Planning

Preventing Preventable Problems in Military Decision-Making Process

By Retired COL Esli Pitts

Article published on: April 1, 2025 in the Spring 2025 Edition of Armor

Read Time: < 23 mins

Bad rehearsal? No. Bad planning. Let’s talk about preventing preventable problems in detail and flexibility while using the full military decision-making process (MDMP).

Devil is in details

Our goal is to mature the plan from that single-page course of action (CoA) sketch to a complete order — within the allotted time. The plan must meet a certain threshold of detail to be successful. If the order lacks detail, leaders figure out a workaround or the mission fails. It’s fine when we recognize those gaps early on, such as when the commander points out a shortcoming during the CoA briefing. But it gets progressively harder to come back. Hard questions during the confirmation- or back briefs are inconvenient but fixable. It is awkward when a commander asks a hard question about the plan’s shortcomings while standing on the terrain model during the rehearsal, but we can still issue a fragmentary order (FRAGO). It’s harder — but still possible — to overcome insufficient planning while in execution, but sometimes we only realize the plan’s shortcomings when the O/C/T helpfully guides us through the after-action review (AAR). Figure 1 shows a conceptual depiction of an order’s lifecycle with the necessary level of detail in green and the typical level of detail in red.

Conversely, the longer we plan, the more details we add — often unnecessarily — until we risk the reverse of insufficient details, which is excessive details, creating rigidity and a lack of flexibility. It’s critical to success to plan the right details, in the right level of detail, not waste time on the wrong ones.

So, how do we build from a concept sketch to an appropriately detailed order using MDMP? The goal is a plan with sufficient detail to execute an operation but not to develop a plan that is so heavily detailed that it becomes inflexible or reliant on everything unfolding perfectly and fails if conditions change. We are talking about simple plans, with appropriate details for the essential elements.

Can’t we just go with intent? There I was, OC’ing (performing as observer/coach) for a British heavy battle group equipped with Challenger tanks and Warrior fighting vehicles. The commander’s order consisted entirely of intent, and intent graphics. His two Challenger companies both violently attacked within his intent but, lacking the details of a complete plan, it was unsynchronized. The two tank companies attacked on a wide frontage, without mutual support, and on a timeline that allowed the enemy to sequentially defeat both. The predictable result was the failure to penetrate the defense with piecemeal destruction of the tank companies followed by the commitment and subsequent destruction of the mechanized infantry. Afterwards, this commander was surprised to find out that the British Army’s planning doctrine differentiated between intent graphics and operations graphics (just like we do).We MUST enable intent through sufficient details.

Despite my examples, we usually do a pretty good job setting up the maneuver plan and integrating indirect fires. But we don’t always plan the other warfighting functions to a similar level of detail.

Wait; doesn’t a high degree of proficiency in battle drills lessen the need for detailed planning? Yes — if you are a platoon or even company.

Everything a platoon does from the assembly area to the objective is a drill, whether uncoiling, support by fire, actions on contact, a change of formation, emergency resupply, or platoon assault. The leader’s job in planning is largely determining the series of drills that comprise the plan and where they will happen. In execution, the leader’s job is to execute that planned flow of drills and, when circumstances change, select the best drills in response. Platoons should be masters of drills.

Companies are like platoons, but the commander writes an order that sequences platoon actions, and plans to have them in the right places, in the right order, to achieve the company’s mission, while weaving in elements of the warfighting functions.

Battalions’ orders establish where and when the actions of the companies, or any element under battalion control, will occur. The plan deconflicts how and where companies tie in with each other, while also integrating the battalion’s operation within the complex framework of brigade’s shaping efforts, adjacent units, and follow-on forces. The battalion accounts for sequencing, conditions to be set, triggers for execution, tasks and purposes, and associated graphics, across all warfighting functions. Said another way, the details.

So, why don’t we plan with appropriate detail? Here are some indicators you might see in your next unit.

Uninvolved commander: Commanders are the most experienced people in their formation. However, they are often absent from planning, and they are not necessarily experienced in THIS kind of formation, THIS kind of terrain, or THIS kind of mission.

Insufficient commander’s planning guidance: the doctrine says commanders should give initial planning guidance upon receipt of the higher headquarters’ order. They should give refined guidance at the completion of MA. They should refine their guidance again before the order goes final. They should also refine their intent as the plan continues to mature. Not all commanders do this.

Insufficient mission analysis (MA): Einstein famously said, “If I were given one hour to save the planet, I would spend 59 minutes defining the problem and one minute resolving it.”1 We, on the other hand, jump right to course of action development. Field Manual (FM) 5-0, Planning and Orders Production proposes allocating 30 percent of available time to MA and 20 percent to CoA Development.2 Do we give it that attention?

Insufficient time or time management. The 1997 version of FM 101-5, Staff Organization and Operations states: “The critical product … is an initial allocation of available time. The commander and the staff must balance the desire for detailed planning against the need for immediate action.”3

Inexperience. Invariably, the staffs I observed had just formed and were doing MDMP for the first or second time. We don’t fully train MDMP at home station and, lacking repetitions, we are unable to maximize the limited time we have at a combat training center. The lack of familiarity with the process, lack of a plans standing operating procedure (SOP) or formatted base products, and the lack of reps all manifested in inefficiency, complaints about the process, attempts to abbreviate it, and (thus) insufficient detail. These factors consistently denied subordinate echelons their two-thirds of the time. First, LEARN the process. Then learn to USE the process.

In addition to inexperience with MDMP, young staff officers/NCOs who lack maneuver experience simply don’t plan as effectively. Lacking experience, we don’t recognize the gaps in our planning, and we provide too much focus on unimportant areas.

Wargaming: The wargame is the staff’s opportunity to refine and complete the CoA across all warfighting functions. Unfortunately, it usually happens in the dead of night and participants soon default to “no change.” We typically build a maneuver plan with associated fires but neglect the necessary depth of detail in most of the warfighting functions. The lack of planning becomes apparent in execution.

There I was, observing a (different) airborne rifle battalion. Its entire plan for an airfield seizure consisted of detailed planning for the airborne operation, followed by drawing a route from the drop zones to the airfield, with a circle around it. The commander didn’t realize the insufficiency of his plan until he was unable to control the fight, describe it to me (or brigade), or even estimate a percentage cleared. This plan was prepared by graduates of the career course and staff college and approved by an experienced commander. They wrote the order weeks before the rotation, so time was not the issue. During the AAR, I provided the commander and staff time to draw the plan they wish they’d executed — starting with planning guidance. In 15 minutes, they produced a workable CoA that was much better than the original plan. How could this happen?

The sufficient level of detail must come out. Where, when, and how is up to you. Ideally, it does so during planning, rather than in execution or at the final AAR when the OC/T asks questions.

If any of this sounds like your last unit, read on.

Mission analysis

Good mission analysis (MA) highlights what is necessary, what is possible, and it precludes bad ideas. This enables the commander to formulate useful refined planning guidance, which improves CoA development. If your MA didn’t shape options for the commander, it was poor MA.

The commander already received the higher order and already understands their plan. An immature staff spends the majority of MA capturing things the commander already knows — that’s wasted energy. Let’s focus MA on areas the commander needs.

Analysis of specified tasks. The order says our unit will conduct a river crossing. The immature staff dutifully writes “conduct river crossing” in the specified tasks list and moves on. The mature staff analyzes this task. First, where is the river narrow enough, the approaches solid enough, and the angle of the banks appropriate to emplace a bridge? (And where can we NOT cross?) Secondly, is the crossing deep in the zone of advance, or early in the movement? These answers will heavily influence our scheme of maneuver. Do some analysis on our specified tasks and we’ll find that the additional details make it easy for the commander to write planning guidance that informs CoA development.

Identify the tactical problem Immature staffs use a simplistic problem statement such as “how do we conduct XYZ?” and rightfully characterizes this as worthless. Instead, let’s think of the problem statement as identifying the hardest thing we will do, and the conditions that cause it to be the hardest thing. Analysis thereof allows us to plan to achieve that most difficult thing. I use a model of “Given [condition], [condition], and [condition], how do we [do the difficult thing]? What do I mean?

Consider an enemy objective, moderately defended, but with an anti-tank (AT) platoon and a significant obstacle belt. We have an attached engineer company, and we assess that our biggest problem is dealing with that AT platoon so we can breach. Here’s a possible problem statement: “given a threat AT platoon, high exposure, and a complex obstacle, how do we mitigate the AT threat to enable a breach?” The commander formulates guidance focusing the maneuver plan on suppression or destruction of the AT platoon because, after that, the breach is easy.

What if we lost the attached engineer company? The AT platoon is still the same threat, but now the hardest thing is getting through the obstacles. Here’s our new problem statement: “Given a complex obstacle, overwatched by enemy AT systems, and a lack of engineer assets, how do we breach?” This problem statement might lead to other CoAs that don’t require us to close on the objective, or we go back to higher for more assets, or we figure out how to destroy the AT platoon so we can breach by ourselves.

Because we understand the tactical problem, we can focus staff energy on mitigating the negative conditions and planning how to achieve the problem. Or we can just ask “how do we breach?”

Lack of understanding of the terrain. There I was, a tank company commander attached to a mechanized infantry battalion at Hohenfels. The S-3 slapped the map and identified the support-by-fire (SBF) from which I would set conditions for the mechanized companies to close on the objective. I pointed out that the large hill between me and the objective would prevent success from there. Oh.

The fact is terrain in Europe is different from that in the desert, and from an urban environment, or that in the Pacific or the jungle. If your frame of reference is six rotations in the desert, you will plan for that on your seventh rotation even though it is in Germany. You can’t bring your National Training Center (NTC) plan — fought at long range — to the rolling and compart-mentalized terrain and one-vehicle-wide mobility corridors fought as a knife fight at Hohenfels. If you don’t understand the impacts of varied terrain, learn to.

Closely related to the terrain, do we understand the battlefield framework within which we will operate? Are we clear on how we nest within higher’s operation as established by their operational graphics? Do we also understand the constraints, limitations, and flexibility inherent within an area of operations, a zone, a sector, a battle position? Are higher’s boundaries clearly established? Do we understand the fire support coordination measures? (In particular, the coordinated fire line and fire support coordination lines are often misunderstood.)

Lack of understanding of the enemy. If our intelligence preparation consists of using higher’s red wire diagrams rather than a general force laydown in time and space on a map, analysis of threat capabilities and associated range arcs, it is insufficient. If our products don’t step down from higher’s products, and don’t analyze two echelons down from us, it is insufficient. If we don’t have an event template that differentiates between threat CoAs and informs friendly decision-making, it is insufficient.

Force ratios. We often do an overall force ratio but neglect analysis of various points in the zone or sector. We need to generate a 3:1 HERE, and then THERE. But also HERE, too. Penetrating threat defenses in an urban environment? That’s 18:1 according to Army Techniques Publication 5-0.2-1,the Staff Planner’s Guide. Understanding the required force ratio at different points in the fight will be essential during CoA development, so we can array forces.

Insufficient time analysis. Not simply an enemy and friendly timeline, but the time/distance factors associated with tactical actions which you already know must be done. How long does it take to uncoil from an assembly area? Execute Route Black? Refuel on the move. Breach? Dig in? The element of time/distance analysis starts during MA and only becomes more important later in planning.

These points are the kind of details the commander needs in mission analysis to advance understanding and start formulating planning guidance.

We delivered a good MA briefing and armed the commander to give us some great planning guidance. Let’s build the CoA.

CoA development

How much detail do we need? First, we build that one-page CoA sketch. But we need it to be feasible, acceptable, suitable, and complete. (And distinguishable if we build more than one.) That’s a lot to ask for a one-pager, so let’s flesh it out.

Decisive Point. What is it? How much combat power do we need to apply there? How long will it take to achieve? What conditions must be set to ensure success at that point?

Arrayal of forces. Given our force ratio analysis throughout the area, how do we array combat power at various points to achieve appropriate force ratios at both main and supporting efforts? This will drive task organization.

Direct fire control measures (DFCMs). There I was, watching rotational units’ frustration with the very real constraints of live ammunition during live-fire exercises. I’m going to say something radical: DFMCs should drive CoA development in both offense and defense. In considering the objective, first understand how you will use direct fires to achieve the mission, then lay in the DFCMs necessary to do so, and then build the maneuver graphics that get the unit in position to execute the planned DFCMs (and use your master gunner). By establishing the DFCMs first, we account for the impacts surface danger zones, minimum safe, or risk estimate distances will have on the operational graphics. This suddenly becomes important when our operations switch from lasers to live ammunition. Don’t be surprised by the limitations live weapons impose on your scheme of maneuver; bake them in from the outset.

Operational framework. FM 3-0,Operations defines several operational frameworks, including: assigned areas; main effort, supporting effort, and reserve; or deep, close and rear operations. These help in “clearly visualizing and describing the application of combat power in time, space, purpose, and resources…”4 What is higher’s? And how do we nest within it?

Task and purpose. There I was as a young tank platoon leader, listening to my battalion commander’s mantra that purpose drives task. The WHY of task and purpose is the determinant factor in task selection, and we must get it right. Understanding purpose allows us to pick from the various tasks by which we can achieve the purpose. My experience is that our analysis is sometimes shallow and trends toward checking the block, and sometimes we state our tasks as purposes.

• immature staff: Establish SBF 1 to fix enemy forces north of Objective MUSTANGS. Note: SBF 1 is a position in the U.S. Army that allows a platoon to clear a no-fire area. SBF stands for “support by fire.”
• Mature staff: Fix enemy forces north of target reference point seven to prevent them reinforcing Objective MUSTANGS.

See the difference? The young planner established a graphic, SBF 1, from which to do the task, but it is not the task. The SBF becomes the focus, and we are successful by getting to it. In the second example, the focus is on fixing the enemy, but we also use the graphics to clarify the task. Yes, it is still happening from SBF 1, but that’s a graphic, not the task; and if we can’t get to SBF 1, we can still fix enemy forces.

Defeat Mechanism. Did we decide on a defeat mechanism? Is our higher headquarters plan based on a particular defeat mechanism? If so, is our plan nested within that?

Scheme of maneuver. Given the selected defeat mechanism, decisive point, required arrayal of forces at various points, the planned DFCMs, the right tasks and purposes, etc., what is the scheme of maneuver that will accomplish them? And then, what are the necessary graphics to depict that scheme?

Necessary graphics. Graphics are the skeletal structure that underlies the operation. Maybe you’ve seen an old-school map board with ops, engineer, fires, logistics, threat, and decision support overlays all taped to it — truly “stacking overlays.” In the age of PowerPoint, underutilized mission command systems, and the shallow detail of “concept of operation” planning, we’ve lost the art of developing detailed plans. Compounding the problem is the heavy use of intent graphics in place of operational graphics. FM 5-0, Planning and Orders Production, states that “planners select control measures, including graphics, only as necessary to control subordinate units during an operation.”5 This sounds minimalist, so maybe we should say that if it is in our plan, it should be on our graphics.

I'm not saying we should create overly detailed plans with so many graphics you cannot see the map. Where young staffs struggle is in over-planning for subordinate elements. Here are a couple of rules to prevent that. First, don’t plan the subordinate’s plan for them. If everything that happens between HERE and THERE on the graphics is the responsibility of one subordinate, then just be comfortable with allocating the maneuver space to that subordinate. The subordinate plans it and submits the graphics. If two subordinates are involved, we put in the graphics necessary to control or deconflict them. Second, even with mission-type orders, it is not “micromanaging” if we tell subordinate A to be at THIS location, with THIS orientation, at THIS time, so they are synchronized within the larger plan. When we need this level of detail, intent graphics don’t work.

The boss has approved our feasible, acceptable, suitable, complete, and distinguishable CoA, and we are ready to move on.

Wargame

We use the wargame to finalize, and synchronize, the plan. However, let’s be real. As mentioned, our wargame rapidly moves into this alternate reality where the staff increasingly announces, “no change.” The planner gratefully captures that on the synch matrix. At the end, the executive officer feels uneasy, but it’s late. Now we’ve underwritten a lack of detail. The best response to “no change” is to ask “Are you sure? What about XYZ?”

What are the ramifications of an incomplete synch matrix? Well, there I was....

The fight advances too far and the tactical operations center (TOC) loses digital or voice communications with the companies as they approach the objective. We should have anticipated this and planned to jump the TOC or move a retransmission team. Instead, in execution, the frustrated executive officer jumps the TOC at the worst possible time, and we are unable to influence the fight at the objective.

The mortars report they are black on ammunition but there was no trigger to move a planned resupply forward. Instead, they fire until their racks are empty and then hunker down, hoping for resupply.

There is no radar coverage at critical points.

There is no understanding of planned or active ambulance exchange points and evacuation assets move to the wrong point.

Conditions are not set for the breach, but we fire the smoke mission anyway. Now we are burning precious minutes of smoke.

The information collection plan is insufficient and not focused on the information necessary to make decisions. As a result, we don’t recognize or collect priority information.

The wargame’s primary output is a synchronization matrix. This is the document that moves our plan from a concept to reality — a plan we can execute. The synch matrix establishes several things. Where? Planned actions should have an associated graphic. The matrix depicts sequencing of both events and units. Event 1 must happen before Event 2. And Unit A goes first, followed by Unit B. It establishes priorities: Alpha is the priority of fires, but priority shifts to Charlie upon…. It lays out conditions to be set prior to commitment, triggers for commitment, and end states to be achieved by that action. It establishes primary and alternate responsibilities for execution. Our synch matrix captures the details of all those moving pieces that happen in execution.

How do we build the details of these critical events? Recall we talked about time/distance analysis in MA? How do these factors apply on the synch matrix? If Event 1 takes 90 minutes, then Event 2 cannot begin until X+90. If so, when must conditions be set? These details are how we integrate combined arms. What are the triggers? Remember our mortar resupply? Here are three event-, time-, or conditions-based triggers to move resupply. Which one works best?

• Our lead company crosses Phase Line Steel.
• Two hours past crossing the line of departure.
• The mortars have fired targets AB 2001 and AB 2002 or otherwise report amber.

Picture the TOC crew using this detailed matrix to manage the details of execution.

If it is important to the plan, is it important to plan in detail? We’re moving that green line for the level of details in our plan much higher

But haven’t we just created a rigid and highly restrictive plan which won’t survive first contact? Maybe. How do we create flexibility in the plan?

Flexibility

There I was in a battalion’s defensive AAR, describing how the enemy sat at one of the unit’s obstacles for 20 minutes, unobserved and unengaged, before bypassing it and penetrating the battalion’s southern flank. The commander exclaimed, “I knew they were going to do that!” Maybe he knew it, but he didn’t tell anyone. Therefore, there was no plan.

We know the situation will change. Von Moltke famously said: “You will usually find that the enemy has three courses open to him, and of these he will adopt the fourth.”6 How can we account for that maxim by building flexibility into our base plans?

There are things we know about the enemy, and things we’ve only templated; but our S-2s brief the threat CoAs as if they’ve already read the enemy’s (not yet written) orders. When the S-2 briefs with that level of certainty, we invariably plan against that detailed enemy CoA, even though the template is little more than a guess at this point and then we are surprised in execution when it is wrong. The S-2 should use different colors to clearly differentiate between known and templated enemy information, and we account for that by building in flexibility where there is uncertainty. For example: “We’ve identified seven battle positions under construction and assess the enemy’s main defensive positions run from HERE to THERE. We’ve seen no indicators in the security zone but template they will screen from HERE to HERE.” Now we can plan with some certainty against the main defense but also build flexibility in the security zone: “If we identify a combat security outpost (CSOP) HERE, we’ll destroy them from attack by fire (ABF) 1. If there are no indicators of a CSOP, we’ll continue movement to ABF 2.” We are building in flexibility because the enemy situation is unclear — just like reality. We will plan with flexibility but our final intelligence update prior to the mission will bring some clarity. For example: “Scouts report no enemy forces in the vicinity of ABF 1. Recommend Bulldog continues movement to ABF 2.”

We’ve all heard that no plan survives first contact. This is why Eisenhower said, “plans are worthless, but planning is everything.”7 This means both threats and opportunities will emerge, so let’s build graphics that enable flexibility.

If we’ve dropped a series of checkpoints on our graphics (just in case), it is easy to say, “Chaos this is Warhorse 6; move to Checkpoint 8 and establish an SBF oriented north.” Our above-mentioned battalion commander was worried about getting penetrated in the south by an enemy force that bypassed his obstacles. Could the staff have planned a series of battle positions at various depths oriented on that gap and tasked the companies to recon them and be prepared to occupy them? Yes.

If our base plan reads like we can only execute it in one way, it is inflexible.

We aren’t done because the base order is published. Available time goes to building flexibility both during the operation and following it. How fleshed out are our decision products, branches, and sequels?

Decisions. Does the staff have a common understanding of what the commanders’ decisions are? There I was, in a battalion TOC, asking the S-2, S-3 and executive officer what the commander’s likely decisions were. I got three different answers. Think the decision products were well-developed? Let’s agree to the three-to-five likely decisions and build them up. How? Let’s look at a potential decision: switching from defense against the most likely enemy CoA to defending against their most dangerous one (the above-mentioned penetration on the south flank). I use the model of IF [condition] AND [condition], THEN [action].

Branches. “If we identify an enemy company (-) east of Phase Line Red, AND we have identified minimal enemy forces north of XXX, THEN we will displace Alpha to battle position 4A to block penetration in the south.” We’ve established an expectation that the TOC watch for these conditions. We laid the groundwork earlier with some contingency graphics, but now we’ve built it into a viable branch plan, available in execution, stemming from a decision, which is responsive to the commanders’ big concern. How can we improve that basic branch?

If our plan does not allow us to shift between the enemy’s most likely and most dangerous CoAs, or otherwise respond to emerging threats or opportunities, it is inflexible.

Sequels. FM 3-0 charges us to anticipate, plan for, and execute transitions. There I was, in command of a battalion during a defense at a combat training center and we had just defeated the opposing force’s regimental attack. We are supposed to plan for success, but I can assure you I had no plan for going on the attack after a successful defense. In the moment, I requested permission to conduct a counterattack into the next corridor, where we knew the enemy was building their future defense. (Denied!)

This is an example of a sequel, which I should have been prepared for. What are the minimum necessary details our base plan requires to ensure we are prepared to transition to a subsequent operation (sequel) based on the results of our current operation — ranging from spectacular success to catastrophic failure—without losing tempo or the initiative?

Time and again, the OC/T says some variation of “you fought the plan, not the enemy” or “you were wedded to the plan.” Are we audacious enough to make use of our flexibility? What is your information collection plan to support deviating from the base plan? How comfortable are we at recognizing variance in the form of an emerging threat or opportunity and recommending we use our planned flexibility? Can we recognize variance early enough to respond proactively? Or only reactively? If we build in the flexibility but are unwilling to use it, we will lose every time.

Experienced staffs routinely plan to an appropriate level of detail and build in flexibility. Maybe they didn’t do so in your last unit. And they might not be doing them in your next unit. But you can change things in your current unit.