Let’s talk about something important.
When approving operations, commanders consider the risks to mission accomplishment, and the risks to the forces involved. Short-hand: “risk to mission” and “risk to force.”
The brightest risks are often the tactical ones. What is our forces take fire? What if an aircraft has a hard landing? What will we do if the objective isn’t where we think it will be?
As a PAO in the planning process, I don’t have much to say about tactical risk. Like everyone, I desperately hope the risks do not come to pass, but can’t do much to mitigate them except monitor (and react to) information that shouldn’t go public.
Strategic risk, on the other hand, is on the PAO’s mind in the JOC. How could tactical actions have strategic effects?
What will this story look like later, when reporters connect it to other political or international stories? What second- and third-order effects are going unsaid? How will people in the area interpret the operation, and how might they interpret a Big Animal statement?
These are often not immediate risks to the mission at hand, or to the forces on the ground. Instead, these are the risks that could affect your organization’s (and the military’s) long-term resources, authorities, approvals and support.
(Photo by Seaman William P. Gatlin, DVIDS)
