The Future of Land Power study launched by CSIS highlights that U.S. ground forces remain essential for securing strategic outcomes despite technological shifts toward drone warfare and autonomous targeting. While long-range standoff strikes in Ukraine and air attacks during Operation Epic Fury against 13,000 Iranian targets demonstrate modern firepower, strikes alone fail to yield decisive political victory without physical territorial control.
U.S. land forces act as vital binding agents for joint power projection, protecting airfields, maritime ports, and critical air defense systems across expansive operational theaters like the Asia-Pacific. Additionally, while artificial intelligence can optimize the kill chain on a transparent battlefield, emerging capabilities expand the required skillsets and troop presence rather than replacing human decision-making. Ultimately, U.S. land power retains immense strategic value by providing flexible military options for deterrence, joint force enablement, and alliance preservation across the entire spectrum of high-intensity conflict.
The reliance on non-contact strike regimes during Operation Epic Fury demonstrates the recurring doctrinal limitation of air and missile campaigns when disconnected from ground control. Long-range standoff fires inflict heavy infrastructure degradation against state targets, yet they cannot deny operational manoeuvre to an adversary on the ground. Operational history since the 1957 Eisenhower Doctrine indicates that air-centric fires create temporary operational pauses rather than permanent political settlements. Ground forces remain the sole mechanism capable of converting tactical strike success into durable operational control.
This dynamic forces joint planners to re-integrate U.S. Army Multi-Domain Task Forces to shield forward-deployed aviation and naval hubs from counter-saturation attacks. Precision strike complexes remain vulnerable to interdiction unless ground-based platforms, such as the MIM-104 Patriot battery, maintain continuous point-defense coverage over expeditionary staging areas. Without persistent air defense batteries embedded alongside forward units, standoff strike networks like those deployed in Operation Epic Fury risk losing launch infrastructure before achieving theater-level objectives.
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