Getting It Right: Fire Support in MOUT

Abstract

Abstract : Although the Army began updating its primary military operations on urbanized terrain (MOUT) doctrinal manual, FM 90-10, Military Operations on Urbanized Terrain, in 1999, the fire support community did not initiated any significant changes to its MOUT doctrine. The most recent fire support doctrine for MOUT was published in 1990. In March 1999, military planners considered contingencies in event that the air campaign to remove Serbian forces from Kosovo during Operation Allied Force was not successful. One of those contingencies was a ground offensive, which presented numerous challenges to the Army. Some of the most demanding challenges centered around urban warfare. Planners were compelled to accept the potential dilemma of fighting Serb forces in urban areas to meet the military objective of forcing Serb forces out of Kosovo. Planning for the Kosovo ground offensive indicated that serious shortfalls exist in MOUT doctrine, especially the primary urban operations manual, FM 90-10. FM 90-10 and the FM 6-20 series manuals did not provide doctrine required for planning fire support in MOUT. This monograph supports this argument by: 1) defining current US Army fire support doctrine and examining how its execution is affected by a MOUT environment; 2) providing observations regarding fire support problems in MOUT that have been documented, especially in the Russian army's Chechen campaign in 1994-1995; and 3) identifying fire support observations in the Chechen campaign that impact current fire support doctrine.