Featured in ARMOR
To Fight or Not to Fight? The Saga Continues
by Robert S. Cameron, Ph.D
In 1996 I started my civil service career in the Armor Center. While documenting and observing key Armor Branch activities, it soon became clear that a recurring point of debate lay in the nature, organization, and operation of cavalry. In the post-Cold War era, longstanding beliefs associated with the importance and role of reconnaissance and security organizations were sometimes tossed aside in favor of new technology-based concepts. Novelty garnered attention and funding, while Old School concepts enshrined in Field Manual 17-95, Cavalry faded.
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The Division Cross-Domain Task Force: Re-imagining Division Reconnaissance & Security for 2030
by Maj. Gen. John B. Richardson IV and Maj. John T. Pelham IV
The division cross-domain task force (D-CDTF), a division reconnaissance and security formation, is the pivotal formation translating convergence at the operational level of war into mass at the tactical level by enabling armored divisions to seek, sense, shape and secure. It is a division-level, cross-domain maneuver element that combines arms in the division close area under the division commander’s command and control.
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Tanks Need the Infantry to Lead the Way
by 1st lt. Brandon Akuszewski and Capt. Larry D. Tran
A U.S. Army combined arms battalion deployed to Vekaranjärvi, Finland for the first time in history to participate in combined arms maneuver training with the Finnish Army’s Karelian Brigade earlier this year. The U.S. 1st Battalion “Mustangs,” 8th Cavalry Regiment deployed in support of Operation Lock 2023 to eastern Finland from May 28 to June 10, 2023.
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Peaking at LD: A Way to Achieve Maintenance Excellence
by Lt. Col. Jay Ireland
The job of a combined arms battalion (CAB) commander is to deliver lethal platoons, sections, and crews to the brigade and division commander. Lethality in a CAB begins with fully functional equipment. Trained crews, platoons, and companies cannot accomplish their assigned mission essential tasks with broken kit.
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Controlling Chaos: The Cavalry Troop Command Post
by Capt. Ryan F. McGovern
As the brigade combat team’s (BCT) reconnaissance and security force, cavalry troops operate at the transition between the brigade’s deep and close fights. Cavalry troops must gain contact with enemy forces and develop the situation rapidly in a dynamic environment far forward from BCT fires and sustainment nodes.
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Cavalry Operations in Arctic Conditions
by 1st Lt. Tristan Meadows
The U.S. Army has now conducted two Arctic training-center rotations in the Alaskan interior. The 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division – now 1st Brigade, 11th Airborne Division (Arctic) – completed its rotation as the rotational training unit (RTU) in March 2022 at Donnelly Training Area (DTA), and 2nd Brigade, 11th Airborne Division (Arctic), recently completed its rotation in April 2023 between Fort Wainwright and the Yukon Training Area (YTA).
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Junior Leaders in the Age of Experimentation
by Maj. Adam Nodin
Why should anyone outside of Army Futures Command bother thinking about the future of innovation and technology? Battalions and companies hardly have enough time to squeeze in a good training event, they can barely keep up with new equipment being fielded, and they can’t get rid of the old stuff fast enough.
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Training Individuals and Units to Fight and Win in LSCO
by Lt. Col. Mitchell Payne and Lt. Col. John Thomas
From the earliest histories of humankind, the nature of war has remained unchanged.1 At its heart, it is an inherently violent contest of wills between two parties, where one party enforces its will upon the other. This inherent nature of conflict has not changed throughout the thousands of years of recorded human history.
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Maximizing Operational Readiness in the Baltics
by 1st Lt. Darren Pitts
During our 2023 U.S. European Command (EUCOM) rotation, 1st Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment “Mustangs” spent seven months on a “heel-to toe” rotation in Lithuania, briefly interrupted by two months of multinational collective training in Finland. During nine months in EUCOM, we were located 500-900 miles aways from the nearest supply support activity (SSA).
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Manning the Next Generation Main Battle Tank
by Capt. Larry D. Tran
What is the ideal crew-size for the next U.S. main battle tank? The Armor community continues to train for large- scale combat operations (LSCO) with continued efforts in modernizing the armored fleet. Dan Heaton describes these modernization programs in his recent ARMOR article.1 Since Heaton’s article was published, the M2A4 Bradley Infantry Fighting vehicles and the Armored Multi-Purpose Vehicles (AMPVs) fielding are continuing to modernize ABCTs.
Read moreProfessional Reading
Heavy Metal: Arguing the Continued Need for Abrams in ActionProfession of Arms
U.S. Constitution
CATS: The Army's Unit Training Strategy
Tactics, Techniques and Procedures for Employing Brigade and Task-Force Engineers
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U.S. Army Armor School194th Armored Brigade
316th Cavalry Brigade
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