Enduring Realities and Rapid Dominance by General Fred Franks Rapid Dominance, as we see it, is a markedly different concept for the use of force to gain national security ob jectives. At its core, Rapid Dominance blends unique capabilities of land, sea, air, space, and special operating forces. It is important to note the vital role of jointness in using forces from all elements and resisting the lure of gimmicks and cost-free options that may appear within the reach of high technology but are not. Examining current joint force capabilities reveals some enduring truths that should be used to evaluate future concepts. Joint force commanders today benefit from the wide array of capabilities available to the joint warfighting team. The ability to combine and use forces from all dimensions in a variety of powerful combinations to fit mission circumstances presents a versatility of capabilities that makes defense by adversaries difficult. Balance and versatility are key. Balance in capabilities and the inherent versatility to combine them in unpredictable, yet highly effective ways has served U.S. national security interests well since the end of the Cold War. One has only to look at the variety of methods employed in Panama (1989), Desert Storm (1991), Somalia (1992), Rwanda (1993), Haiti (1994), and Bosnia (1995) in both war and operations other than war. Joint force commanders employed, and in some cases invented, new combinations of balanced capabilities and were willing to go beyond the confines of service doctrines to fit mission circumstances. For example, a U.S. Army brigade of the 10th Mountain Division with helicopters replaced much of the carrier air wing and flew off the carrier Eisenhower during the Haiti operation. This force packaging capability is an advantage unique to the U.S. As we look beyond the present to future and bolder defense concepts such as Rapid Dominance, the key will be to maintain that balance in land, sea, air, space, and special operating forces combinations available to the joint force commander. U.S. military forces are now multidimensional in capabilities, able to use force in ways unpredictable to an adversary. U.S. forces also have enormous versatility, able to be used in war and what have become termed operations other than war. Balance permits that.