authority for a portion of Marine aircraft sorties to be flown in support of the joint force as allocated by the JFACC.(6:1) The JFACC's primary purpose, according to the air force JFACC Primer, is to create "unity of effort for employing air power for the benefit of the joint force as a whole." JFACC responsibilities include planning, coordinating, allocating, and tasking aircraft for long-range reconnaisance, interdiction, and defensive counter-air missions outside the ground component commanders' areas of responsibility. He retains tactical control (TACON) of these assets while the respective service retains operational control (OPCON).(1:11) Reorganization is one solution to address problems within an organization. Another is to agree with a proposition formulated by authors Thomas Peters and Roger Waltherman, who postulate organization structure isn't important.(11:232). Despite the organizational language which proposes targeting equivalance found in most military concept papers, there remains, as an irrefutable bottom line, one general, from one service, who will be "head person in charge". That general should come from a ground component. There is too much organizational distance when establishing the power broker in targeting decisions in the hands of the JFACC. On the whole, service agreements appear to have met the basic needs of a warfighting CINC executing the air portion of his campaign plan without compromising service warfighting philosophies. The reality is that competing service component target requirements exceed the capacity of available air-to-ground missions. According to Colonel Williams, USA J-3 air target representative during Desert Storm, an honest broker is required to ensure sufficient weight of effort is applied to support the CINC's guidance.(12:70) This is supported by Lt Colonel Dade, a Marine Corps targeting representative during Operation Desert Storm, who wrote, "No other component completely trusted Air Force Central Command's (CentAF) ability to take off their JFACC hat during the targeting board, and then put it back on to make objective decisions when there was a nomination conflict with a CentAF target."(5:35) The Desert Storm honest broker was the Air Force component commander, assigned to dual-hat as the JFACC. Dual-hatting a component commander and the JFACC position doesn't work and caused problems with targeting contentious enough to breed disunity. Yet, a U.S. CENTCOM position paper written two years after Desert Storm backs up the original intention to conduct the Joint Targeting Coordination Board with the JFACC as chair, with the full intention to continue the arrangement during future operations.(15:7) The correct solution is to remove targeting privileges from the JFACC. Targeting is a warfighting duty and belongs squarely on the CINC's shoulders. If the CINC foregoes this responsibility, then it rightly reverts to the GCC. When men and material are organized and deployed for battle, the only thing left to do is to decide when and what to shoot, with what weapon. Repeatedly creating the ideal circumstances to kill the enemy and destroy his material while preserving the force is the essence of warfare. This rather simple reduction of armed conflict is not intended to trivialize the immense complexities and problems to be solved while prosecuting wars, let alone address concepts such as commander's intent and end state. Yet, the CINC remains rightfully accountable for it all. Modern organization allows for delegation of authority and division of labor. To delegate the tasks of choosing where, when, and how to strike the enemy by delegating targeting, while becoming actively involved in logistics, for example, a supporting function, is to ask for problems encountered during Desert Storm. Major Motz, an EA-6B pilot, wrote in his JFACC study that JFACC targeting during Desert Storm had a decided strategic focus and it was only when Deputy CentCom got involved did the focus change to shaping of the battlefield.(9:68) With targeting duties removed, the JFACC will be busy enough fulfilling the CINC's orders. The great efforts by the services to organize a joint JFACC agency can be put to good use. Finally, the desire of a component commander to dual-hat as a JFACC might fade away when he realizes that the JFACC, as commander or coordinator, will be following orders rather than giving them. Desert Storm clearly demonstrated the effectiveness of a joint air effort in support of a CINC's campaign plan. Nevertheless, the JFACC concept executed during Desert Storm remains flawed and breeds contempt for the target selection process, yet remains today's yardstick for success or failure for U.S. joint air integration. Lt Col Joseph Collins, Associate Professor at the U.S. Military Academy, describes it well by saying that for better or for worse, Desert Storm is "burned into our collective consciousness" and will be a "benchmark for future US defense policy and military art."(2:83) At the same time, a closer look at aspects of Desert Storm, specifically targeting, is most instructive by its deficiencies, not its successes. While clearly demonstrating the effectiveness of a joint air effort in support of a CINC's campaign plan, the JFACC concept failed to gain the confidence of the ground commanders. Attempts to organize away this critical deficiency indicate a service-wide inability to recognize the more basic problem--that targeting decision-making belongs rightfully in the supported commander's hands. The United States has no competition for sea or air supremacy in the world today. Nevertheless, what good does that do this country when we face difficult issues such as Bosnia-Hertzegovina? The United States reluctance to pursue an aggressive posture in Bosnia, such as we observed after Iraq invaded Kuwait, is principally based on the great difficulty in gaining a significant victory by ground forces. We can conclude that despite the ease or hardship faced in achieving control of the ground bounded by the political entity at stake, when military forces are involved, victory by ground forces remains a necessary precursor to achieving the end-state and political objectives despite the capability to control the sea or the airspace Since ground victory brings conflict resolution, a reasonable strategy during conflict is to employ the joint force to ensure victory by land-based surface forces. Somewhat circuitously, we've returned to the crux of the targeting issue. In the effort to gain military victory, should final targeting decisions be made by the JFACC? Or should targeting decisions be made by the Army, the service designated by Congress to conduct land battle for the United States?(14:2-4) During Desert Storm, the Air Force component commander, dual-hatting as the JFACC, chaired the targeting board which prioritized targets. The land combatant forces, the army and the Marine Corps, took issue with strategic target priorities outside the Fire Support Coordination Line (FSCL), particularly when faced with both an imminent ground offensive and an enemy capable of inflicting heavy losses on attacking ground forces. The hegemony of U.S. sea and air power, and the necessity for land-force victory in today's conflicts demand that air and naval forces support the land-force commander. Should the supporting air forces also decide how the land force commander should be supported? Regardless of how the services solve this most basic question, until mankind begins to live on the sea, and live away from the earth's surface, the power to maintain control of the land mass will be the single requisite determinator for achieving conflict resolution. Individual service targeting differences arise from different perspectives on how to most effectively and efficiently utilize military forces to prosecute a war and achieve military objectives. By no means does this demand a major restructuring of our military. However, it should bring to light the critical requirement for land-force victory and the differences the services have in achieving that requirement Consensus is not required to address causative reasons for disagreement because equally viable alternatives exist for war prosecution. Still, a fair consideration of opposing views remains an effective and important tool to maintaining a clear understanding of the necessary events to conclude conflict and to choosing alternatives. However, as in the case of the Air Force study of the Gulf War, rejecting outright the portion of the study's results which portrayed a dissenting view leads a reader to question the original motives of research and analysis.(10:3) In Lt.Col Douglas MacGregor's study on the merging levels of war, he described an article by three Russian Generals studying the lessons and conclusions of the Persian Gulf War. (8:40)) These Russian Generals registered three important stipulations to the overall American capability during Desert Storm to project air and naval forces globally in order to exert political influence. These were: 1. The air offensive failed to destroy Iraqi ground forces. 2. The air offensive failed to destroy the Iraqi nuclear complexes. 3. It was the ground offensive that compelled the Iraqis to submit unconditionally to the American-led coalition forces. This outside perspective adds important weight to the necessary influence of ground forces to conclude conflict. The JFACC might take great issue with a proposal for him to act solely as a supportability advisor for targeting. Any objection to such a proposal would rightly recognize that units fighting wars are supporting or supported. The JFACC is a supporting agency. So too is carrier air for the Navy, and Marine air for the MAGTF. This will remain a fact of warfare for as long as political boundaries are drawn on the earth's surface. The Navy controls an air arm critical to successful mission accomplishment and integral to sea supremacy and protection of the fleet. Reluctant as Naval aviators may be in acknowledging their role in sea supremacy, they remain a supporting force of the surface fleet, while retaining the capability to project power ashore. The Marine Corps is a combined force organized to be employed as Air/Ground task force. Maneuver warfare being developed, taught, and discussed throughtout the Marine Corps makes no suggestion that the Marine ACE, as a maneuver element or as the main effort, is supporting or supported. The aircraft, independent of service, ultimately supports ground forces in their scheme of maneuver. Without the air arm, the Marine Corps cannot adequately support the Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) commander or the ground forces. Without ground forces, the ACE brings no meaning to the organization. Marine Corps force employment enables the United States to forward deploy at sea with an intimidation force which far exceeds political diplomacy or rhetoric. The very organization of the Marine Corps allows for support to ground units inherent within the organization, support which cannot be relied upon by Army units depending on JFACC allocation of TACAIR. One compensatory fact is the significant artillery capability of Army forces, coupled with the Close in Fire Support (CIFS) provided by the Blackhawk helicopter. However, these forces were not employed for 38 days into the Gulf War and did not bring their offensive firepower to bear until the ground offensive began. If future conflicts are fought with a strategy similar to Desert Storm, the Army must still depend on the JFACC's target selection process currently envisioned. The position thus far stated, of targeting priority deference to the GCC, is vulnerable to an objection due to parochialism. AFSC Pub 1 states specifically that joint warfare demands that services drop prejudicial views for the overall benefit of teamwork warfighting.(7) Also, the process of instituting a major change such as a transfer of decision-making authority is extremely slow to implement in the military services, regardless of the focus of effort or the strength of the proponents of the proposed change. During the long and continuing process of developing joint warfare doctrine, the JFACC remains a commander and coordinator of supporting air forces seeking to reduce the enemy's combat power sufficient to ensure the greatest safety to ground combat forces pursuing their objective. One great contributution to joint warfare would be to place the destiny of the GCC in his own hands, allowing him to recommend to the CINC the balance between strategic and tactical targets for destruction. Service air forces will remain supporting forces for so long as the nature of occupying and extracting wealth from the earth's land mass remains prevalent over occupying and extracting wealth from the sea or space. Warfare can be expected to change at the same pace that political conflicts over land mass boundaries transition from land surfaces to the surrounding seas and the airspace. This is no small observation in defining the course of modern warfare today and anticipating warfare tomorrow. 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Munro,N. and Opall,B "Survey Questions U.S. Air Efficiency in Desert Storm." Defense News, 1-7 February 1993,3. 11. Peters,T.J. and Waterman,Jr.,R.H. In Search of Excellence. Harper and Row. 1982,232. 12. Schmidt,Col.S.W. and Williams,Col.C.L. "Disjointed or Joint Targeting?" Marine Corps Gazette, Dec 92,21-22. 13. Thomas,Maj.T.W. ,"Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC)/Omnibus Agreement," Lecture: USMC Command and Staff College. 12 January 1993. 14. Unified Action Armed Forces (UNAFF). Joint Chiefs of Staff Publication 2. Washington, D.C. December 1986,3. 15. U.S. Central Command Position Paper. "Component Representation on Joint Forces Air Component Commander" (JFACC). 4 March 1992,7. 16. U.S. Commander in Chief Atlantic Command and U.S. Commander in Chief Pacific Command Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC) Concept of Operations. 15 January 93,4. 17. Winton,H.R., Reflections on the Air Force's New Manual", Military Review. November 1992,20-31.
