This article examines the U.S. military’s plans for carrying out combined joint operations across multiple theaters and domains in the twenty-first century. It summarizes the most likely strategic and operational approaches available to future adversaries, such as anti-access/area denial (A2/AD), gray zone warfare, and other asymmetric methods. The article also considers the respective challenges posed by the two likely catalysts for military operations: contested norms and persistent disorder. The U.S. military response to this strategic context is still forming, but there are common themes among the services: the recognition that future operations will entail greater risk; the need to disperse forces to survive on a more lethal battlefield; a desire to create networked forces attacking with a combination of physical and nonphysical (cyber and electronic warfare); and a rebalancing of force structure in terms of both weapon sophistication and mission type.
Locatable mineral reports for Colorado, South Dakota, and Wyoming provided to the U.S. Forest Service in fiscal year 1999