What Is a Military Letter of Intent?
4 OCT 2017
CLASS
A military letter of intent is a letter formally declaring the roles and responsibilities of all parties in a particular operation or action. Letters of intent exist to avoid conflicts that may arise from disagreements later.
1 General
In common everyday use, letters of intent can be for just about anything that involves two or more parties agreeing to a condition or number of conditions.
2 Legal Status
Letters of intent are not contracts or offers. Consequently, they are not legally binding, but rather make the circumstances of the agreement known to all parties. Most letters of intent include a paragraph elucidating this characteristic of the document.
3 Military
Most military letters of intent involve cooperation amongst several agencies. The letters function to divide up the work and define the roles that every agency and group will perform in the course of its completion.
4 Roles
Some more detailed letters of intent or ones that involve higher-ranking members of various groups will also include the listing of various duties for which some individuals will be responsible.
5 How to Write
There are numerous resources available to those wishing to draft a letter of intent for the military; an example can be found at http://www.nato.int/ims/2000/i001113e.pdf.