HIGH RISK, HIGH REWARD: REFLECTIONS ON JOINT FORCIBLE ENTRY
Posted byMichael Marra
March 23, 2023
“Ladies and gentlemen, this is high stakes poker, and all the chips are on the table.”
— Major General Gary L. Harrell, U.S. Army
MG Harrell’s characterization of what came to be known as Operation NORTHERN DELAY was not an overstatement. It was 12 March 2003 and a group of planners in Qatar had just two weeks to plan the largest mass airborne drop in contemporary history —15 USAF C-17As dropping approximately 1,000 Army and Air Force personnel with all of their equipment into northern Iraq. Some might claim that experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan have little relevance for our current challenges. Twenty years ago, I helped plan and execute that operation as an Air Force airman. Today, as the course director for the Military Strategy and Campaigning course at the Army War College, it is clear to me that Operation NORTHERN DELAY and other recent experiences still have great relevance to our mission of honing students’ military judgment. As I reflect on those experiences twenty years later, the lessons that stand out as being particularly relevant are decision making under conditions of ambiguity, setting the conditions for successful rapid joint planning, and the requirements for successful power projection.
Decision Making Under Conditions of Ambiguity
The cause of this sudden rush to plan was the last-minute decision by the government of Turkey to deny access necessary for the original concept of coalition mechanized forces flowing south from staging bases in Turkey. Military planners were coordinating for months with Turkish officials when this unwelcome surprise came. Though the land route was denied, the requirement to seize and hold parts of northern Iraq to pressure Saddam from north and south remained. The war was already raging in the south of Iraq and planners knew that at any time conditions in the north could change, further complicating the mission. The sense of urgency among the planners was palpable.
https://warroom.armywarcollege.edu/articles/joint-forcible-entry/
