Next up to deploy: Civilians

By STEPHEN LOSEY
November 02, 2008

Few civilian job postings require applicants to carry an M4 carbine and M9 pistol while at work.

But that unusual job description is popping up more and more these days. The Defense Department aims to deploy more civilian employees to combat zones to assume jobs done by military personnel stretched thin by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

To do this, the Pentagon is building a new database of civilian employee volunteers who possess critical skills. It is expected to be done by April.

Defense will need medical workers, engineers, contracting officials, budget analysts and information technology specialists, to name a few, said Patricia Bradshaw, deputy undersecretary of Defense for civilian personnel policy.

http://www.federaltimes.com/index.php?S=3798588

Blackwater: We’ll defend against pirates

By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Sunday Oct 19, 2008 9:29:26 EDT

The military contractor Blackwater Worldwide is offering to protect merchant ships from pirates, the company announced Thursday, advertising the security services of its ship for use off the coast of Somalia or elsewhere.

A rash of pirate attacks has driven up the cost of insurance and pay for crew members aboard the thousands of merchant vessels that pass off the Horn of Africa, the company said, making it comparatively economical to engage its ship, the McArthur, and its crew of ex-military specialists.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/10/navy_blackwater_pirates_101708w/

Gates: Extremist threat requires new approaches

By Robert Burns - The Associated Press

Posted : Friday Oct 17, 2008 6:24:49 EDT

WASHINGTON — The United States and its allies must find new approaches — and create new institutions — to deal with the long-term threats posed by violent extremism, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Wednesday.

In a speech at the U.S. Institute of Peace, Gates said the security of the American people will depend increasingly on an ability to head off the next insurgency or stop the collapse of another failing state. He focused specifically on Afghanistan, but nuclear-armed Pakistan also is at or near the top of the Bush administration’s list of countries in danger of falling victim to internal chaos.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/10/ap_gates_101508/

Transcript at http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches/speech.aspx?speechid=1298

Balance at Heart of New Defense Strategy, Gates Says

By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, July 31, 2008 – Balance is the key word of the new National Defense Strategy, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said during a news conference today.

Gates and Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters that the U.S. military must be prepared to perform the full range of missions. The department must be ready to wage a full-out war and handle irregular warfare and humanitarian missions, Gates said.

"Now, the reality is that conventional and strategic force modernization programs are strongly supported in the services and in the Congress," Gates said.

More at http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=50657

Link to National Defense Strategy: http://www.defenselink.mil/news/2008%20National%20Defense%20Strategy.pdf

Transcript of press conference: http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transcriptid=4268

Officials call for dramatic boost in State Department staff

By Alyssa Rosenberg

The State Department needs funding for more staff to fill job vacancies overseas and to provide current employees with language and diplomacy training, said lawmakers and witnesses at a Senate hearing on Wednesday.

"Although I've often said we need to do more with less, there comes a time when our priorities must be reset," said Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Federal Workforce Subcommittee. "We should consider ourselves lucky that the men and women of the State Department have answered the call to serve….These dedicated public servants must no longer be taken for granted."

Voinovich said he and the other members of the American Academy of Diplomacy Advisory Council planned to recommend a 16 percent increase in State's workforce during a formal presentation to Congress in September.

Full story: http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=40494&dcn=e_gvet

Fedblog: Deploying Civilians

Outside the bureaucracy, looking in.
By Tom Shoop
Thursday, July 17, 2:10 p.m. ET:

Military service members aren't the only ones stepping up to deploy to hot spots around the world at a moment's notice. With the launch of the Civilian Response Corps <http://get.govexec-media.com/portal/wts/ccmcfOaC-taqmt6LyuE-buwuqOc> yesterday, civilian federal employees such as diplomats, development specialists, public health officials, law enforcement and corrections officers, engineers, economists, lawyers, public administrators and agronomists are officially volunteering to go to countries in crisis.

Full column: http://blogs.govexec.com/fedblog/2008/07/deploying_civilians_1.php

Troops need more language skills, experts say

By Cristian Hernandez - Staff writer
Posted : Friday Jul 11, 2008 13:09:55

Every service member needs some minimum foreign language skills before deploying — but that capability could require an extensive change in language and cultural training that would have to start long before they enter the military, a House subcommittee was told Wednesday.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/07/military_foreignlanguages_071008w/

SouthCom chief encourages military bloggers

Stavridis to TFX News: Write On !

By Andrew Scutro - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Jun 18, 2008 9:55:29 EDT

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — The four-star chief of U.S. Southern Command urged service members to become published writers and bloggers at a three-day conference of the U.S. Naval Institute beginning here Tuesday.

Adm. James Stavridis, author of several guides and books on the Navy, said it’s important for members of the military, contractors and retirees to "read, think, write and publish."

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/06/military_stavridis_bloggers_061708w/

Mercy wins hearts amid danger in Philippines

By Jim Gomez - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Jun 16, 2008 8:18:46 EDT

CALBAYOG, Philippines — A mayor waited five years in vain for Filipino politicians to make good on a promise to build a badly needed health clinic in this far-flung city. U.S. Navy Seabees helped local troops construct it — in 30 days.

The Seabees, the Navy’s construction units, arrived weeks ahead of the hospital ship USNS Mercy, which visited impoverished Calbayog for the second time Saturday after treating thousands of people for free in 1987.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/06/ap_mercy_philippines_061508/

Anthropologists lend military insight into customs, values of foreign cultures

By Greg Grant ggrant@govexec.com
April 25, 2008

Small teams of social scientists and anthropologists working with American units to map the "human terrain" in Iraq and Afghanistan and use "soft power" to engage local populations have saved lives and are an important tool in nation building, according to military officials.

In today's irregular wars, "battlefields are often civilian neighborhoods" where American troops face an "indistinguishable mix" of enemy fighters and innocent civilians, said Andre van Tilborg, deputy undersecretary of Defense for science and technology, at a hearing on Thursday before the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Terrorism, Unconventional Threats and Capabilities. Social scientists can help provide the cultural knowledge that could mean the difference between gun battles and peaceful outcomes in troops' daily interaction with foreign cultures, van Tilborg said.

http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0408/042508g1.htm

Transcript: DoD News Briefing with Commander, Regimental Combat Team 1 in Iraq

Today our briefer is Marine Colonel Lewis Craparotta, who is the commander of Regimental Combat Team 1. His unit began operations as part of Multinational Forces-West in January, and this is our first opportunity to talk to the colonel since he's taken responsibility in that AOR. He is speaking today from Camp Fallujah. And as is our normal format here; he's going to give you a brief overview and then take some questions.

http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transcriptid=4215

House committee presses State and Defense officials on lack of coordination on nation building

By Rafael Enrique Valero

Lawmakers told State and Defense department leaders at a House Armed Services Committee hearing on Tuesday that their lack of farsighted interagency coordination is blurring jurisdictions in countries like Iraq and Afghanistan. But Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Joints Chiefs Staff Chairman Adm. Michael G. Mullen defended their approach of letting Defense take the lead on foreign military training programs that have traditionally been funded by State.

In 2005, the Army made stability operations a core military objective to keep weak nations from collapsing. The unprecedented shift in military policy has since eclipsed State's traditional budgetary control of some key nation-building programs. In 2006, the Armed Services Committee asked the White House to reconsider whether Defense should be in budgetary control of training and equipping foreign forces and providing stabilization aid instead of State's Foreign Military Financing program.

"That you're both back here today in support of greater authority for the Defense Department would indicate that the administration has not taken the hint," said committee chairman Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo. He said that State should lead foreign assistance projects and that changing missions on the battlefield should not drive long-term solutions.

Full story: http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=39801&dcn=e_gvet <http://get.govexec-media.com/portal/wts/ccmcfOa8jMaqji8aqAvcaTngy9g>

More interagency coordination urged for terrorism fight

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Apr 16, 2008 6:39:52 EDT

The idea of boosting the number of multiagency government civilians involved in national defense and better coordinating their efforts in tandem with the military — shortfalls that became apparent after the 2003 invasion of Iraq — appears to have drawn broad support.
The personnel shortfalls had their genesis in the post-Cold War drawdown of the 1990s, when the number of State Department Foreign Service Officers slipped dramatically to the current total of a little less than 6,500.

That was according to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who testified before the House Armed Services Committee on Tuesday in a joint appearance with Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

"I think Bob Gates has said that’s somewhere near the number of people in ... military bands or Pentagon lawyers," Rice told the committee.

Gates interrupted her. "A lot more lawyers," he said with a wry grin, drawing chuckles from the committee and observers.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/04/military_cooperation_041508w/

Army FM 3-0 "Operations"

Army Field Manual 3-O, titled "Operations," is now available on-line at:
http://www.army.mil/fm3-0/FM3-0.pdf

Also see TRADOC Commander’s explanatory article:
http://usacac.army.mil/CAC/milreview/English/MarApr08/WallaceFm3EngMarApr08.pdf

RAND study says U.S. lacks resources to defeat insurgencies

By Megan Scully, CongressDaily

The federal government needs to invest an additional $20 billion to $30 billion annually to develop a "more complete and balanced set of capabilities" for the types of counterinsurgency operations the United States and allies are conducting in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a report released Monday by RAND Corp.

The study, titled "War By Other Means," argues that U.S. civilian and military agencies lack the necessary equipment, organizations and investment priorities to contain, weaken and overcome insurgencies. The report also criticizes the military for failing to change plans and priorities to focus on defeating insurgencies rather than combating state enemies. "Major threats, crises, or wars usually precipitate changes in national defense capabilities -- e.g., the airplane, the tank, radar, atomic weapons," according to the report. "Not this one."

Aside from funding increases for the military's special operations forces -- whose accounts have grown from 1 percent to 2 percent of the Pentagon's total budget -- there has been "no substantial change in military investment priorities" since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the report states.

Meanwhile, despite the common perception that civil capabilities are as important to counterinsurgency operations as military power, increases in the State Department's budget have been "dwarfed" by massive increases in Defense Department spending, the report states.

"If Islamic insurgency is the gravest threat to the United States and its interests in the near to middle term, and if countering this insurgency requires a broad and balanced array of capabilities, the grim implication is that the United States is ill equipped to counter the gravest threat it faces," according to the study. "Therefore, it must invest to correct its [counter-insurgency] deficiencies and imbalances."

The study, which suggests significantly reducing the reliance on large-scale U.S. military power in the Muslim world, recommends focusing on developing civilian capabilities aimed at undermining the appeal of insurgents, expanding information technology, and relying on "competent, legitimate and appropriate" local security forces.

The report highlights 13 high-priority areas for the United States to focus its efforts and funding, including expanding public education capacity; using experts to build indigenous justice systems and train local police forces; developing more effective human intelligence operations; and supporting effective local information operations to build the case for the local government.

RAND officials stress in their report that working with allies can help make up for U.S. deficiencies, particularly in areas such as police and constabulary training, public service restoration and reform of the security sector.

Full story: http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=39265&dcn=e_tma

Q&A: Public diplomacy at the Pentagon

By Katherine McIntire Peters

Last May, Michael Doran became the first deputy assistant secretary of Defense for support to public diplomacy, a newly created position to develop policy for strategic communications at Defense. Earlier this week, Government Executive interviewed Doran at his office in Arlington, Va. Edited excerpts from the interview follow:
You recently testified about CIST, that is, "countering ideological support to terrorism." Did you invent that term?
There were a number of different acronyms floating around government. There was countering violent Islamic extremism, countering violent extremism, countering ideological support for terrorism. When I came aboard we decided on CIST. It was floating out there. We didn't create it.
Full story: http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=38996&dcn=e_gvet

Report seeks 'smart power' overhaul of federal operations

By Greg Grant ggrant@govexec.com
November 6, 2007
America's global image is at an all-time low and is heading lower, crippling Washington's ability to shape world events and allowing other nations to usurp American leadership, concludes a recent report by a Washington think tank. The reason is that since the Sept. 11 attacks, America has elevated the war on terror to the central component of our global engagement, said study co-chair and former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.
Since Sept. 11, Americans have been "exporting our fear and anger," said Armitage at an event Tuesday at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, which sponsored the Commission on Smart Power report. "I believe we need to get back to exporting more traditional values, such as hope, optimism and tolerance and opportunity."
More at http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=38492&dcn=todaysnews

Progress at West Point

A new, privately funded institution teaches cadets about a new enemy.

by Paul McLeary 10/18/2007 12:00:00 AM

FOR OVER 200 years, the military academy at West Point has schooled future Army officers in the ways of large-scale industrial war and, as the old joke goes, has established a reputation of having 200 years of history, untouched by progress. But with the United States the world's only remaining military superpower, and with insurgent-directed Fourth Generation warfare seemingly the order of the day in 21st century conflict, times have changed.

One of the West Point instructors taking a proactive view of this new environment is Lt. Col. Joe Felter. A 1987 West Point grad who spent the 1990s as a Special Forces operator, Felter has returned to his alma mater as director of the Combating Terrorism Center, a privately-funded think tank that offers valuable instruction to the corps of cadets about the enemy they'll encounter once they march out of the academy's Thayer Gate for the last time.

More at http://weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/235wdloj.asp

House panel questions benefits for deployed civilians

By Brittany R. Ballenstedt

Members of a House subcommittee on Tuesday probed whether non-Defense agencies are providing adequate incentives and benefits to encourage civilian employees to serve in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At a hearing before the House Armed Services Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, witnesses from the Agriculture, Justice, State and Treasury departments and the U.S. Agency for International Development testified that they are providing attractive compensation and benefits packages to employees serving in war zones.

Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Vic Snyder, D-Ark., extended sympathy to the family, friends and colleagues of Agriculture employee Tom Stefani, who was killed on Oct. 4 by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan. "We thank all federal civilian employees who have volunteered to serve in combat zones for their sacrifices and their service to our nation," Snyder said.

Full story: http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=38303&dcn=e_ndw

Support grows for standing up an unconventional warfare command

BY SEAN D. NAYLOR

An idea that wouldn't die may be getting a new lease on life. Despite years of the idea being shot down at the highest levels, there are again growing calls from inside and outside the military for the establishment of an "unconventional warfare command" that would oversee those special operations forces whose primary mission is not killing and capturing the enemy.

Recent leadership changes in Congress, the Defense Department and U.S. Special Operations Command have given supporters of the idea fresh hope that the PowerPoint slides might finally become reality.

More at http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2007/09/3049653