This monograph investigates Pentomic doctrine of the 1950's. The political and military factors that drove the Army to adopt a new vision of war, restructure and reorganize its major combat formations and to eventually abandon that change are very similar to forces driving today's Army. Although the primary focus of this monograph is the military aspects of the Pentomic doctrine, the doctrine was initially directed by political concerns, consequently, political factors are examined first. Similar political pressures led to direct competition between the uniformed services for limited resources in an age of shrinking defense budgets. Each respective service turned to nuclear weapons technology as a solution to meet battlefield requirements. The monograph examines how political factors are effecting today's Army and how similarities exist between today's political environment and that of the Pentomic era. Today's Army is again turning to technology to provide answers to insufficient manpower to meet required defense force structure. As the Army adopts new technology, the vision of future warfare tends to change raising questions on how the Army plans to fight in the presence of such technology. The Army's answer to a nuclear battlefield produced Pentomic division doctrine with its many ancillary changes in how the Army conducts war. 1990's technology impacts today's Army and will lead to a myriad of proposed changes in how the Army conducts our future wars. By studying the past the Army may avoid mistakes in the future. The force structure and composition of Pentomic units were vastly different from the forces that had just recently fought in the Korean Conflict. The Army underwent a paradigm shift in its view of warfighting. The political and military factors that the 1950's Army had to consider provides a case study on what the Army planned to achieve and which operational problems drove modifications in force structure, technology and methods of execution. This paper shows a linkage between the 1950's environment that led to wholesale change in the Army and today's environment. As the Army begins its search for answers to that environment we find Pentomic doctrine may contain the solutions.

ADA 284721 Approved for public release; Distribution is unlimited. The opinions and conclusions expressed herein are those of the student-authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College or any other governmental agency. (References to these studies should include the foregoing statement.)