Raising of 6 Brigade(CS&ISTAR)

[Ecky]

The Army website (http://www.defence.gov.au/army/) has short statement on the raising of 6Bde.


RAISING OF 6 BRIGADE (CS&ISTAR)

On 8 July 2008, I issued an Order of the Day describing how I had commissioned a review of Army
structures. The outcome of this review has been the Adaptive Army initiative, launched in August
2008. Since this time, many officers and soldiers across Army have been involved in the planning and
implementation of the various streams of Adaptive Army.

One element of the Adaptive Army initiative has been the review of our structures to ensure our force
generation, preparation and certification procedures are efficient and highly adaptive. On 1 July last
year, as part of this review, I announced the raising of Forces Command.

Today, I am pleased to announce the formation of 6 Bde (CS&ISTAR) which brings together
significant technological and warfighting capabilities within Forces Command.

The re-raising of 6 Bde, with its new CS&ISTAR role, is a key milestone as we continue our effort
across the Army Training Continuum to ensure our officers and soldiers remain at the forefront of the
world’s best trained and prepared Armies.

Bringing together a large number of the Army’s Combat Support, Intelligence, Surveillance, Target
Acquisition and Reconnaissance Units, this Formation prepares key capabilities for deployment in
varied and complex environments. More importantly, it represents a key aspect of our inculcation of a
more adaptive culture within the Army. Our ability to recognise changed circumstances, and adapt to
suit these new circumstances, is at the heart of the Adaptive Army initiative.

The themes of innovation and adaptiveness are not new. They were demonstrated in World War 1 at
the Battle of Hamel, where 6 Bde, under the overall command of General Monash, broke the German
defensive line with Combined Combat Arms achieving a disproportional effect on the enemy.

Innovation and adaptiveness are key themes of Adaptive Army and are particularly apparent in 6 Bde
(CS&ISTAR) where new technologies and innovative approaches to warfighting are brought together
to support Army’s deployable brigades.

While 6 Bde (CS&ISTAR) has no direct links to its past namesake, I am sure it will strive to continue
the proud traditions of those who have previously served under its banner.

To those who have played a role in the development and raising of 6 Bde (CS&ISTAR) – well done!
As we celebrate Army’s Birthday, we join you in celebrating the birth of our newest Formation.


I assume this is an evolution of the Adaptive Army ISTAR Group (http://www.army.gov.au/docs/Adaptive_Army_Public_Info_Paper.pdf) into a Bde with additions.
Does anyone have any information on which units have been moved into 6Bde?
20STA + ???

Cheers

Ecky

[Gubler, A.]

The new brigade will also include combat support units like divisional level signals. So:

20 STA Regt
1 Sig Regt (was 1 JSU)
1 Int Bn

and possibly a bunch of former LHQ units like:

16 AD Regt
7 Sig Regt (EW)
1 MP Bn

and the RFSU

[Raven22]

I'm pretty sure 1 Sig Regt will stay part of 1 Div. They need to be able to talk to their deployed forces afterall.

[Gubler, A.]

I'm pretty sure 1 Sig Regt will stay part of 1 Div. They need to be able to talk to their deployed forces afterall.

That's what I thought but why are they calling it a cbt supt & ISTAR brigade? Unless it gets all those former LHQ units it will just be ISTAR.

The engrs are pushing for their own bde level HQ and with this CA you would expect they would get it.

[JimWH]

Doesn't seem like an awful idea. Basically I'm all in favour of corps having control of their units in order to maximise their training potential, and to find synergies across services when possible. Joint Health Command being an excellent example. Obviously this needs to be balanced against operational needs and the need for collective training. Against which it does have to be said that we don't deploy formations to war zones without first doing collective training, which must go a long way to mitigating any ill effects of corps-level grouping.

[Raven22]

That's what I thought but why are they calling it a cbt supt & ISTAR brigade? Unless it gets all those former LHQ units it will just be ISTAR.

The engrs are pushing for their own bde level HQ and with this CA you would expect they would get it.

FORCOMD already owns all the other units that will make up 6 Bde. 1 Div still own 39 PSB and 1 Sig Regt and I doubt they wil give them to FORCOMD just so they can sit in a spiffy new Bde.

[Gubler, A.]

FORCOMD already owns all the other units that will make up 6 Bde. 1 Div still own 39 PSB and 1 Sig Regt and I doubt they wil give them to FORCOMD just so they can sit in a spiffy new Bde.

Yeah but I'm still trying to find justification for the "CS" in CS&ISTAR". Usually CS just means sigs, arty and engrs. But anyway a brigade level HQ to take up all those FORCOMD (ex LHQ) units makes sense in the perversion of logic that dominates the ADF. Of course the objective of a ISR Group was to provide a means of generating ISR battle groups made up of combat teams of various ISR capabilities: 20 STA Regt, 7 Siig Regt (EW), 1 Int Bn and the hoped for 'Recon Bn, RAR'. Adding the air defence, MPs and construction engineers into this mix (and others) just makes it another level of admin...

[Ecky]

Thanks for the insights, Ecky :)

[Raven22]

Basically I'm all in favour of corps having control of their units in order to maximise their training potential, and to find synergies across services when possible.

Doing that sort of thing only works if done properly, otherwise it simply takes the assets away from those who use them. I'm dealing with a similar issue at the moment that you're probably familiar with - all the health assets at my brigade, including my units medics etc, have been joined together under one massive health organisation as part of the CSSB. This is to have a bigger asset able to support their own training and better support the ebb and flow of the RTS cycle. Of couse what this means in reality is that when I am planning an activity and need medical support, instead of just tasking my unit's own medics I now have to raise a support request on ACMS and fight the good fight through Ops just to get access to our own assets. Its exactly what this Army doesn't need - more paperwork.


Adding the air defence, MPs and construction engineers into this mix (and others) just makes it another level of admin...

It does make sense, or at least more sense than the current arrangement. Having an engineering squadron answering to the same boss as the entire 2nd division isn't a very smart way of doing things. FORCOMD has enough on their plate as it is.

[JimWH]

Of couse what this means in reality is that when I am planning an activity and need medical support, instead of just tasking my unit's own medics I now have to raise a support request on ACMS and fight the good fight through Ops just to get access to our own assets. Its exactly what this Army doesn't need - more paperwork.
Which is of course the downside. What is really needed is a good balance between making assets available for collective training and operations and the desire to keep people together for the best results in their individual training curriculum. In terms of the medics although I can only imagine the embuggerance associated with trying a medic out of a CSSB, the difference in terms of how JHC can train them justifies the move. And the reason for this is fairly generalisable: highly specialised skills (like medics or engineers) are best delivered to a group of people continuously rather than to individuals or small groups in a haphazard fashion.
And for what it is worth, I think leaving medical units at the CSSB level is a daft idea, as to most serving MOs of RAMC: even when concentrated at brigade level you're still talking about training at most a few dozen people at a time. The Ambulance Service of NSW has about 100 people in the training programs at any time, and they produce people with more skill in a shorter time. The CSSB medical platoon/company is the next target of JHC.

[ADMk2]

Thanks for the insights, Ecky :)

Good work, Ecky. Give yourself a gold star...

:)

[Gubler, A.]

Just confirmed 6 Bde has most of the old LHQ units (someone sent me their facebook page!):

16th Air Defence Regiment
20th Surveillance & Target Acquisition Regiment
6th Engineer Support Regiment (1 Topo Survey Sqn, 17 & 21 Construction Sqns, Explosive Hazards Cell)
19th Chief Engineer Works
7th Signal Regiment (Electronic Warfare)
51st Battalion, Far North Queensland Regiment (regional force surveillance)
NORFORCE (regional force surveillance)
The Pilbara Regiment (regional force surveillance)
1st Ground Liaison Group (air force – army coordination)
1st Intelligence Battalion
2/30th Training Group (RMAF Butterworth)

[JimWH]

It really sounds like an excuse for another 1 star billet then, throwing the engineers in with the ISTA makes very little sense to me except as an administrative choice.

[Exsandgroper]

It really sounds like an excuse for another 1 star billet then, throwing the engineers in with the ISTA makes very little sense to me except as an administrative choice.

You could add another one or two 1 star billets by changing the make up of 6 Brigade,

6 Brigade
16th Air Defence Regiment
20th Surveillance & Target Acquisition Regiment
7th Signal Regiment (Electronic Warfare)
1st Ground Liaison Group (air force – army coordination)
1st Intelligence Battalion

? Brigade
51st Battalion, Far North Queensland Regiment (regional force surveillance)
NORFORCE (regional force surveillance)
The Pilbara Regiment (regional force surveillance)
2/30th Training Group (RMAF Butterworth)

? Brigade
6th Engineer Support Regiment (1 Topo Survey Sqn, 17 & 21 Construction Sqns, Explosive Hazards Cell)
19th Chief Engineer Works
7th Signal Regiment (Electronic Warfare)

Cheers

[Gubler, A.]

It really sounds like an excuse for another 1 star billet then, throwing the engineers in with the ISTA makes very little sense to me except as an administrative choice.

Yep and as Raven says to provide an admin buffer between FORCOMD and the units because FORCOMD is not what LHQ used to be. But why create an entire new admin brigade HQ with more staff appointments that don't have an operational role. In place of CS&ISTAR Gp, aka HQ 6 Bde (CS & ISTAR) these units could have been placed under command of nearby and pre-exsisting operational brigade HQs. The very same thing which was done with LHQ and 2 DIV's former direct reporting ARES units like 8 Sig Regt and the two Construction Regiments. The side benefit of such a move would make for some interesting capability integration within the operational brigades like 20 STA Regt, 7 EW Regt and the int coys integrating with the armd cav regts and inf bn recce pltns to create "ISTAR Battle Groups" rather than bloating the admin ranks.

[Raven22]

In place of CS&ISTAR Gp, aka HQ 6 Bde (CS & ISTAR) these units could have been placed under command of nearby and pre-exsisting operational brigade HQs. The very same thing which was done with LHQ and 2 DIV's former direct reporting ARES units like 8 Sig Regt and the two Construction Regiments.

The idea of putting them in their own Bde instead of having them reporting to one of the other Bdes is so there is a centralised command able to manage the RTS function and facilitate collective training Army wide. If you have one of the units reporting to some other Bde, then that Bde will get to train with it and no one else. If they are by themselves they can be centrally maneged and have a champion at FORCOMD level. The vast majority of the Army never sees any of the assets in 6 Bde until they deploy. The new idea is to allow everyone to see these assets (among others) during the normal force gen cycle so they actually know how to use them before they go over to 1 Div (hence Ex Hamel at the end of the year.)

[JimWH]

The idea of putting them in their own Bde instead of having them reporting to one of the other Bdes is so there is a centralised command able to manage the RTS function and facilitate collective training Army wide. If you have one of the units reporting to some other Bde, then that Bde will get to train with it and no one else. If they are by themselves they can be centrally maneged and have a champion at FORCOMD level. The vast majority of the Army never sees any of the assets in 6 Bde until they deploy. The new idea is to allow everyone to see these assets (among others) during the normal force gen cycle so they actually know how to use them before they go over to 1 Div (hence Ex Hamel at the end of the year.)
[start necro post]
Hang on, so you guys new about Hamel in March? We only got told about it at the end of May, which has been a constant source of embuggerence ever since. Nt the least of which is because the ARA have worked out they can only provide half the medics the exercise is expected to need. Of course, it's also possible (highly possible?) that Brigade simply didn't tell us till June...
Of course, FORCOMD just asked (as in last week) for a GRes MO to be sent to A'stan for 6 months (preceded by 3 months in Darwin) starting in September, so it's fairly blindingly obvious that somebody doesn't like AHS very much at the moment.
[/necro post]

[Raven22]

Ex Hamel was on my units synch matrix in January when I marched in.

You're in the Army now, you've got to get used to only finding things out at the last minute and just after. It's no fun if you about things with enough time to plan for them. You'll generally find that the plan wlil change at the last minute anyway,just to add a bit more excitement to the mix.

Edit: Actually, FORCOMD are intentionally keeping the brigades in the dark about Ex Hamel in order to exercise them properly, so if you happen to find out what the hell we are actually doing, let me know.

[JimWH]

I know that they're not planning a parachute drop (if they were we'd need a forward deployed surgical capability with an orthopod available all the time, and they haven't asked for that), and I know that there'll be quite a bit of movement around the excercise area (we've got teams embedded in a least two maneuvering units). Beyond that I have no idea, except that it's going to be bloody huge.