Time‐independent wave propagation is treated in media where the index of refraction contains a random component, but its mean is invariant with respect to translation in some direction distinguishing the wave propagation. Abstract splitting operators are used to decompose the wave field into forward and backward traveling components satisfying a coupled pair of equations. Mode‐coupled equations follow directly from these after implementing a specific representation for the abstract splitting operators. Here we indicate a formal solution to these equations, concentrating on the diffusion regime, where we estimate the forward‐ and backscattering contributions to the mode specific diffusion coefficients. We consider, in detail, random media with uniform (random atmosphere) and square law (stochastic lense) mean refractive indices.