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No democratic nation has unlimited funds available for its armed forces, so the armed forces must constantly evaluate their activities to squeeze the most benefits out of allocated funds. This is true of procurement, maintenance of hardware, and the activities conducted by these forces.
In peacetime, one of the main activities of NATO naval forces is participation in major exercises, which are conducted with participants from several nations. Here, of course, the requirement to extract maximum benefits is paramount. But exercises are probably the biggest source of wasted assets and funds.
Why do we exercise? The basic ob- vested in the Orange submarine barrier and the Blue antisubmarine warfare screen, the absence of Blue-on-Orange encounters made this exercise unproductive.
“Smart” maneuvers to avoid encounters belong to artificial exercises and computer rooms, not to live exercises at sea involving many ships and thousands of men.
Had this been an isolated incident, it could be explained as a blunder. Often during major NATO exercises, incidents predicted by the exercise planners never occur because somebody is fighting the setting by applying “smart” maneuvers, not considering the basic objectives of live exercises. Plans and worse, Orange players often tend to stick to their own tactics to derive some benefits and training value for themselves from exercises. All exercise planners know this argument: “Our pilots only get so many hours per month, so they have to use their own tactics, not Soviet tactics!”
Realism in live exercises is also hampered by peacetime restrictions and by limited exercise duration. The latter restriction forces the planners to create an unrealistically high incident rate to involve all participants in the activity- Unrealistically short exercises combined with unrealistically high incident rates leave no time in major live exercises to simulate realistic kills and battle dam-
jectives are to test, evaluate, and exercise forces, plans, and procedures. Unfortunately, not everyone completely understands these goals. In a recent NATO exercise, for instance, a major Blue surface force widely circumnavigated the Orange submarine barrier, thereby avoiding any submarines. Some will probably claim that this was well done. The Blue commander evaluated the threat realistically, avoided it, and ensured the safe and timely arrival of his forces. But considering the huge amount of forces and man hours inprocedures for avoiding encounters can be examined in war games without losing valuable time at sea.
Some will claim that these sort of limitations on live exercises are unrealistic. But how realistic can we expect live exercises to be? Orange forces are always extremely scarce, and their capabilities are often limited. Although Orange units should use Warsaw Pact tactics, this is often impossible because of limited abilities to simulate Soviet Kirov cruisers, Alfa-class submarines, or reconnaissance satellites. Even ages. No matter how often an incoming raid is engaged, all aircraft will continue to attack to give all pilots training value. Once sunk, submarines are not removed from the sea.
If we want realism in our exercises, we must ask, realism for whom? If it is for the shore commands, it can best be created in synthetic exercises or war games. If it is for the task forces at sea, it can be created partly by canalizing Blue forces through areas where they can confront as realistic a threat as possible as often as possible. And if
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Proceedings / March lt,^l)
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individual units are to participate in a realistic scenario, the exercise must be planned so the conduct of operations can change according to the situation.
It is unrealistic for an exercise planner to try to plan a realistic scenario for everybody. When I started as an exercise planner, an experienced exercise planner told me that only two or three levels of command could be satisfied by any particular scenario. I agree; one must decide which levels to satisfy—major command, major subordinate command, principal subordinate command, task force command, task group command, or the commanding officers, divisional officers, and the men.
In major NATO exercises, the levels of command at which an exercise is aimed should be stated in the exercise objective. If we want to train a carrier task force in penetrating a submarine barrier, this objective should be clearly stated. The task force commander then should not be allowed to pass west of Iceland when the submarine forces are operating east of Iceland. Live exercises have to be streamlined so that encounters will take place.
If the exercise objective is to train task force commanders in safe arrival of forces, it must be stated. We must accept that realistic threats and minimum waste will be present only in war games and synthetic exercises.
Major NATO exercises are conducted as a balance between exercising NATO strategy and conducting specific force training. But we have fallen between the two owing to the limitations mentioned. To achieve a realistic, acceptable level of force training, exercises must be streamlined and guided by defined objectives. Exercising NATO strategy, however, demands realistic threats in realistic environments, which can only be achieved in synthetic exercises or war games. It is foolish to believe that realistic threats can be established in live exercises by reducing exercise activity in certain areas and requesting that nations transit their forces for hundreds of nautical miles to play Orange for a few days.
Major NATO exercises should emphasize force training and leave strategy to war games and synthetic exercises.
Commander Madsen is an exercise planner on the staff of Commander, Naval Forces Baltic Approaches (COMNAVBALTAP). He attended the U. S. Naval Staff College at Newport, Rhode Island in 1979 and also served on the staff of Flag Officer Denmark.
Proceedings / March 198!