The Advisory or Advisor Challenge

[Tom Odom]

Thanks for the info.

I still believe that SF - not SOF - but SF, should be used to train indiginous forces as a primary mission.

The DA stuff should be left to the Rangers, MARSOC and other black SOF elements. If we need more DA capabilities, it seems to this treadhead that it would be easier to grow them (what is the difference between these SOF elements and the Marine Raiders/Army Rangers of WWII?) then Special Forces capabilities, which are admittedly much more difficult to grow.

It's very interesting to see the history behind how DA has been incorporated into the SF Groups...but I wonder if it really the way it should be.

Then again, no one asked my opinion! LOL!

Just finished working a long project on advisors and thanks to guys on here it will soon be out. But in the course of that effort, I had an in-depth conversation with a senior officer who was a key player in the MiTT effort in Iraq. We agreed that yes this is an SF mission but SF is not built on the scale necessary to get the job done. As for RC components taking on the mission, they just do not have the correct tools for the job. They are structured to train conventional reserve units in conventional tactics and they share the same culture. And culture is bar none the key consideration in whether one of these advisory efforts works or fails. I see the need for an advisor functional area like FAO that adds a greater manpower pool to those available for such duties--AND THEN REWARDS THEM FOR IT. Forgive the caps but without rewards, this goes no where beyond the ever growing stack of good idea PPT presentations.

Best

Tom

[Old Eagle]

Spot on. However, the effort has to be HUGE, based on the magnitude of the mission. Not just in Iraq and Afghanistan, but many other locations now and in the future.

Good luck.

I'd like to see what your presentation looks like. Maybe a PM?

[MASON]

What will the umbrella organization look like?

This seems like a Dept of State mission in some ways and a military mission in others. ??? Civil affairs work with Agricultural, Police, engineering, educational, medical , business and financing etc expertise required depending upon situation faced locally. Long term 5-10 yr + assignments.

[John T. Fishel]

I finally had a chance to read all of John's monograph. It is, as always, thought provoking and imaginative. As I noted in an earlier post, the advisor team is an adaptation of an SFODA, OSS?SOE Jedburghs and Ops Groups. I have no real quarrel with its size or general composition - I'd probably add a commo specialist in trade for something else. And, like SF, I'd work hard to see that team members were cross trained.

I do have several concerns at the higher levels of command. First, combat advisors are not solely and Army function. Marines, sailors, airmen all act as advisors. The guys from other services all made major contibutions to the MILGP El Salvador advisory effort and two of the three advisors who died in El Sal were from the Navy and the AF. So, perhaps, the advisor corps should be a joint activity.

I also think that much of the expertise - especially the institutionalized expertise - is found in the sOF community. FID is an SF mission but there are not enough SF to do it all, as John points out. Thus, I think that proponency for the advisor corps ought to be in USSOCOM - perhaps delegated to SF Command - and the organizational structure built around a sub-unified command concept. This would both give it joint capabilities and an education/training structure where the expertise - including basic language - resides.

For the army, then combat advisor would be a specialty with all the promotion opportunities that John recommends.

[TROUFION]

Don't know if it has been mentioned before but inside MARSOC is the FMTU-foriegn military training unit. The structure is based on SF, the missions are designed for operating everywhere except Afghanistan and Iraq, I think they are conventionally minded currently but the structure and trainingcould be shifted. Unfortunately I don't know that much about them, it is too new to have any real history.

[FascistLibertarian]

Hello
I have read the article. I personally think it is a good idea. I have a few questions (feel free ignore them if they are pointless).

1) Would the Corps deploy with all 3 divisions or would they have 1 division at a time deployed?
2) Where are the people who speak the native language going to come from and how would they fit into the structure? (ie this would vary depending one where the Corps was deployed)
3) Does anyone think if this works a reconstruction corps would be a good idea? (for winning hearts and minds and for construction).
4) Do you think a smaller model (brigade or battalion size) could work for smaller countries? (im thinking the Anglo-Sphere).

I really enjoyed the article!

[John T. Fishel]

There is another issue here and that is: would the Army really be willing to create an advisor corps on its own? The Army has gotten rid of Rangers and almost did SF in until El Sal came along and saved it. What would have happened without Cohen-Nunn, SO-LIC, and USSOCOM under GEN Jim Lindsey, I shudder to think about. And the costs of the "enhanced" FAO program have been significant resulting in less advisor capability than before "enhancement."

This is what brings me to the idea of SF proponency - JFKSWC has the training skills - and a sub-unified command of SOCOM. Many of the ideas John proposed derive from the old Security Assistance Force concept and its development as a FID Augmentation Force (FIDAF) concept. Putting this together with a PRT and a JFC with JTFs makes some sense to me.

[Rob Thornton]

This seems like a Dept of State mission in some ways and a military mission in others. ??? Civil affairs work with Agricultural, Police, engineering, educational, medical , business and financing etc expertise required depending upon situation faced locally. Long term 5-10 yr + assignments.

I think what we are discussing is really just the Military or Security Force aspects of what might be a larger effort. In itself that is a very large question and a departure of magnitude. Consider that LTC Nagle is advocating using at least part of the force increase to sustain an Advisory Corps, while maintaining fill levels of the BCTs. This is a big idea in and of itself.

Security (derived from some flavor) is a pre-condition to stability, There is nothing to say that the Army Advisory Corps could not become a component of a DIME effort, but it does not have to fulfill (nor is it organized to) the other DIE advisory functions. Even if you assigned it to them it is unlikely they could meet the requirements of advising in areas they are untrained to, or un-trainable to - ex. agriculture engineering, etc. That does not mean you could plug those into the COCOM, or under the umbrella of the COCOM's designated hitter. I do think there are certain functions that can benefit from being Joint, and inter-agency, but to do so makes the manning issue harder since the other services and agencies may not be getting the backfills required to maintain the parent organizations needed to meet their other missions.

If we are talking outside of known points (Iraq and Afghanistan) I think the first thing might be to do a macro assessment on the state we are assisting to determine what needs work to bring about sustained stability and then tailor the advisory assistance package to meet those needs. The assessment could be done by the diplomatic mission since they have the on the ground long term relationship and the resident DIME expertise to do so (if lacking they could request augmentation to do the assessment), then sent up to have it approved. The parts of the package could then generated and sent out in an advisory TF sort of package with a clear CoC that kept it headed in the right direction.

Our (the Military's) first step should be in determining how we are going to meet the request. Will it be from an established organization with the capability to train, equip and organize for success? Or will it be on an ad-hoc basis that tasks and is seen as temporary? I think the difference is between swimming and treading water. I think it largely depends on if we believe that we are going to be advising the host nation forces of failed, failing or reborn states to help them regain or sustain security and stability in order to prevent groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and AQ from establishing sanctuaries and recruiting grounds for further terrorist activities, and subversion that leads to instability.

If we believe that this is as critical a mission as almost any other then we might expend the effort, if we believe that more BCTs can do the job as well by either tasking for personnel and equipment, or by adding to their METL, then we will probably go that way.

The level of importance we place on the means to achieve the ends will determine how we spend the money. We need to ensure that however the additonal troop increase is used, it helps the military (in this case largely the Army - within the context of the article) meet the strategic policy goals set forth by the U.S. Government