Field, Mission, Deployment: Sleep

FM7-22,11-42. Soldiers cannot be trained to perform better on less sleep!

Sleep banking is achieved by significantly extending the nightly time in bed to more than 8 hours per night. Soldiers must bank sleep for multiple consecutive nights prior to embarking on a mission that is likely to result in inadequate sleep. The extra sleep they obtain in this manner creates a bank of sleep they use to sustain alertness and performance during subsequent sleep loss (acute sleep deprivation or chronic sleep restriction).

FM7-22, 11-45. Two complementary approaches optimize Soldier alertness and effectiveness during continuous and sustained operations when they have little or no opportunity for sleep.

FIRST (and most effective): Optimize sleep itself, to the maximum extent if possible to do so given operational constraints. Nothing is better, in the short- or long-term, at preventing or reversing the effects of sleep loss than sleep itself.

SECOND: Directly facilitate alertness in the sleep-deprived Soldier by using a stimulant such as caffeine. This has to be done in a way that minimizes the counterproductive effects of the stimulant on the Soldiers’ ability to take advantage of whatever limited opportunities for sleep may arise during the mission.

FM7-22, 11-47. The longer an individual goes without sleep, the greater the decline in cognitive performance, and the longer it will take to recover from the sleep debt that has accrued. In general, it takes longer to recover from chronic sleep restriction (several nights of inadequate sleep) than it takes to recover from a comparable level of acute total sleep deprivation (a single period of extended wakefulness).

The goal should always be to maximize the opportunity for recovery sleep following any mission that results in sleep loss.