Title: An Assessment of Adversarial Exploitation of the Seams Between Geographic Combatant Commands

Date Originally Written: November 6, 2025

Date Originally Published: November 21, 2025

Author and Article Point of View: The author is a U.S. Army officer currently serving in the U.S. Indo-Pacific (INDOPACOM) area of responsibility. INDOPACOM shares boundaries with European, Central, Africa, Southern, Northern, and Space Commands. The author believes the current combatant command construct and the command relationships with subordinate intelligence formations create seams that America’s adversaries exploit.

Summary: This assessment examines America’s adversaries’ use of seams created by artificial boundaries between geographic combatant commands. Intelligence sharing between the geographic combatant commands is not enforced or standardized resulting in fog of war along the seams and boundaries. These seams can be closed by implementing mandatory intelligence sharing and standardized data formatting.

Text: The United States currently organizes its military forces across seven Geographic Combatant Commands (GCC) and four Functional Combatant Commands (FCC). The seven GCCs have a variety of missions, funding, capacity, and range in age from 1952 (European Command) to 2019 (Space Command) [1]. Six of the seven GCCs are directly responsible for the command and control of the various forces inside their geographic area of operations while the Space Command has global reach. The six earth-based GCCs share boundaries on land and at sea across the entirety of the globe.

Although the GCCs have clear geographic boundaries, they still lack a clear chain of command. TheGoldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986 established the chain of command from the President through the Secretary of Defense to the Combatant Commanders [2]. This reorganization removed the Service Chiefs from the chain of command and placed them into an advisory role.

Despite having defined areas of responsibility and a clear chain of command, the Combatant Commands (CCMDs) have boundaries. According to the U.S. Army’s Field Manual 1-02.1, a boundary is “A line thatdelineates surface areas for the purpose of facilitating coordination and deconfliction of operations between adjacent units, formations, or areas” [3]. Unfortunately, all too often a boundary does not serve to facilitate coordination, instead, it serves as a seam. America’s adversaries do not follow the artificial boundaries created by the establishment of CCMDs and that are outlined in the Unified Campaign Plan. Instead, they seek to exploit the seams created by the boundaries. Specifically, they seek to exploit the gaps inintelligence collection and sharing enabled by these artificial boundaries. The very mechanism meant to clearly and distinctly assign areas of responsibility also provides adversaries with increased freedom of movement.

To overcome the use of seams by America’s adversaries, intelligence professionals should utilize a process called intelligence reach. “Intelligence reach is the activity by which intelligence organizations proactively andrapidly access information from, receive  support from, and conduct collaboration and information sharing… unconstrained by geographic proximity or command” [4]. In the case of the CCMDs, intelligence reach orintelligence sharing is conducted at the CCMD Joint Senior Intelligence Officer (J2) level during a monthlysynchronization meeting [5]. Unfortunately, at the CCMD J2 level much of the intelligence sharing or reach is focused on the Combatant Commander’s campaign plan or to support the annual Posture Statement to the United States Congress.

Synchronization and intelligence sharing are needed at echelons lower than the CCMD J2 level. To supportthe CCMD J2, the Army’s United States Security and Intelligence Command (INSCOM) has assignedMilitary Intelligence Brigades (Theater) (MIB(T)) to the six GCCs. But due to command relationships, whereINSCOM only has administrative control over the MIB(T)s and cannot direct their operations, intelligence sharing is not enforced by the various CCMDs. INSCOM can only suggest the coordination between the MIB(T)s. Creating a new policy that mandates synchronization would likely require staffing through the Services and the Joint Staff along with agreements from Combatant Commanders.

An example of this type of recommend intelligence sharing involves the 207th MIB(T) in Africa Command, the 66th MIB(T) in European Command, and the 513th MIB(T) in Central Command all collaborating and sharing intelligence on Russian naval activity in the Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea, and the Red Sea.

In addition to information sharing shortfalls faced by the current CCMD and MIB(T) design, CCMDs also suffer from a lack of data standards. Specifically, commander visualization tools and data formatting. All six GCCs use different commander visualization tools which cause delays in shared understanding between the commands. More importantly, no single agency (Department of Defense, INSCOM, or Joint Staff) has created or enforced the standardization of data formatting across the six MIB(T)s. This shortcoming exacerbates problems when cross-boundary targets, entities, or reports are shared between two GCCs.

Senior defense officials should develop policies to formalize intelligence sharing between the GCCs’ MIB(T)s – at minimum monthly. Additionally, GCCs should be required to operate using single, common commander’s visualization tool and a standardized data format for intelligence sharing. Without these changes, America’s adversaries will continue to freely exploit the seams created by the current geographic combatant command construct.

Endnotes:

[1] United States Department of War. Combatant Commands https://www.war.gov/About/Combatant-Commands/ Accessed 6 November 2025.

[2] United States House of Representatives. H.R. 3622 (99th): Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986. (Washington D.C.: United States House of Representatives, 1986).

[3] Headquarters, Department of the Army. Field Manual 1-02.1: Operational Terms. (Washington D.C.: Department of the Army, 2021): 1-11.

[4] Headquarters, Department of the Army. Army Doctrine Publication 2-0: Intelligence. (Washington D.C.: Department of the Army, 2019): 3-5.

[5] Classroom Discussion. A338 – Advanced Intelligence Seminar: USINDOPACOM Discussion. (Ft. Leavenworth: Command and General Staff College, April 2021).