"We need to break free of the gravitational pull of our current doctrine, future concepts and institutional biases," said Schoomaker in his guidance to the participants of UQ06.

"Have the guts to try when you think you know the right direction. These initial efforts should be based on professional judgment, not necessary fully developed studies, analysis, and formal processes. Look at the real need, not what we would like to plan for or what you think we can resource."

In his guidance, the general tasked the UQ06 participants to reach.

"Set the bar realistically high," said Schoomaker. "Establish stretch objectives. Don�t drive people; rather develop strategies that invite people to opportunity."

Bottom-up approach

The UQ06 approach is to work from the bottom up, officials said. The exercise started with a company-level war game that took place Dec. 6-9 at Carlisle Barracks, Pa.

The exercise put company commanders in an environment following major combat operations. It put company commanders in situations that were not the norm; for example, they had to deal with non-governmental organizations such as the Red Crescent, Doctors without Borders and other aid workers.

The Army Futures Center at Fort Monroe, Va., is running the exercise and leaders there say they are bringing back an old proven way of doing business to prepare the Army of tomorrow for today: a bottom-up approach.

"The reason for the bottom-up approach is to look at the nature of irregular warfare in a complex environment," said Col. Robert C. Johnson, chief of Future Warfare Studies, deputy game director of Unified Quest 06. "The Army Chief of Staff tasked us to take a look at how we can refine our capabilities in irregular warfare. We are doing that through the study of future warfare and war gaming is the primary tool."

OIF vets involved

In the company-commander level of UQ06, veterans of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operational Enduring Freedom were used to determine what is needed at the company level to support the mission.

"We were able to find out what can be done on the company-level alone and what support they need," said Richard Ricklefels, a consultant to UQ06 from Booz Allen. "These commanders responded to many different tasks and situations. I walked out of the room knowing that the future of the Army is in good hands. They understand the environment and have experienced many situations that were unexpected and handled them."

The bottom-up approach to UQ06 will help the Army plan for the way it fights wars in the future and can also change some of the tactics used in OIF/OEF, Johnson said.

"We are looking at how to make things better for the Soldiers and commanders," Johnson said. "We are doing it by bringing in the right kind of people and using their operational experience. With the lessons learned through this and other war games, we will be able to use land power as the centerpiece of battle and allow us to see how we can all (services) work together to solve problems. These exercises also help us to continue to ask the right questions and keep evolving as a fighting force."

Battalion-level exercise this week

The battalion-level UQ06 exercise will take place Jan. 9-12, the brigade-level exercise will take place Feb 7-10 and the war game at the division/corps level will take place Feb. 28-Mar. 3.

For the past 10 years, the Army has looked at the top down version to solving problems. With a new force structure and new systems, the Army is looking at getting information at all levels with its bottom up approach to Unified Quest 06. Adapting the way we do things to changing technology is another way that at TRADOC � Victory starts here.

Editor's note: John Harlow writes for the TRADOC News Service.

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