Mission Command & Manoeuvrist Approach – Basic Principles of Nato Urban Operations

Analyzing the recent confrontations, as those from Syria, Ukraine, Iraq, and so on, we have found that most of the military operations, at least the decisive ones, have taken place predominantly in urban environments whose fundamental characteristics are given, especially by the density of buildings and population. Carrying out operations in such environments, particularly offensive, requires the military forces to deal with the most complex and difficult situations, because in addition to engaging a very diverse typology of adversaries, it is also necessary to apply control measures in order to limit the losses and collateral damage among own forces and local populations. As a result, this context has imposed an operational adaptation of military forces, whose principles consist in manoeuvrist approach and mission command, which, correlated and applied coherently, finally led to the desired end states.