Joint Force Command – also referred to as USJFCOM – used to be a combatant center of the armed forces in the United States of America. The command was responsible for a wide variety of particular services for the military troops. It no longer exists today. Its last commander was Raymond T. Odierno. The headquarters was located in Norfolk, Virginia.
Mission
One of the primary missions of Joint Force Command was to deal with all the transformation issues. There were no other combatant commands specialized in such missions. In order to fulfill this general and comprehensive mission, the command was guided on four major principles – training, development and experimentation, integration and conventional force. The mission was underlined in a more complicated and detailed plan that was read and personally accepted by the president. The command used to work in a tight collaboration with the president, therefore it mostly concentrated on his orders and ideas. It was often referred to as the transformation laboratory.
Over the years, Joint Force Command has successfully fulfilled its mission. Although it is not too obvious, most of the armed forces in the United States of America have been through a continuous change due to this command. The techniques, ideas, mentalities and tactics have always been upgraded. The command developed and created new ideas, tested all the new techniques before suggesting them through harsh experiments, educated all the leaders whenever new concepts were about to be implemented, trained most of the commanders and suggested better ideas to change the armed forces in a positive way. The command supported the United States Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps and Army.
History
Although it played a major role for most of the armed forces in the United States of America, Joint Force Command did not have a very long and rich history before being disestablished. It was commissioned in 1999 and took over the US Atlantic Command. The name was changed, as well as the mission, while many of the leaders and personnel remained the same. The new mission of the command was to support the military transformation.
Before getting there, the US Atlantic Command was one of the main commands in the United States Navy for almost half a century, from 1947 to 1993. It focused on the Atlantic defense, especially against the potential attacks of the Soviet Union. However, the Cold War reached to an end, so the importance of this command was not as obvious anymore. Multiple armed forces were restructured, including this command. This is how Joint Force Command was brought to life.
These days, USJFCOM is mostly popular for Noble Resolve, one of the most important operations it conducted. It aimed to get the military authorities and the civilian ones closer in an attempt to increase the national defense, especially during critical times. At the same time, Empire Challenge was a yearly demonstration of intelligence and reconnaissance that attracted thousands of viewers. The command was disestablished in the summer of 2011 to cut the costs. Most of the units were relocated to other installations.