The Objective Force is an army designed from the bottom up around a single, networked, integrated C4ISR architecture that will link us to joint, interagency, and multi-national forces. It will be a rapidly deployable, mounted formation, seamlessly integrated into the joint force and capable of delivering decisive victory across the spectrum of military operations. The Objective Force and its Future Combat System will leverage and deliver precise combat power. It is a capabilities-based force that rapidly responds to strategic environment requirements.

To help guide our Transformation efforts, The Army leverages lessons-learned from extensive experimentation and wargaming. We are working to harness the power of knowledge, the benefits of science and technology, and innovative business solutions to transform both the Operational and Institutional Army into the Objective Force. The Army's annual Title 10 Wargames provide critical insights for developing the Objective Force. Likewise, results from joint experiments - Millennium Challenge '02 and other service Title 10 Wargames like Global Engagement, Navy Global, and Expeditionary Warrior, and more - also inform these efforts. We are also learning valuable lessons from current operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

To evaluate the effectiveness of the Stryker Brigade Combat Team (SBCT) concepts for battalion and company operations in a Joint Force, The Army employed a SBCT unit during Millennium Challenge '02. Less than four weeks after Stryker vehicles were delivered to the first unit at Fort Lewis, the unit demonstrated rapid air and sealift deployability and integrated into the exercise well. Additionally, when given a mission on short notice to support a Marine Corps unit in ground operations, the SBCT unit demonstrated its agility and versatility.

An Information Enabled Army

Achieving the full spectrum dominance of the Objective Force (OF) requires changing the way we fight. We cannot achieve the OF capabilities without leveraging the full potential of technological advances developed by the Nation's industrial base and science and technology communities. We have consolidated management of Information Technologies (IT) into a single effort - Army Knowledge Management (AKM). Information management is critical to achieving The Army Vision, and AKM supports Transformation through the development and implementation of a net-centric, knowledge-based Army architecture interoperable with the joint system. AKM will accelerate the Detect-Decide-Deliver planning processes and enable warfighters to first see the adversary- before our forces are detected; understand the Common Relevant Operating Picture (CROP); act against adversaries; and finish the warfight with decisive victories see first, understand first, act first, finish decisively. AKM will provide knowledge at the point of decision for all leaders.

The net-centric operations that AKM enables will decrease our logistic footprint and enhance sustainability of the Objective Force through multi-nodal distribution networks. Advanced information technologies will dramatically enhance Battle Command.

Command, Control, Communications, and Computer (C4) decision tools seamlessly linked to Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) assets produce a radically improved Common Relevant Operating Picture (CROP) and enable Battle Command. The Army Knowledge Enterprise (AKE) construct describes our process to enable improved strategic and tactical information distribution and collaboration. AKE leverages the ingenuity and resourcefulness in shaping the environment to achieve dominance and helps leaders achieve decision superiority and mission efficiencies.

Operational: The Objective Force

The Objective Force will consist of command structures scaled to meet Joint Force Commander requirements and modular combined-arms units tailored according to each situation. Objective Force integrated, mobile, air-ground teams will conduct mounted and dismounted operations and employ both manned and unmanned platforms to achieve decisive victories. The Objective Force will conduct simultaneous combat and stability operations and master transitions between operational phases. It will be offensively oriented, multi-dimensional force enabled by advanced information technologies that give Soldiers real-time intelligence and actionable information.

The Objective Force will arrive in theater combat capable deployment will be synonymous with employment. The Objective Force will be strategically responsive and rapidly deployable worldwide by air, sea, highway and rail modes to support inter-theater strategic deployment and intra-theater operational maneuver. An Objective Force Unit of Action (UA) will deploy on almost one-third the number of aircraft required to deploy a heavy brigade combat team today. It will be operationally deployable and capable of operational maneuver over strategic distances by air, land, or sea. Soldiers will overcome anti-access and area denial strategies and environments through precision maneuver and decision superiority.

The Objective Force networked system will include Soldiers equipped with the Land Warrior system; a family of 18 integrated, synchronized, manned and unmanned Future Combat Systems (FCS); and critical complementary systems such as the Comanche, High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) with Guided MLRS rockets, and the Future Tactical Truck System. The components of the FCS are being synchronously developed and fielded, as a complete family to achieve the warfighting capabilities the Nation requires to defeat adversaries.

Soldiers of the Objective Force will seamlessly integrate Objective Force capabilities with the capabilities of joint, Special Operations, multinational forces, and other federal agencies. The Land Warrior system will integrate individual Soldiers in the network while providing them increased protection and lethality. And FCS will give Soldiers the capability to destroy any adversary in any weather and environment with smaller calibers, greater precision, more devastating target effects, and at longer-ranges.

Joint C4ISR a net-centric information architecture nested within the Global Information Grid (GIG) – will connect the Objective Force. Every Objective Force

Soldier and platform will be capable of sensing and engaging the enemy while maintaining situational awareness of friendly forces. Advanced information technologies and C4ISR decision tools and assets will enhance the Common Relevant Operating Picture (CROP). The Objective Force will identify, locate, and engage critical targets with lethal or non-lethal affects and assess battle damage on those targets. The joint C4ISR linkages will enable the attack of targets with whatever joint or Army assets are available for immediate employment. Similarly, enhanced situational awareness will facilitate multi-layered active and passive defense measures.

The FCS is a transformational approach to meeting this Nation's requirements for the Objective Force. We will design and field a balanced FCS family to avoid optimizing a component at the expense of sub-optimizing overarching capabilities of Objective and joint forces. Acquisition and requirements development processes are being updated to accommodate DoD's direction to field a networked system of systems rapidly through spiral development and an open architecture that allows maturing technological insertions as they occur.

The Army embraces the ongoing DoD and Joint Staff Capabilities and Acquisition processes reform efforts to achieve revolutionary capabilities in the fielding of a new generation of equipment. This collaborative effort holistically enables us to design new information-age capable organizations, use evolutionary acquisition strategies to equip those organizations, and see the Objective Force fielded this decade.

Enabling the Objective Force Soldier

Eighteen manned and unmanned systems; the Objective Force Soldier; and C4ISR comprise the Future Combat System. Manned and unmanned reconnaissance capabilities are part of the FCS Family of Systems' interdependent networked air- and ground-based maneuver, maneuver support, and sustainment systems.

There are 10 Unmanned Systems: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) Classes 1-4; Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGV) – the Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment (MULE); the Armed Robotic Vehicle (ARV); and the Manpackable Unmanned Ground Vehicle (MUGV); Unattended Ground Sensors (UGS); and Unattended Munitions - the Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS) Launch System (LS) and Intelligent Munitions Systems (IMS).

There are 8 manned systems: the Infantry Carrier Vehicle (ICV); Command and Control Vehicle (C2V); Reconnaissance and Surveillance Vehicle (RSV); Line-of-Sight, BeyondLine-of-Sight Mounted Combat System (LOS/BLOS MCS); NLOS- Mortar; Medical Vehicle (MV); the FCS Recovery and Maintenance Vehicle (FRMV); and the Non-Lineof-Sight (NLOS) Cannon.

Decisive warfighting is about fires and maneuver. Joint and organic close, supporting, indirect fires destroy the enemy, suppress the enemy's capabilities, protect our forces and enable ground units to maneuver. The ICV, the Unattended Munitions NLOS-LS, IMS, C2V, MCS, NLOS-Mortar, and NLOS Cannon are important elements of the FCS that

will enable the Objective Force to conduct distributed and simultaneous joint combat operations. With joint fires, the NLOS Cannon is critical to support and protect our land forces in hostile environments. NLOS-LS NetFires is a platform-independent launcher with a family of missiles with precision attack and loitering capabilities. Both Precision Guided Mortar Munitions and Excalibur precision cannon munitions will enhance organic maneuver fires. A new, joint fire support, battle command and fire support architecture will allow rapid target engagement by any asset.

The Land Warrior program responds to this legacy and enhances our Soldiers combat power generation capability. The Land Warrior program will develop a lightweight, low observable, enhanced-armor protection, fighting ensemble for the individual Objective Force Soldier. Through networked connectivity to the FCS-equipped, maneuver Unit of Action, Land Warrior Soldiers will enable revolutionary lethality, mobility, survivability, and sustainability for the individual warfighter while reducing logistics demands. Science and Technology (S&T) investments in military logistics are an important enabler for the Objective Force. We are placing our emphasis on sustainment's big drivers - fuel, ammunition, maintenance, and water to dramatically reduce our logistics footprint and

lift requirements in these areas.

Bridging the Capabilities Gap – Stryker Brigade Combat Teams

The Army responded to a capabilities gap between its lethal, survivable, but slow-todeploy heavy forces and its rapidly deployable light forces that lack adequate protection, lethality, and tactical mobility. In 2002, The Army began fielding the first Stryker Brigade Combat Team to bridge that gap. In 2003 less than four years after its we are on track to achieve IOC with the first SBCT at Fort Lewis,

announcement

Washington.

Stryker Brigade Combat Teams respond to Combatant Commander requirements across the spectrum of military operations. Optimized for combat in complex and urban terrain, Stryker Brigades will be decisive in other major combat operations. The SBCT Reconnaissance, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition (RSTA) Squadron provides organic human intelligence capabilities and UAVs embedded at the brigade level. Its military intelligence and signal companies leverage theater and national assets to create an information-enabled force.

Leveraging platform commonality, enhancing logistics practices and enablers, and reorganizing logistics formations, the SBCT is vastly more deployable and sustainable than our heavy forces, while significantly increasing combat power generating capabilities. Augmented for sustained operations, the SBCT requires 37% fewer CSS personnel than a digitized heavy brigade. While capitalizing on these advantages, developing and available technologies allow us to mass effects and create a robust, reliable capability to conduct operational maneuver over strategic distances.

Finally, SBCTS provide an invaluable means of spearheading Transformation. The SBCT trains junior officers and noncommissioned officers in the tactics, techniques, and procedures that will inform employment of the Objective Force.

The Army has resourced six Stryker Brigade Combat Teams to contribute to fulfilling the 1-4-2-1-defense construct and national security requirements; however, at this time, the Secretary of Defense has only authorized the procurement of the first four brigades. The Army will provide the Secretary of Defense with a plan for Stryker Brigades 5 and 6. Fielding of the SBCTS affects the entire Army, and current fielding timelines will enhance the Nation's ability to fight and win the GWOT and conduct major combat operations. The transformation of four Active Component brigades to SBCTs provides a rotational base with three of the SBCTs focused on the Pacific theater. One of the two SBCTS fielded at Fort Lewis will be forward-based in Europe not later than 2007. The Stryker Cavalry Regiment will support the XVIII Airborne Corps' critical need for robust, armed reconnaissance. The conversion of a Reserve Component brigade to an SBCT will enhance our strategic reserve and support the GWOT, Smaller Scale Contingencies, and Homeland Defense missions. Additionally, SBCT stationing provides rapid, strategic responsiveness through power projection platforms capable of supporting four critical regions described in the 1-4-2-1-defense construct. The first SBCT has formed, trained, tested and is now capable and will be deploying to OIF.

Preserving the Army's Legacy

Today's force guarantees The Army's near-term warfighting readiness to fight and win our Nation's wars, decisively. Because we bypassed a procurement generation, our Combat Support and Combat Service Support systems now exceed their 20-year expected life cycle, and 75% of our critical combat systems exceed their expected half-life cycle. To maintain operational readiness while preserving resources for Transformation, The Army is recapitalizing and selectively modernizing a portion of the current force. The modernization program addresses the critical issue of AC and RC interoperability and serves as a bridge to mesh these two components seamlessly. In general, The Army increased funding for programs that are clearly transformational and support the Defense transformation goals, sustained funding for high priority systems that will transition to the Objective Force, and reduced funding for systems not essential to Army Transformation. We remain committed to a 17-system recapitalization program and have reduced prioritized recapitalization from three-and-one-third to two divisions.

Army Special Operations Forces (SOF) are indispensable and will continue to provide unique capabilities to the Joint Force and Land Component Commanders. Increasing joint campaign requirements for SOF contributed to the validation and resourced growth in SOF structure.

The Army will remain the largest user of space-based capabilities among the Services. Army space assets are providing tangible support to the war on terrorism and Operation ENDURING FREEDOM - they ensure Army and Joint Force Commanders optimize