scope:

AIM

The aim of this publication is to provide medical support doctrine for NATO multinational joint operations and essential material for medical planning staffs. As the NATO hierarchy of medical documents is still in a formative stage, and there is at present a lack of subordinate documents within the medical support area, this publication contains more details than would normally be expected. However, this detail will be subsumed by subordinate documents as they are written, leaving a succinct publication more suited to be a true doctrinal publication.

Scope

This document forms a doctrinal bridge between medical support principles and policies included within MC 326/1 and planning guidelines developed at the strategic, regional and sub-regional levels. It is consistent with AJP-4, which refers to a supporting doctrine publication, in which medical doctrine is further developed and explained to provide operational planners with a greater overview of the finer points and complexities of medical support planning and execution.

NATO medical support doctrine allows considerable flexibility. It does not reflect nor exclude any particular nation's approach to medical support. The doctrinal framework is focused on "how to think" rather than "what to think" and does not preclude close cooperation between the nations, even if some differences in national doctrines exist. Hence different options for cooperation in medical support are offered, to be tailored on a case by case basis.

This publication provides a detailed overview of the interactions between medical and other staffs. The statement that "in NATO, Medical is part of Logistics" is true but incomplete. It poorly reflects the span of collaboration and interactions across the entire spectrum of the command staff elements that is required from the medical staffs in operations. In fact medical staffs operate in a highly specialised and multifaceted environment, which involves linkages and interface with all key NATO commander staffs, of which logistics is only one part.

Novel terminology not yet defined in the NATO Glossary of Terms and Definitions (AAP-6) or the NATO Glossary of Medical Terms and Definitions (AMedP-13) is defined in the Glossary to this publication.

The custodian for this document is the Bi-Strategic Command (SC) Medical Advisory Group (Bi-SC MEDAG) to which all comments, proposed amendments and updates should be forwarded.