TRADOC 'Strategic Estimate'

On Friday, InsideDefense.com reported that Army intelligence analysts looking deep into the next decade had issued a "strategic estimate" document that envisions potential operational environments and related missions against adversaries in Iran, China, Yemen, North Korea, Pakistan and Nigeria:

In the new estimate, Training and Doctrine Command's intelligence directorate anticipates operational environments through 2028 as part of an effort to identify future needs for all aspects of the Army -- including new weapons -- while thinking anew about land operations after more than a decade of war in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"This strategic estimate will serve as the foundation to build, train and educate the U.S. Army," Gen. Robert Cone, TRADOC commanding general, wrote in a foreword to the 100-page document, dated August 2012.

The volume is intended to inform decisions about future Army budgets, it states: "Currently, in the midst of a global recession, the Army finds itself at a strategically important crossroad as it tries to determine where to wisely invest its limited training, personnel, and materiel resources."

The document describes the need to be ready to confront a wide range of potential adversaries, from standing conventional forces to irregular militias and paramilitary forces to terrorist groups and criminal gangs.

"The strategic environment remains as it has always been: complex," the report notes.

We now have the document.