{"id":36493,"date":"2023-04-04T19:55:58","date_gmt":"2023-04-04T19:55:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/uncategorized\/2023\/04\/04\/the-us-army-moves-to-tweak-its-formations-for-future-conflicts\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T00:53:57","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T00:53:57","slug":"the-us-army-moves-to-tweak-its-formations-for-future-conflicts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/battlefield-tech\/2023\/04\/04\/the-us-army-moves-to-tweak-its-formations-for-future-conflicts\/","title":{"rendered":"The US Army moves to tweak its formations for future conflicts"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 The U.S Army plans to spend roughly the next two years finalizing key decisions on what its future formational design will look like in the 2040s<\/a>, the service\u2019s four-star general in charge of modernization and requirements said at the Association of the U.S. Army\u2019s Global Force Symposium last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c2040 seems like a long way away,\u201d Gen. James Rainey, Army Futures Command boss, said in a March 29 speech, \u201cbut I believe we have about an 18 to 24 month window that we need to pursue with a sense of urgency to figure out what\u2019s going to be different, what\u2019s the operating environment going to look like; not to get it right, but to make sure we don\u2019t get it really wrong and to be in a better position than whoever we\u2019re fighting.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AFC \u201chas a responsibility to find that deep future operating environment,<\/a> and we need to start iterating on the concept. We hope to be in the draft concept business by this fall, probably,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The command was established in 2018<\/a> to help the service focus on modernizing the force.<\/a> Taking over the command last fall, Rainey is its second commander<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Working with Training and Doctrine Command, AFC will need to figure out how the Army will fight in the future \u2013 specifically a 2040 benchmark \u2013 and then design fighting formations that can support that, Rainey told Defense News in an exclusive interview at the show.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Army is well on its way to fielding over 30 weapon systems and other capabilities<\/a> in 2030 that will enable the service to fight across all domains<\/a> against adversaries able to deny access to key terrain, Rainey said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to buy vehicles, systems, weapons, radios, but we need to transform our formations as a formation,\u201d he said in his speech. \u201cWe buy things, but we fight formations, so everything we do material-wise needs to be \u2018how does this fit into a formation?\u2019 And we\u2019ll make better decisions, candidly. And most importantly, we\u2019ll put better-capable formations on the battlefield.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are still a variety of questions that need to be answered as the service builds its future force, and many of these need to be considered quickly. \u201cLet me talk about the sense of urgency to 2040,\u201d Rainey said in his speech. \u201cWhen I say 2040, I\u2019m talking about a fully fielded Army of 2040. To do that we will have to be in full-up aggressive fielding mode by about 2035.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If capability needs to be fielded by 2035 to build the force of 2040, \u201cthey probably need to be prototyping, in low-rate production, something like that, in that space by 2031,\u201d Rainey said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right now the Army is working on a five-year defense-spending plan<\/a> that covers fiscal 2025 through 2029, he pointed out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concepts that are drafted over this time will need to be \u201crigorously, aggressively\u201d verified through experimentation, according to Rainey. The Army\u2019s Project Convergence \u201ccampaign of learning\u201d effort is one of those places for experimentation, but the service will experiment persistently through other means like theater-located exercises to better craft concepts.<\/p>\n\n\n\t