The Hard Choices That Will Define the Army of Tomorrow (and Beyond)
John Amble | October 18, 2019
For the past several years, the Center for Strategic & International Studies has released an annual assessment of US military forces. Written by Mark Cancian, a senior adviser in CSIS’s International Security Program, each report highlights the big themes that characterize the armed services’ strategic posture, organization, end strength, modernization priorities, and more. We hear about all of these things often in public statements from Defense Department leaders. But there’s something uniquely important about an effort to create a sort of comprehensive, annual snapshot of each service—even more so when it’s undertaken outside the walls of the Pentagon. After all, it’s natural to tend to cast a generally positive light on things when we’re talking about ourselves, individually and organizationally. Sometimes we need to hear how things look from an external perspective.
This past week, as thousands were gathering in Washington, DC at the annual meeting of the Association of the US Army, CSIS released the Army section of its annual report. So while headlines coming out of the AUSA annual meeting focused on the potential for extending the time soldiers and families stay at one duty station before moving, a revamped Army special operations strategy, and the many weapons and platforms vying for Army attention (and dollars), the CSIS report takes a broad-aperture view of the big-picture things that combine to give a sense of where the Army is heading.
https://mwi.usma.edu/hard-choices-will-define-army-tomorrow-beyond/
