________________________________________________________________________Richard S. Kem
delineated how that was to be executed. So, in all war planning, the Corps engineer was the
major player in terms of the engineer applications.
In 1976, there was the political decision to "fight forward" in NATO [North Atlantic Treaty
Organization]. So, in fact, our general defense plan was being revised to reflect this doctrinal
shift of fighting forward. This came about from the standpoint of the German government
that basically the thought that we would trade space for time, which had been the strategy
before--that we would pull back until reinforced and then regain the border--was no longer
sellable to the German populace; that is, that NATO would give up portions of Germany.
So, within the NATO countries the decision was made that NATO would fight forward.
"Forward defense" became the new operating words and that, in fact, required us to change
some things, especially within VII Corps with our great depth. Just look at the map and look
how far east the Czech border is from, say, what V Corps faced at Fulda. Certainly, V Corps
had the shorter distance, but we had the depth, which meant if we were going to fight
forward we had to move forward.
So, we had a lot of things to do, and when you revise wartime operating plans it's not just a
paper exercise. It means terrain walks, picking positions--those typical steps you go through
for any kind of a military operation. The Corps concept of the operation goes down to the
division commanders, who would develop their concept and then brief it back. Once it's
decided on a forward position kind of thing, then division commanders pass down to the
brigade commander to pass down to battalion commanders and to the company commanders
who pick the actual fighting positions and kill zones on the actual terrain for how you wish to
fight. After that you sort of roll the process back upward by putting on paper all those aspects
at each level so that it's a cogent war plan. That was the process that was going on in 1976
'77. We were really redoing operating plans and redoing them in terms of not only forward
defense concepts but down to the actual terrain.
There were some other changes too at that time, most of them reflecting on the great size of
the VII Corps area. For the first time a German division was given to an American Corps.
The 12th Panzer Division was assigned to VII Corps for the warfight. We now had three
divisions plus the 1st Infantry Division (Forward) and the 2d Armored Cav Regiment as
major combat elements to fight the battle.
There is great initiative and vigor caused by change. So, there was a lot of thought, a lot of
meetings, a lot of people throwing out their ideas, and it germinated quite a bit of good kind
of tactical thinking. It was a real positive for me to arrive at this time because in the midst of
change you can make things happen. Over the next year the war plan for VII Corps to support
the new forward defense doctrine was developed.
Q:
There would have been engineer input at all stages of that roll-down and roll-up.
A:
That's right. So, what that meant for engineers was that we would participate at the Corps
staff level and the initial Corps concept of operation to include troop lists. For example, we
would put a Corps combat battalion, as was then doctrine, in direct support of a division. So,
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