US Army Cuts Signal Emphasis on Readiness

The US Army announced a series of organisational and capability decisions on 2 May, with Chief of Staff General Randy George promising more to follow. It may be tempting to interpret these decisions as signalling what the US Army thinks about the future of war. In reality, they speak to a series of institutional reforms that the US Army believes are pre-requisites to being ready for war.

Merging Command Headquarters

The announced decisions fall into two categories. First are the merger of several US Army headquarters. US Army Training and Doctrine Command and US Army Futures Command will now revert to being a single headquarters. Meanwhile US Army Forces Command – responsible for the readiness of US Army units in the Continental United States, US Army Northern Command and US Army Southern Command, are to be merged into a Western Hemisphere Command.

There was some logic behind the separation of these functions. Designing how the force will fight in the future is different to assuring that it is properly trained today. Managing operations in South America is not the same operational problem as preparing to screen the Arctic approaches or managing units on training rotations throughout CONUS. However, with a directive to cut the size of the force, the US Army was determined to reduce the number of headquarters rather than combat units. While the mergers will create headquarters with large spans of command, they remain coherent.

The second category of announcements relate to the retirement of older UAV platforms, and halting procurement of Joint Light Tactical Vehicles (JLTV), Humvees, M10-Booker Light Tanks, and AH64D Apache attack helicopters. The thing to emphasise is that these are not cuts. On JLTV and Humvees, the US Army has thousands of these vehicles in the force. The decision to stop procuring more was a determination that there are enough vehicles available for the Army's needs. When it came to the M10 Booker, it fell victim to having a significant logistical requirement while the Army already fields a large fleet of Abrams main battle tanks and wants to invest in improving the survivability of armour through systems deployed with them, rather than duplicating the sustainment burden through another armoured vehicle type. The judgement had little to do with the Booker’s merits as a platform and much more to do with the readiness of deployable units of action. 

A Unified Apache Fleet

The decision to retire AH64D will see the Army continue to operate AH64E Apache. Put simply, the Army is trying to move to a unified Apache fleet to make maintenance more efficient and cheaper, and to ensure that its attack aviation can integrate with other elements of the force. The US Army still believes attack aviation is part of its combined arms toolkit, albeit in a more limited role than during the high point of AirLand Battle.

Retiring some older UAV platforms speaks to the more fundamental changes that General George wants to see through his programme to Transform in Contact. He wants to move away from long acquisition timelines and protracted programmes of record with a high price per platform. Instead, learning from the rate of adaptation necessary to remain competitive in Ukraine, he wants to see the Army buy many different classes of UAV, empower units to upgrade and adapt them, and purchase new systems quickly. Critically the career path for UAV operators will move away from grading them as dedicated operators of defined platforms – Shadow or Grey Eagle – towards classing them as expert UAV operators competent on using different platforms and adapting them.

This was the thrust of General George and his team's thinking before the Trump Administration took office. Indeed, initial steps in this direction were underway in 2023. However, acquisition for the US Army is managed by the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics, and Technology, who reports to the political leadership and not to the Army Chief of Staff. Before freeing up budget, therefore, the US Army wanted assurance that it could reallocate funds to key new priorities, but also spend money more flexibly to change the way it procures. It seems that progress is being made in this direction with the new Administration, though critics in industry would argue that little has actually changed as regards the bureaucratic processes they must follow.

That the US Army wants to make procurement more agile does not mean that it lacks the need for major programmes of record. Magazine depth of long-range strike munitions, next generation command and control, integrated air and missile defence including counter-UAV systems, and electronic warfare are all major priorities.

Points of Interest for UK Defence

For those watching these decisions – and those that will follow – the question is not whether to replicate US Army decisions. The British Army, for example, has one Apache fleet at the AH64E standard. It lacks key equipment types rather than having a surplus of platforms in service. The decisions are therefore different. But the changes made to how the US Army is procuring, and the authorities it is seeking to accelerate procurement and make it more flexible, certainly chime with critiques of the UK procurement system as used in peacetime, compared with the demonstrated requirements in war. Chief of the General Staff General Roly Walker’s emphasis on increasing the lethality of British Army units is intended in part as a benchmark against which to change how the army acquires and introduces equipment. The question is whether the UK's National Armaments Director and wider Defence Reform will deliver the institutional changes to make procurement match modern industrial and military needs.

The challenge for both the US and British Army’s in this process is how little of the problem they control. General George may be able to free up some budget by cutting programmes, to move laterally. General Walker can use innovation funds to try and rapidly bring novel equipment into discrete units. But the dysfunction of military procurement in the US and UK reflects departmental policy, legal requirements, and political interference in what militaries keep and buy that are beyond the control of service chiefs. Army leadership are signalling that they are prepared for change. It remains to be seen whether the political leadership in either country are invested in the reforms necessary to make those changes ultimately successful.

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