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AJP-3.13

AJP-3.13 NATO's doctrine for deploying and redeploying forces

NATO commanders and staffs planning and conducting deployment and redeployment of forces, not a commercial supplier directly

AJP-3.13 is NATO's doctrine for deploying forces into a theatre of operations and redeploying them out, addressed to NATO commanders and staffs and binding nations through STANAG 2532, not a supplier directly.

Edition
A
Published
2021-05

What it is

AJP-3.13 is NATO's Allied Joint Publication on deploying and redeploying forces: the doctrine that gives a joint commander and staff a common way to move units into a theatre of operations, run them through reception and integration, and later move them back out again. Edition A, Version 1 was promulgated on 17 May 2021, is effective on receipt, and supersedes the edition of AJP-3.13 that came before it. It builds directly on AJP-3, Allied Joint Doctrine for the Conduct of Operations, and nations agree to use it through STANAG 2532. Its own purpose statement is that it "provides joint commanders and staffs with a common framework to command, coordinate and synchronize Alliance deployment and redeployment operations" - guidance for the people running an operation, not a requirement written for a company.

Who this directs, and how it reaches a supplier

AJP-3.13 never names a supplier, manufacturer or acquirer as its audience. It is "intended primarily as guidance for joint NATO commanders and staffs," though the doctrine adds that it is also instructive for coalition operations involving NATO partners and non-NATO nations, and provides a reference for non-military actors: international organisations, non-governmental organisations, the Red Cross and Red Crescent movement, host governments, local populations and private-sector actors. A commercial party appears only from the commander's side of that relationship, as a contractor whose support is coordinated and vetted, or as a party to a host-nation-support agreement. What actually reaches a supplier is a nation's own contract or task order once it has committed forces to an operation, never this doctrine directly.

Deployment and redeployment, each in five stages

The doctrine defines deployment as the relocation of forces to an assigned area of operations, and redeployment as its mirror image, forces returning to a national location. Deployment consists of five elements: strategic deployment (moving forces from their national location to the theatre), then a four-stage reception, staging, onward movement and integration process, known as RSOM&I. Redeployment also has five elements: disengagement, followed by a four-stage rearward movement, staging and dispatch process (D&RMSD), and then strategic redeployment back to national locations. Redeployment is not simply deployment run in reverse. Priority shifts from effectiveness to efficiency, and it has to manage things deployment does not: base closure, environmental clean-up, the disposal, donation or destruction of surplus materiel, and a final financial reconciliation that the document says "will attract close scrutiny from the audit authorities."

Command relationships, and the requirements every stage has to plan for

The doctrine sets out who does what: SHAPE issues strategic guidance and negotiates host-nation and transit agreements; the Standing Joint Logistic Support Group HQ de-conflicts national plans into a single multinational deployment or redeployment plan; and the commander joint task force determines the order of arrival or departure and is responsible for establishing or closing down the joint operations area itself. Beneath that sit component commands, a joint logistic support group, and a designated RSOM or RMSD commander who runs the reception, staging and movement process day to day. Every stage has to account for the same operational and capability requirements: force visibility (knowing where units and materiel actually are), protection (including force health protection against disease and environmental hazards), an assessment of both the physical infrastructure and the resources available to use it, communications and information systems, medical support, military engineering, and environmental protection that complies with host-nation and international environmental law.

Host-nation support and contractor support

Where a host nation is willing, its support can cover basing, customs and border clearance, construction and engineering, labour, transit authority, transportation assets, security and infrastructure. The doctrine is explicit that host-nation support is normally weighed before turning to a contractor, though contracted solutions are used where host-nation capacity is short, and NATO's Support and Procurement Agency can arrange commercially contracted support under bilateral or multilateral agreements. Where nations use contracted solutions, the doctrine asks them to coordinate with each other so they are not competing for the same scarce commercial resources at the same time. Nothing in this is a scheme a contractor is assessed against; it describes how a commander plans around commercial and host-nation capacity, not a requirement a supplier implements on its own initiative.

The publications beneath and beside it

AJP-3.13 builds on AJP-3, Allied Joint Doctrine for the Conduct of Operations, and its own Section 3 planning material is meant to be read alongside AJP-5, NATO's planning doctrine. It sits beside AJP-4 for sustainment, AJP-4.3 for host-nation support in more depth, AJP-4.4 for movement and transportation, and AJP-4.6 for the joint logistic support group, with AJP-3.12 covering the military engineering support that a deployment or redeployment relies on. The standards explorer lists the rest of what sits alongside this document.

How you get it

AJP-3.13 is published by the NATO Standardization Office and, like every NATO standardization document, carries no charge. The NSDD listing for AJP-3.13 is the authoritative source, and national standardization authorities can also supply a copy. We credit NATO for the catalogue and neither sell nor host a copy ourselves.

How we help

AJP-3.13 is doctrine, not a checklist a company implements, so there is nothing here for a supplier to map a product against. Its value to a reader is context: understanding how a NATO or national deployment or redeployment is planned and run, and where a specific contract requirement for movement, host-nation support or contracted logistics actually sits within that process.

Where a company does have a role, as a contracted supplier of movement, logistics or host-nation-support services under a specific task order, what it can reasonably be asked to evidence is its own internal process: the procedures it follows, training records for the people doing the work, and the documentation a contracting officer or customer audit expects to see, including at the financial closeout a redeployment brings.

ComplyTrain is a quality and compliance platform for exactly that kind of internal record-keeping: controlled procedures, training records, corrective actions and the document trail that work generates, kept current and ready to produce. What we do not do: we do not move forces or materiel, run reception or staging operations, negotiate host-nation-support agreements, or carry out the physical disposal and clean-up work a base closure requires. All of that happens in the field, and AJP-3.13 places none of it on a supplier directly in any case. What a specific contract actually requires is set by that contract and the customer's quality clause, never by us. The standards explorer shows what else sits in the catalogue alongside AJP-3.13, and we are glad to talk through what your contract actually requires.

Standards it references

Questions

Does AJP-3.13 apply to my company?

Not directly. AJP-3.13 is guidance for NATO commanders and staffs on planning and running deployment and redeployment; it never names a supplier, manufacturer or acquirer as its audience. A company's obligations come from the specific contract or task order a customer writes, which may draw on this doctrine's assumptions, not from AJP-3.13 itself.

Is AJP-3.13 a STANAG?

No. AJP-3.13 is the Allied Joint Publication, the doctrine itself. STANAG 2532 is the Standardization Agreement by which NATO nations record their agreement to use it. The STANAG is the cover; AJP-3.13 is what it covers.

What is the difference between deployment and redeployment?

Deployment moves forces from a national location into a theatre of operations; redeployment moves them back out again. The document is explicit that redeployment is not simply deployment reversed: priority shifts from effectiveness to efficiency, and redeployment additionally has to manage base closure, environmental clean-up, disposal of surplus materiel and financial reconciliation that deployment does not.

What do RSOM and RMSD mean?

RSOM is reception, staging and onward movement, the four-stage process that brings deploying forces from their port of arrival into the joint operations area. RMSD is rearward movement, staging and dispatch, the equivalent process that moves redeploying forces from the joint operations area back to a port of departure.

Does ComplyTrain map to AJP-3.13?

No. AJP-3.13 has no certification, audit or accreditation scheme for a company to map a product against, and ComplyTrain makes no claim to implement or align with it. Where ComplyTrain helps is with the internal procedures, training records and audit trail a defence contract's own quality clause requires, whatever standard that clause names.

How current is this edition?

This page describes Edition A, Version 1, promulgated 17 May 2021, which is effective on receipt and supersedes the edition of AJP-3.13 that preceded it.