AJP-01 Allied joint doctrine

What it is

NATO's capstone doctrine

AJP-01, Allied Joint Doctrine, sits at the top of the Allied Joint Doctrine Architecture. In its own words, it "provides commanders and their staff with a common framework for understanding the approach to employing the military instrument of power," and "it is the basis from which all subordinate NATO doctrine is derived." The document describes its own scope as "the NATO capstone doctrine for Allied joint operations and activities," explaining the strategic context for such operations and focusing on the fundamentals that run through every joint operation and activity NATO undertakes.

The document sets out three levels of Allied doctrine, and names its own place plainly: "This publication is AJP-01, Allied Joint Doctrine and is the capstone publication that links doctrine to Alliance strategy and policy." Level-1 also includes keystone publications such as AJP-3, which "establish the doctrinal foundation for a series of joint publications." Level-2 publications, such as AJP-3.2, "are supporting joint doctrine for specific functional areas and themes at the operational level," and level-3 publications, such as tactics manuals, "contain tactics, techniques and procedural-level joint/single service doctrine that support and enhance AJPs." AJP-01 itself "directs and complements the other level-1 keystone publications," and points readers to the NATO Military Strategy, the Concept for the Deterrence and Defence of the Euro-Atlantic Area, and the NATO Warfighting Capstone Concept alongside it.

The current edition is Edition F, Version 1, promulgated December 2022. Its summary of changes lists what it introduces over the previous edition, including the continuum of competition, an updated treatment of deterrence, the behaviour-centric approach and multi-domain operations, but it does not name the edition or date it replaces.

Who it addresses

AJP-01 is direct about its readership: "AJP-01 is intended as guidance for NATO commanders and their staff." It adds a secondary, weaker readership: "It also provides a reference for NATO civilians and non-NATO civilians operating with the Alliance." No supplier, manufacturer or acquirer appears anywhere in the document. This is guidance for a military chain of command, not a standard a company implements or is measured against.

The strategic context

Chapter 1 introduces the doctrinal terms the rest of the document builds on. The "conflict triangle" explains conflict as arising from contradiction, the attitude of the actors involved, and the behaviour that follows from that attitude. The "continuum of competition" then describes four types of relationship between states or groups: cooperation, rivalry, confrontation and armed conflict, with the boundaries between them "complex and dynamic" rather than fixed thresholds. The chapter closes by setting out the drivers of the current security environment: strategic competition, challenges to the rules-based international order, the effects of the Information Age, the proliferation of technology, pervasive instability and terrorism, sub-threshold activity, the resurgence of state-based threats, and unpredictable "shock events" such as a pandemic or financial crash.

NATO's core tasks and policies

Chapter 2 explains how the Alliance operates. The NATO 2022 Strategic Concept "is based on the three core tasks of: deterrence and defence; crisis prevention and management; and cooperative security," the first resting on Articles 3 and 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty and five principles of deterrence (credibility, cognition, capability, competition and communication), the second on non-Article 5 crisis response and disaster relief, and the third on NATO's partnerships, which the document says have "developed partnerships with over 40 countries" across several regional frameworks. The chapter also covers projecting stability and the fight against terrorism as core policies, NATO's direction and guidance structure (the North Atlantic Council, the Military Committee and the NATO Military Strategy) and the levels of operations (strategic, operational, tactical), closing with the four campaign themes commanders use to frame a campaign: peacetime military engagement, peace support, security and warfighting.

Fighting power and how it is orchestrated

Chapter 3 defines fighting power as "the ability of the armed forces to shape, contest, and fight," built from a conceptual component (policy, concepts and doctrine itself), a moral component (professional military culture and moral legitimacy) and a physical component (personnel, equipment, training, readiness and sustainment), with interoperability and responsiveness as force multipliers. It closes with a table of eleven principles of joint and multinational operations, from unity of effort and definition of objectives through to security, surprise, flexibility and sustainability.

Chapter 4 explains how commanders orchestrate that fighting power, through four doctrinal tenets: the behaviour-centric approach (focusing on the attitudes and behaviour of targeted audiences), the manoeuvrist approach (an indirect approach that out-thinks and out-manoeuvres a hostile actor rather than attriting it), the comprehensive approach (combining political, military and civilian capabilities toward a shared end state), and mission command (centralized intent, decentralized execution). It also introduces strategic communications, information advantage and sustainment, and the frameworks - analytical, operations, functional, geographic and joint function - a commander uses to design an operation.

Command and control

Chapter 5 sets out NATO's command and control architecture: the NATO Command Structure and NATO force structure, the command levels within Allied Command Operations, and the degrees of authority a nation delegates when it assigns forces to NATO. The document defines each precisely: full command, which "exists only within national services"; operational command; operational control, "the authority delegated to a commander to direct assigned forces to accomplish specific missions or tasks"; tactical command; tactical control; administrative control, over which "no NATO or coalition commander" holds authority for assigned forces; and logistics control. NATO and coalition commanders, the document is explicit, "do not have full command over their forces assigned to them since nations will delegate only operational command or operational control."

Cross-cutting topics

Three annexes follow the main chapters. Annex A covers eight cross-cutting topics that run through every campaign theme: protection of civilians, children and armed conflict, cultural property protection, women, peace and security, conflict-related sexual violence, sexual exploitation and abuse, combating trafficking in human beings, and building integrity. Annex B expands the gender and women, peace and security agenda that NATO commits to under UN Security Council Resolution 1325. Annex C treats "understanding" as a discipline distinct from knowledge - the difference, in the document's own terms, between "I know something to be true" and "I understand why it is, what makes it knowledge."

Where a company appears at all

The document has almost nothing to say about contracted or commercial work, and what it does say is narrow. On personnel, it states that "the comprehensive approach provides the right and diverse mix of personnel and includes military, civilians, contractors, other agencies and actors to conduct successful operations." On sustainment, it describes the function as "the comprehensive provision of personnel, logistics, medical, military engineering, finance, budget and contracts support necessary to generate and sustain the force throughout all phases of operations." Nothing else in the document touches a supplier, a manufacturer or a commercial acquirer.

How you are evaluated

None. AJP-01 names no certification body, no government quality-assurance surveillance, no notified body, no self-declaration route and no customer audit. It is guidance for a NATO military chain of command, explaining why the doctrine beneath it exists, not a standard anyone outside that chain is assessed against.

Standards it references

• STANAG 2437 - the NSDD's cover agreement for AJP-01. The document's own text does not name or quote this STANAG, so how AJP-01 binds a nation cannot be described from the text itself.
• AJP-2, Allied Joint Doctrine for Intelligence, Counter-Intelligence and Security - a level-1 keystone publication AJP-01 lists and directs.
• AJP-3, Allied Joint Doctrine for the Conduct of Operations - a level-1 keystone publication AJP-01 lists and directs, and the one it points readers to repeatedly for operational-level detail on assessment, campaigns and command relationships.
• AJP-4, Allied Joint Doctrine for Sustainment - a level-1 keystone publication AJP-01 lists, noted in its own references as "in development."
• AJP-5, Allied Joint Doctrine for the Planning of Operations - a level-1 keystone publication AJP-01 lists and directs, covering the operations planning process AJP-01 summarizes.
• AJP-6, Allied Joint Doctrine for Communication and Information Systems - a level-1 keystone publication AJP-01 lists and directs, covering the Federated Mission Networking AJP-01 references.
• AJP-10, Allied Joint Doctrine for Strategic Communications - a level-1 keystone publication AJP-01 lists and directs, covering the strategic communications function Chapter 4 introduces.
• AAP-47, Allied Joint Doctrine Development - the administrative publication governing how Allied joint doctrine, including AJP-01 itself, is produced.
• AAP-77, NATO Terminology Manual - the source behind NATOTerm, which AJP-01 draws its agreed definitions from.
• AJP-3.2, Allied Joint Doctrine for Land Operations - the example AJP-01 gives of a level-2 publication supporting a specific operational-level function.

Standards it references

• AJP-2Background
• AJP-3Background
• AJP-4Background
• AJP-5Background
• AJP-6Background
• AJP-10Background
• AAP-47Background
• AAP-77Background
• AJP-3.2Background