After 17 years of conducting counter-terrorism operations, the U.S. and its NATO partners have divested and reduced their ability to support maneuver operations with effective and lethal field artillery in Large Scale Combat Operations (LSCO). While we have focused on the Global War on Terrorism, our adversaries have continued to invest in and develop sophisticated fires and Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) capabilities. This thesis examines U.S., NATO, and Russian ground-based indirect fires by analyzing current doctrine, organizations, and material in the fires warfighting function. To further define the problem, this thesis analyzes current U.S. Army, U.S. joint, multinational, and Russian doctrine, as well as, periodical journals, academic works, and open-source published articles. To address the problem, this thesis identifies current capabilities and interoperability gaps, impediments to effective joint-multinational fires employment, the importance of combining capabilities, and provides recommendations to improve U.S.-NATO fires capability.

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.)