A Summary of Multi-Domain Operations

As is the case for most military concepts, MDO requires some explanation.

Like many previous concepts, MDO describes the threats and components of the future operational environment in order to make a strong case for initiating significant changes. In the same way that the National Defense Strategy identifies China and Russia as strategic competitors, the MDO concept describes how those actors are impacting the operational environment today and into the future. The concept places significant emphasis on how Russia has demonstrated its willingness to stress the international order as it competes below the traditional threshold of armed conflict.¹

The concept describes three so-called tenets of MDO that help solve the problem that every military faces: How does a joint force compete militarily prior to armed conflict, penetrate and then dis-integrate an enemy’s anti-access and aerial denial systems, exploit the resulting freedom of maneuver, and finally, return to a period of strategic competition following the war?² The tenets are calibrated force posture, multi-domain formations, and convergence. Collectively, these tenets describe an army organized and authorized to plan and conduct tactical operations in all five military domains, even before the onset of armed conflict.³

Calibrated force posture describes the Army’s worldwide footprint and mirrors the 2018 National Defense Strategy’s global operating model.⁴ This tenet calls for greater decentralized authorities and access to tightly controlled national capabilities that would allow the Army to better compete against adversaries prior to armed conflict.⁵

Multi-domain formations describe Army combat organizations that conduct operations in all domains at increasingly lower echelons. A far-reaching element of this tenet is the idea that soldiers will achieve greater levels of individual performance through machine learning, artificial intelligence support systems, and biotechnical sensors.⁶

The tenet of convergence asserts that through cross-domain synergy, layered options, and mission command, the Army will impose complexity on the enemy in ways not achievable through single domain alternatives. As the Army explores how to achieve this tenet, it must develop systems and processes that help manage the commander’s increased span of control of a diverse collection of capabilities and weave them together on the unit’s synchronization matrix.⁷

Besides publishing this concept, the Army has taken a number of modernization initiatives. Beginning in 2017, the Army leadership issued a new vision⁸ and six modernization priorities⁹ that set the tone for all modernization efforts. To disrupt the status quo of the acquisition process, the leadership established eight cross-functional teams (CFTs), managed by a new four-star command.¹⁰ The Army also created an Artificial Intelligence Task Force¹¹ and a Talent Management Task Force¹² to study and develop information age systems and capabilities that inform the Army’s transition away from legacy Cold War approaches to warfare. Collectively, these initiatives attempt to kick start the Army on the path towards achieving the future described in the MDO concept. The Army leadership recognizes that changes in the character of warfare will take place, and that these changes are unpredictable. The goal of the modernization strategy is to set the conditions for the Army to adapt to those changes better than any possible rival.