FIELDING THE FUTURE
PRESERVING LIVES ON THE
NEW BATTLEFIELD
Field medical care takes new directions as the shape of military conflict changes.
by James A. Black, Lt. Col. David S. Johnston and Col. Michael R. Davis, M.D., FACS T
he U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command (USAMRDC) has learned valuable lessons by studying the Second Battle of Fallujah, which took place in Iraq between November and December 2004. Military historians called it some of the heaviest urban combat that U.S. Marines and Soldiers had seen since the Battle of Hue City in Vietnam in
1968. From an operations and medical perspective, this battle provides the military with strategic lessons that will enable the U.S. to prevail in close-quarter armed conflict with near-peer adversaries, such as Russia and China.
More than 300,000 residents vacated Fallujah before the battle in anticipation of a protracted struggle that could have produced catastrophic collateral damage. Te Iraqi insurgents and foreign mujahedeen present in the city fortified their defenses in advance of the anticipated U.S. attack: digging tunnels, preparing trenches and hiding scores of improvised explosive devices in “spider holes.” Te insurgents’ tactics included booby-trapping buildings and vehicles, wiring doors and windows with grenades, and using Jersey barriers within homes to create strong chokepoints from behind which they could attack unsuspecting troops entering the building.
While U.S. coalition forces ultimately prevailed, the insurgents inflicted more than 100 casualties and kept our troops at bay during protracted house-to-house fighting. U.S. strategists surmised that had Fallu- jah been a battle with near-peer adversaries, the casualties could have been staggering—especially had there been fewer evacuation paths for land and air rescues.
Tat is why USAMRDC is pursuing a number of promising innovative medical and knowledge prod- ucts that will enable warfighters to survive bleeding emergencies and other injuries, empowering them to return to battle amid the chaos of war.
https://asc.ar my.mil
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