‘Updates are available.’ How do we upgrade the human operating system?
“The most important six inches on the battlefield is between your ears.”
In my previous blog, I outlined how an extreme Alpine mountaineer’s view of psychological preparation was relevant to the British Army’s training for the complexity and cognitive demand of the future operating environment.
Now, it is time to suggest how the Army can ensure its training is meeting that demand.
The Human as a Platform
The first step is understanding that the Human is a capability platform in its own right. By doing so, we can objectively consider what constitutes human performance, what influences it, and how we can actively improve it. This is what we do for any other military platform; the human should be no different.
DCDC’s recently publication on Human Augmentation does just this. It splits the human platform down into a triumvirate of physical, psychological, and social performance to to exploring how we improve human performance.
DCDC suggest that improvement can be achieved through either:
Human Performance Optimisation (HPO). Improving human performance up to the limit of biological potential without adding new capabilities — training, nutrition, hydration, recovery.
Human Performance Enhancement (HPE). Improving human performance beyond the limit of biological potential, including additional capabilities beyond those innate to humans — exoskeletons, genetic engineering, pharmacology.
The drive to ‘upgrade’ the performance of soldiers is nothing new.
From the vaccination of the Continental Army against smallpox in 1776, to the ‘panzerschokolade’ laced with crystal meth issued to Wehrmacht Panzer crews during World War II, militaries have been looking for ways to gain the performance edge. Modern technology has meant that the upgrades now include mechanical and digital possibilities along with those of a pharmaceutical variety.
It is crucial that we continue to explore every opportunity to maximise human performance, as we would do any other capability platform. Humans will remain intimately involved in the fight for the foreseeable future, while they retain an advantage over machines in the areas of creativity, judgement, and being able to react to uncertainty and friction.
Enhancement vs Optimisation
The question is how far to go in search of upgrading the human. HPE will inevitably be a feature of the future operating environment as technology continues its advance unabated. The arrival of brain interfaces, gene-editing and tele-existence could all provide transformational changes in the conduct of warfare. Such technology, however, remains at an immature stage of development, although it will no doubt grow rapidly in sophistication over time.
Both our potential adversaries and our allies are already pursuing ways to increase performance through HPE. We must do the same, establishing our own framework for enhancement and how far we are prepared to go with the upgrade. The key will be answering the significant ethical, moral and legal questions that surround HPE. France has established their position in recent months — more the armour of Ironman than the genetic mutation of Spiderman.
HPO on the other hand provides a more immediate, less costly and less controversial option of improving human performance. Optimisation is an area in which the Army has traditionally invested, looking for incremental gains in the physical, psychological and social functional areas of the human platform. There are, however, still gains to be made in improving the psychological performance of our human platforms through HPO in three broad areas.
Getting the Requirement Right
First, the Army needs to understand what the future operating environment will demand cognitively of soldiers in each trade group and rank. While we understand how the Future Soldier programme wishes to transform the Army from an equipment and operating capability perspective, what do we want our soldiers to look like from a cognitive capability perspective? What should the human platform be in 2035?
It is more than just their educational requirement. It is how you want soldiers to be able to think, process, reason and make decisions. Do you want them to be optimised for problem solving, abstract thinking, processing speed, reasoning, sensory perception, spatial awareness, or varying combinations of all of these? It is more nuanced than just a qualification. It is about the fundamental characteristics of the individual you want in a particular role. This cognitive requirement then needs to be reflected in the Formal Training Statements that outline the skillsets and capabilities required by each soldier for their role.
Getting the Culture Right
Second, Future Soldier focuses upon technology, innovation and radical experimentation to meet the demands of the future battlespace. To achieve this from a human platform perspective, the Army needs to make Learning and Development an institutional priority, central to its transformation.
There is much discussion surrounding the “intellectual edge”, and that “people are the Army”. This needs to be reinforced by a top-down directive that inculcates learning as a central pillar to the Army’s transformation, making learning a professional obligation to all of its members. Learning and Development is more than educational courses linked with further careers or gaining promotion. It is about continually learning, developing and refining skillsets to meet the ever changing and cognitively demanding battlespace. Essentially, this is about getting the culture right.
The current Commandant of the United States Marine Corps (USMC) has sought to do exactly this. He has placed learning at the very centre of achieving the Corps’ latest transformation programme, Force Design 2030, using MCDP7 Learning to state his intent to achieve a culture of continuous development, continuous learning, and professional competence.
Getting the Implementation Right
The creation of a Trials and Development Unit for Training, Learning and Education is essential in designing how we get to the human platform of 2035.[1] Centralised evaluation and experimentation of best practice and the latest learning technology from within the Army, three Services, peer militaries and the civilian world could then drive our optimisation of the human platform.
It would also allow the Army to examine how it upskills its current population for a more technologically driven battlefield, and what it needs those entering the Army to look like. For example, is it still acceptable for the Army’s minimum entry standard for numeracy and literacy to remain the same as it was in the 1860s? [2] Do we need to shift our entry standards, risking shrinking our recruiting pool, or do we need ways to bridge the intellectual gap for those entering?
For the individual, this is about personalising their learning journey throughout their careers. The detailed behavioural and cognitive profile generated during their selection for the Army provides the starting baseline, shaping and influencing their training from there on. Currently, the data obtained at selection is only used to grade applicants against the acceptable standard and does not play a part in their subsequent training.
The use of regular behaviour and cognitive assessments could provide detail on how an individual develops throughout their career. Education and training could then be tailored to provide either new skills or upgrading of existing ones. Self-awareness training for the individual of how they learn, process, feel and evaluate themselves is a fundamental part of this journey, supporting already existing mental resilience and mental health programmes under OPSMART.
Such personalisation of training and periodic profiling would increase the ability to match individuals to specific roles, while also acting as a measure of cognitive readiness for deployment, alongside more traditional measures.
Matching Brainpower with Firepower
Thinking of the human as a capability platform is key to achieving the match between “brainpower with firepower” for the future operating environment. Only by seeking ways to exploit the psychological performance aspects of that platform, in addition to the physical and social ones, can we maintain our competitive edge. Otherwise, we are really wasting our time by Twight’s contention.
Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Husband is a British Army infantry officer with 22 years of experience in training, operations and the delivery of leadership and resilience training in the outdoor environment.
This BLOG is an academic study conducted as part of the KCL Master by Research programme on the Advanced Command and Staff Course at the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom. The views expressed are those of the author; they do not constitute the opinion of, or a representation by the British Army or the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom.
[1] Interview with a British Army Learning Development Advisor, 29 April 2021.
[2] The current requirement for EL2 in Numeracy and Literacy is comparable to the fourth-class education certificate introduced in the 1860s. Source: A.R. Skelley, The Victorian Army at Home: The Recruitment and Terms and Conditions of the British Regular 1859–1899 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1977), 94.
