Providing Engineer Reconnaissance to the Maneuver Commander

The use of reconnaissance on the battlefield has been a valuable tool for centuries. The ability of the engineers to support these reconnaissance efforts has, however, been a source of many discussions. The discussions are not whether it is important to provide detailed engineer reconnaissance on the battlefield, but how to provide this specific reconnaissance. While some maneuver forces, specifically the scout military occupational skill (MOS 19D) soldiers are trained to provide all types of reconnaissance information to include specific engineer information, far too many times the engineer reconnaissance is secondary in priority and quality, to the detriment of the entire force. The engineer branch must come up with a way to augment the brigade and task force reconnaissance units to provide detailed engineer reconnaissance to the brigade combat team commander with this much needed information. Present engineer doctrine speaks of the importance of providing assets to gathering detailed engineer reconnaissance. However, this same doctrine does not speak of providing assets to this mission. For far too long, engineer commanders have had to answer this question on their own with little help from the engineer branch or engineer doctrine. This thesis will examine this longstanding dilemma and evaluate the flaws within our doctrine and force structure with the goal of recommending a practical solution to the problem of getting high-quality, timely engineer reconnaissance to the maneuver commander.