Combined-Arms Teams in the Offense:Maximizing Lethality by Mixing Formationsby CPT
Sean T. Martin and CPT Robert A. Francis
Otto von Bismarck once said, “Fools say that they learn by experience.I prefer to profit by others’experience.â€Like Bismarck, the U.S.Army can draw lessons about the deployment of armored brigade combat teams at the National Training Center.Brigades learn crucial lessons on the battlefields of Erdabil Province,where the price of failure is pride instead of blood.In more thana year of fighting in Erdabil Province, Demon Mechanized-Infantry Battalion (MIBN) has conducted manyattacks to penetrate or seize pieces of key terrain.We’ve found that operating as cohesive combined-arms teams is paramount to success.During offensiveoperations, combining arms at the company level and below maximizes lethality by mixing formations of platforms that have complementary capabilities to act as “hunters and killersâ€;provideground-force commanders with the assets necessary to both isolatewith armor and rapidly seize terrain with dismounts;and pair peer leaders with diverse experiences and perspectives from the Infantry and Armor Branches.
MIBN structure
The MIBN is the core maneuver formation of the brigade tactical group (BTG).The BTG operates with three MIBNs, a tank-company reserve, a combat-engineer company, an anti-armor troop and a modified reconnaissance battalion (Figures1a and 1b).MIBNs are formed by a habitual relationship between infantry and armor companies,where the two company commanders alternate leading the formation as the MIBN commander.A similar relationship exists at the platoon level to form the mechanized-infantry company (MIC).
https://www.benning.army.mil/armor/eARMOR/content/issues/2020/Summer/3Martin-Francis20.pdf
