"This handbook is designed to give you some handy checklists of exactly what types of records CMH, RMDA, and CALL need; how to preserve your records for yourself and for these collectors; and what to expect when these collectors show up at your tactical operations center"--P. [i].

The Center of Military History (CMH), Records Management and Declassification Agency (RMDA), and Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) are all repositories for a unit's operational records and data. They have jointly prepared this handbook to provide the commander clear guidance pertaining to the preservation and disposition of his unit's important operational records and data. The commander's role is simple to comprehend but difficult to achieve. Primarily, it is a matter of personal interest. The commander's priorities become the unit's priorities, and the unit does only those things the commander inspects and believes are important. If the commander insists that the records and operational data sources are maintained, preserved, and retired appropriately, they probably will be. After establishing the need to keep operational records, the commander must set the procedure in place to do it regularly (and inspect to ensure that it is done regularly). This handbook is designed to give the commander some handy checklist of exactly what types of records CMH, RMDA, and ALL need; how to preserve records; and what to expect when collectors show up at the tactical operations center. The purpose of this publication is to assist the commander in understanding the importance of operational data and records; the critical need to preserve records to protect Soldiers, improve doctrine, and capture unit history.

The Center of Military History (CMH), Records Management and Declassification Agency (RMDA), and Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) are all repositories for a unit's operational records and data. They have jointly prepared this handbook to provide the commander clear guidance pertaining to the preservation and disposition of his unit's important operational records and data. The role of the commander is simply to comprehend but difficult to achieve. Primarily, it is a matter of personal interest. The commander's priorities become the unit's priorities, and the unit does only those things the commander inspects and believes are important. If the commander insists that the records and operational data sources are maintained, preserved, and retired appropriately, they probably will be. Have staff standing operating procedures been set up? Is there one person whose additional, specified duty is to ensure that the records are kept and retired? This is not just a "make-work" administrative chore; it is essential to the long-term preservation of the unit's history, part of the commander's responsibility to take care of their Soldiers, and required by law and regulation. After establishing the need to keep operational records, the commander must set the procedures in place to do it regularly (and inspect to ensure it is done regularly). This handbook is designed to give the commander some handy checklists of exactly what types of records CMH, RMDA, and CALL need; how to preserve records for the staff and for these collectors; and what to expect when these collectors show up at your tactical operations center. In short, the purpose of this publication is to assist in the understanding the importance of operational data and records; the critical need to preserve these records to protect Soldiers, improve doctrine, and capture unit history for all time; and the commander's role in making this happen.

In Dying to Learn, Michael Hunzeker develops a novel theory to explain how wartime militaries learn. He focuses on the Western Front, which witnessed three great-power armies struggle to cope with deadlock throughout the First World War, as the British, French, and German armies all pursued the same solutions-assault tactics, combined arms, and elastic defense in depth. By the end of the war, only the German army managed to develop and implement a set of revolutionary offensive, defensive, and combined arms doctrines that in hindsight represented the best way to fight. Hunzeker identifies three organizational variables that determine how fighting militaries generate new ideas, distinguish good ones from bad ones, and implement the best of them across the entire organization. These factors are: the degree to which leadership delegates authority on the battlefield; how effectively the organization retains control over soldier and officer training; and whether or not the military possesses an independent doctrinal assessment mechanism. Through careful study of the British, French, and German experiences in the First World War, Dying to Learn provides a model that shows how a resolute focus on analysis, command, and training can help prepare modern militaries for adapting amidst high-intensity warfare in an age of revolutionary technological change.

"Military History Operations," (ATP 1-20 / FM 1-20) is applicable to all Army military history offices, military history units, and military history operations of major tactical and support commands generally at corps level and below. FM 1-20 provides basic doctrine describing the roles, relationships, organizations, and responsibilities of Army component command historians, historians, unit historical officers, and military history detachment (MHD) members in the United States Army. It describes, but does not extensively cover, historians and historical offices of units at echelons above corps and at the joint level. It is designed to provide historians, unit historical officers, commanders, and staffs the methods to preserve and document the history of the U.S. Army. It explains how the Army conducts military history operations during wartime, for both deployed forces in the combat theater and those units supporting the operation. The Army has responded to numerous contingencies or military operations other than war in recent years, and this FM provides doctrine on conducting military history operations during such contingencies. It also provides commanders doctrinal guidance on the employment of organic military history assets as well as separate military history units.