Military

Extensive reconnaissance patrols in an area alerts the enemy to pending operations, and thus may be a deceptive measure. You must maintain a responsive combat service support without lines of communication too long. You can try to avoid endangering refugees, but a successful offense depends on rapid, responsive and violent maneuver. Negative reports may be just as important as enemy sightings in the desert.

All units must be equipped, trained, and experienced such that they consider it more normal to move at night or in conditions of limited visibility. You should not disregard any target that has a long-range antitank capability. If you maneuver quickly around obstacles, you may find you are lead by the enemy into a fire pocket. Units are liable to lose direction unless routes are reconnoitered and even marked of with such insignificant objects as small rock piles.

Because of considerable use of ammunition and POL, offensive operations should use every opportunity for resupply. If caught in a sandstorm blowing against your direction, it is best to halt until the storm abates. A moving force is more at a disadvantage because of dust clouds and the lack of concealment. Where there is restricted trafficability, you should avoid frontal attacks.

You can retain the initiative by making rapid estimates of the situation and issuing fragmentary orders ("fragos"). You also need to commit units from march column. In a meeting engagement, you have inadequate intelligence of the enemy force, and you have limited time to develop the situation. You want to intersperse your field artillery throughout the formation for immediately available indirect fires.

You want to maintain the momentum of the attack oriented on the enemy's greatest vulnerability his combat service support system. Your major threat is a counterattack. An advantage of your plan is to attack on a narrow front to increase chances of favorable force ratios. You want mutual support of attacks and your reserves readily available to support the main effort.

When breaching a strongpoint, the initial phase is characterized by stealth, and uses breaching teams to assist assaulting forces marking lanes, clearing minefields, setting up ladders or bridges. You must effectively employ your combined arms teams not all at once, but so that one element is always in position to cover by fire while another element is moving to a new position. It may not be practicable to assault certain strong points with armored vehicles. Daylight frontal attacks have limited success against a well-emplaced enemy, even with considerable supporting fires.

You also must consider your unfavorable force ratio and identify the enemy avenues of approach early. Your best defense is to remain mobile and active with aggressive maneuver so you are not outflanked by the enemy. It is better to conduct the defense in depth. Instead of trying to defend longer from intermediate units, it is often better to counterattack to destroy enemy advance units.

You want to prepare to place counterbattery fire because the enemy has weaknesses such as not being able to pull back after firing because of cumbersome towed artillery or tanks with limited main-gun depression. The commander can do nothing more than react to enemy initiatives. He can't maneuver to destroy him until he establishes intelligence from scouts about the enemy's short-term objectives, avenues of approach or reality of movements. It is impossible to have firepower in all directions. You must be able to maneuver to threatened areas before the enemy. Rather than numerous small obstacles, your engineer effort should be expended on one or two main obstacles that can divide or divert an attack in desert terrain.

You must keep your observers high above the desert floor when the sun is low and in front of you when it is timely for enemy attack. Although lodgement areas may be well lighted, this can be seen for miles over the horizon, and should be controlled until you join the battle. If you preposition combat vehicles early, their heat can provide thermal-images used by the enemy. Your avenues of approach in the desert are probably unlimited. Mechanized infantry cannot contribute to long-range fight. Artificial obstacles must be large to have effect.