The United States Armyâconsisting of Active, National Guard, and Reserve unitsâis required to [b]e able to conduct joint, multinational operations anywhere across the spectrum of operations. This spectrum ranges from the low endâemphasizing stability and civil support operationsâto the high endâemphasizing major combat operations. To accomplish this mission, the Army has chosen to man, equip, and train each of its combat and support units to be "full-spectrum-capable," able to function in all operational scenarios described in the previous passage. While the Army considers its units "full spectrum capable," Army units are optimized for traditional ground campaigns against the ground forces of other nations. Army leadership desires a full-spectrum, expeditionary (globally deployable) Army and has focused current and future resources toward achieving this vision. Impacting on this vision is the reality that the all-volunteer Army has also become a rotational force that can not be deployed indefinitely for the duration of a an extended conflictâas was the case in the Second World Warâwithout the fear that the force would "break" because soldiers might opt to leave the Army in significant numbers due to excessive combat tours. This factor plays a significant role in organizing, manning, training, and equipping the Army. The general rule of thumb for the rotational Army is that for every one unit deployed, two other similar units are required (one unit preparing to "relieve" the deployed unit and another unit that has just returned from a deployment and undergoing a recovery process so that it can redeploy in the future). In 2003, the Armyâin what it described as the "most significant Army restructuring in the past 50 years"âbegan to restructure its division-based force into a brigade combat team (BCT)-based force, primarily to increase the force pool of combat units available for deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan. The Army's current stated goal is to create 76 active and reserve brigade combat teams (BCTs)â48 active and 28 Army National Guardâand approximately 225 active and reserve support brigades. As of September 30, 2007, the Army had converted 35 active component brigades to the BCT construct, with an additional three brigades undergoing conversion. The Army contends that the new BCT configuration will be "more flexible to deal with irregular, catastrophic, and disruptive challenges as well as traditional warfare." In 2007, the Army National Guard undertook the conversion of 9 more brigades into the BCT configuration out of a total of 28 to be converted. In addition, the Army had converted a variety of support units across all components into 58 Multi-Functional Support Brigades and created 96 Functional Support Brigades in the active and reserve components by the end of FY2007. All of these BCTs and support brigades are full-spectrum units that were not designed to fill specialized roles in counterinsurgency, stabilization, or training and advisory operations. The Army plans to continue its brigade-centric conversion of active and reserve components, hoping to complete the conversion of the force by FY2012. The only major future organizational change envisioned is the fielding of Future Combat System (FCS) âequipped BCTs, currently scheduled to begin in FY2014. Under current plans, the Army intends to field its first of 15 fully equipped FCS BCTs in FY2014, completing the fielding of all 15 brigades by FY2030. These 15 FCS BCTs will not be in addition to the 76 BCTs currently planned for, but will instead be created from 15 existing Heavy (M1 Abrams tank/M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicle) BCTs. FCS-equipped BCTs are also being touted by the Army as full-spectrum forces, but some suggest that FCS BCTs may not be appropriate forces for use in counterinsurgency and stabilization operations, particularly if they are conducted in predominately restrictive terrain and urban areas. There is general agreement amongst a number of military analysts that the full-spectrum U.S. Army's initial success in defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Iraqi Army during a three-week campaign demonstrated that the Army is "good at destroying targets and bad at rebuilding states." In the case of Afghanistan, the Taliban regime was toppled primarily by the efforts of U.S. Special Operations Forces coordinating U.S. airpower and indigenous Afghan opposition forces against the Taliban. In contrast to Afghanistan, U.S. Army and Marine conventional ground forces were able to defeat Iraq's conventional forces in about three weeks, which some have attributed to the combination of overwhelming U.S. military technology, airpower, and the "ineptitude" of the Iraqi Army. Army leadership and some military analysts viewed the low-casualty, rapid defeats of the regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq as validation of the Army's Rapid Decisive Operations (RDO) concept, but the Army's performance during the Stability Operations Phase (commonly referred to as Phase IV) was considered inadequate by some. However, the Army's difficulties in Phase IV should not be solely attributed to its focus on full-spectrum organization and doctrine. One military expert suggests that "Stabilization" or "Phase IV" operations are far more challenging than defeating conventional military forces. They can best be conducted if the U.S. is prepared for immediate action after the defeat of conventional enemy forces. Both in Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. wasted critical days, weeks, and months in engaging in a security effort before opposition movements could regroup or re-engage. It left a power vacuum, then exploited one, and it was not prepared for nation building or the escalation of resistance once the enemy was "defeated." The failure to properly plan, resource, and execute "Phase IV" operations has been cited as a significant contributing factor in the emergence of insurgencies, particularly in the case of Iraq. The Army's performance in the conduct of counterinsurgency operations has varied widely between units, with some suggesting that the Army as an institution needed to relearn counterinsurgency warfare âan assertion that directly challenges the Army's contention that it is a "full spectrum"-capable force. The Department of Defense (DOD) and the Services, taking into account "lessons learned" in Iraq and Afghanistan, have initiated a multitude of doctrinal, educational, and training changes, primarily focused on improving counterinsurgency and stabilization capabilities. This section summarizes some of the more significant changes. In what some view as a response to DOD's demonstrated Phase IV inadequacies and the resultant lessons learned in Iraq and Afghanistan, DOD issued a directive titled "Military Support for Stability, Security, Transition, and Reconstruction (SSTR) Operations" on November 28, 2005. This directive, applicable to all DOD components, establishes the following policy: Stability operations are a core U.S. military mission that the Department of Defense shall be prepared to conduct or support. They shall be given priority comparable to combat operations and be explicitly addressed and integrated across all DOD activities including doctrine, organizations, training, education, exercises, material, leadership, personnel, facilities, and planning. The significance of this directive is that stability and associated operations are now to be treated as equal to combat operationsâa major cultural shift for the U.S. military that has traditionally been manned, equipped, and trained to fight conventional conflicts against other nations. Some note that historically the Army has avoided stability operations, arguing that stability operations degrade unit combat readiness. The Army has developed and published (in conjunction with DOD and the other Services) doctrine for stability and support operations and counterinsurgency operations. This doctrine plays a central role in how the Army organizes, equips, and trains its forces. Two years prior to DOD Directive 3000.5, the Army published Field Manual (FM) 3-07, "Stability Operations and Support Operations" in February 2003 to provide the doctrinal foundations necessary to accomplish a wide range of stability and support operations. FM 3-07 does not recommend the formation of specialized, dedicated stability or support units and instead relies on commanders organizing existing units to meet individual mission needs. In December 2006, the Army and Marine Corps released their highly-publicized Army and Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual (FM 3-24, Marine Corps Warfighting Publication 3-33.5). Prior to FM 3-24, the last doctrinal publication on counterinsurgency was written in the 1980s to support the United States' involvement in El Salvador's "successful 12 year counterinsurgency campaign against a well-organized Soviet-backed Marxist guerilla movement." FM 3-24 is described as downplaying the military's role in a successful counterinsurgency campaign, stressing instead the need for non-military U.S. agency involvement, a less kinetic and lighter military approach, and the need to constantly learn and adapt. FM 3-24 also does not advocate the creation of specialized counterinsurgency units and continues to rely on full-spectrum-capable units to successfully prosecute the counterinsurgency campaign. In response to renewed emphasis on stabilization and counterinsurgency operations, the Army has made significant changes in how soldiers and officers are educated and how units are trained. This section summarizes the educational and training changes instituted by the Army. Military education focuses on training leaders, both non-commissioned (NCOs) and commissioned officers, throughout their careers. In general terms, the Army has decreased the emphasis placed on teaching conventional force-on-force combat operations and increased emphasis on stabilization and counterinsurgency operations, as well as regional cultural awareness and language skills.