DODD 5100.01 tasks the Army to “train and equip, as required, forces for airborne operations, in coordination with the other military Services, and in accordance with joint doctrine.” This guidance directs the Army, which has primary responsibility for the development of airborne doctrine, procedures, and techniques, to develop, in coordination with the other military Services, doctrine, procedures, and equipment that are of common interest.
This TC serves as a guide to describe the fundamentals of how to incorporate IO at the tactical and operational level. Appendixes A through F offer tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) Special Forces (SF) Soldiers can use to analyze and plan information operations. This TC implements Army and joint IO doctrine established in FM 3-13, Inform and Influence Activities, and Joint Publication (JP) 3-13, Information Operations. This TC reinforces the definition of IO used by Army forces: IO employs the core capabilities of electronic warfare (EW), computer network operations (CNO), Military Information Support operations (MISO), military deception (MILDEC), and operations security (OPSEC), in concert with specified supporting and related capabilities, to affect or defend information and information systems and to influence decisionmaking. This TC is specifically targeted for SF; however, it is also useful to Army special operations forces (ARSOF) and the Army in understanding how SF employs IO.
FID is participation by civilian and military agencies of a government in any of the action programs taken by another government or other designated organization to free and protect its society from subversion, lawlessness, insurgency, terrorism, and other threats to its security (Joint Publication [JP] 3-22, Foreign Internal Defense). This publication depicts the integrated theater efforts that include ARSOF and conventional forces roles in joint, multinational, intergovernmental, and nongovernmental organizations working in a collaborative environment. It provides an overview of selected sources of power applied through the instruments of national power brought to bear for supporting FID and the impact and interaction of Army units with the other instruments of national power. In addition, it illustrates how FID is a key component of a host nation’s (HN’s) program of internal defense and development (IDAD), and that the focus of all U.S. FID efforts is to support that IDAD program to build capability and capacity to free and protect the HN from subversion, lawlessness, and insurgency.
FM 3-18 is the principal manual for Special Forces (SF) doctrine. It describes SF roles, missions, capabilities, organization, mission command, employment, and sustainment operations across the range of military operations. This manual is a continuation of the doctrine established in the JP 3-05 series, ADP 3-05, ADRP 3-05, and FM 3-05.
Special Forces (SF) Soldiers use various biometric identification systems in SF operations. Biometric applications are fundamental to a wide array of SF operational activities, including, but not limited to, the growing field of SF sensitive site exploitation (SSE) and the range of unit protection activities. SSE applications include the identification of enemy personnel and cell leaders in a counterinsurgency (COIN) environment following tactical operations, particularly during direct action missions. Unit protection applications include maintaining databases on the identities of both United States Government (USG) and local national personnel.
This directive provides Terms of Reference (TOR) for United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC); Naval Special Warfare Command (NAVSPECWARCOM); Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), Marine Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC), Joint Military Information Support Command (JMISC), and Joint Special Operations University (JSOU).
Field Manual (FM) 3-05.131 establishes Army special operations forces (ARSOF) doctrine for planning, coordinating, and executing noncombatant evacuation operations (NEOs) across the entire continuum of operational environments. NEOs are inherently joint operations. History demonstrates that joint forces conducted the vast majority of NEOs. This manual describes ARSOF operating within that context, thus the content of this manual mixes joint and Army terminology where appropriate. This manual does not duplicate or supplant established doctrine dealing with tactical or strategic operations, but it does provide a specific framework to apply that doctrine. Commanders tasked to conduct NEOs should ensure that their planning staff is familiar with referenced publications.
Field Manual (FM) 3-05.230, Special Forces Tactical Facilities, supports key United States (U.S.) Army Special Forces (SF) doctrine. An SF tactical facility (TACFAC) is defined as any secure urban or rural facility that enables Army special operations forces (ARSOF) to extend command and control (C2), provides support for operations, and allows operational elements to influence a specified area. SF TACFACs include a variety of secure locations for SF operations, including (but not limited to) firebases, camps, and team houses.
Special operations (SO) encompass the use of small units in direct or indirect military actions focused on strategic or operational objectives. These actions require units with combinations of specialized personnel, equipment, and tactics that exceed the routine capabilities of conventional military forces. SO are characterized by certain attributes that cumulatively distinguish them from conventional operations. SO are often politically sensitive missions where only the best-equipped and most proficient forces must be deployed to avoid detection and possible mission failure.
Unconventional warfare, or UW, is defined as activities conducted to enable a resistance movement or insurgency to coerce, disrupt or overthrow an occupying power or government by operating through or with an underground, auxiliary and guerrilla force in a denied area. Inherent in this type of operation are the inter-related lines of operation of armed conflict and subversion. The concept is perhaps best understood when thought of as a means to significantly degrade an adversary’s capabilities, by promoting insurrection or resistance within his area of control, thereby making him more vulnerable to a conventional military attack or more susceptible to political coercion. “UW includes military and paramilitary aspects of resistance movements. UW military activity represents the culmination of a successful effort to organize and mobilize the civil populace against a hostile government or occupying power. From the U.S. perspective, the intent is to develop and sustain these supported resistance organizations and to synchronize their activities to further U.S. national security objectives.”
The intent of U.S. UW efforts is to exploit a hostile power’s political, military, economic, and psychological vulnerabilities by developing and sustaining resistance forces to accomplish U.S. strategic objectives. Historically, the military concept for the employment of UW was primarily in support of resistance movements during general-war scenarios. While this concept remains valid, the operational environment since the end of World War II has increasingly required U.S. forces to conduct UW in scenarios short of general war (limited war). Enabling a resistance movement or insurgency entails the development of an underground and guerrilla forces, as well as supporting auxiliaries for each of these elements. Resistance movements or insurgencies always have an underground element. The armed component of these groups is the guerrilla force and is only present if the resistance transitions to conflict. The combined effects of two interrelated lines of effort largely generate the end result of a UW campaign. The efforts are armed conflict and subversion. Forces conduct armed conflict, normally in the form of guerrilla warfare, against the security apparatus of the host nation (HN) or occupying military. Conflict also includes operations that attack and degrade enemy morale, organizational cohesion, and operational effectiveness and separate the enemy from the population. Over time, these attacks degrade the ability of the HN or occupying military to project military power and exert control over the population. Subversion undermines the power of the government or occupying element by portraying it as incapable of effective governance to the population.
FOUO 7th Special Forces Group (Airborne) Command Operations Brief, May 14, 2009.