RUSI Newsbrief, 24 Jun 2013 By Sam Evans

The 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) sees the British Army delivering a scale, range and duration of military tasks which can not be performed by a discounted regular component alone. In delivering these requirements from a future force of 82,000 regular and 30,000 trained reserve personnel and to be prepared for the challenges of an unpredictable future, the military has needed to adopt a fundamentally new strategy to the way it is structured to satisfy its tasks.

From first principles, the military 2020 project designed a totally integrated force in a position to fulfilling three main roles: contingent capability (for deterrence and defence); UK engagement and homeland resilience; and overseas engagement and capacity building. Most importantly, it concluded that the reserve could not be organised solely to supplement the regular force for giant-scale intervention. This represents a serious shift from the present configuration of the Territorial Army to a model where elements would typically undertake delivery of military outputs, in appropriate roles and readiness, generated and maintained by force elements, including:

• Capabilities not requiring significant or complex collective training to keep readiness, comparable to sustainment roles in fuel support, transportation and the already well-established provision of medical services
• Specialist capabilities which it’s not possible, necessary or cost-effective to preserve completely within the regular force structure (as an example, medical, cyber, intelligence and language specialisations)
• Capabilities for longer-term institutional resilience, providing an important ability to regenerate a bigger army in times of need.

The British Army of 2020 will therefore have a better structural reliance on its reserves; they’ll become an indispensable component to the land force. This represents a fundamental shift within the purpose of the Territorial Army, which, to raised reflect this crucial change in role, is proposed to be renamed the military Reserve.

Recent operations have seen the military deploy some 23,000 reservists primarily as individual augmentees, specialist reserve capabilities (consisting of medics) and, from time to time, sub-units. One day there’ll be a demand to carry formed platoons, squadrons and now and again regiments from the Territorial Army at appropriate readiness, in order that the military can meet the tasks set within the SDSR. To deliver the military 2020 proposition, therefore, the assured availability of those capabilities, sufficiently trained and at a suitable level of readiness, is essential. That’s significantly more demanding than training individuals, particularly when a reservist’s time for training is restricted.

The requirement to routinely generate this level of collective capability represents a huge re-orientation for the Territorial Army and for the military as an entire; delivering the integrated army could be demanding.

The integrated force would be necessary to future success on operations at home and overseas. Delivering this force shall be depending on setting both the physical and conceptual conditions from the outset.

For the military to exist, it must train. This is applicable equally to the reserves, which may only deliver its contribution to the integrated force on a long-lasting basis whether it is trained, equipped and ready similarly to its regular counterpart.

Sustaining this contribution would require the Territorial Army to be routinely given tasks and operational deployments that experience genuine merit, relevance and appeal. Many will see reservists forming an integral section of a typical unit; equally, for less complex tasks, a reserve battalion could form the root of the deployed unit, with its regular partner providing augmentation. Such opportunities can play to a few of the innate strengths of the reserves, comparable to homeland resilience, overseas engagement and capacity building. There’s a natural tension with the standing forces; efficient and effective solutions might want to strike a balance that ensures prospects, professionalisation and opportunity around the force.

Underpinned by the army’s core values, future terms and stipulations of service will make sure the recruitment and retention of high-quality personnel – in line with a suitable balance between liability for and commitment to service – for a reserve that could expect greater routine use. The variety of tasks for which reservists may be mobilised might be better aligned with those in their regular counterparts. The chance of an entire career – balancing a field-focused force with broader prospects of employment around the integrated force – requires a more structured career-management model better exploiting the civilian knowledge, skills and experience of the reservist for the military. A comprehensive individual training and accredited education system might want to develop more appropriate knowledge, both to a reservist’s specific role and for wider employability. Additionally, the army education system for regulars must better understand the reserves as an integral part of the integrated force.

The Army 2020 future training model may even must accommodate the requirement to coach a single force with the time a reservist has, and is resourced, to coach.

Physical integration between reserve and regular units on a largely geographical basis, for training and for deployment on operations as a single force, is a necessary design principle and outcome of Army 2020. Formalised pairing between a customary and a reserve unit often is the important first step that sets the conditions to deliver integrated capability. It’ll facilitate coherent programmes of activity, deliver more efficient and effective training, and make sure better use of finite equipment, infrastructure and administration. It’s going to forge better links to local communities, to employers of reservists and to these leaving the regulars. Establishing the pairing arrangements, together with clarity of roles and locations, provides the conditions for the proper people to be recruited into the precise posts within the right portion of the rustic.

Pairing, and the revitalisation of the reserves, also offers an important opportunity to have interaction differently with the society from which the army recruits and to which it must consistently demonstrate relevance, utility and price.

The army is already conducting a sequence of pilot schemes to check the pairing and integration concepts. These studies may also help to raised define the army’s doctrine for the integrated force.

While noting the importance of a few of the changes required to generate this integrated force, two have to be viewed as fundamental to the successful integration of the reserves into Army 2020.

If the military is to genuinely operate within the fully integrated way envisaged by Army 2020, a cultural shift is needed by all parties – not just around the army, but around the defence establishment and more widely across society. This requires the interests of one or more key parties to be addressed and collectively managed and led. This has to be refrained from placing undue burdens on personnel – prejudicing the army’s outputs for defence and the nation, while continuing to retain the best reputation of the British Army. This would not be easy to reach. There’s the true risk that the myriad of change facing the military over the following couple of years – the top of combat operations in Afghanistan; redundancies of regulars; unit deletions and mergers; withdrawal from Germany; and basing changes – will disenchant and disenfranchise the very people required to deliver it.

The premium for increased reliance at the reserves is that their service ought to be enabled and enduringly supported in a method not previously done, including the availability of support to reservists’ families and employers. Society at large need to be given the means to higher understand, recognise and support this. While the reserves might be small as a proportion of the national workforce, employers must see greater equity of their relationship with the military. Currently, many employers don’t view the proposition as being balanced from their perspective. Benefits, inclusive of accredited skills and bigger predictability of educating and deployments, will go much of ways to re-balancing their view of the British Army’s taking advantage of very tangible and value-effective manpower gains.

The potential reward for achievement is awfully significant. Everyone within the army and wider defence establishment, whether regular or reserve, has a responsibility to make the fully integrated British Army a reality.

Brigadier Sam Evans
Assistant Chief of Staff Reserves, Army Headquarters.

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