Integration of JIIM Roles

This is the Fifth Edition of the Overarching Insights and Best Practices Paper on “Joint
Operations.” It is written by the Deployable Training Division (DTD) of the Joint Staff J7
and released by the J7 Deputy Director for Joint Training.

Fifth Edition: November 2017

Scope:
1st- The paper is the overarching insights and best practices paper from the DTD.
2nd- It shares executive insights that are more fully covered in our functionally-based focus
papers; in current editions, in-progress revisions, or under-development new papers.

Table of Contents:
1.0 Executive Summary ……………………………………………………………………………………….1
2.0 Global Integration …………………………………………………………………………………………4
3.0 Risk ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..5
4.0 Mission Command …………………………………………………………………………………………6
5.0 Authorities…………………………………………………………………………………………………….7
6.0 Interorganizational Cooperation ………………………………………………………………………8
7.0 GCC C2 Organizational Options ……………………………………………………………………..9
8.0 Forming a JTF HQ ……………………………………………………………………………………….12
9.0 JTF C2 and Organization ………………………………………………………………………………13
10.0 Joint Headquarters Organization, Staff Integration, and Battle Rhythm ………………15
11.0 Information Sharing ……………………………………………………………………………………..17
12.0 Chief of Staff Roles and Functions at Joint Headquarters ………………………………….18
13.0 Command Senior Enlisted Leader ………………………………………………………………….19
14.0 Design and Planning …………………………………………………………………………………….20
15.0 Assessment ………………………………………………………………………………………………….22
16.0 Commander’s Critical Information Requirements (CCIRs) ……………………………….23
17.0 Intelligence ………………………………………………………………………………………………….24
18.0 Targeting …………………………………………………………………………………………………….26
19.0 Joint Operations in the Cyberspace Domain …………………………………………………….27
20.0 Communication Strategy and Synchronization ……………………………………………….29
21.0 Sustainment …………………………………………………………………………………………………30

Terminology and Acronyms: Numerous military acronyms and organizational names are
used in this paper. They are defined in the glossary to increase readability for the intended
readership. We assume the reader has basic understanding of military terminology.

POC: Mr. Mike Findlay – DTD Email: [email protected]
Deployable Training Division, Joint Staff J7, Joint Training
116 Lake View Parkway, Suffolk, VA 23435-2697

Accessibility: This and other insight and best practice papers can be accessed on the internet
at the Joint Electronic Library site: http://www.jcs.mil/Doctrine/focus_papers.aspx.

Disclaimer: The views in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the
official policy or position of the Joint Staff, the Department of Defense (DOD), or the United
States Government (USG).

Releasability: Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.

PREFACE

This paper is our executive level insights and best practices paper on joint operations. It provides
insights useful to joint headquarters on topics such as mission command, authorities, Combatant
Command organizational options, design and planning, assessment, forming a JTF HQ, and the

role of a Chief of Staff. We capture these insights directly from the joint warfighters.

This paper may be beneficial to three main audiences:
• Joint operators as they enhance the readiness of their formations.
• Service partners that work in the joint environment.
• The education, doctrine, and concept community.

Four key insights are continually reinforced throughout the paper:

• Importance of trust and relationships. Relationships and mutual trust remain critical to the
concept of interdependence and effectiveness. Be inclusive versus exclusive with both
military and non-military partners.

• Value of commander-centric operations and mission command and its three attributes of
trust, understanding, and intent / empowerment to release the initiative of subordinates and
attain the necessary agility and adaptability necessary in today’s environment.

• Importance of setting conditions for subordinates by operating within a comprehensive
whole of government approach, instilling an inclusive trust-based atmosphere and sharing
understanding of the situation, problem, and risk with stakeholders and partners, anticipating
requirements and prioritizing scarce resources, establishing clear command relationships,
providing mission type orders with intent and risk guidance, empowering subordinates, and
providing open channels for feedback.

• The important role of the staff in supporting commander timely decisionmaking,
subordinates, and sharing information with higher and adjacent mission partners.

Many of the topics in this paper are more fully addressed in our evolving base of 16 functionally­
based Focus Papers. The Joint Staff J7 Deployable Training Division (DTD) gains insights on
operational matters through regular contact and dialogue with combatant and operational level
commanders and staffs as they plan, prepare for, and conduct operations and exercises. The DTD
incorporates these insights in functionally-based focus papers, refines them through senior flag
officer feedback, and then shares them with the operational force, with joint lessons learned,
doctrine, and future concepts communities, and in senior leader education forums.

All of these unclassified papers are found on the publicly-available web site depicted on the
following page.

Please share your thoughts, solutions, and best practices as you think, plan, and work your way
through operational challenges to DTD’s POC, COL (Ret) Mike Findlay.

�-1=N1/t?
Brigadier General, U.S. Marine Corps
Deputy Director, Joint Training
Joint Staff J7

ii

The figure below is a screen shot of the Joint Electronic Library web site depicting DTD Insights
and Best Practices papers (http://www.jcs.mil/Doctrine/focus_papers.aspx). This web site is
publicly available.

There is a functionally-oriented paper for every section in this executive level document with the
exception of global integration, risk, information sharing, and cyberspace (and these are all being
considered). Please note that these insights are continually evolving. Most insights in this paper
come directly from the respective focus paper.

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1.0 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY. The military
dimension of conflict remains a clash between
hostile, independent, and irreconcilable wills, each
trying to dominate the other through violence or the
threat of violence. Enemies are continuing to search for, find, and exploit U.S. vulnerabilities in
peace, activities short of traditional conflict, and in war. Today’s conflicts remain rooted in the
human dimension like those before, and defy full understanding and scientifically derived
prediction and solution sets. Our leaders realize this; their insights are in this paper.

Our military has significantly evolved over the past 17 years as we have adapted to an
increasingly complex environment in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Europe, Africa, the Pacific, the
Korea peninsula, as well as supporting civil authorities in the United States. The Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff has addressed this uncertain environment by emphasizing its transregional,
multifunctional, and multidomain characteristics, and highlighted the requirements for greater
global integration to meet today’s challenges.

Overarching Insights:

1) Importance of trust and relationships. Personal relationships and mutual trust remain
critical to the concept of interdependence and effectiveness. Personal relationships are
essential and together with trust, are the foundation for successful operations in the joint,
interagency, and multinational world. Be inclusive versus exclusive with both military and
non-military partners. Transparency with partners is a means to earn trust.
 Interdependence and Synergy. We fight as one team with our joint, interagency, and

multinational partners. Fighting as one team is not just a slogan; we depend on each
other to succeed in today’s complex environment – we call this interdependence. Access
to the unique capabilities or authorities possessed by our partners is often essential to
mission accomplishment. Some may view interdependence with our partners as a risk
since we may need to depend on capabilities that we do not necessarily command and
control. Gaining synergy and harmony with USG agencies and multinational partners can
be more challenging than with our joint partners since there may be no clear authority
directing command relationships. However, a joint force commander (JFC) can establish
an atmosphere of trust and transparency, identify and focus on shared goals, and
deliberately craft task organization and command relationships to increase harmony and
mitigate risks associated with interdependence. Some key insights:
 Continue to reinforce the value of gaining synergy and harmony with other USG

agencies, international partners, and the joint force based on shared goals.
 Develop strong personal relationships and the requisite trust and transparency to have

a broad understanding of each other’s perspectives and objectives. Some leaders use
terms like “HANDCON” and “WARCON.”

 Set conditions for success by establishing clear command relationships, particularly
supported/supporting command relationships between components of the joint and
coalition force. Foster and develop coordination and collaboration measures to
achieve unity of effort with our interagency partners.

 Recognize that you don’t need to own your partners’ assets to leverage their
capabilities if you have developed the requisite personal and command relationships.

 Inclusiveness: We have observed numerous best practices in the area of inclusiveness
with our interagency and multinational partners – our mission partners:

The nation is in the midst of the most
volatile and complex security
environment since World War II. CJCS

2

 Inclusiveness in understanding the complex environment and the problem. The
environment is more than a military battlefield; it’s a human-based network that is
beyond a military-only ability to fully understand, visualize, and influence. We need
to understand and consider the many perspectives of external stakeholders to perform
well in this environment.

 Inclusiveness in design, planning, and execution. The best plans and operations are
those fully integrated with the other elements of national and international power –
from the very beginning of design.

 Inclusiveness in assessment. External stakeholders have unique perspectives and
expertise and together they help build a more enriched overall assessment. Including
their perspectives and equities from the beginning in assessment, estimates, and
planning allow for a more complete understanding of the nature of the problem and
how to possibly solve it.

2) Value of commander-centric operations and mission command and its three attributes of
trust, understanding, and intent / empowerment to release the initiative of subordinates and
retain the necessary agility and adaptability necessary in today’s environment.
 The commander’s role – applying the Art of War – in this complex environment is

essential. Without exception, we find that commander-centric organizations outperform
staff-centric organizations – they maintain a bias for action. Clear commander’s guidance
and intent, enriched by the commander’s experience, instinct, and intuition are
ingredients found in high-performing units. Insights for commanders:
 Commander’s vision, guidance and intent provide clarity in a dynamic, ambiguous

environment. Mission-type orders are the key to success.
 Rely on your instinct and intuition while recognizing and leveraging the value of the

staff to assist in understanding a complex environment.
 Focus on unity of effort, not unity of command. Recognize the reality of different

capabilities, perspectives, and goals of your partners. Strive to arrive at a set of
common desired outcomes to promote unity of effort.

 Build a command climate and organizational capability that fosters inclusion with
your joint, interagency, and multinational partners in planning and operations.

 Decentralize and empower where appropriate to enable agility and speed of action
while recognizing that there are occasions where centralized control is necessary.
Instill the importance of disciplined initiative by subordinates. Understand that
different Services and Coalition forces may “fight” their capabilities differently based
on their philosophies, processes, and people.

 Too much organizational, personnel, and process structure in a headquarters can
impede information sharing and decision-making. Lean headquarters tend to be more
agile, have a bias for action, stay in their lane at the tactical, operational, or strategic
level, and continually assess the situation to retain focus on mission accomplishment.

 Commanders who work with their staffs and receive the benefit of their analysis
reach better solutions in less time.

 Mission Command: Our observations clearly reinforce the importance of commanders’
guidance and intent, applying their experience, instinct and intuition. Insights:
 Mission-type orders that lay out the “what” versus the “how” continue to be

important in today’s environment. Mission-type orders provide subordinates the
requisite latitude to adapt to fluid situations within risk guidance while providing

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senior leaders the decision space to engage with national leadership and mission
partners.

 Broad latitude for subordinates is essential; guard against the temptation to attempt to
scientifically model outcomes and centrally control operations.

 We have seen that successful commanders exercise mission command by building
personal relationships, coaching and mentoring, inspiring trust and confidence,
leveraging the ability of their staffs, prioritizing limited resources, empowering
disciplined initiative of their subordinates, and instilling an atmosphere of command
and feedback (versus an emphasis on control).

 There are some mission areas in which positive control of operations is required:
defense support of civil authorities where financial accounting of expenditures must
be directly tied to official requests and nuclear command and control.

3) Set conditions for subordinates by operating within a comprehensive whole of government
approach, instilling an inclusive trust-based atmosphere and sharing understanding of the
situation, problem, and risk with stakeholders and partners, anticipating requirements and
prioritizing scarce resources, establishing clear command relationships, providing mission
type orders with intent and risk guidance, empowering subordinates, and providing open
channels for feedback. Insights:
 Dialogue with national leadership to understand, frame, and reframe the problem. Assist

in clarification of national strategic objectives, risk, policy, strategic narratives, and
development of feasible military options within a comprehensive whole of government
approach.

 Senior leaders have an important role in providing Best Military Advice (BMA) as part of
setting conditions. Consider including risk, assumptions, priorities, and options in BMA.
Identify feasible options, but also recommend which option you think is best suited. Take
care to protect your integrity, credibility, trust, and non-partisan stance. Keep BMA
within the chain of command. Be discreet and provide BMA in writing.

 Stay at the appropriate level to focus on setting conditions for subordinates’ success, i.e.,
the theater-strategic level for Combatant Commands and operational level for JTFs.

 Integrate military actions as part of a comprehensive, whole of government, and coalition
approach to achieve strategic objectives while accounting for the potentially different
goals, authorities, and the capacity limitations of us and our partners.

4) Role of the staff in supporting commander’s decision making, supporting subordinates, and
sharing information with higher HQs, stakeholders, and mission partners. Insights:
 HQ form follows function. Review both HQ organization and staff processes to enhance

their support to commander decision-making. The Chief of Staff must drive and
discipline both the HQ organization and processes.

 HQs support more than the Commander. They also support and enable subordinates, and
are an important information conduit to higher HQs and mission partners. Commanders
and Chiefs of Staff must emphasize this, lest the staffs become singularly focused and
forget their responsibilities to the larger team.

 Ruthlessly limit HQ growth. Stay focused on providing agile and adaptable support to the
commander. Do not allow growth or complex processes to impede support.

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2.0 GLOBAL INTEGRATION.1

Two broad observations:

 First, future conflict will likely be transregional, multidomain, and multifunctional. This
is a marked shift from the more regionally-focused conflicts in the past. Our adversaries are
opportunistic; tomorrow’s conflicts may quickly escalate across geographic boundaries,
domains, and functions; we are moving away from a strictly regional orientation.

 Second, our approach to the military dimension of conflict has traditionally been either at
peace or at conflict. This approach is changing to deal with actors that seek to advance their
interests while avoiding our strengths by competing asymmetrically short of traditional
conflict.

Challenges:

 Changing the paradigm of visualizing and fighting from a Geographic Combatant Command
regional orientation to a broader more balanced global and regional perspective. Our
adversaries will likely take advantage of any regional conflict by pursuing opportunities
elsewhere; we must expand our competitive space geographically, domain-wise, and
functionally. We have already started acting globally; consider the global perspective of the
CJCS, SecDef, and POTUS, increased cross-CCMD coordination, and increased importance
of the Functional Combatant Commands. We are starting to integrate cyber and space into
what was previously a land, maritime, and air domain fight.

 This change from a regionally-oriented paradigm has implications for how the Joint Staff is
organized. The Joint Staff has traditionally been closely aligned to the geographic AOR
boundaries in reporting, analysis, and recommendations. It is evolving to better synthesize
regional perspectives to a global view and develop recommendations to help senior leaders.

 The ability to anticipate, plan, and integrate operations globally during crisis and
contingencies to support POTUS, SecDef, CJCS, and CCDR decisions at the pace of the
challenge. Agility and adaptability are critical in today’s age.

 Recognizing, anticipating, communicating, and mitigating risk to our interests from
adversaries’ activities short of traditional conflict – the gray area in which they often thrive.

Insights:

 Recognize the role of the Chairman, the Joint Staff, and the Services to help “set the globe”
in force management, force readiness, and force movement by providing a global perspective
on risk, assumptions, priorities, and options to inform SecDef decision making and set the
conditions for CCMDs.

 Enhance the agility and adaptability of the global framework to enable the Secretary of
Defense to anticipate and make timely decisions at the speed of the problem.

 Continue the cooperation and collaboration among combatant commanders, sustain and
codify supported and supporting relationships, and be prepared for ruthless prioritization to
defend our national interests, including designation of a main and supporting efforts, and
economy of force roles.

 Anticipate and acquire necessary authorities and permissions to gain comparative advantage
across the military dimension, particularly in areas short of traditional conflict.

1 A focus paper is currently being considered for this topic. A good discussion of this is in JP 5-0.

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3.0 RISK.2 The concept of risk is integral to design,
planning, assessment, execution, and command.

Commanders at all levels are increasingly
focusing on three areas of risk – risk to
what, risk from what, and duration of risk.
They also address the temporal aspect to
risk by considering both current and future
risk to balance mitigation of current risk
with potential future risk. The CJCS
Manual (CJCSM) 3105.01, Joint Risk
Analysis addresses this construct of “risk
to what” and “risk from what” (see figure).

We find an increased recognition of the
need for planning agility and adaptability
with regard to risk framing and mitigation. Commanders
are tempering the traditional heavy emphasis (and staff
size) oriented on detailed planning recognizing that it
may be counterproductive to overthink what is inherently
complex and uncertain. They are emphasizing more
timely assessment and adaptation to better respond to
unforeseen changes in the environment. This starts to get at the
“why” for some of our earlier key insights: importance of
commander-centricity and smaller staffs – to increase agility
and adaptability of HQs.

Challenges:
 Linking operational-level risk and mitigation to strategic risks to our national interests. Lack

of action could lead to escalation or destabilization, engagement may lead to counter-action
or unforeseen second order effects, while too much or too little commitment could risk
strategic or operational failure. [Consider recent tactical events that have had a CNN effect.]

 Desensitization of a perception of risk over time and resultant decrease in mitigation efforts.
Insights:
 Frame risk over time “to what, from what, and duration” –

and share your understanding up, down, and across.
 Having authority to do something does not mean that the

risk is not shared. What may appear to be operational or
tactical-level risk may have strategic implications; over-
communicate and socialize potential risks with superiors.

 Provide decision makers an honest assessment of the costs
and potential consequences; operate within a command
and feedback philosophy versus command and control. [discussed in next section]

 Retain a J36-like staff section focused on protection in the HQ and leverage a force
protection working group to focus on mitigating risk to force. Recent lesson: ensure unity of
command for base security; specify who is responsible for each base and empower them.

2 We do not have a focus paper on risk. We may develop a risk-centric paper in the future.

“Risk to force’ and ‘risk to
mission’ assessment by the
executing commander often fall
short of satisfying the
information requirement and
concerns of the national level
leadership” -Senior Flag Officer

Risk: Probability and severity of
loss linked to hazards JP 5-0

“In broad terms, Commanders own
risk to force, political leaders own risk
to mission. But at the end of the day –
risk is shared.” -Senior Flag Officer

Protection — Joint Function:
Preservation of the effectiveness
and survivability of mission-
related military and nonmilitary
personnel, equipment, facilities,
information, and infrastructure
deployed or located within or
outside the boundaries of a given
operational area. DOD

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4.0 MISSION COMMAND. Mission command has clear
utility as a command philosophy for most operations. The
three attributes of mission command: trust, understanding,
and intent release the disciplined initiative of subordinates
to operate at the speed of the problem while providing
senior leaders the decision space necessary to better set conditions. Mission command coupled
with an instilled sense of interdependence with partners achieves complementary versus additive
employment of capabilities to achieve synergy.
Challenges:
 Understanding the diverse perspectives, national interests,

authorities, capabilities, and policies of partners.
 Sharing the continually changing context within a

dynamic environment and crafting clear guidance and
intent to allow for empowerment and decentralization.

 Operating within a pervasive information environment
that affects the tempo of operations, decision making, and real-time visibility of tactical
actions in the global media, coupled with the potential for severely degraded communication
systems that may prevent sharing of understanding.

 A false sense of needing to centralize decision-making to reduce risk – resulting in preventing
subordinates from taking advantage of chaos and opportunities at the speed of the problem.

Building trust and gaining shared understanding: Our joint commanders frequently highlight
the large number of mission partners with whom they work to build trust, share understanding,
and achieve unified action. They also note that senior leaders’ viewpoints and policies change as
they interact and learn. Building and maintaining trust, fostering dialogue and feedback, and
gaining shared understanding with many mission partners imposes significant time demands on
commanders and staffs at combatant commands and JTFs. This focus on relationships may be
greater than expected for those whose previous experience was at the tactical level, however, this
enables empowerment, harmony, and effectiveness.
Commander’s intent and empowering subordinates to act: Commanders are responsible to
provide quality guidance and intent to subordinates. This starts with insightful dialogue to inform
and be informed by national and international leadership. Guidance and intent (including risk
guidance) enables mission command, especially in a complex, fast paced and unpredictable
world. Commanders must share both context and their intent to successfully empower
disciplined initiative in their subordinates to operate at the speed of the problem.
Role of the support(ed/ing) command relationship and the establishing authority: The
support command relationship provides access to capabilities and reinforces horizontally-focused
interdependence. We find that the Establishing Authority is critical to success in their provision
of priorities, allocation of resources, and risk guidance. The Support Command Relationship
(COMREL) allows the Supported Commander to leverage the many capabilities from other
commanders and partners to be more effective.
Insights:
 Build and maintain trust and relationships. Empower and decentralize to enable initiative.
 Reach out to gain and share understanding. Instill an atmosphere for open feedback.
 Make time for strategic reflection in development of guidance and intent.
 Leverage the benefits of interdependence and multi-domain synergy.
 Plan for communication-degraded environments. Leverage mission-type orders and intent.

“Mission Command enables speed,
agility, and decisiveness at the
tactical level while providing the
necessary decision space at the
higher level for the up and out
engagement to anticipate and set
conditions.” – Senior Flag Officer

Definition: The conduct of military
operations through decentralized
execution based on mission-type
orders. JP 3-0

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5.0 AUTHORITIES. The term “authorities” is commonly used by commanders and their staffs
but is not defined in doctrine. “Authorities” has multiple dictionary definitions encompassing …