The Marine Corps and the FID Mission?

[Ken White]

Before we get into the debate I would like to provide a perspective:

1) By law (Title 10) FID is a SOF core mission.

that is true but, specifically:

""[10 USC A.I.167.](j) Special Operations Activities.--For purposes of this section,
special operations activities include each of the following insofar as
it relates to special operations:(emphasis added / kw)
(1) Direct action.
(2) Strategic reconnaissance.
(3) Unconventional warfare.
(4) Foreign internal defense.
(5) Civil affairs.
(6) Psychological operations.
(7) Counterterrorism.
(8) Humanitarian assistance.
(9) Theater search and rescue.
(10) Such other activities as may be specified by the President
or the Secretary of Defense.""

That is not to be a nit picker but to make the point that FID, as you say is a total government activity; that SOCOM has FID as a core activity insofar as it pertains to Special Operations -- but that all the services have a co-equal to SOCOM FID responsibility. The services also have responsibilities in all the above listed mission areas, just not to extent or in the way that SOCOM does.

2) However, by Joint doctrine all services are responsible for providing forces trained and ready to conduct and support FID.

True, even though SOCOM may have nominal proponency for it. This is also true:

The Army and the Marines and to a lesser extent (but no less important) the Navy and the Air Force have a long history of conducting operations that fall into the FID category (especially when we understand FID doctrine - all the services have contributed extensively to Indirect FID with their security assistance programs, their military to military partnerships, mobile training teams, combined training exericses (e.g., REFORGER, Cobra Gold, Bright Star, Team Spirit, Balikatan, Cabanas, Foal Eagle, just to name a few) and International Military Education and Training (IMET) which nearly all the service schools contribute to). SOF participates in those areas but has been employed to a greater extent in Direct FID and Combat FID (though again, the Army and the Marines are now heavily engaged in Combat FID in Iraq and Afghanistan as is SOF) while SOF continues to contribute to Direct FID around the world in Africa (JTF HOA and OEF-Trans-Sahal), Central and South America (e.g., Colombia and OEF - CCA) and Asia (e.g., OEF-P in The Philippines).

Except I would add that in both Afghanistan and Iraq, the services are all engaged in Direct FID as well. As a parallel, I believe you stated not long ago that SOCOM did not control all / most SOF in the CentCom AOR, that CentCom did. we're all in this together. I hope...

... First, there is going to be enough work for everyone for a long time to come. While SOF in general and Special Forces in particular will be able to handle most of the Direct FID operations outside of OIF and OEF Afghanistan all the services will need to contribute to Indirect FID as they always have and hopefully (if we ever see authorities change) they will to an even greater extent. (emphasis added / kw * )

I suspect they will...

...SFA, COIN, Train, Advise and Assist are all natural subsets of FID. And by the way, FID doctrine also clearly states that it is more than a military approach, it has to be interagency. The problem goes back to my first point above - by law SOF (FID ?) is a (SOF ?) core mission and because of that most people have blown off reading FID doctrine...

That and a strong desire, as it's a dirty job, to avoid it if at all possible. We've done that once (for several pertinent reasons), to repeat that error would be unwise IMO.

...and we have all these COIN entrepreneurs out there developing new terminology and organizations and in my (hopefully) humble opinion we are wasting a lot of intellectual time and energy trying to create new things rather than applying what has already been proven and perhaps just updating and tweaking the good existing doctrine (some have argued that since FID doctrine does not account for 1206 and 1207 funding authorities it is no longer relevant and that Security Force Assistance must replace it – again, I say that is bunk, just add 1206 and 1207 funding authority definitions (or whatever the new term is in the FY 08 legislation) to the existing FID doctrine and get on with business). Again, just because FID is a SOF core mission does negate the fact that all services have a role in FID and I am happy to see the Marine Corps taking it on responsibly.

Totally agree. FID is one of the SOF core missions; it is, quite correctly, on everyone's mission list.

* Emphasized to point out that there's only so much SOF, in any mid or larger sized commitment, conventional forces will have to do direct and combat FID.