Journal of Defense Management
Open Access

Development and Implementation of Military Doctrine

Micheal Karan^{* *}Correspondence: Micheal Karan, Department of Defense Management, Jamia Nagar, Okhla, New Delhi, India, Email:

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Description

The statement of how armed forces participate in campaigns, major operations, battles, and engagements is known as military doctrine (Cold start).

It is not a set of rigid rules, but rather a guide to action. A unified frame of reference for the military is provided by doctrine. By developing standard methods for carrying out military activities, it helps standardise operations and facilitates readiness.

Theory, history, experimentation, and practise are all connected by doctrine. Its goal is to promote initiative and original thought. The military's authoritative body of declarations on how its forces execute operations is known as doctrine. It also gives military leaders and planners a common language to work with.

Military doctrine development

Military innovation studies and doctrinal research are two research streams that have previously examined doctrine as a mechanism for change. Early publications in the field of doctrine research often viewed doctrine as a dependent variable and sought to understand what influences changes in military doctrines. The primary goal of recent works on military doctrine has likewise been to explain why doctrines have changed. With a few notable exceptions, studies that have explored the success and failure of doctrinal implementation have studied how doctrines have been employed for transformation.

Studies on innovation in the military occasionally use doctrines as an independent variable as either a source of innovation or a barrier to it. According to Stephen Rosen, because there was a standard practise to deviate from, centrally dispersed doctrines sped up the rate at which lower echelons might innovate. According to Deobrah Avant, cultural biases affected how new formal concepts were embraced and put into practise. Raphael Marcus and Matt Matthews both asserted that when fresh concepts lack cultural coherence or legitimacy, they run the risk of being dismissed. New formal doctrines have been shown to alter the behaviour of military forces, but only under certain circumstances, according to prior study. An implicit presumption that new concepts are automatically adopted after being defined is the result of prior studies that concentrated on how doctrines are developed rather than how they are applied. As a result, theories about the reasons why new doctrines are likely to be implemented have only been anecdotally offered. To my knowledge, no theories have been developed for the circumstances in which new formal doctrines are likely to be implemented; this absence of theory is the research gap that this paper fills.

German infiltration tactics, which were established as doctrine in 1916–1917 after being proven effective on the battlefield, serve as an illustration of successful doctrinal implementation based on credibility. The U.S. 1982 FM 100-5 Operations or AirLand Battle doctrine was assessed as credible during drills and staff games despite not having been tested in battle. The U.S. Army effectively implemented it because the ideas were generally regarded as trustworthy based on analytical evaluations. The development of aircraft carrier doctrine by the U.S. Navy during World War II is another instance of a notion that was put to the test through simulation. The U.S. Navy converted to a carrier doctrine that had been designed before the war after realising the battleship's weakness.

Conclusion

Doctrine prescribes certain paths of conduct but does not impose them; it is a manual for action. In order to accomplish the goals of the Joint Force Commander (JFC), air force doctrine outlines and directs the proper use of airpower in military operations. It is what we currently know as a result of our experience. Doctrine consequently influences how the Air Force assembles, educates, outfits, and maintains its forces. Doctrine gives us a common set of understandings on which Airmen can make their decisions while preparing us for future uncertainties.