JOINT OPERATIONAL ACCESS CONCEPT 

(JOAC) 

VERSION 1.0 

17 January 2012 

Distribution Statement A

Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited. 
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FOREWORD 

The Joint Operational Access Concept (JOAC) describes in broad terms 

my vision for how joint forces will operate in response to emerging antiaccess 

and area-denial security challenges. Due to three major trends - the growth of 

antiaccess and area-denial capabilities around the globe, the changing U.S. 

overseas defense posture, and the emergence of space and cyberspace as 

contested domains - future enemies, both states and nonstates, see the 

adoption of antiaccess/ area-denial strategies against the United States as a 

favorable course of action for them. 

The JOAC describes how future joint forces will achieve operational 

access in the face of such strategies. Its central thesis is Cross-Domain 

Synergy-the complementary vice merely additive employment of capabilities in 

different domains such that each enhances the effectiveness and compensates 

for the vulnerabilities of the others-to establish superiority in some 

combination of domains that will provide the freedom of action required by the 

mission. The JOAC envisions a greater degree of integration across domains 

and at lower echelons than ever before. Embracing cross-domain synergy at 

increasingly lower levels will be essential to generating the tempo that is often 

critical to exploiting fleeting local opportunities for disrupting the enemy 

system. The JOAC also envisions a greater degree and more flexible integration 

of space and cyberspace operations into the traditional air-sea-Iand battlespace 

than ever before. 

Each Service has an important role in ensuring Joint Operational Access. 

The JOAC was developed by representatives from each of the Services and the 

Joint Staff in coordination with the combatant commands, multinational 

partners, and other stakeholders. The JOAC development was supported by an 

experimentation campaign including a multi-scenario wargame, multiple · 

Service-sponsored events, and other concept development venues. 

The strategic challenge is clear: the Joint Force must maintain the 

freedom of action to accomplish any assigned mission. The Joint Operational 

Access Concept is a critical first step in ensuring the joint force has the 

requisite capabilities to do so. 
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i

JOINT OPERATIONAL ACCESS CONCEPT (JOAC)

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

This paper proposes a concept for how joint forces will achieve operational 

access in the face of armed opposition by a variety of potential enemies and 

under a variety of conditions, as part of a broader national approach. 

Operational access is the ability to project military force into an operational 

area with sufficient freedom of action to accomplish the mission. Operational 

access does not exist for its own sake, but rather serves our broader strategic 

goals, whether to ensure access to commerce, demonstrate U.S. resolve by 

positioning forces overseas to manage crisis and prevent war, or defeat an 

enemy in war. Operational access is the joint force contribution to assured 

access, the unhindered national use of the global commons and select 

sovereign territory, waters, airspace and cyberspace.

 Enduring requirement for force projection. As a global power with 

global interests, the United States must maintain the credible capability to 

project military force into any region of the world in support of those interests. 

While the requirement for operational access applies to any mission, the most 

difficult access challenge—and therefore the subject of this concept—is 

operational access contested by armed opposition. 

Distinction between antiaccess and area-denial. As used in this 

paper, antiaccess refers to those actions and capabilities, usually long-range, 

designed to prevent an opposing force from entering an operational area. Areadenial refers to those actions and capabilities, usually of shorter range, 

designed not to keep an opposing force out, but to limit its freedom of action 

within the operational area.

Importance of preconditions. The challenge of operational access is 

determined largely by conditions existing prior to the onset of combat 

operations. Consequently, success in combat often will depend on efforts to 

shape favorable access conditions in advance, which in turn requires a

coordinated interagency approach. The joint force will attempt to shape the 

operational area in advance of conflict through a variety of security and 

engagement activities (as described in the Capstone Concept for Joint 

Operations), such as multinational exercises, access and support agreements, 

establishment and improvement of overseas bases, prepositioning of supplies, 

and forward deployment of forces.

Emerging trends. Three trends in the operating environment promise to 

complicate the challenge of opposed access for U.S. joint forces: 
ii

(1) The dramatic improvement and proliferation of weapons and other 

technologies capable of denying access to or freedom of action within

an operational area.

(2) The changing U.S. overseas defense posture.

(3) The emergence of space and cyberspace as increasingly important 

and contested domains.

Enemy adoption of antiaccess/area-denial strategies. Events of 

recent decades have demonstrated the decisive results U.S. joint forces can 

achieve when allowed to flow combat power into an operational area 

unimpeded. Yet, few if any enemies perceived that they possessed the ability to 

deny U.S. access by armed opposition, and U.S. operational access during that 

period was essentially unopposed. The combination of the three major trends 

described above has altered that calculus dramatically. Increasingly capable 

future enemies will see the adoption of an antiaccess/area-denial strategy 

against the United States as a favorable course of action for them. The ability 

to ensure operational access in the future is being challenged—and may well be 

the most difficult operational challenge U.S. forces will face over the coming 

decades.

The Military Problem. The essential access challenge for future joint 

forces is to be able to project military force into an operational area and sustain 

it in the face of armed opposition by increasingly capable enemies when U.S. 

overseas defense posture is changing and space and cyberspace are becoming 

increasingly important and contested domains.

The Central Idea: Cross-domain synergy. To meet that challenge, 

future joint forces will leverage cross-domain synergy—the complementary vice 

merely additive employment of capabilities in different domains such that each 

enhances the effectiveness and compensates for the vulnerabilities of the 

others—to establish superiority in some combination of domains that will 

provide the freedom of action required by the mission. The combination of 

domain superiorities will vary with the situation, depending on the enemy’s 

capabilities and the requirements of the mission. Superiority in any domain 

may not be widespread or permanent; it more often will be local and temporary.

Attaining cross-domain synergy to overcome future access challenges will 

require a greater degree of integration than ever before. Additionally this 

integration will have to occur at lower echelons, generating the tempo that is 

often critical to exploiting fleeting local opportunities for disrupting the enemy 

system, and will require the full inclusion of space and cyberspace operations 

into the traditional air-land-sea battlespace.

Precepts. Several general principles amplify the central idea in 

describing how future joint forces could achieve operational access in the face 

of armed opposition.
iii

Conduct operations to gain access based on the requirements of the 

broader mission, while also designing subsequent operations to lessen 

access challenges.

Prepare the operational area in advance to facilitate access.

Consider a variety of basing options.

Seize the initiative by deploying and operating on multiple, independent 

lines of operations.

Exploit advantages in one or more domains to disrupt or destroy enemy 

antiaccess/area-denial capabilities in others.

Disrupt enemy reconnaissance and surveillance efforts while protecting 

friendly efforts.

Create pockets or corridors of local domain superiority to penetrate the 

enemy’s defenses and maintain them as required to accomplish the 

mission.

Maneuver directly against key operational objectives from strategic 

distance.

Attack enemy antiaccess/area-denial defenses in depth rather than 

rolling back those defenses from the perimeter.

Maximize surprise through deception, stealth, and ambiguity to 

complicate enemy targeting.

Protect space and cyber assets while attacking the enemy’s cyber and 

space capabilities.

Required capabilities. The concept identifies 30 operational capabilities 

the future joint force will need to gain operational access in an opposed 

environment. The implications of creating and maintaining these capabilities 

in the necessary capacity are potentially profound.

Adoption of this concept will establish a common intellectual framework 

for the challenge of opposed access, will inform subsequent joint and Service 

concepts, and will result in doctrine, organization, training, materiel, 

leadership and education, personnel, and facilities (DOTMLPF) solutions.
iv

Table of Contents

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY............................................................................................. i

1. Introduction.................................................................................................... 1

2. Purpose .......................................................................................................... 2

3. Scope.............................................................................................................. 3

4. The Nature of Operational Access.................................................................... 4

5. Operational Access in the Future Operating Environment ............................... 8

6. The Military Problem: Opposed Operational Access in an Advanced 

Antiaccess/Area-Denial Environment............................................................ 14

7. A Concept for Joint Operational Access ......................................................... 14

8. Operational Access Precepts.......................................................................... 17

9. Joint Operational Access and the Joint Functions......................................... 27

10. Capabilities Required by this Concept ........................................................... 33

11. Risks of Adopting this Concept...................................................................... 36

12. Conclusion.................................................................................................... 38

ANNEX A Glossary .............................................................................................. 40

ANNEX B Assessment Plan.................................................................................. 46

ANNEX C Bibliography ........................................................................................ 60

List of Figures

Figure 1. Antiaccess and area-denial capabilities as part of a layered, integrated 

defense ......................................................................................................... 11

Figure 2. Cross-Domain Synergy ........................................................................... 15

Figure 3. JOAC Project Framework........................................................................ 46

Figure 4. JOAC SOOPA Model ............................................................................... 47

Figure 5. JOAC Development Architecture ............................................................. 48
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1

1. Introduction

This paper proposes a concept for how joint forces will achieve operational 

access in the face of armed opposition by a variety of potential enemies and 

under a variety of conditions, as part of a broader national approach.

1 

Operational access is the ability to project 

military force2 into an operational area with 

sufficient freedom of action to accomplish the 

mission. As war is the extension of politics by 

other means, operational access does not exist 

for its own sake, but rather serves our broader 

strategic goals, whether to ensure strategic 

access to commerce, demonstrate U.S. resolve 

by positioning forces overseas to manage 

crisis and prevent war, or defeat an enemy in 

war.

3 Operational access is the joint force 

contribution to assured access, the 

unhindered national use of the global 

commons and select sovereign territory, 

waters, airspace and cyberspace. The global 

commons, in turn, are areas of air, sea, space, and cyberspace that belong to 

no one state.

4 While operational access is achieved through the projection of 

military force, assured access is achieved by projecting all the elements of 

national power.5

 

1 The use of operational in this context refers to military operations broadly and is not 

restricted to the operational level of war. The 2011 National Military Strategy (NMS) describes 

the national strategy for defeating hostile antiaccess/area-denial strategies. Chairman of the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff, The National Military Strategy of the United States of America 2011; 

Redefining America’s Military Leadership (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 8Feb11), p. 

8.

2 Force projection: ―The ability to project the military instrument of national power from 

the United States or another theater, in response to requirements for military operations.‖ 

DOD Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 

2Jun11].

3 On War Carl Von Clausewitz. http://www.clausewitz.com/readings/Principles/#Intro

[accessed 22Apr11].

4 Barry R. Posen defined global commons as areas of air, sea, and space that ―belong to no 

one state and that provide access to much of the globe.‖ ―Command of the Commons: The 

Military Foundation of U.S. Hegemony,‖ International Security, Vol. 28, No. 1 (Summer 2003), 

p. 8. The same description can apply to cyberspace, which provides access to much of the 

globe’s information. Posen attributes the origin of the term to Alfred Thayer Mahan, who 

described the sea as ―a wide common, over which men may pass in all directions.‖ The 

Influence of Sea Power upon History: 1660-1783. (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1890), p. 25.

5 Power projection: ―The ability of a nation to apply all or some of its elements of national 

power - political, economic, informational, or military - to rapidly and effectively deploy and 

Operational access: The ability to 

project military force into an operational 

area with sufficient freedom of action to 

accomplish the mission.

Assured access: The unhindered 

national use of the global commons and 

select sovereign territory, waters, 

airspace and cyberspace, achieved by 

projecting all the elements of national 

power.

Global commons: Areas of air, sea, 

space, and cyberspace that belong to no 

one state. 
2

As a global power with global interests, the United States must maintain 

the credible capability to project military force into any region of the world in 

support of those interests. This includes the ability to project force both into 

the global commons to ensure their use and into foreign territory as required. 

Moreover, the credible ability to do so can serve as a reassurance to U.S. 

partners and a powerful deterrent to those contemplating actions that threaten 

U.S. interests. For decades, the American ability to project military force from 

the United States to an operational area has gone essentially unopposed. 

During the Gulf War of 1990-1991, for example, Coalition forces flowed into the 

operational area unhindered for six months in the build-up to Operation Desert 

Storm. Coalition forces similarly deployed uncontested into Afghanistan in 

2001 for Operation Enduring Freedom and into Kuwait in 2003 for Operation 

Iraqi Freedom.

This paper asserts that such unopposed operational access will be much 

less likely in the future, as potential enemies, exploiting weapons and other 

systems that are increasingly effective against an advancing enemy, will 

resource and adopt antiaccess strategies against U.S. forces. It is that 

emerging challenge—increasingly opposed operational access—that this 

concept addresses. That challenge may be one of the most difficult that joint 

forces will face in the coming decades—and also one of the most critical, since 

a military that cannot gain the operational access needed to bring force to bear 

loses utility as an instrument of national power.

2. Purpose

This concept describes how a future joint force will overcome opposed access 

challenges. Its purpose is to guide force development by: 

Establishing a common intellectual framework for military professionals, 

policymakers, and others interested in the challenge of opposed access.

Invigorating interest in and study of an operational challenge that a 

generation of military leaders, focused on other missions, has not had to 

consider in recent years.

Establishing a basis for subsequent joint and Service concepts and 

doctrine. 

Identifying the broad capabilities required to gain operational access in 

the face of armed opposition.

Informing study, evaluation, wargaming, and experimentation that will 

result in changes to doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership 

 

sustain forces in and from multiple dispersed locations to respond to crises, to contribute to 

deterrence, and to enhance regional stability.‖ DOD Dictionary of Military Terms, 

http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 17Jan11].
3

and education, personnel, and facilities (DOTMLPF).

3. Scope

This concept applies to combatant commands, joint task forces, and 

subordinate commands. It addresses operational access within the context 

established by the Capstone Concept for Joint Operations (CCJO)6, which 

describes a future operating environment characterized by uncertainty, 

complexity, and rapid change. As a solution to those conditions, the CCJO 

proposes a process of operational adaptation involving the dynamic 

combination of four broad categories of military activity: combat, security, 

engagement, and relief and reconstruction. The concept proposed here exists 

within the context of that adaptation process.

This is a warfighting concept. It addresses opposed access, those 

situations requiring the use of force to gain access against an enemy trying to 

deny that access through the use of force. While even benign missions such as 

foreign humanitarian assistance can pose access challenges, this concept takes 

the position that opposed access presents the most difficult access challenge 

and that unopposed access constitutes a lesser included challenge. That said, 

many of the noncombat aspects of this concept may apply to unopposed access 

situations, such as disaster relief in an inaccessible region. Moreover, this 

concept emphasizes warfare against highly capable enemies with advanced, 

multidomain antiaccess/area-denial capabilities on the premise that this is the 

greatest access challenge of all. Although not specifically addressed in this 

paper, the effects of weapons of mass destruction remain a critical 

consideration.

This concept acknowledges that joint operations will occur in support of 

a broader national strategy employing all the elements of national power. 

Comprehensive national and multinational efforts are critical but beyond the 

scope of this paper, which limits itself to the actions of military forces. 

Additionally, this concept applies to both unilateral joint operations and 

multinational operations, the latter being the more likely context.7 The crossdomain synergy that is the central idea of this concept can be the product of 

internal joint interactions or integration with foreign military powers.

This concept addresses opposed access in conceptual terms; it does not 

 

6 Department of Defense, Capstone Concept for Joint Operations, v3.0, 15Jan09.

7 Multinational operations: ―A collective term to describe military actions conducted by forces 

of two or more nations, usually undertaken within the structure of a coalition or alliance.‖ 

DOD Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 

26May11]. According to the NMS (p. 1): ―In some cases, the joint force will serve in an 

enabling capacity to help other nations achieve security goals that advance common interests.‖
4

provide tactics, techniques, or procedures for defeating specific antiaccess and 

area-denial systems, although it is intended to inform subsequent efforts to 

develop those methods. Nor does it establish specific programmatic 

requirements, although it does identify the broad capabilities required to 

implement the described approach fully.

This is an overarching concept, under which can nest other concepts 

dealing with more specific aspects of antiaccess/area-denial challenges, such 

as the Air-Sea Battle concept already under development, or concepts on entry 

operations or littoral operations as possible examples. It is envisioned that 

such concepts would deal with their subject matter areas in greater specificity 

while remaining compatible with this concept.

4. The Nature of Operational Access

The requirement for operational access has existed since the first army crossed 

the sea to fight in a foreign land. For the United States, separated as it is from 

most of the world by two oceans, operational access has been an enduring 

Air-Sea Battle

Recognizing that antiaccess/area-denial capabilities present a growing challenge to how joint forces 

operate, the Secretary of Defense directed the Department of the Navy and the Department of the Air 

Force to develop the Air-Sea Battle Concept. The intent of Air-Sea Battle is to improve integration of air, 

land, naval, space, and cyberspace forces to provide combatant commanders the capabilities needed to 

deter and, if necessary, defeat an adversary employing sophisticated antiaccess/area-denial capabilities. 

It focuses on ensuring that joint forces will possess the ability to project force as required to preserve and 

defend U.S. interests well into the future.

The Air-Sea Battle Concept is both an evolution of traditional U.S. power projection and a key

supporting component of U.S. national security strategy for the 21st Century. However, it is important to 

note that Air-Sea Battle is a limited operational concept that focuses on the development of integrated 

air and naval forces in the context of antiaccess/area-denial threats. The concept identifies the actions 

needed to defeat those threats and the materiel and nonmateriel investments required to execute those 

actions.

There are three key components of Air-Sea Battle designed to enhance cooperation within the 

Department of the Air Force and the Department of the Navy. The first component is an institutional

commitment to developing an enduring organizational model that ensures formal collaboration to 

address the antiaccess/area-denial challenge over time. The second component is conceptual alignment 

to ensure that capabilities are integrated properly between Services. The final component is doctrinal, 

organizational, training, materiel, leadership and education, personnel, and facilities initiatives developed 

jointly to ensure they are complementary where appropriate, redundant when mandated by capacity 

requirements, fully interoperable, and fielded with integrated acquisition strategies that seek efficiencies 

where they can be achieved.
5

requirement and a primary concern throughout its history.

Projecting U.S. military force invariably requires extensive use of 

international waters, international airspace, nonsovereign cyberspace, space, 

and the electromagnetic spectrum. U.S. access to and freedom of navigation 

within these global commons are vital to its national interests, both because 

the American way of life requires free access to the global marketplace and as a 

means for projecting military force into hostile territory. Even where the 

ultimate objective is the latter, operations in the global commons may be 

critical if an enemy attempts to gain strategic depth by pushing armed 

opposition out into international spaces. In fact, the contest over operational 

access can dominate practically all other considerations in warfare, as it did 

throughout the Pacific theater and in the battle for the North Atlantic during 

the Second World War.

Gaining and maintaining operational access in the face of armed 

opposition involves two tasks inseparable in practice. The first is the combat 

task of overcoming the enemy’s antiaccess and area-denial capabilities through 

the application of combat power. The second is moving and supporting the 

necessary combat power over the required distances, essentially a logistical 

task that can be a challenge in itself. Each depends on the other. Any concept 

for opposed operational access must reconcile both.

As with practically all combat actions, time can be a critical factor in 

operations to defeat opposed access. The temporal dimension can range from 

political imperatives that could impose extremely short timelines, to operational 

requirements to reinforce forward-deployed forces before they are destroyed, to 

tactical requirements to locate and neutralize antiaccess and area-denial 

weapons before they inflict unacceptable losses. Moreover, many enemies 

attempting to deny access will seek to impose delays on an advancing force by 

trading space for time and inflicting losses in the process.
6

As used in this paper, antiaccess

refers to those actions and capabilities, 

usually long-range, designed to prevent 

an opposing force from entering an 

operational area.8 Antiaccess actions 

tend to target forces approaching by air 

and sea predominantly, but also can 

target the cyber, space, and other forces 

that support them. Area-denial refers to 

those actions and capabilities, usually of 

shorter range, designed not to keep an opposing force out, but to limit its

freedom of action within the operational area. Area-denial capabilities target 

forces in all domains, including land forces. The distinction between 

antiaccess and area-denial is relative rather than strict, and many capabilities 

can be employed for both purposes. For example, the same submarine that 

performs an area-denial mission in coastal waters can be an antiaccess 

capability when employed on distant patrol.

Advancing across open ocean and through open airspace to overcome 

prepared defenses is by nature a very challenging form of warfare, tending to 

impose higher-than-normal losses on the attacker, and therefore requiring the 

resolve to absorb those losses. Any concept for defeating opposed access 

should acknowledge that reality.

Maintaining and expanding operational access may require entry of land 

forces into hostile territory for a number of reasons.9 These may range from 

limited-objective attacks, such as raids to 

eliminate land-based threats to friendly air 

and naval forces, to seizing a lodgment for 

a sustained land campaign. Neither of 

these necessarily implies the deliberate 

establishment of a static beachhead or 

 

8 This is not to say that there are no friendly forces within the theater. Forward-deployed or 

other forces might already be present when conflict starts and can be critical in defeating 

hostile antiaccess efforts to support the approach of follow-on forces. At the same time, those 

forward-deployed forces can be at considerable risk if not reinforced quickly enough, which 

introduces a potentially critical time element. This situation might be a simple result of the 

timing of the conflict, although it also might reflect a deliberate operational choice by the 

enemy to allow some U.S. forces into the operational area before ―closing the door‖ to follow-on 

forces.

9For the purposes of this paper, forcible entry is defined as: ―The projection of land forces 

onto hostile territory in the face of armed opposition. Cf. the doctrinal definition: Forcible 

entry: ―Seizing and holding of a military lodgment in the face of armed opposition.‖ DOD 

Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 

17Jan11]. The distinction is important because, depending on the mission, future land forces 

might not seize and hold a lodgment, but might maneuver directly against the objective.

Antiaccess: Those actions and capabilities, 

usually long-range, designed to prevent an 

opposing force from entering an operational 

area.

Area-denial: Those actions and capabilities, 

usually of shorter range, designed not to keep 

an opposing force out, but to limit its freedom 

of action within the operational area.

Establishing operational access may require 

forcible entry, the projection of land forces 

onto hostile territory in the face of armed 

opposition. The subsequent land operations 

may vary in scope and duration, from smallscale raids to sustained campaigns.
7

airhead in the traditional sense. While the access ultimately required in a 

situation may require forcible entry, forcible-entry operations themselves rely 

on some level of pre-existing access in the other domains.

In some cases, the enemy also must project military force into the 

operational area from a distant home base. In such cases, gaining friendly 

operational access can involve interdicting the enemy’s force projection through 

the employment of one’s own antiaccess capabilities.

The challenge of operational access is determined largely by conditions 

existing prior to the actual operation. These conditions can be influenced by

both friendly and hostile activities conducted prior to and during the 

development of a crisis. Geography, particularly distance, arguably determines 

the access challenge more than any other factor, as military power historically 

has tended to degrade over distance. Advances in airpower and long-range 

weapons have mitigated the degrading effects of distance to some extent but 

have not eliminated them, while cyber capabilities are unaffected by distance. 

Those advancements apply not only to the attacker but also to the defender, 

who can exploit those capabilities to engage the enemy at greater ranges. 

Historically, a key way to mitigate the degrading effects of distance has 

been to establish forward bases in the anticipated operational area, thereby 

maintaining some of the capabilities of a home base at a distant location. The 

more capability and capacity that a military can amass at the forward base, the 

more it can mitigate the effects of distance. Moreover, permanent or long-term 

forward bases can assure partners and deter adversaries. The ability to 

establish new expeditionary bases, or to improve those already in existence, 

also can serve as deterrent options. Conversely, a forward base becomes a 

resource requiring protection and sustainment and can even become a political 

liability, often by causing friction with the host nation or within the region.

Some operations to gain access will occur in austere environments 

lacking the advanced infrastructure typical of modern societies. In the 

antiaccess case in particular, even if the objective area is well-developed in 

terms of infrastructure, the most desirable approaches may well be austere. In 

the area-denial case, many conflicts will arise in failed or failing states where 

infrastructure is lacking. In such cases an advancing force will have no option 

other than to operate under austere conditions. At the same time, the ability to 

operate effectively in such conditions can confer an advantage to an advancing 

force because it increases operational flexibility by freeing the force from major 

ports, airfields, and other infrastructure and thereby also complicates enemy 

intelligence collection efforts. 

Political conditions also can mitigate or amplify access challenges. 

Foreign partners willing to provide military and political support (including 

access to infrastructure, territorial waters, or airspace) can be critical. The 
8

employment of forces in engagement activities often years prior to a crisis may 

be critical to success by encouraging willing and capable partners. Conversely, 

an adversary who has successfully built a strong network of partnerships 

throughout and en route to the region can make gaining operational access 

extremely challenging.

The presence of forward-deployed or other in-range combat forces at the 

beginning of a crisis can facilitate operational access—and sometimes even 

deter acts of aggression in the first place. Naval forces, which can remain on 

station in international waters almost indefinitely, are especially suited to such 

missions, as could be special operations forces inserted clandestinely. Air and 

space forces can exploit speed and global range to move quickly into position in 

response to an emerging crisis. That said, forward-deployed forces, like 

advanced bases, can be vulnerable to attack, particularly given a lack of 

advanced warning.

The more a joint force commander can promote favorable access 

conditions in advance, the more likely success will be. While such 

preparations can be invaluable and a priority for combatant commanders, it is 

important to keep in mind that numerous constraints—political, strategic, 

resource, legal, and others—can severely limit the commander’s latitude. 

Moreover, there are limits to what military engagement can achieve. Even longstanding allies may, for political reasons, deny access for a particular 

operation. In the end, joint forces must be able to gain by force the operational 

access needed to accomplish the mission regardless of the initial conditions.

While the United States must project and sustain military force at global 

distances—and therefore must protect its lines of communications10 back to 

home bases—most adversaries operating in their own region will not be so 

burdened. While U.S. joint forces almost always will need to transit 

international waters and airspace, many adversaries will not, although they 

may attack U.S. forces there. These requirements create potential 

vulnerabilities for U.S. forces not shared by most adversaries.

5. Operational Access in the Future Operating Environment

While operational access itself is not new, some of the conditions under which 

joint forces will operate to gain it in the future are. The Joint Operating 

 

10 Line of communications: ―A route, either land, water, and/or air, that connects an 

operating military force with a base of operations and along which supplies and military forces 

move. Also called LOC.‖ DOD Dictionary of Military Terms, 

http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 17Jan11].
9

Environment 201011 envisions a future characterized by complexity, 

uncertainty, and rapid change, all of which will influence future joint 

operational access. In addition, three particular trends in the operating 

environment promise to complicate the challenge of opposed access for U.S. 

joint forces: (1) the dramatic improvement and proliferation of weapons and 

other technologies capable of denying access to or freedom of action within an 

operational area, (2) changing U.S. overseas defense posture, and (3) the 

emergence of space and cyberspace as increasingly important and contested 

domains. These trends were identified based on the sources listed in Annex C

and were supported by the assessment campaign described in Annex B.

The first trend is the dramatic improvement and proliferation of 

weapons and other technologies capable of denying access to or freedom 

of action within an operational area, which come not only from advanced 

technologies, but also from the innovative use of basic, even crude, 

capabilities.12

Key antiaccess capabilities include:

A variety of surface-, air- and submarine-launched ballistic and cruise 

missiles able to accurately attack forward bases and deploying U.S. 

forces and their supporting logistics at ranges exceeding 1,000 nautical 

miles.

Long-range reconnaissance and surveillance systems that provide 

necessary targeting information, including satellites, aircraft, and landand ship-based radar.

Kinetic and nonkinetic antisatellite weapons that can disable space 

systems vital to U.S. force projection.

Submarine forces able to interdict U.S. and friendly sea lines of 

communications in both sovereign and international waters between 

U.S. bases and the theater of operations.

Cyber attack capabilities designed to disrupt U.S. command and control 

systems and critical infrastructure, both civilian and military.

Terrorists willing to attack U.S. or partner bases and deploying forces, 

even at points of origin in the continental United States or other regions.

 

11 The Joint Operating Environment (JOE) forecasts emerging security challenges based on 

current trends in the world. Joint Future Group (J59), U.S. Joint Forces Command (Suffolk, 

VA, 18Feb10).

12 While these capabilities could be employed for various purposes, they will be referred to 

as ―antiaccess and area-denial capabilities‖ hereafter since that is the subject of this concept.
10

Special operations forces capable of direct action and unconventional 

warfare in the approaches to the operational area.

As a result of improvements in these antiaccess capabilities, deploying 

forces will find themselves at risk at ever greater ranges. Deploying to the 

theater while under attack is a challenge that U.S. joint forces have not had to 

deal with in recent decades. Personnel, supplies, and equipment located in 

rear areas once thought to be secure increasingly will be targeted.

Key area-denial capabilities include:

Air forces and air defense systems, both fixed and mobile, designed to 

deny local U.S. air superiority.

Shorter-range antiship missiles and submarines employing advanced 

torpedoes to deny U.S. maritime superiority in the objective area.

Precision-guided rockets, artillery, missiles, and mortars (G-RAMM) 

designed to attack surface targets, including landing forces, with much 

greater accuracy and lethality than their ―dumb‖ predecessors.

Chemical and biological weapons to deny the use of select areas.

Computer and electronic attack capabilities to degrade, neutralize, or 

destroy U.S. command and control in the operational area.

Abundant land and naval mines capable of quickly closing straits, land 

passes, long stretches of coastline, or airfields.

Armed and explosives-laden small boats and craft in cluttered and 

restricted coastal waters and straits.

Land maneuver forces.

Special operations forces capable of direct action and unconventional 

warfare in the objective area.

Unmanned systems, such as unmanned aircraft and unmanned 

underwater vehicles, which could loiter to provide intelligence collection 

or fires in the objective area.

The above capabilities, many once available only to powerful states, are 

now increasingly available to weaker states and even non-state actors. Some 

enemies will possess limited numbers of only a few of these capabilities, but 

others will deploy fully integrated and layered advanced antiaccess/area-denial 

systems comprising air, naval, land, space, and cyber forces guided by a single 

command and control system and employed in mutual support such that to 
11

defeat one capability an attacker must expose himself to others. See Figure 1.

Figure 1. 

Antiaccess and area-denial capabilities as part of a layered, integrated defense

Some enemies with layered, multidomain antiaccess systems, and the 

geographical depth within which to employ them, may actually attempt to 

defeat a U.S. advance before it reaches its objective area. Other enemies have 

no chance of physically keeping the United States out of an operating area but 

may instead attempt to inflict greater losses than U.S. resolve will tolerate.

The second trend affecting future operational access is the changing

U.S. overseas defense posture, which itself is the result of several related 

factors. The first factor is markedly decreased support abroad for an extensive 

network of U.S. military bases around the globe. In an increasingly globalized 

world, there is much greater international competition for regional influence 

and access. Immediately after the Cold War, states had few partnership 

options other than the United States, but today numerous rising powers 

provide alternatives. Whether due to coercive threats or inducements offered 

by other powers, many states will be unwilling to offer the kind of long-term 

basing rights the United States enjoyed during the Cold War. Gaining basing 

rights for expeditionary operations is already a primary concern for U.S. 

military planners and diplomats, and that challenge is likely to grow.

The second factor is projections of severely contracting resources. Even 

were there an international appetite for it, the United States simply could not 

afford to establish garrisons around the globe in response to every plausible 

threat, especially in an era of dynamic uncertainty in which threats could 

emerge unpredictably.
12

The third factor is force protection. In an age of increased terrorism, 

increasingly affordable precision weapons, and heightened sensitivity to 

perceived impositions on national sovereignty, U.S. garrisons on foreign soil 

become both causes of friction and inviting targets. American sensitivity to 

casualties, especially to a garrison force outside a war zone, only exacerbates 

the problem.

The third trend is the emergence of space and cyberspace as 

increasingly important and contested domains with critical importance for 

the projection of military force. Arguably, this emergence is the most important 

and fundamental change in the opposed access challenge over the past several 

decades.

Space and cyberspace are increasingly important both for supporting 

operations in the other domains and as operational domains in their own rights

when directed. In a support role, space systems provide satellite 

communications, missile warning, intelligence collection, satellite 

reconnaissance advanced warning, and position, navigation and timing, among 

other support. Cyberspace, meanwhile, provides the information infrastructure 

upon which the command and control of practically all military operations 

rests. This is especially true for U.S. forces projecting military force globally, 

but it is increasingly true for practically all modern militaries, especially since 

capabilities can be purchased commercially and relatively cheaply. In fact, 

U.S. space and cyberspace capabilities depend significantly on commercial 

systems and adversaries in some cases will purchase space capabilities on the 

same platforms used by U.S. joint forces.

Because of that increased importance, many future enemies will seek to 

contest space control and cyberspace superiority as means to denying 

operational access to U.S. joint forces. In fact, space and cyberspace will be 

priority domains for many future adversaries, both state and nonstate, because 

U.S. forces critically depend on them, because the capabilities are readily 

available and relatively affordable, and because the effects of operations can be 

difficult to trace and even perceive.

Moreover, because the critical support provided by space and cyberspace 

generally must be in place in advance and because many operations in those

domains, especially offensive operations, require significant lead time, space 

and cyberspace operations likely will commence well in advance of other 

operations. In fact, even in the absence of open conflict, operations to gain and 

maintain cyberspace superiority and space control will be continuous 

requirements.

U.S. military operations conducted in the past several decades have 

demonstrated the decisive results U.S. joint forces are capable of when allowed 

to flow combat power into an operational area unimpeded. Yet, few if any 
13

enemies perceived that they possessed the ability to deny U.S. access by armed 

opposition, and U.S. operational access during that period was essentially 

unopposed. The combination of the three major trends described above—the 

growth of antiaccess and area-denial capabilities around the globe, the 

changing U.S. overseas defense posture, and the emergence of space and 

cyberspace as contested domains—has altered 

that calculus dramatically. Future enemies, 

both states and nonstates, will see the 

adoption of an antiaccess/area-denial strategy 

against the United States as a favorable course 

of action for them. Those able to field layered 

and fully integrated antiaccess/area-denial defenses in multiple domains may 

attempt to deny U.S. operational access altogether, while others with less 

robust and comprehensive capabilities may simply attempt to inflict greater 

losses than they perceive the United States will tolerate politically.

Any example of such a strategy likely will exhibit some common critical

elements, to include:

Long-term shaping operations prior to conflict, including information 

operations, designed to increase influence and build up antiaccess/areadenial capabilities in a region and to encourage regional actors to deny 

the United States the political conditions that facilitate access.

Imposing a steeper cost than the United States is willing to bear—either 

through a catastrophic attack or an attrition-based defeat mechanism 

designed to create substantial casualties.

Creating as much strategic and operational depth as possible within 

which to inflict casualties, even interdicting deploying U.S. forces by 

sabotage at their points of origin or ports of embarkation.

Attacking U.S. forward bases, whether by missiles, special operations 

units, or irregular forces—to include the use of weapons of mass 

destruction.

Attacking U.S. command and control and communications, especially 

long-range capabilities, to include space and cyber capabilities.

Attacking U.S. distribution operations at either fixed points or vulnerable 

choke points in the lines of communications or through cyber attacks 

that disrupt logistics command and control.

Employing antiaccess and area-denial capabilities in combination to 

contest local air and maritime superiority and land freedom of maneuver.

Future enemies, both states and nonstate actors, will see the adoption of 

an antiaccess/area-denial strategy 

against the United States as a 

favorable course of action for them.
14

Beyond those common elements, any example of an antiaccess strategy 

will conform itself uniquely to the capabilities of the enemy and other 

situational factors.

6. The Military Problem: Opposed Operational Access in an Advanced 

Antiaccess/Area-Denial Environment

The essential problem for future joint forces is to be able to project military 

force into an operational area and sustain it in the face of armed opposition

when three trends apply:

Antiaccess and area-denial weapons and technologies are dramatically 

improving and proliferating.

U.S. overseas defense posture is changing.

Space and cyberspace are becoming increasingly important and 

contested domains. 

Meeting that challenge increasingly will require defeating integrated

antiaccess/area-denial systems of growing lethality and sophistication.

7. A Concept for Joint Operational Access

To meet the challenge described above, 

future joint forces will leverage crossdomain synergy—the complementary vice 

merely additive employment of 

capabilities in different domains such 

that each enhances the effectiveness and compensates for the vulnerabilities of 

the others—to establish superiority in some combination of domains that will 

provide the freedom of action required by the mission. See Figure 2. 

Future joint forces will leverage cross-domain 

synergy to establish superiority in some 

combination of domains that will provide the 

freedom of action required by the mission.
15

Figure 2.

Cross-Domain Synergy

Superiority here refers to that degree of dominance of one force over another in 

a domain that permits the conduct of operations by the former at a given time 

and place without prohibitive interference by the latter.13 The combination of 

domain superiorities will vary with the situation, depending on the enemy’s 

capabilities and the requirements of the mission. Determining that 

combination in any situation is a function of operational design. Superiority in 

any domain may not be widespread or permanent; it more often will be local 

 

13Adapted from doctrinal definitions of air superiority and maritime superiority. Air 

superiority: ―That degree of dominance in the air battle of one force over another that permits 

the conduct of operations by the former and its related land, sea, and air forces at a given time 

and place without prohibitive interference by the opposing force.‖ Maritime superiority: 

―That degree of dominance of one force over another that permits the conduct of maritime 

operations by the former and its related land, sea, and air forces at a given time and place 

without prohibitive interference by the opposing force.‖ Cyberspace superiority: ―The degree 

of dominance in cyberspace by one force that permits the secure, reliable conduct of operations 

by that force, and its related land, sea and space forces at a given time and sphere of 

operations without prohibitive interference by an adversary.‖

Note that superiority applies to a ―given time and place‖ and need not be permanent or 

widespread throughout a domain. Superiority is distinct from supremacy, which is that degree 

of superiority in a domain wherein the opposing force is incapable of effective interference. See 

air supremacy: ―That degree of air superiority wherein the opposing force is incapable of 

effective interference.‖ And maritime supremacy: “That degree of maritime superiority 

wherein the opposing force is incapable of effective interference.‖ All definitions taken from 

DOD Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 

18Nov10], except cyberspace superiority, taken from ―Joint Terminology for Cyberspace 

Operations,‖ VCJCS memo for the Service chiefs, combatant commanders and directors of 

Joint Staff directorates, undated, p. 8.
16

and temporary.

This concept envisions a greater degree of integration of actions and 

capabilities across domains and at lower 

echelons than ever before. Embracing

cross-domain synergy at increasingly lower 

levels will be essential to generating the 

tempo that is often critical to exploiting 

fleeting local opportunities for disrupting 

the enemy system. This concept also 

envisions the fuller and more flexible 

integration of space and cyberspace operations into the traditional air-sea-land 

battlespace than ever before.

Cross-domain synergy creates and exploits asymmetrical advantages 

inherent in a joint force—airpower to defeat antiship weapons, naval power to 

neutralize air defenses, ground forces to neutralize land-based threats to air 

and naval forces, cyber operations to defeat space systems, and so on 

(although by no means does this suggest that a joint force should forgo 

symmetrical advantages). Nowhere is that more critical than in defeating a 

multidomain antiaccess/area-denial strategy. The relationships between 

operations in the various domains, and the specific asymmetries to be 

exploited, will vary with the situation.

This synergy applies not only to joint forces deploying to the operational 

area—that is, attacking the enemy antiaccess system from the outside in—but 

also to forward-deployed forces already in the operational area attacking the 

enemy system from the inside out. The latter can be critical in neutralizing key 

enemy capabilities to support the approach of the former. Reachback 

capabilities able to contribute from distant stations without deploying to the 

operational area, such as space and cyber forces, will support both. Moreover, 

this synergy can result not only from integration within the joint force, but also

from integration with foreign military partners contributing various capabilities 

and capacities to the multinational effort. Joint forces must also be able to 

integrate with those partners.

The CCJO introduced the idea of joint synergy, the combination of 

Service capabilities such that each enhances the effectiveness and 

compensates for the vulnerabilities of the 

others. Joint synergy is the expansion of 

the idea of combined arms to multiple 

Services. Joint synergy has been a 

strength of U.S. joint forces for decades.

Whereas joint synergy focuses on the 

integration of Service capabilities, crossdomain synergy requires the integration 

This concept envisions a greater degree of 

integration of actions and capabilities across 

domains and at lower echelons than ever 

before, to include the full and flexible 

integration of space and cyberspace 

operations into the traditional air-sea-land 

battlespace.

Joint synergy has been a strength of U.S. joint 

forces for decades. Whereas joint synergy 

focuses on the integration of Service 

capabilities, cross-domain synergy requires 

the integration across domains without 

regard for which Service provides the action 

or capability. 
17

across domains without regard for which Service provides the action or 

capability. The concept thus envisions a seamless application of combat power 

between domains, with greater integration at dramatically lower echelons than 

joint forces currently achieve. 

The level at which capabilities are integrated to achieve cross-domain 

synergy will range from the component (for example, airborne or amphibious 

forces securing forward air bases to extend the range of air power) to the lowlevel tactical (individual aerial, naval, space, cyber, and land-based capabilities 

cooperating in an attack against a single antiaccess system).

The concept applies to practically any opposed access situation, but its 

specific application will vary widely depending on the domains in which the 

enemy operates, the number and type of the enemy’s antiaccess and areadenial capabilities, and the level and manner of the integration of those 

capabilities.

8. Operational Access Precepts

The central idea, cross-domain synergy, describes in the broadest terms how 

the joint force will gain 

operational access in the face 

of armed opposition. The 

following general principles, 

when applied to each situation 

through planning and 

execution, amplify that basic 

concept with an additional 

level of description. They are 

not a checklist but rather a 

guide to judgment based on an 

understanding of the unique 

factors of any situation. These

precepts flow from the 

conditions and challenges 

described earlier. Coupled 

with the central idea of crossdomain synergy, they provide a 

description of how joint forces 

will operate to gain access in 

the face of armed opposition.

Operational Access Precepts

Conduct operations to gain access based on the requirements 

of the broader mission, while also designing subsequent 

operations to lessen access challenges.

Prepare the operational area in advance to facilitate access. 

Consider a variety of basing options. 

Seize the initiative by deploying and operating on multiple, 

independent lines of operations. 

Exploit advantages in one or more domains to disrupt enemy 

antiaccess/area-denial capabilities in others. 

Disrupt enemy reconnaissance and surveillance efforts while 

protecting friendly efforts. 

Create pockets or corridors of local domain superiority to 

penetrate the enemy’s defenses and maintain them as 

required to accomplish the mission. 

Maneuver directly against key operational objectives from 

strategic distance.

Attack enemy antiaccess/area-denial defenses in depth 

rather than rolling back those defenses from the perimeter. 

Maximize surprise through deception, stealth, and ambiguity 

to complicate enemy targeting. 

Protect space and cyber assets while attacking the enemy’s 

space and cyber capabilities.
18

Conduct operations to gain access based on the requirements of the 

broader mission, while also designing subsequent operations to lessen 

access challenges. Since operational access does not exist for its own sake, 

joint forces should conduct access operations in accordance with the broader 

objectives and ideally in conjunction with the other elements of national power. 

Importantly, a joint force commander should avoid over-committing forces or 

projecting combat power deeper into hostile territory than is required by the 

objective. This is especially true of major land forces, which can be difficult to 

withdraw once committed.

At the same time, because of the mounting lethality of emerging 

antiaccess and area-denial weapons, commanders should design campaigns 

that do not require attacking into the teeth of an enemy’s antiaccess/areadenial defenses where possible. Moreover, due to this lethality, commanders 

and political leaders should consider the potentially rapid escalatory effect the 

employment of such weapons in the early stages of a situation could have. 

Finally, to the extent that other elements of national power can achieve the 

national objectives, they are preferable to military forces employed in combat 

because of the risks of the latter in the emerging environment.

Prepare the operational area in advance to facilitate access. As 

mentioned, the challenge presented by opposed access will be determined 

largely by conditions created prior to combat. Much of that shaping is a 

national or even multinational effort, and joint forces will find themselves 

operating in support of other agencies and departments, in particular the U.S. 

State Department. Preparing the operational area will be a continuous priority 

effort for combatant commanders, commencing well in advance of combat and

continuing after combat begins, and combatant commanders will have to 

coordinate with other agencies and departments in that effort. 

This precept comprises a wide range of actions designed to strengthen 

regional partnerships and partners, which include not only foreign militaries 

but also other agencies and nongovernmental organizations. These actions

include engagement activities such as bilateral and multinational exercises to 

improve multinational operations; key leader engagements; missions to train, 

advise and equip foreign forces to improve their national ability to contribute to 

regional access; negotiations to secure basing and transit rights and to 

establish command relationships, roles and responsibilities, and support 

agreements; freedom-of-navigation exercises with regional partners; the use of 

grants and contracts to improve relationships with and strengthen host-nation 

and other regional partners; and planning conferences to develop multinational 

plans. Additionally, this effort can include military information support 

operations and other information activities designed to foster support for U.S. 

efforts in a region. This effort also can include establishing, improving, and 

hardening forward and intermediate bases critical to the projection of military 

force into the region as well as prepositioning supplies and equipment. Finally, 
19

this effort can include the forward deployment of forces, whether conducting 

security activities on a routine basis or deploying for combat in response to a 

developing crisis. These steps can all signal U.S. commitment to a region.

The effort to shape advantageous access conditions is part of a larger, 

long-term effort to improve security cooperation in a region and will benefit 

from that broader effort. Actions to secure access will be included within each 

theater and appropriate country security cooperation plan. Even seemingly 

unrelated missions such as humanitarian assistance can contribute indirectly 

to securing access by engendering goodwill in the region. That said, 

commanders must anticipate that agreements made during routine security 

cooperation may not endure during actual crisis or conflict, and therefore they 

should develop options based on varying degrees of pre-existing access.

Another critical and continuous effort to improve access conditions in 

advance will be on-going intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance 

activities to improve situational awareness, both overall and in the various 

domains, and to uncover adversary antiaccess/area-denial capabilities, plans,

and preparations in the region. Operations in space, cyberspace, and across 

the electromagnetic spectrum likewise will be continuous to ensure that 

support to navigation, command and control, targeting, sustainment, and 

intelligence are in place when needed. Moreover, computer network 

operations, both offensive and defensive, likely will commence long before 

lethal combat begins and even before combat forces begin to deploy.

Consider a variety of basing options. As mentioned, the use of 

forward bases is a primary means for mitigating the effect of distance on force 

projection. Forward bases, including mobile seabases, constitute critical 

―access infrastructure‖ which supports the deployment of forces and supplies. 

The greater the capabilities and capacity that can be established at or flowed 

through the base, the greater the force that ultimately can be projected. 

Future enemies consequently can increasingly be expected to attack those 

bases as part of an antiaccess/area-denial strategy in an attempt to restore the 

penalty of distance. They will employ a variety of means ranging from missiles 

to terror attack—any of which might employ weapons of mass destruction. 

Therefore, while undeniably valuable in the context of opposed access, forward 

bases are maintained at potentially considerable risk.

Since this concept calls for some elements of a joint force to maneuver 

against key operational objectives directly from ports of embarkation, reliance 

on forward bases will decrease while also increasing employment options. The 

greater the proportion of such elements in the joint force, the less an enemy 

attack on any bases will endanger the mission. This capability is especially 

valuable in initial assault forces.

Not all forces will be able to deploy directly into combat, however, and 
20

sustained operations eventually will require robust bases in the operational 

area. Several options exist for resolving this dilemma. The practical solution 

in any given situation likely will consist of a combination of them. The first 

option is to protect and harden permanent bases so they can withstand attack 

and retain their functionality. The loss of a forward base could be 

catastrophic, and since abandoning a base generally is not politically viable, 

forward bases must be protected. A second option is to disaggregate large 

bases into a greater number of smaller bases, decreasing vulnerability through 

redundancy and complicating the enemy’s targeting efforts. This option, 

however, tends to increase the logistical burden and protection requirements. 

A third option, in conjunction with disaggregation, is to employ austere 

temporary bases as opposed to sophisticated permanent bases. The ability to 

operate effectively from such locations can confer a significant advantage to a 

joint force. Especially for small or specialized forces, this can include the use 

of remote or even abandoned bases, airfields, ports, or other military or civilian 

facilities. Such locations present a less lucrative and less obvious target for the 

enemy, improving survivability and complicating the enemy’s targeting. 

Moreover, the ability to dismantle and relocate facilities also can improve 

security and operational flexibility. The disadvantage of such locations is that 

they tend to lack the capabilities and capacity of permanent installations. The 

greater the proportion of the force able to operate from austere forward 

locations, the less will be the threat posed by enemy attack against permanent 

forward bases—and the greater will be the operational choices. A fourth option 

is the use of seabasing,14 which reduces sovereignty issues that often can 

preclude the establishment of forward bases. The inherent mobility of 

seabasing can complicate the enemy’s defensive preparations by making the 

objective remain ambiguous through holding a large coastal area at risk. It can 

enhance security by complicating the enemy’s detection and targeting. 

Seabasing options may be limited by capacity. One other option is to 

emphasize capabilities with minimal dependence on forward bases, such as 

amphibious, long-range strike, cyber, electronic, or space capabilities, either in 

primary or supporting roles.

Seize the initiative by deploying and operating on multiple, 

independent lines of operations. Seizing and maintaining the initiative is 

critical to any combat operation. One key advantage of U.S. joint forces over 

most potential enemies is their ability to manage complex operations. 

Operating on multiple lines in multiple domains simultaneously can help joint 

forces to seize that initiative by overloading an enemy’s ability to cope. 

Moreover, it increases friendly employment options while forcing the enemy to 

 

14 Seabasing: ―The deployment, assembly, command, projection, reconstitution, and reemployment of joint power from the sea without reliance on land bases within the operational 

area.‖ Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 

17Jan11].
21

defend multiple avenues of approach, especially if the joint force is not 

dependent on major infrastructure nodes but has the ability to operate 

effectively in austere environments. Operating on multiple lines also improves 

a joint force’s ability to exploit unforeseen opportunities and to overcome 

setbacks. Finally, the dispersal of joint forces also will mitigate the risk posed 

by enemy weapons of mass destruction.

Correspondingly, this concept envisions that future joint forces will 

organize tactically into tailored joint formations able to deploy, operate, and 

survive autonomously. For land forces especially, this suggests smaller units 

and platforms that are rapidly deployable yet lethal. This concept sees 

deployment and combat as a single evolution of parallel actions rather than as 

distinct and sequential phases. Each formation will operate in multiple 

domains as required. While maneuvering independently, they will maintain the 

ability to concentrate smoothly into larger formations as necessary. While they 

will be self-contained with respect to the envisioned mission, the joint force will 

be able to support them quickly with external capabilities as needed—

principally additional air, space, electronic, and cyberspace capabilities, which 

can best mitigate the latency imposed by distance.

Such distributed operations will place a burden on both command and 

control and sustainment, as Section 9 will discuss.

Exploit advantages in one or more domains to disrupt enemy 

antiaccess/area-denial capabilities in others. Joint forces will attempt to 

identify and exploit any domain mismatches, seeking to apply relative strength 

against weakness both within and between those domains in which joint forces 

enjoy advantages. Gaining superiority in any given domain is not merely a 

matter of operations in that domain. One of the great asymmetrical advantages 

of joint forces over most potential enemies is their potential to bring combat 

power to bear across domains, often in complementary and reinforcing 

combinations that prevent the enemy from countering effectively. Operating 

initially in unopposed or lightly opposed domains as described above, joint 

forces will apply combat power to gain superiority in other contested domains 

in pursuit of the combination that will provide the overall freedom of action 

necessary to accomplish the mission.

The decision on which domains to operate in initially will depend on the 

mission and the enemy’s capabilities and vulnerabilities in the various 

domains; there is no universal sequence. That said, joint force projection 

almost always will include the early conduct of information operations and 

operations in space and cyberspace, since freedom of action in those latter 

domains is increasingly important to all joint operations. Moreover, those

operations rarely require the additional risks incurred in deploying forces to the 

operational area. In fact, information, space, and cyberspace operations 

generally should commence well before the need for combat, as part of efforts 
22

to shape the operational area.

Low-signature forces in all domains are especially key for early 

penetration of an enemy’s antiaccess/area-denial defenses before they have

been degraded. Where geography supports it, the undersea environment is a 

potentially valuable place to project military force with limited exposure to 

enemy fires. Undersea forces tend to operate in a dispersed manner and have 

only limited vulnerability to forces operating in other domains. Undersea 

warfare is especially valuable in gaining maritime superiority, although 

undersea forces also could bring naval power to bear against other domains 

through the use of land-attack missiles or electronic attack. The air is another 

domain generally suitable for the early focus of effort, again because air forces 

tend not to operate in massed formations that make them vulnerable to 

catastrophic loss and because they tend to be broadly effective in bringing 

power to bear rapidly against other domains. Finally, special operations forces 

are valuable for locating, targeting, and destroying key enemy capabilities, as 

well as for cultivating indigenous resistance elements that can help disrupt the 

antiaccess/area-denial strategy. Like space and cyberspace forces, special 

operations forces likely will be in position, often operating in denied territory, in 

advance of the commitment of major forces to set the conditions for the 

employment of those forces. Operations to maintain or gain access in the 

maritime commons can build on these low signature operations, avoid high 

density threat antiaccess weapons, and maneuver to achieve surprise and 

rapid operations.

In contrast, large land forces generally will be the last to penetrate within 

range of an enemy’s antiaccess and area-denial weapons because of the 

potential for catastrophic loss. That is not irrevocably true however. Land 

forces, for example, could be used to seize advanced bases on the outskirts of 

an enemy’s defenses from which to project air and naval power into the heart of 

those defenses. Moreover, small land or surface naval forces, to include special 

operations forces, could infiltrate an enemy’s antiaccess defenses undetected.

The sequence of expansion into additional domains will depend on a 

variety of factors. Access to space, cyberspace, and the electromagnetic 

spectrum generally will not rely on superiority in other domains as a 

precondition. In contrast, access to the land domain and, to a lesser extent, 

the surface maritime domain (at least within range of an enemy’s antiaccess 

capabilities) very often will. In almost all cases, air is an important domain in 

which to expand because airpower generally can be brought to bear 

responsively to most other domains and air superiority often is a precondition 

to gaining access to the land and sea within a contested operational area. 

Disrupt enemy reconnaissance and surveillance efforts while 

protecting friendly efforts. The reconnaissance/counterreconnaissance fight 

is a critical multidomain contest in any combat operation to gain operational 
23

access, as each combatant attempts to gain better situational awareness than 

the other. The joint force likely will start at an intelligence disadvantage as it 

moves into an enemy’s home areas, a situation likely to be exacerbated as the 

enemy disposes antiaccess and area-denial capabilities from concealed 

positions, often hidden in complex environments. The disadvantage can be 

mitigated to some degree through intelligence provided by forward-deployed 

forces. The joint force will require a major intelligence, reconnaissance, and

surveillance effort applied aggressively, to include fighting for information, to 

overcome those disadvantages. Conversely, it will need to degrade the enemy’s 

situational awareness through a combination of attacking his reconnaissance 

and surveillance operations and confounding his collection efforts through 

deception and concealment.

Create pockets or corridors of local domain superiority to 

penetrate the enemy’s defenses and maintain them as required to 

accomplish the mission. It is not necessary to achieve domain superiority 

permanently in a given domain throughout the operational area to accomplish 

the mission. Although joint forces in recent decades usually enjoyed such 

superiority—or even supremacy—future joint forces often may not. A joint 

force commander who waits for that condition will likely surrender the initiative 

and miss opportunities. Rather, by using the asymmetrical advantages and 

cross-domain synergy described above, future joint forces will open limited 

pockets or corridors of superiority in the necessary domains and maintain 

them long enough to accomplish required tasks.

This concept envisions the joint force managing the fluid opening and 

closing of access corridors over time and space as needed. It is not enough 

merely to open one of these corridors in the enemy antiaccess/area-denial 

defenses; the joint force must maintain it as well, although it may not be 

necessary to maintain it for the entire duration of a mission as long as it can be 

re-opened as needed. It is important, however, that forces that have 

penetrated into the depth of the enemy defenses not be left in an 

unsupportable position.

Maneuver directly against key operational objectives from strategic 

distance.15 Some elements of the joint force will operate directly against key 

objectives from points of origin or other points outside the theater without the 

need for forward staging.16 Not being tied to fixed forward bases will increase 

 

15 Headquarters, Department of the Army, FM 3-0, Operations (Washington, DC, 27Feb08), 

paragraphs. 8-2 through 8-4. Strategic distance refers to action originating from outside an 

operational area, often from home station.

16 Staging: ―Assembling, holding, and organizing arriving personnel, equipment, and 

sustaining materiel in preparation for onward movement. The organizing and preparation for 

movement of personnel, equipment, and materiel at designated areas to incrementally build 

forces capable of meeting the operational commander's requirements.‖ See also origin: 
24

operational flexibility while complicating enemy defensive preparations. The 

greater the proportion of such elements in the joint force, the less will be the 

overall burden on such bases and the less vulnerable the joint force will be to a 

successful attack against those bases. Moreover, avoiding intermediate staging 

en route can increase tempo by eliminating operational pauses. This is 

another capability that is especially valuable in initial assault forces.

Not all elements of the force will be able to operate this way, however. 

Where forward basing is an operational necessity, the joint force may be 

required to seize and operate temporary or permanent forward operating 

locations or operate from a seabase. Seizing such bases may be a mission best 

suited to elements able to maneuver as described above.

Attack enemy antiaccess/area-denial defenses in depth rather than 

rolling back those defenses from the perimeter. This concept envisions 

that joint forces will attempt to penetrate into the depth of an enemy’s 

antiaccess/area-denial defenses. To do this, they will exploit and expand any 

domain advantages and maximize cross-domain synergy as described above. 

Additionally, they naturally will take advantage of any identified gaps in the 

enemy defenses. The penetration is designed to disrupt the integrity of the 

enemy defensive system, the preferred defeat mechanism, by striking at critical 

hostile elements, such as logistics and command and control nodes, long-range 

firing units, and strategic and operational reserves.17

The historical alternative to this approach is to attack the perimeter of the 

enemy’s defenses, pushing back those defenses while advancing. Such an

approach operates primarily by attrition and does not threaten the integrity of 

the enemy’s defensive system, but rather merely compresses those defenses as 

they fall back. This may actually play into the enemy’s antiaccess/area-denial 

strategy, which likely will attempt to use space and time to inflict cumulatively 

unacceptable casualties on an advancing joint force.

While striking enemy antiaccess/area-denial capabilities in depth, a joint 

force should also attempt to neutralize the enemy’s ability to do the same to it, 

attacking those capabilities the enemy could employ to attack U.S. command 

and control, sustainment, and lines of communication.

 

―Beginning point of a deployment where unit or non-unit-related cargo or personnel are 

located.‖ Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/

[accessed 20Apr11].

17 That said, the potentially escalatory effects of strikes into an adversary’s homeland must 

be carefully weighed against U.S. political objectives and acceptable risk. Such escalation is 

particularly likely when the conflict is distant from the US homeland, and there has been no 

corresponding attack on US territory. In these cases, the probability and risk of reprisal 

attacks against the continental United States must be considered.
25

Maximize surprise through deception, stealth, and ambiguity to 

complicate enemy targeting. Surprising the enemy is always a virtue in war. 

Given the vulnerability of deploying joint forces to increasingly lethal antiaccess 

and area-denial weapons, surprise arguably is even more valuable—indeed, 

possibly even essential—in the context of future opposed access, and future 

commanders should spare no effort to achieve it by any available means. That 

said, while the desire to surprise may be as great as ever, the ability to surprise 

rests ultimately on the enemy’s susceptibility to being surprised. This will be 

problematic in a future operating environment increasingly characterized by 

pervasive sensors and information transparency. This paper therefore carefully 

distinguishes among three basic ways to achieve surprise: deception, stealth,

and ambiguity.18

For the purposes of this paper, deception19 means convincing an enemy 

that the joint force will adopt one course of action while adopting another. 

Successful deception therefore depends less on one’s own efforts than on the 

enemy’s inclination to accept misleading evidence. In other words, successful 

deception tends to be less about creating false expectations than about 

understanding and exploiting enemy expectations that already exist. Skillful

deception therefore will always be an art form that depends on the existence of 

an alternative course of action that appears likely to the enemy. Successful 

deception will be difficult in the future opposed access environment, although 

when achieved deception tends to have the greatest effect among the three 

methods of surprise. In the context of future opposed access, forms of 

deception that could prove especially useful include electromagnetic 

deception20 and cyber deception, which could provide intentionally erroneous 

information on the location and activities of deploying joint forces to enemy 

intelligence networks.

Stealth means denying the enemy information about friendly capabilities, 

intentions, or dispositions. (Stealth in this context should not be confused 

with ―stealth‖ technology, which is only one means of achieving stealth.) The 

 

18See Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication (MCDP) 1, Warfighting (Washington: HQMC, 

1997), pp. 43-44.

19Deception: ―Those measures designed to mislead the enemy by manipulation, distortion, 

or falsification of evidence to induce the enemy to react in a manner prejudicial to the enemy's 

interests.‖ See also military deception—―Actions executed to deliberately mislead adversary 

military decision makers as to friendly military capabilities, intentions, and operations, thereby 

causing the adversary to take specific actions (or inactions) that will contribute to the 

accomplishment of the friendly mission.‖ Dictionary of Military Terms, 

http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 3Dec10]. 

20Electromagnetic deception: ―The deliberate radiation, re-radiation, alteration, 

suppression, absorption, denial, enhancement, or reflection of electromagnetic energy in a 

manner intended to convey misleading information to an enemy or to enemy electromagneticdependent weapons, thereby degrading or neutralizing the enemy's combat capability.‖ 

Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 3Dec10].
26

enemy is not deceived as to friendly plans, but is ignorant of them. Again, 

achieving stealth in a transparent operating environment characterized by 

pervasive sensors and information networks will be extremely challenging, 

although U.S. forces should continue to pursue technologies and other means 

that offer potential opportunities to restore stealth to the battlespace.

The third basic method for achieving surprise is through ambiguity. 

Joint forces achieve ambiguity by operating in a way that supports multiple 

courses of action and therefore forces the enemy to prepare for all of them. In 

a future opposed access environment characterized by information 

transparency—indeed often by information overload—ambiguity may be the 

single method of surprise offering the best potential for success. This concept 

supports ambiguity in two important ways. First, the idea of operating on 

multiple, self-contained lines of operations provides multiple options for a joint 

force and compels an enemy to defend on multiple axes. Second, since reliance 

on fixed forward bases tends to commit a force to certain lines of operation, the 

idea of maneuvering against key objectives directly from ports of embarkation 

without reliance on such bases similarly enables a joint force to appear 

ambiguous as to its ultimate objectives.

While conceptually distinct, these three methods can tend to blur in 

practice. And while depending entirely on either deception or stealth for future 

surprise could prove risky, this concept envisions that some artful combination 

of the three could be an essential element of future joint operations to gain 

access in the face of armed opposition.

Protect friendly space and cyber assets while attacking the 

enemy’s space and cyber capabilities. Space and cyberspace are now 

essential to all joint force projection, both for the support they provide to 

operations in the other domains and as operational domains in their own right 

when directed. The former provides critical position, navigation, and timing, 

command and control, missile warning, weather, and intelligence collection. 

The latter supports an increasing proportion of joint command and control and 

logistics functions. For just this reason, most enemies adopting an 

antiaccess/area-denial strategy will attack joint space and cyberspace 

operations in an attempt to disrupt force projection efforts. In fact, many 

enemies may try to disrupt U.S. use of space and cyberspace commercial as 

well as governmental well before the onset of lethal combat. The same can be 

said about the electromagnetic spectrum generally, which is especially critical 

in the context of force projection given the distances involved—although that is 

hardly a new phenomenon.

For this reason, efforts to gain and maintain adequate space and 

cyberspace superiority, as well as ensure use of the electromagnetic spectrum,

will be a continuous part of preparing the operational area for access. Both 

counterspace and countercyberspace operations are appealing to many 
27

potential enemies because attacks can be comparatively inexpensive and often 

are difficult to attribute. For these reasons, a joint force conducting force 

projection must protect its access to space and cyberspace capabilities. That is 

not to say that losses will not occur. As in any other domain, losses are 

inevitable, and joint forces projecting military force must be prepared to 

operate effectively despite such losses.

Similarly, many potential enemies increasingly rely on space and cyber 

capabilities, both of which are relatively affordable when purchased 

commercially. In the context of antiaccess and area-denial, both can be critical 

to an enemy’s targeting capability and therefore an important part of an 

antiaccess/area-denial strategy. Degrading an enemy’s cyber and space 

capabilities therefore can be a critical part of gaining and maintaining 

operational access. Developing good cyberspace and space situational 

awareness21 will be critical to both protecting friendly and degrading enemy 

capabilities.

Specific critical tasks include, but are not limited to, protecting friendly 

satellite communications and ensuring friendly position, navigation, and timing 

support while denying the enemy the same.

Gaining space and cyberspace superiority when and where needed is not 

necessarily a symmetrical effort—that is, cyberspace operations to gain 

cyberspace superiority and space operations to gain space superiority—but 

often can be achieved more effectively, like superiority in the other domains, 

through the cross-domain application of combat power.

9. Joint Operational Access and the Joint Functions

This concept has implications for the performance of the various joint 

functions.22 Attaining cross-domain synergy will require effective application of 

the joint functions across the five domains and often will require integration 

with interagency and foreign partners.

 

21 Space situational awareness: ―The requisite current and predictive knowledge of the 

space environment and the operational environment upon which space operations depend—

including physical, virtual, and human domains—as well as all factors, activities, and events of 

friendly and adversary space forces across the spectrum of conflict.‖ Dictionary of Military 

Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 24Jan11].

22 Joint functions: ―Related capabilities and activities grouped together to help joint force 

commanders synchronize, integrate, and direct joint operations. Functions that are common 

to joint operations at all levels of war fall into six basic groups - command and control, 

intelligence, fires, movement and maneuver, protection, and sustainment.‖ DOD Dictionary of 

Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 18Nov10].
28

Command and control. This concept will put a heavy burden on 

command and control. The command and control system23 must support 

forces operating at global distances, deploying and maneuvering independently 

on multiples lines of operations from multiple points of origin, and 

concentrating fluidly as required. It must support an operating tempo the 

enemy cannot match and facilitate integration across multiple domains 

simultaneously and at lower echelons. The synergy that is central to this 

concept will require a high degree of integration and synchronization in 

planning and execution across domains, not only at the component level, but 

at lower echelons as well. The joint command and control system will have to 

include techniques, procedures, and technologies that enable commanders to 

integrate operations across domains in innovative ways.

To support high-tempo distributed operations and to cope with a 

degraded command and control environment, this concept envisions 

decentralized command and control to the extent possible in both planning and 

execution. Such mission command24 enables subordinate commanders to act 

independently in consonance with the higher commander’s intent and effect 

the necessary cross-domain integration laterally at the required echelon. While 

distributed-collaboration technologies can facilitate this effort, commanders 

also must be prepared to operate effectively in a degraded environment. The 

ability to do so has implications for doctrine, training, and education.

The adversary will deliberately attempt to degrade friendly use of the 

electromagnetic spectrum, to include disruption of space and cyber systems. 

Due to heavy joint reliance on advanced communications systems, such an 

attack will be a central element of any enemy antiaccess/area-denial strategy, 

requiring a higher degree of protection for friendly command and control 

systems.

Especially with respect to incorporating space and cyberspace operations 

in a joint access campaign, new and adaptable relationships and authorities 

may be required to better integrate the capabilities of geographic and 

functional combatant commands with overlapping responsibilities. Moreover, 

combat operations may commence immediately upon deployment and may 

 

23 Command and control system: ―The facilities, equipment, communications, 

procedures, and personnel essential to a commander for planning, directing, and controlling 

operations of assigned and attached forces pursuant to the missions assigned.‖ DOD 

Dictionary of Military Terms, http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 

14Jan11].

24 Mission command: ―The conduct of military operations through decentralized execution 

based upon mission-type orders.‖ See also mission-type order: ―1. An order issued to a lower 

unit that includes the accomplishment of the total mission assigned to the higher 

headquarters. 2. An order to a unit to perform a mission without specifying how it is to be 

accomplished.‖ DOD Dictionary of Military Terms, 

http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ [accessed 9Jun11].
29

span multiple areas of responsibility en route to the operational area, creating 

the need for a single campaign across traditional boundaries and requiring a 

re-examination of command relationships and methods and timing for 

establishing a joint task force. 

Intelligence. Given the increased lethality, precision, and accuracy of 

antiaccess and area-denial systems, the joint force requires the ability to

collect, fuse, and share accurate, timely, and detailed intelligence across all 

domains. Furthermore, this intelligence collection, fusion, and sharing may 

include interagency and multinational partners. All of this will require a 

reexamination of the current classification, access, and data sharing protocol 

restrictions.

Intelligence remains a critical contest in an access/antiaccess battle with 

each combatant trying to gain necessary intelligence while denying the other. 

The joint force must be prepared to fight for information rather than expecting 

uncontested collection and may begin operations at a disadvantage. 

Characterizing an adversary is a continuous activity, commencing years before 

hostilities begin and continuing during and after those hostilities. This has 

implications for steady state sizing, systemic capacity, and analytic 

technologies of intelligence forces. Specifically, the reconnaissance and 

surveillance contest is critical to access operations.

This concept’s preference for disruption over attrition will require 

intelligence not only about the location of enemy elements, but also about how 

those elements work together as a coherent system, including their potential 

for cross-domain cooperation.

Fires. Defeating opposed access will require lethal and nonlethal fires 

applied flexibly and responsively between domains. The emphasis on crossdomain synergy that is central to this concept applies first and foremost to 

fires. Although current capabilities provide some measure of flexibility and 

responsiveness, this concept envisions a qualitative improvement in these 

attributes. Achieving this objective increases the need to adopt flexible 

procedures for requesting, approving, and coordinating fire support among the 

Services and, possibly, among combatant commands.25 Target acquisition 

must be rapid and accurate, and procedures must be developed to minimize 

the latency or delay between identification and engagement of potentially 

fleeting critical targets.

Gaining operational access against armed opposition will remain a 

 

25 While tactical or operational control of some counterspace and countercyber ―fires‖ may 

be delegated to the joint force commander engaged in an operational access mission, some of 

these fires may be employed by a supporting commander (e.g., Commander, U.S. Strategic 

Command).
30

classic fire-and-maneuver problem, albeit often on a large scale. Joint forces 

must be able to concentrate or distribute fires quickly as the situation requires 

based on the needs of maneuvering forces. This concept envisions that any 

element maneuvering independently will have responsive access to the 

necessary joint fires, regardless of echelon or Service. Such access will depend 

on the ability to ensure the necessary communications in a potentially 

degraded information environment.

Although reliance on precision-guided munitions to attack selected 

targets will increase, the inventory of such munitions will remain finite, and 

joint forces attacking a prepared antiaccess/area-denial defense often will lack 

the precise targeting information required to justify their expenditure. 

Moreover, joint forces will continue to require accurate area fires to neutralize, 

suppress, and obscure targets to protect friendly forces and facilitate 

maneuver. While the Joint Combat Concept (JCC) emphasizes the need for 

discrimination, commanders at every echelon will need to reconcile that 

requirement with the significant threat posed by a capable antiaccess/areadenial system.

This concept envisions that lethal and nonlethal fires in all five domains 

will be managed within the same targeting and fire support coordination 

systems. While that is true today for traditional nonlethal fires such as 

electronic jamming, it may not be true for certain cyber and space capabilities, 

which today are controlled by supporting functional combatant commands. 

This concept envisions that control of such capabilities in the future will 

devolve to lower echelons to make the fires more responsive to the needs of 

operational commanders. The precise level to which that control can 

appropriately devolve remains to be determined.

Movement and maneuver. This concept envisions the fluid, adaptive 

maneuver of joint force elements as they advance on the objective area, operate 

within it, and conduct retrograde operations in an antiaccess/area-denial 

environment.

Self-contained joint elements, supported by joint fires, will move 

independently on multiple lines of operations from multiple ports of 

embarkation, rerouting as necessary en route, concentrating quickly against 

key objectives, and dispersing again as the situation requires. These maneuver 

elements will make maximum use of deception, stealth, and ambiguity to mask 

their movements and reach their operating areas without unacceptable risk or 

losses. Air and naval forces will maneuver in simultaneous and 

complementary movements as they advance. Where geography allows, land 

forces likewise will maneuver against intermediate land objectives to facilitate 

the continued advance of those naval and air forces before maneuvering 

against objectives in the objective area through forcible entry if the mission 

requires.
31

Some portion of the joint force will be able to maneuver directly against 

key objectives from ports of embarkation, without reliance on fixed 

intermediate or forward bases, identifying and changing those objectives en 

route. This will put a premium on en route communications for command and 

control.

Space and cyber forces will ―maneuver‖ as necessary to conduct and 

support operations in advance, and will maintain or improve their positions as 

the situation develops. Joint forces likewise will ―maneuver‖ in cyberspace by 

penetrating hostile digital networks.

Protection. Protecting the joint force will be critical to ultimate success 

since most enemy antiaccess/area-denial strategies will operate on the 

principle of attrition. Protection against antiaccess and area-denial capabilities 

will pose different challenges. While all protection schemes will involve a 

combination of active and passive measures to defeat enemy attack, protecting 

against antiaccess weapons will place a greater emphasis on minimizing the 

exposure of the force during its advance toward the objective area, when many 

elements of the force are most vulnerable. A joint force will lessen its exposure 

by a combination of dispersion, multiple lines of operations, speed of 

movement, agile maneuver that reroutes around threats, deception, masking or 

other concealment techniques, and disruption of enemy intelligence collection 

through counterreconnaissance, countersurveillance, and other methods. 

Once arrived in the objective area, joint force elements can no longer use some 

techniques to avoid detection and will therefore rely on active and passive 

defensive measures to defeat actual enemy attack.

Protecting joint force command and control will demand special 

emphasis because this is a critical function against which many enemies will 

concentrate their targeting. To protect command and control systems, the joint 

force must develop systems, technologies, and warfighting techniques to 

ensure continued freedom of action and access to space, cyberspace, and the 

electromagnetic spectrum when and where needed. 

Protecting logistics will include protecting logistical bases, distribution 

activities, and logistics networks and associated data. Several options exist for 

base protection. These include hardening of bases to withstand attack,

distributing the functions of a base into smaller, more numerous and 

temporary installations to mitigate the effects of an attack, and employing 

mobile seabasing where possible. Any operational solution likely will include 

some combination of these options.

Of growing concern to future joint forces will be missile defense and 

defense against sabotage—the former because of the increasing availability of 

and dramatic improvements in missiles and the latter because many enemies 

will see it as an inexpensive capability with the potential for disproportionately 
32

large results. In both cases, defense against the capability tends to be much 

more costly than the capability itself.

Sustainment. Because of the logistically intensive nature of force

projection, effective sustainment will be critical to future joint force success—

and therefore a likely target for enemy attack. Joint forces will require new 

sustainment concepts that account for adversary capabilities. These 

innovations may require new platform designs, more robust information 

networks, and the ability to more rapidly reach distributed combat forces 

operating in contested areas. 

The distributed nature of operations described in this concept will 

especially strain the distribution system and its command and control. 

Commanders will require a robust and flexible system that allows them quickly 

to move, support, and sustain forces that may be in multiple locations with 

multiple objectives. In support of those units that maneuver directly against 

operational objectives from strategic distance, this concept envisions a merging 

of the intertheater and intratheater segments of the global distribution pipeline. 

Logistics commanders will require full visibility of all requirements, resources,

and capabilities throughout the full length of that pipeline to effect the level of 

coordination required to support the operations described.

This concept envisions a sustainment system comprising a combination 

of basing options, the prepositioning of equipment and supplies, and a flexible, 

protected distribution process. Establishing such a system will be a key part of 

preparing the operational area for access. This concept envisions no 

breakthrough advancement that will dramatically change the sustainment 

challenge. Rather, it envisions incremental efficiencies in three areas. First, 

decrease the logistical appetite of joint forces in all classes of supply, but 

especially in fossil fuels. Second, improve supply chain management by 

increasing visibility of both expenditure rates and available inventory levels. 

Improvements in these areas will support command decision-making (that 

said, warfare is an especially wasteful and unpredictable activity, and the joint 

force cannot expect and should not attempt to manage the distribution system 

with anything approaching the efficiency of the business world). Third,

improve the capabilities and capacities of U.S. military airlift and sealift. This 

may include developing lift assets that would not be perceived as catastrophic 

losses if destroyed and those that provide options for maneuvering within an 

area-denial environment. Innovative solutions such as lighter-than-air craft 

may ease the lift challenge.

In some situations, it may be preferable for joint forces to sustain 

themselves via seabases, which increases employment options by decreasing 

reliance on airfields and other ashore sustainment infrastructure. Large-scale 

distribution from a seabase will require new capabilities and capacities. Shipto-ship and ship-to-shore connectors will be required for the configuration and
33

distribution of a broad variety of sustainment packages, under challenging sea 

states and in support of continuous sustainment demands.

Given limitations in organic logistical resources, operations to gain 

operational access may have to rely on the contracted use of commercial 

service providers. Joint forces will require the expeditionary ability to access 

such support, from identifying support requirements and potential providers to 

letting contracts and managing the associated contractor personnel. 

Additionally, commanders must be able to direct contractors, who currently 

require direction from government contracting officers, furnish support for 

contractors in their operational areas, and manage risks associated with 

contractor nonperformance. Moreover, inadvertently awarding contracts to 

local entities with ties to the enemy is a real concern that requires close 

attention to contractor vetting. In the event of significant attacks on staging 

bases, logistics facilities and other locations with significant contracted 

capabilities, retention and protection of civilian contactors may become a 

critical challenge.

To meet the challenges of opposed access, the survivability of the joint 

sustainment system will be critical. For land-based logistics especially, the 

challenge will be to ensure the survivability of the infrastructure. As noted 

above, this concept envisions enhanced joint force protection capabilities 

through some combination of hardening, dispersal, redundancy, and mobility 

of the infrastructure and the logistics network. This concept further envisions

that a greater portion of joint combat power will likely be dedicated to 

protecting distribution activities—although this will occur at the expense of 

forces available to attack the enemy’s antiaccess/area-denial defenses and at 

some point such a shift can imperil the overall mission. 

10. Capabilities Required by this Concept

The following capabilities have emerged as essential to the implementation of 

this concept. They derive logically from the concept itself or from 

accompanying experimentation. This list is neither all-encompassing nor 

prioritized. It is designed merely to provide a baseline for follow-on concept 

development, analysis, and experimentation. Although grouped by joint 

function for ease of understanding, many of these capabilities apply across 

multiple joint functions. (While information and engagement are not joint 

functions, they have been added as categories because several of the 

capabilities fall within those groupings.) Furthermore, many of these 

capabilities have implications for DOTMLPF as well as for integration with 

interagency and foreign partners.
34

Command and Control

JOA-001. The ability to maintain reliable connectivity and 

interoperability among major warfighting headquarters and 

supported/supporting forces while en route.

JOA-002. The ability to perform effective command and control in a 

degraded and/or austere communications environment.

JOA-003. The ability to create sharable, user-defined operating pictures 

from a common database to provide situational awareness

(including friendly, enemy and neutral situations) across the 

domains.

JOA-004. The ability to integrate cross-domain operations, to include at 

lower echelons, with the full integration of space and 

cyberspace operations.

JOA-005. The ability to employ mission command to enable subordinate 

commanders to act independently in consonance with the 

higher commander's intent and effect the necessary crossdomain integration laterally at the required echelon.

Intelligence

JOA-006. The ability of operational forces to detect and respond to 

hostile computer network attack in an opposed access 

situation.

JOA-007. The ability to conduct timely and accurate cross-domain allsource intelligence fusion in an opposed access situation.

JOA-008. The ability to develop all categories of intelligence in any 

necessary domain in the context of opposed access.

Fires

JOA-009. The ability to locate, target, and suppress or neutralize hostile 

antiaccess and area-denial capabilities in complex terrain with

the necessary range, precision, responsiveness and reversible 

and permanent effects while limiting collateral damage.

JOA-010. The ability to leverage cross-domain cueing to detect and 

engage in-depth to delay, disrupt or destroy enemy systems.

JOA-011. The ability to conduct electronic attack and computer network 

attack against hostile antiaccess/area-denial capabilities.

JOA-012. The ability to interdict enemy forces and materiel deploying to 

an operational area.

Movement and Maneuver

JOA-013. The ability to conduct and support operational maneuver over 

strategic distances along multiple axes of advance by air and 

sea.
35

JOA-014. The ability to ―maneuver‖ in cyberspace to gain entry into 

hostile digital networks.

JOA-015. The ability to conduct en route command and control, mission 

planning and rehearsal, and assembly of deploying forces, to 

include linking up of personnel and prepositioned equipment.

JOA-016. The ability to conduct forcible entry operations, from raids and 

other limited-objective operations to the initiation of sustained 

land operations.

JOA-017. The ability to mask the approach of joint maneuver elements 

to enable those forces to penetrate sophisticated antiaccess 

systems and close within striking range with acceptable risk.

Protection

JOA-018. The ability to defeat enemy targeting systems, including their 

precision firing capabilities.

JOA-019. The ability to provide expeditionary missile defense to counter 

the increased precision, lethality, and range of enemy 

antiaccess/area-denial systems.

JOA-020. The ability to protect and, if necessary, reconstitute bases and 

other infrastructure required to project military force, to 

include points of origin, ports of embarkation and 

debarkation, and intermediate staging bases.

JOA-021. The ability to protect forces and supplies deploying by sea and 

air.

JOA-022. The ability to protect friendly space forces while disrupting 

enemy space operations.

JOA-023. The ability to conduct cyber defense in the context of opposed 

access.

Sustainment

JOA-024. The ability to deploy, employ, and sustain forces via a global 

network of fixed and mobile bases to include seabasing.

JOA-025. The ability to quickly and flexibly establish nonstandard 

support mechanisms, such as the use of commercial providers 

and facilities.

JOA-026. The ability to plan, manage, and integrate contractor support 

in the context of operations to gain operational access in the 

face of armed resistance.
36

Information

JOA-027. The ability to inform and influence selected audiences to 

facilitate operational access before, during, and after 

hostilities.

Engagement

JOA-028. The ability to develop relationships and partnership goals and 

to share capabilities and capacities to ensure access and 

advance long-term regional stability.

JOA-029. The ability to secure basing, navigation, and overflight rights 

and support agreements from regional partners.

JOA-030. The ability to provide training, supplies, equipment, and other 

assistance to regional partners to improve their access 

capabilities.

11. Risks of Adopting this Concept

Adopting this approach for gaining and maintaining operational access in the 

face of armed resistance is not without risks.

The most serious of these is that joint forces fail to achieve the 

synergy that is essential to this concept. This concept rests on the premise 

of cross-domain synergy, but merely combining Service capabilities across 

domains does not ensure synergy. To mitigate this risk, commanders should 

be aware of that reality and consciously take steps to create the conditions 

under which synergy can emerge. That said, commanders should keep in mind 

that achieving synergy by itself does not guarantee victory.

Likewise, joint forces may not be able to achieve the necessary 

coordination required to apply combat power effectively across domains, 

again negating the concept’s central premise. The cross-domain 

application of combat power relies on the ability to coordinate between those 

domains, which may be difficult in a degraded command and control 

environment. The mitigation to this risk is to maintain the ability to fall back 

on intradomain and Service-specific capabilities.

Similarly, the concept’s emphasis on cross-domain combat power 

could be misread by resource allocators to suggest significantly less 

need for organic self-sufficiency. Such an outcome would be dangerous if 

degraded command and control prevents cross-domain integrations, leaving 

elements to their organic capabilities. Mitigating this risk requires maintaining 

a sensible balance between organic capabilities and those accessible only 

through external support, together with robust and redundant means for 
37

requesting and coordinating that support.

The concept’s conditional preference for disruption could lead 

commanders and staffs to waste valuable time and energy in search of 

precise disruption mechanisms even when the nature of the enemy or the 

conditions of warfare preclude such a diagnosis. This risk, inherited from 

the JCC, misinterprets the concept, which acknowledges the peril of relying 

solely on disruption and instead affirms the need for whatever attrition may be 

required to defeat an enemy’s antiaccess/area-denial defense. Commanders 

must balance these mechanisms based on a sound understanding of the 

situation.

The concept’s call for integrating simultaneous actions across 

multiple domains on multiple lines of operations could lead to joint 

operations of debilitating complexity. The friction of military conflict urges 

simplicity and punishes unnecessary complexity, but operations to overcome 

opposed access are complex by nature. Commanders must be alert to this 

tension and must continuously strive for the proper balance.

The concept’s reliance on deep, precise strikes to neutralize enemy 

antiaccess and area-denial weapons before they can inflict significant 

losses may be unrealistic in the time frame of the concept. Locating, 

targeting and defeating such systems effectively from a distance remains a very 

difficult challenge, from the perspectives of both target intelligence and 

weaponeering. If such hostile systems cannot be neutralized, the successful 

execution of the concept could be at risk.

The concept could be logistically unsupportable. The concept’s call 

for multiple operationally self-contained formations operating independently 

imposes a logistical burden, but the concept offers no direct remedies other 

than improved efficiency. To mitigate this risk, commanders must remain 

aware of the logistical burden imposed by the concept of operations and must 

be prepared to adjust the concept accordingly. Likewise, force developers must 

seek to reduce logistical demand throughout the force.

The concept could be economically unsupportable in an era of 

constrained Defense budgets. In its fullest form, this is a resource-intensive 

concept. The emphasis on cross-domain synergy implies a degree of joint 

interdependence at relatively low echelons that will demand a robust command 

and control system and a major investment in frequent and realistic training 

for those forces. The emphasis on distributed, independent lines of operations 

will tend to demand greater numbers of smaller, but still capable, platforms, 

while also increasing lift and sustainment requirements. The very nature of 

opposed access argues for additional organizational strength to account for 

higher casualty levels than joint forces have suffered in decades.
38

Current national policy may not support operational requirements. 

This concept advocates attacking the full depth of an enemy’s antiaccess/areadenial defenses rather than merely their perimeter. At times, that will require 

strikes deep into the sovereign territory of other nations. Policy guidance may 

restrict such strikes, especially if an enemy emplaces antiaccess/area-denial 

systems in populated areas or possesses nuclear weapons and escalation is a 

strategic concern. Moreover, this concept calls for early preparatory actions in 

the space and cyberspace domains. Under current policy, authorization for 

such actions might not be forthcoming, especially in pre-crisis stages. In any 

case, the mitigation is to work with policy makers to ensure that operational 

requirements are clearly understood and accounted for.

Gaining and maintaining operational access in the face of armed 

resistance is inherently fraught with risk. This is the nature of any 

opposed access mission and not a risk specific to this concept in particular, 

but it is worth stating nonetheless. The future antiaccess/area-denial 

environment will demand accepting higher levels of calculated risk. Calculated 

risk is not reckless; prudent consideration and actions to protect the force are 

an enduring requirement. When national interests are not at stake, risk 

calculation rightly favors the expenditure of time and resources to minimize 

casualties. Ultimately though, war is a dangerous enterprise and a force 

conditioned to avoid risk develops habits that may leave it disadvantaged 

against an opportunistic, willful, and risk-accepting adversary. Therefore, the 

joint force must continuously evaluate risk while simultaneously recognizing 

and exploiting or creating opportunities inside the adversary’s decision cycle. 

It is just this opportunistic advantage, gained through cross-domain synergy 

that is proposed for mitigating the risk in the antiaccess/area-denial 

environment.

12. Conclusion

Joint forces must be able to project military force into any operational area in 

the face of armed opposition in support of national interests. This is not a new 

challenge, but it is one that U.S. joint forces have not been called upon to face 

in recent decades. That condition likely is changing, and the ability to 

overcome opposed access may prove to be of critical importance in coming 

years. While the nature of force projection has not changed, three emerging 

trends will impact its future conduct: dramatic improvement and proliferation 

of antiaccess/area-denial capabilities, changing U.S. overseas defense posture, 

and the emergence of space and cyberspace as increasingly important and

contested domains.

To meet this challenge, future joint forces will leverage cross-domain 

synergy—the complementary vice merely additive employment of capabilities in 

different domains such that each enhances the effectiveness and compensates 
39

for the vulnerabilities of the others—to establish superiority in some 

combination of domains that will provide the freedom of action required by the 

mission. The central idea describes in the broadest terms how the joint force 

will gain operational access in the face of armed opposition. The supporting 

precepts amplify that basic concept with an additional level of description. 

Operationalizing this concept will result in implications across the joint 

functions and will require the development and implementation of essential 

capabilities. The capability and capacity implications of this approach are 

potentially profound.
40

ANNEX A GLOSSARY

Unless otherwise stated, all definitions are from ―DOD Dictionary of Military 

Terms,‖ http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/.

airborne. In relation to personnel, troops especially trained to effect, following 

transport by air, an assault debarkation, either by parachuting or touchdown.

air superiority. That degree of dominance in the air battle of one force over 

another that permits the conduct of operations by the former and its related 

land, sea, and air forces at a given time and place without prohibitive 

interference by the opposing force.

air supremacy. That degree of air superiority wherein the opposing force is 

incapable of effective interference.

amphibious force. An amphibious task force and a landing force together with 

other forces that are trained, organized, and equipped for amphibious 

operations. Also called AF.

antiaccess. Those capabilities, usually long-range, designed to prevent an 

advancing enemy from entering an operational area. [JOAC]

area-denial. Those capabilities, usually of shorter range, designed not to keep 

the enemy out but to limit his freedom of action within the operational area. 

[JOAC]

assured access. The unhindered national use of the global commons and 

select sovereign territory, waters, airspace and cyberspace, achieved by 

projecting all the elements of national power. [JOAC]

combat. A category of military activity that aims to defeat an armed enemy

through the application of force. [CCJO]

combined arms. More than one tactical branch, arm or specialty of a single 

Service employed together in operations. [Adapted from AR 310-25, Dictionary 

of U.S. Army Terms]

command and control. The exercise of authority and direction by a properly 

designated commander over assigned and attached forces in the 

accomplishment of the mission.

cross-domain synergy. The complementary vice merely additive employment 

of capabilities in different domains such that each enhances the effectiveness 

and compensates for the vulnerabilities of the others. [JOAC]
41

cyber defense. The integrated application of DoD or U.S. Government 

cyberspace capabilities and processes to synchronize in real-time the ability to 

detect, analyze and mitigate threats and vulnerabilities, and outmaneuver 

adversaries, in order to defend designated networks, protect critical missions, 

and enable U.S. freedom of action. Cyber defense includes:

Proactive NetOps: (e.g., configuration control, information assurance (IA) 

measures, physical security and secure architecture design, intrusion 

detection, firewalls, signature updates, encryption of data at rest);

Defensive Counter Cyber (DCC): Includes: military deception via 

honeypots and other operations; and redirection, deactivation, or removal 

of malware engaged in a hostile act/imminent hostile act;

Defensive Countermeasures.

[From ―Joint Terminology for Cyberspace Operations,‖ VCJCS memo for the 

Service chiefs, combatant commanders and directors of Joint Staff directorates, 

undated.]

cyberspace. 1. A global domain within the information environment consisting 

of the interdependent network of information technology infrastructures, 

including the Internet, telecommunications networks, computer systems, and 

embedded processors and controllers. [JP 1-02] 2. Domain characterized by 

the use of electronics and the electromagnetic spectrum to store, modify, and 

exchange data via networked systems and associated physical infrastructures. 

[From ―Joint Terminology for Cyberspace Operations,‖ VCJCS memo for the 

Service chiefs, combatant commanders and directors of Joint Staff directorates, 

undated.]

cyberspace operations. The employment of cyber capabilities where the 

primary purpose is to achieve objectives in or through cyberspace. Such 

operations include computer network operations and activities to operate and 

defend the Global Information Grid. [From ―Joint Terminology for Cyberspace 

Operations,‖ VCJCS memo for the Service chiefs, combatant commanders and 

directors of Joint Staff directorates, undated.] 

cyberspace superiority. The degree of dominance in cyberspace by one force 

that permits the secure, reliable conduct of operations by that force, and its 

related land, air, sea and space forces at a given time and sphere of operations 

without prohibitive interference by an adversary. [From ―Joint Terminology for 

Cyberspace Operations,‖ VCJCS memo for the Service chiefs, combatant 

commanders and directors of Joint Staff directorates, undated.]

deception. Those measures designed to mislead the enemy by manipulation, 

distortion, or falsification of evidence to induce the enemy to react in a manner 

prejudicial to the enemy's interests. See also military deception—Actions 

executed to deliberately mislead adversary military decision makers as to 
42

friendly military capabilities, intentions, and operations, thereby causing the 

adversary to take specific actions (or inactions) that will contribute to the 

accomplishment of the friendly mission.

domain superiority. That degree of dominance of one force over another in a 

domain that permits the conduct of operations by the former at a given time 

and place without prohibitive interference by the latter. [JOAC]

electromagnetic deception. The deliberate radiation, re-radiation, alteration, 

suppression, absorption, denial, enhancement, or reflection of electromagnetic 

energy in a manner intended to convey misleading information to an enemy or 

to enemy electromagnetic-dependent weapons, thereby degrading or 

neutralizing the enemy's combat capability.

electromagnetic spectrum. The range of frequencies of electromagnetic 

radiation from zero to infinity. It is divided into 26 alphabetically designated 

bands.

electronic attack. Division of electronic warfare involving the use of 

electromagnetic energy, directed energy, or antiradiation weapons to attack 

personnel, facilities, or equipment with the intent of degrading, neutralizing, or 

destroying enemy combat capability and is considered a form of fires.

engagement. A category of military activity that seeks to improve the 

capabilities of or cooperation with allied and other partners. [CCJO]

fires. The use of weapon systems to create a specific lethal or nonlethal effect 

on a target.

force projection. The ability to project the military instrument of national 

power from the United States or another theater, in response to requirements 

for military operations.

forcible entry. Seizing and holding of a military lodgment in the face of armed

opposition. (JP 3-18)

forcible entry (JOAC working definition). Projection of land forces onto 

hostile territory in the face of armed opposition.

freedom of navigation operations. Operations conducted to demonstrate 

U.S. or international rights to navigate air or sea routes.

global commons. Areas of air, sea, space and cyberspace that belong to no 

one state. Access to the global commons is vital to U.S. national interests, 

both as an end in itself and as a means to projecting military force into hostile 

territory.
43

information environment. The aggregate of individuals, organizations, and 

systems that collect, process, disseminate, or act on information.

information operations. The integrated employment, during military 

operations, of information-related capabilities in concert with other lines of 

operation to influence, disrupt, corrupt, or usurp the decision-making of 

adversaries and potential adversaries while protecting our own.

intelligence. The product resulting from the collection, processing, 

integration, evaluation, analysis, and interpretation of available information 

concerning foreign nations, hostile or potentially hostile forces or elements, or 

areas of actual or potential operations.

joint force. A general term applied to a force composed of significant 

elements, assigned or attached, of two or more Military Departments operating 

under a single joint force commander.

joint functions. Related capabilities and activities grouped together to help 

joint force commanders synchronize, integrate, and direct joint operations. 

Functions that are common to joint operations at all levels of war fall into six 

basic groups—command and control, intelligence, fires, movement and 

maneuver, protection, and sustainment.

joint synergy. The combination of Service capabilities such that each 

enhances the effectiveness and compensates for the vulnerabilities of the 

others. [CCJO v3.0]

joint task force (JTF). A joint force that is constituted and so designated by 

the Secretary of Defense, a combatant commander, a sub-unified commander, 

or an existing joint task force commander.

landing force. A Marine Corps or Army task organization formed to conduct 

amphibious operations. The landing force, together with the amphibious task 

force and other forces, constitute the amphibious force. Also called LF.

line of communications. A route, either land, water, and/or air, that 

connects an operating military force with a base of operations and along which 

supplies and military forces move.

maritime superiority. That degree of dominance of one force over another 

that permits the conduct of maritime operations by the former and its related 

land, sea, and air forces at a given time and place without prohibitive 

interference by the opposing force.

maritime supremacy. That degree of maritime superiority wherein the 

opposing force is incapable of effective interference.
44

mission command. The conduct of military operations through decentralized 

execution based upon mission-type orders.

mission-type order. 1. An order issued to a lower unit that includes the 

accomplishment of the total mission assigned to the higher headquarters. 2. 

An order to a unit to perform a mission without specifying how it is to be 

accomplished.

movement and maneuver. This joint function encompasses disposing joint 

forces to conduct campaigns, major operations, and other contingencies by 

securing positional advantages before combat operations commence and by 

exploiting tactical success to achieve operational and strategic objectives. This 

function includes moving or deploying forces into an operational area and 

conducting maneuver to operational depths for offensive and defensive 

purposes. It also includes assuring the mobility of friendly forces.

objective area. A defined geographical area within which is located an 

objective to be captured or reached by the military forces. This area is defined 

by competent authority for purposes of command and control.

operational access. The ability to project military force into an operational 

area with sufficient freedom of action to accomplish the mission.

operational area. An overarching term encompassing more descriptive terms 

for geographic areas in which military operations are conducted. Operational 

areas include, but are not limited to, such descriptors as area of responsibility, 

theater of war, theater of operations, joint operations area, amphibious 

objective area, joint special operations area, and area of operations.

port of embarkation. The geographic point in a routing scheme from which 

cargo or personnel depart. This may be a seaport or aerial port from which 

personnel and equipment flow to a port of debarkation; for unit and non-unit 

requirements, it may or may not coincide with the origin.

power projection. The ability of a nation to apply all or some of its elements of 

national power - political, economic, informational, or military - to rapidly and 

effectively deploy and sustain forces in and from multiple dispersed locations to 

respond to crises, to contribute to deterrence, and to enhance regional stability.

protection. The preservation of the effectiveness and survivability of missionrelated military and nonmilitary personnel, equipment, facilities, information, 

and infrastructure deployed or located within or outside the boundaries of a 

given operational area.

reachback. The process of obtaining products, services, and applications, or 

forces, or equipment, or materiel from organizations that are not forward 

deployed.
45

relief and reconstruction. A category of military activity that seeks to restore 

essential civil services in the wake of combat, a breakdown of civil order, or a 

natural disaster. [CCJO]

seabasing. The deployment, assembly, command, projection, reconstitution, 

and re-employment of joint power from the sea without reliance on land bases 

within the operational area.

security. A category of military activity that seeks to protect and control civil 

populations, territory and resources, whether friendly, hostile or neutral. 

[CCJO]

space. A medium like the land, sea, and air within which military activities 

shall be conducted to achieve U.S. national security objectives.

space situational awareness. The requisite current and predictive knowledge 

of the space environment and the operational environment upon which space 

operations depend - including physical, virtual, and human domains - as well 

as all factors, activities, and events of friendly and adversary space forces 

across the spectrum of conflict.

staging. Assembling, holding, and organizing arriving personnel, equipment, 

and sustaining materiel in preparation for onward movement. The organizing 

and preparation for movement of personnel, equipment, and materiel at 

designated areas to incrementally build forces capable of meeting the 

operational commander's requirements.

strategic distance. A descriptor for action originating outside the operational 

area, often from home station. [JOAC]

sustainment. The provision of logistics and personnel services required to 

maintain and prolong operations until successful mission accomplishment.

unmanned aircraft. An aircraft or balloon that does not carry a human 

operator and is capable of flight under remote control or autonomous 

programming. [Note: Includes remotely piloted aircraft, remotely piloted 

vehicles, unmanned aerial vehicles and unmanned aircraft systems.]

weapons of mass destruction. Chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear 

weapons capable of a high order of destruction or causing mass casualties and 

exclude the means of transporting or propelling the weapon where such means 

is a separable and divisible part from the weapon. Also called WMD.
46

ANNEX B ASSESSMENT PLAN

The development of the JOAC followed a comprehensive Concept Development

Plan that employed an innovative approach and coordinated campaign to 

concept development and assessment. The JOAC campaign consisted of four 

integrated lines of effort: concept development; analysis; experimentation; and 

engagement/transition. This annex provides a summary of the assessment 

activity used to develop the JOAC. It concludes with a recommended way 

ahead that identifies key aspects requiring further assessment that are suitable 

for inclusion into the annual joint experimentation work plan.

B.1 Concept Development Framework

Figure 3 depicts the JOAC campaign framework with concept development, 

experimentation, and engagement and transition lines of effort across the 

project timeline with the analysis line of effort interwoven throughout the 

project. This framework enabled complete integration of all lines of effort in 

support of the development of the JOAC.

Figure 3. JOAC Project Framework

Based on an approved warfighter challenge and guided by CJCSI 3010, the 

JOAC Project Team adapted the Statement of the Military Problem, Outcomes, 
47

Objectives, Products, and Activities (SOOPA) model shown in Figure 4, which 

was updated as understanding of the JOA problem and solution improved.

S

Statement of 

the Military 

Problem

The essential problem for future joint forces is to be able to project 

military force into an operational area and sustain it in the face of armed 

opposition in light of the following three trends:

Future enemies are acquiring dramatically improved antiaccess 

and area-denial capabilities.

U.S. overseas defense posture is declining, increasing the 

requirement for force projection from the U.S. Homeland.

Space and cyberspace are becoming increasingly important and 

contested domains.

Meeting that challenge increasingly will require defeating integrated 

antiaccess/area-denial systems of growing lethality and sophistication.

O Outcomes 

1) Concept that describes how a future Joint Force Commander (JFC) 

will fight for freedom of action within the global commons and select 

sovereign territory across the range of expeditionary operations in an 

opposed access environment.

2) Required joint force capabilities identified / transitioned to the 

appropriate capability development sponsors. 

O Objectives 

1) Establish a common intellectual framework for military 

professionals, policymakers, and others interested in the challenge of 

opposed access.

2) Invigorate interest in, and the study of, an operational challenge that 

a generation of military leaders, focused on other missions, has not 

had to consider in recent years.

3) Establish a basis for subsequent joint and Service concepts and 

doctrine. 

4) Identify the broad capabilities required to gain operational access in 

the face of armed opposition.

5) Inform study, evaluation, wargaming, and experimentation that will 

result in changes to DOTMLPF.

P Products Signed JOAC that serves as the Chairman’s vision for the joint force’s ability to 

gain and maintain operational access across all domains.

A Activities 

Complete all Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Manual (CJCSM) 3010 

Concept Development activities as required, including but not limited to:

1) Initial Stakeholder Conference

2) Writing Workshops

3) Writing activities of outlines, drafts, and final products

4) Planning Conferences

5) Capabilities Limited Objective Experiment

6) Leveraging other combatant command and Service events

7) Red Team Review and Red Team Comments Resolution

8) Joint Staff Action Process (JSAP) Staffing

9) In-progress reviews (IPR) to Operational Deputies (OPSDEPS)

10) Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) Tank Presentation

11) Transition ―Off Ramps‖

Figure 4. JOAC SOOPA Model

This SOOPA model resulted in an initial draft of the JOAC that included an 

identification of the scope and purpose of the concept as well as an overview of 

the threat environment.
48

Figure 5 provides an overview of the concept development architecture for the 

JOAC project. Highlights of this architecture include a breakout of each line of 

effort and the interrelationships between key supporting activities. This 

approach recognizes Joint Experimentation as an integral part of the full cycle 

of concept development, assessment, and transition. Joint Experimentation 

design experts and analysts were included from the outset in the concept 

development process. 

Figure 5. JOAC Development Architecture

Summaries of the major JOAC development activities by line of effort follow in 

the sections below.

B.2 Concept Development Line of Effort

The JOAC Core Writing Team (CWT) consisted of subject matter experts (SME) 

from each of the four Services, JS J7, a space SME from OSD AT&L, and a 

Concept Writing Activities

Experimentation Venues Transition

LOE EW 11

JFEWE

JOAC version 0.5 JOAC version 0.23

Initial JOAC capabilties JOAC Activity Model JOAC Mission Capabilities Library

Identified & prioritized capabilities

Support data Briefings showing analytic & valid underpinning to JOAC

JOAC version 0.28

Coordination

JOAC version 1.0

JOAC revisions

DOTMLPF implications Engagement JS/J-7

Doctrine Training Leadership JS/J-8

Organization (J-1 & J-5 support) Materiel (FCBs) J-1

Personnel J-4

Facilities

Reassessed capabilities

JOA planning considerations

Revised JOAC Activity Model

JOAC version 0.3

JOAC Initial Draft

SOOPA

Literature Review

DARPA Seminar Wargame

Roundtable Discussions

Cross- Domain Synergy Central Idea & Elements Global Commons Space Cyber

Stakeholders Conference
49

USJFCOM concept development team. Each of the combatant commands also 

had the opportunity to assign a SME to the CWT. Throughout the development 

process, the CWT participated in an extensive literature review, a series of SME 

round table discussions, and the CJCSI 3010 defined concept development 

process. The CWT also participated in and leveraged findings from the 

experimentation and analytic support efforts. The following subsections 

summarize these activities.

B.2.1 Literature Summary and Data Review

Development of the JOAC began with an extensive literature summary and data 

review to identify leading thought among academics and military leaders on the 

issues surrounding opposed operational access and the potential solutions to 

combating these issues. The summary of the literature and data reviews 

provided a front-end analysis of JOA and a comprehensive body of knowledge 

that provides support to the concepts found in the JOAC. The review also 

examined past, ongoing, and future concept development activities that could 

contribute to the JOA Concept project.

The review contains a summary of key facts, assumptions, implications, 

conditions, and issues related to JOA. The activity centers on identification of 

ideas that supported the CWT’s development of each section of the paper. The 

review enabled development of an initial list of tasks and capabilities related to 

JOA that were vetted and refined through experimentation. Key findings from 

the literature survey, as found in its executive summary, are excerpted as 

quotes below. 

Strategic guidance and doctrine support the development of a concept for 

JOA. The National Security Strategy (NSS) concludes the nation must 

prepare for ―...increasingly sophisticated adversaries, [and] deterring and 

defeating aggression in anti-access environments.‖ Additionally, the 

Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) acknowledges a challenging 

operational landscape that includes: 

• Increasingly multidimensional conflicts (―hybrid‖ threats)

• Threats to the global commons and expansion into space and 

cyberspace

• Growing anti-access (A2) / area denial (AD) capabilities, including 

ballistic missile threats 

While the challenges inherent in access are not new, the Joint Force 

requires a concept for JOA now because of significant changes in the 

operational environment. Emergent concerns include:

• Weak and failing states, rising nations, and non-state actors

• Proliferation of technology and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) 

combined with the effects of globalization, which will bring the 

homeland into reach – U.S. bases are not immune
50

• More widely available longer-range, more precise weapons 

• Protection of ―homeland‖ will include elements of space and 

cyberspace

• Hybrid challenges and tactics

• Air and sea dominance are not assured

• U.S. dependence on space and cyberspace

The development of longer range intelligence, surveillance, and 

reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities by potential anti-access opponent[s] 

suggests that the assumed near-immunity of U.S. forces in the post-Cold 

War era is eroding and maritime vulnerability is returning to the lateSoviet period.

The open nature of the World Wide Web and the diffusion of related 

technical knowledge throughout the world have created an environment 

with major threats to the freedom of cyberspace. Threats to cyberspace 

subsequently increase vulnerabilities for militaries that rely on 

cyberspace technologies. Space has become the primary location for 

global and regional reconnaissance assets used for nuclear weapons 

monitoring, intelligence gathering, and support of combat operations on 

the earth's surface. A logical opening operation to any anti-access 

campaign is to neutralize U.S. space assets. 

Understanding the strategic and operational implications of the A2/AD 

challenge requires an examination of the following aspects of the future 

environment:

• Rising regional powers adapting strategies and capabilities to deny US 

access and freedom of action as a strategy.

• Increasingly capable future enemies will see the adoption of an 

antiaccess/area-denial strategy against the United States as a viable 

course of action.

• The ability to ensure operational access in the future is being 

challenged—and may well be the most difficult operational challenge 

U.S. forces will face over the coming decades.

While the need for access is not new, changes in the strategic and 

operational environment, proliferation of technology, emergence of nonstate actors with state-like power, and widening abilities to disrupt the 

space and cyber domains dramatically alter the military equation. 

Challenges exist in all five domains (air, cyber, land, sea, and space). 

Hence, solutions mandate development of cross-domain capabilities. 

These capabilities do not reside in a single Service, and therefore, require 

a joint concept to effectively gain and maintain JOA.

The JOAC Literature Summary and Data Review is available at the link below: 

(https://us.jfcom.mil/sites/J9/CG/OA/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItem
51

s.aspx?RootFolder=%2fsites%2fJ9%2fCG%2fOA%2fShared%20Documents%2fJ

OAC%20Deliverables%2f3%2e3%20Summary%20of%20Literature%5fData%20

Review&FolderCTID=&View=%7bFC439951%2d2D0F%2d4237%2dAFD8%2d16

097158B7DF%7d).

B.2.2 Seminar Wargames and Round Table Discussions

Beginning in July 2010, using the literature survey as the starting point, the 

CWT participated in a series of seminar wargames and held a series of round 

table discussions with groups of Highly Qualified Experts (HQE) to elicit 

perspectives on access challenges. The approach targeted events to inform the 

purpose and scope of the concept, understanding the nature of the challenge 

and evolving threat, identifying the statement of the military problem, and 

exploring solutions to that problem. Additionally, the CWT met on a regular 

basis throughout this process to refine the paper. The CWT developed key 

terms and working definitions to support the concept. Events that supported 

them included: 

Joint Operational Environment Seminar Wargame on Challenges to the 

Global Commons

National Defense University SME panel discussion on the emerging 

Antiaccess/Area-denial Threat

Round table discussion on the statement of the military problem

Access Challenges to Space round table discussion

Access Challenges in the Cyberspace Domain round table discussion

Domain Synergy round table discussion

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)/Center for 

Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) Seminar Wargame on 

A2/AD and Guided Rockets, Artillery, Missiles, and Mortars (G-RAMM)

Executive summaries and results of these events can be found at: 

https://us.jfcom.mil/sites/J9/CG/OA/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItem

s.aspx.

Key to success was the CWT’s ability to participate in and leverage other 

related Service experimentation efforts including the U.S. Army’s Joint Forcible 

Entry Warfighter Experiment (JFEWE) and the USMC Expeditionary Warrior 

2011 (EW 11) to both validate and further enrich the JOAC development 

process. The effects that these activities had on the progression of thought in 

the development of the JOAC are discussed within the Experimentation Line of 

Effort.

B.2.3 Review Activities

Additionally, the JOAC paper has been thoroughly reviewed by subject matter 

experts both within and outside the Department of Defense. 
52

The Joint Staff J7 sponsored a Red Team Review consisting of both 

retired flag and general officers and senior civilians to review JOAC v0.3. 

Over a period of three weeks from 25 Feb to 18 Mar 11, the Red Team 

analyzed the draft concept, challenging its ideas and assertions to 

identify defeat mechanisms within it and inform the JOAC v0.5

The Joint Staff J7 conducted an initial coordination review of JOAC v0.5 

via the Joint Staff Action Process (JSAP). Those comments were 

adjudicated by the CWT to inform JOAC v0.7

The Joint Staff J7 conducted a final coordination review of JOAC v0.7. 

Those comments were adjudicated by the CWT to inform JOAC v0.9

B.3 Experimentation Line of Effort

The JOAC campaign framework included a line of experimentation used to 

support the development of the JOAC. These activities included: the JOAC 

Capabilities Limited Objective Experiment (LOE); the United States Marine 

Corps, Title 10 experiment, EW 11; and the United States Army, JFEWE. 

Details about these events, the JOAC Project experimentation approach, and 

findings and insights from these events can be found in the JOAC Capabilities 

Limited Objective Experiment (LOE) Final Report, the JOAC Capabilities Limited 

Objective Experiment (LOE) Final Report Supplement III – EW 11, and the JOAC 

Capabilities Limited Objective Experiment (LOE) Final Report Supplement IV -

JFEWE, respectively. The JOAC Team leveraged two additional events, the 

United States Air Force Global Mobility Wargame, and the United States Navy 

Global 11. While these activities provided valuable insight into JOAC 

development and validation, the level of JOAC involvement did not warrant 

formal supplements to the JOAC LOE Final Report. The following subsections 

summarize the events and the key findings for the JOAC Project. 

B.3.1 Global Mobility Wargame: 7-11 Jun 10

The JOAC Project leveraged the USAF Global Mobility Wargame to shape the 

team’s nascent understanding of the antiaccess/area-denial challenge. The 

purpose of the Global Mobility Wargame was to address air mobility and 

logistics issues in preparation for Unified Endeavor 2010, the Air Force’s 

biennial Title 10 wargame. 

Participation in the Global Mobility Wargame enabled the JOAC Project Team 

to better understand the following four key issues:

The advantages and disadvantages of future precision delivery systems in 

geographically challenging environments

The manner by which joint future theater lift might be employed in 

concert with the rest of the Mobility Air Forces

The manner by which antiaccess/area-denial challenges impact the 
53

Pacific en route strategy

The manner by which the Seabasing Joint Integrating Concept impacts 

the USAF contribution to theater distribution and sustainment

These findings helped shape the team’s initial thoughts pertaining to the 

operational access challenge and assisted in the development of ideas 

pertaining to force projection in an antiaccess/area-denial environment.

B.3.2 Limited Objective Experiment: 5-10 Dec 10

The JOAC LOE examined the future challenges the joint force may face gaining 

operational access while overcoming future A2/AD capabilities in the face of 

armed opposition by a variety of potential enemies and under a variety of 

conditions. To enable a sufficient depth of conversation, the JOAC LOE was a 

classified event, using approved Defense Planning Scenarios (DPS) and MultiService Force Deployment (MSFD)-based vignettes to ensure a broad spectrum 

of enemy challenges and capabilities was captured. Three operational vignettes 

(near-peer, regional hegemony, hybrid high / low insurgency) were developed 

and examined spanning a wide range of military operations representing three 

distinct portions of the future environment. 

The objectives for the JOAC LOE were as follows:

Provide a prioritized list of operational capability requirements needed to 

conduct JOA across a broad threat spectrum

Provide insights to the JOAC

Provide a structure to better understand the JOA challenge

This was accomplished by studying the activities required to conduct JOA. 

These activities were represented through a JOAC Activity Model (AM) as the 

backbone of the analytic framework that describes the high level operational 

activities necessary for JOA. Each of these activities was directly related to 

doctrinal or Department of Defense (DOD) definitions as well as Universal Joint 

Task List (UJTL) tasks and Joint Capability Areas (JCA) as applicable. This 

JOAC AM provided the functional context for the JOAC LOE assessment. 

The JOAC LOE was conducted in a single plenary group over the course of six 

days in a facilitator-led discussion aimed to explore key elements of interest for 

identifying and then prioritizing the operational capabilities required for JOA. 

Participants included members of the community of interest, SMEs in the three 

MSFD threats, and members of the writing team. The facilitator used guiding 

questions to get at data of interest through the operational context provided by 

the vignettes. Participants were able to document any additional thoughts or 

discussion using threaded discussion in FacilitatePro®, a collaborative tool that 
54

allows participants to contribute to conversations as they occur. 

JOAC v0.23 was the current version of the JOAC at the time of the event. The 

results of the experiment were related to this version of the paper. LOE results 

led to the development of the JOAC precepts, underscored many capabilities 

already found in JOAC v0.23, and highlighted additional capabilities required. 

The JOAC LOE provided valuable insights needed for the future joint force to 

operate against an adversary posing an A2/AD strategy circa 2028. Thirty-six 

initial capability requirements resulted from the LOE. Significant findings that 

impacted the revision of JOAC included:

The importance of ISR requirements as a means to understanding 

intentions through precursor surveillance reinforced the need identified 

in the JOAC to apply information in a precise and effective manner to 

locate and understand enemy A2/AD capabilities. These ISR capabilities 

apply to both collection and analysis

Identification of engagement activities necessary to prepare the 

operational area for facilitating access. This need for engagement affects 

other capability areas such as requirements in logistics to build a 

multitude of dispersed bases and enhancing survivability of prepositioned materiel

The importance of a more adaptable and mobile force, which is reflected 

in the LOE logistics requirements, calling for smaller, autonomous 

entities that have the ability to move over long ranges with reduced 

sustainment requirements

The protection of space and cyber assets and the ability to attack the 

enemy’s space and cyber capabilities. This requirement led to a 

recommended organizational improvement of a cyber cell within the 

Joint Task Force (JTF) Headquarters

The need for cross-domain synergy, the ability to create advantage in one 

domain (or more) that provides opportunity or advantage in another 

domain, is emphasized by the JOAC as an important requirement for 

operating in the future environment in order to fragment an adversary’s 

A2/AD capabilities

Emphasized the need for camouflage, concealment, and deception (CCD), 

calling for training pertinent to CCD as well as the ability to counter or 

conceal information

Identification of the need for better understanding of multi-combatantcommand leadership structure, cross-domain synchronization and 

awareness

B.3.3 Expeditionary Warrior 2011 (EW 11): 31 Jan - 4 Feb 11

The JOAC Project leveraged the USMC EW 11, an important component of the 

USMC Title 10 wargaming program, to vet the ideas contained in the JOAC 

v0.28 with the community of interest. The purpose of EW 11 was to explore 
55

the USMC’s role in a JOA environment and further develop the Enhanced 

Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) Operations (EMO) concept at the 

operational and tactical levels in an unclassified seminar-style wargame. The 

event was co-sponsored by Headquarters USMC, Marine Corps Combat 

Development Command (MCCDC) G3/5 and the Marine Corps Warfighting 

Laboratory (MCWL). Representatives from the Services, combatant commands, 

foreign military officers, and NATO Allied Command Transformation (NATO 

ACT) participated in the wargame. 

EW 11 discussions provided a means to determine credibility of the 

overarching concept of domain synergy, the underlying precepts, and identified 

capabilities embedded within the JOAC v0.28. Facilitated discussions during 

EW 11 explicitly addressed the utility of the JOAC in addressing the JOA 

problem. The JOAC Project Team supported the execution of EW 11 by 

supplying facilitators, analysts, and rapporteurs to two of the JOAC cells: the 

JTF and Combined JTF (CJTF). EW 11 JOAC results supported the 

development of JOAC v0.3 and JOAC v0.5. Detailed information on EW 11 and 

the EW 11 Final Report may be obtained by contacting Maj Michael Tirone, 

Wargaming Division, MCWL, (703) 784-6882, michael.tirone@usmc.mil.

While the EW 11 results indirectly reinforced, and in some cases indicated, 

areas for refinement in the capabilities required for JOA, the identification of 

areas requiring expansion, clarification, or inclusion within the JOAC was the 

primary outcome from the wargame. Significant findings that impacted the 

revision of JOAC included:

The need to create stronger linkages to other current concepts

The need to add capabilities that enable integration of our multinational partners

The need to better articulate the emerging importance of space and 

cyberspace

B.3.4 Joint Forcible Entry Warfighter Experiment (JFEWE): 19-21 Jan 

11, 7-17 Mar 11

The JOAC Project leveraged the USA JFEWE 2011 by sending analysts and 

observers to the JFEWE experiment to identify and record insights to support 

the development of the JOAC. The primary focus for the JOAC Project Team 

was on the JFEWE Shaping Seminar (SS), hosted by the Mission Command 

Battle Lab (MCBL) at Ft. Leavenworth, KS, 19-21 Jan 11, given its focus on 

operational access at the planning level. The focus at the tactical level of the 

JFEWE Simulation Exercise (SIMEX), hosted by the Maneuver Battle Lab (MBL) 

at Fort Benning, GA, 7-17 Mar 11, was less conducive to the identification of 

JOA capability requirements at the operational level. The overall approach for 

JFEWE SS was designed to view Joint Operational Access (JOA) capabilities 

through the lens of Joint Publication 3-18, Joint Forcible Entry Operations. 
56

JFEWE SIMEX was designed to address the operational access issues of a 

significant tactical force. JFEWE SIMEX was primarily concerned with area 

denial issues as defined by the JOAC. The JFEWE SS supported the JFEWE 

SIMEX and provided limited support to JOAC development.

The design of the JFEWE SS and its primary nature as a JFEWE SIMEX 

planning effort did not allow direct data collection by the JOAC team. However, 

the JOAC Project Team indirectly collected data on a revised JOA question set 

developed following the JOAC LOE. This JFEWE SS data was derived from the 

event discussions and comments made by the participants in FacilitatePro®. 

Although open discussion was greatly limited, survey responses collected 

during the event provided some evidence that reinforced JOA capabilities 

identified in the JOAC LOE. Similarly, the design and focus of the JFEWE 

SIMEX limited JOAC insights. However, the survey responses for this event 

also reinforced JOA capabilities identified during the JOAC LOE. Detailed 

information on the JFEWE may be obtained by contacting the following points 

of contact:

JFEWE SS: Mr. Duane Riddle, duane.riddle@us.army.mil

JFEWE SIMEX: Mr. Bob Kruger, bob.kruger@us.army.mil

JFEWE: Mr. Jason Rakocy, jason.rakocy@us.army.mil

JFEWE significant findings that impacted the revision of JOAC included:

The requirement to operate in a degraded C2 environment and 

reconstitute supporting space assets once lost

The requirement to overcome the A2/AD environment and strategy 

posed by adversaries’ closed communities and propensity to operate 

within and among civilian populations. To do so, the joint force requires 

the capabilities of: strong HUMINT; trust building activities as part of 

setting conditions and establishing forward presence; and teams trained 

to operate within and among the populations of interest

The requirement for cross-domain synergy and synchronization across 

the five domains (air, maritime, land, space, and cyberspace)

The ability to operate in austere and degraded environments

The criticality of time and space when trying to synchronize the physical 

domains with operations in the space and cyberspace domains

Many capabilities identified during the JOAC LOE were underscored by 

both the JFEWE SS and the JFEWE SIMEX

B.3.5 Global 11 Wargame: 15-22 Jul 11

The JOAC Project leveraged the USN Global 11 Wargame to serve as another 

validation event, to support revision of the JOAC v0.7, and to inform follow-on 
57

conceptual work and transition efforts. The purpose of the Global 11 Wargame 

was to investigate the USN’s ability to exercise sea control as necessary to 

support joint ground combat operations via seabasing.

During Global 11, the JOAC Team found that although the term ―cross-domain 

synergy‖ (the central idea of the JOAC) was not a term of art for the players, as 

planning began it became readily apparent that synchronization of domain 

capabilities would be required to set conditions to successfully execute the 

Joint Task Force mission. Additionally, the participants employed many tenets 

of the JOAC precepts during the design, planning, and execution of the 

wargame.

By the event’s conclusion, it appeared that all participants clearly understood 

the difficulties associated with the future antiaccess/area-denial fight. 

Discussions during the planning and out brief indicated that the JOAC

problem statement, central idea, precepts, and required capabilities are 

correct.

Participation in the event’s follow-on DOTMLPF workshop facilitated an 

implications crosswalk between the wargame’s results and the JOAC, resulting 

in a refinement of the concept’s identified capabilities.

B.4 Synthesis Activities

The JOAC Project Team compared the results from the experimentation efforts 

to the material resident in JOAC v0.3 to provide an analytic assessment of 

content that the writing team should address in its v0.5 revision. This analysis 

identified where and how findings from the experimentation efforts were 

addressed and identified any potential inconsistencies and deficiencies in 

coverage. It included an Analysis Crosswalk between the experimentation 

analysis products and JOAC v0.3 and an evaluation of the expression of the 

capabilities within JOAC v0.3 in terms of resolution (i.e., operational level) and 

fidelity (i.e., specificity of the expressed capability). The Analysis Crosswalk 

also contains a combined summary of implications from both of these analyses. 

The writing team used this holistic evaluation as part of their revision 

assessments. 

The analysis included an assessment of the manner in which the findings and 

JOA capabilities identified during the JOAC LOE are captured within the JOAC 

v0.3. The analysis also assessed the changes to JOAC v0.3 resulting from the 

EW11 and JFEWE experimental findings. The assumptions used to evaluate 

whether the JOAC v0.3 capabilities were at the operational level and 

appropriate for a concept formed criteria and constraints for JOAC v0.5. These 

criteria and constraints are given below:

Criterion 1: The capabilities identified in the JOAC v0.3 need to be at the 

operational level
58

Criterion 2: The capabilities identified in the JOAC v0.3 need to be solution 

agnostic

Criterion 3: The capabilities identified in the JOAC v0.3 need to be identifiable 

as potentially having a solution within the purview of a specific 

FCB (Battlespace Awareness, Logistics, Force Application, 

Protection, Building Partnerships, Command and Control, NetCentric Operations)

Criterion 4: The capabilities identified in the JOAC v0.3 need to address those 

capabilities required to enable cross-domain synergy

Criterion 5: The capabilities identified in the JOAC v0.3 need to address those 

capabilities required to meet antiaccess challenges

Criterion 6: The capabilities identified in the JOAC v0.3 need to address those 

capabilities required to meet area-denial challenges

Constraint 1: Capabilities must all satisfy criteria one, two, and three as well as 

at least one of criteria four, five, or six

Constraint 2: Discussion within the body of the JOAC needs to clearly lead the 

reader to the conclusion that the list of capabilities is required to 

meet the A2/AD challenge and support the overarching concept 

of cross-domain synergy. That is, the discussion must support 

the list of required capabilities

Detailed findings and recommendations from this analysis can be found in the 

Analysis Crosswalk at: 

https://us.jfcom.mil/sites/J9/CG/OA/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItem

s.aspx?RootFolder=%2fsites%2fJ9%2fCG%2fOA%2fShared%20Documents%2fJ

OAC%20Deliverables%2f3%2e17%20Concept%20Draft%20v0%2e5&FolderCTI

D=0x0120009776195D76ADCB4BB0479D46A3CD069E&View=%7bFC439951

%2d2D0F%2d4237%2dAFD8%2d16097158B7DF%7d.

B.5 Way Ahead

The JOAC conceptual and experimental work used in the development of the 

JOAC underscores the importance of overcoming A2/AD challenges across the

joint force. Further highlighting the need to continue this work is the fact that 

the nature of the access problem will likely change and evolve over time, as will 

the geopolitical environment. Solutions to the access problem lie within the 

purview of Service capabilities, but must be continually informed by the joint 

community. Considering the size and scope of the issue, the JOAC cannot 

solve every A2/AD challenge, nor does it provide a detailed capabilities list that 

will immediately result in DOTMLPF solutions. The JOAC should serve as the 

Joint Force conceptual foundation for addressing the A2/AD challenge. The 

path to generating solutions starts with a more in-depth examination of the 

underlying conceptual implications of the JOAC to include:
59

Integration and development of supporting concepts to operationalize the 

JOAC. These supporting concepts will provide a greater degree of fidelity 

to key portions of the JOAC

Follow-on analysis, identification and transitioning of the DOTMLPF 

implications of adopting the JOAC

Further investigation at the joint and Service level of the required 

capabilities identified in the JOAC

The Department of Defense should leverage the Joint Capability Integration 

Development System as a pathway for this follow-on work to proceed.
60

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