Delivering Cultural Competence

[nichols]

CS,

You asked to be nicholized....soooo here ya go....but first a disclaimer.

I'm a retired Infantry Gunny with a little over 15 years overseas time. I am currently a gopher for my Governement boss who is the APM for Culture & Language Training Systems........basically I manage contracts. No high speed stuff in my kit, just a simple grunt view of life.

I'm going to provide you with some links that may help you understand where we are right now.......we basically arrived here without knowing our starting point, azimuth, and distance

There are a few of approaches that are being used/looked at in the Marine Corps:

Regional, Culture, and Language Familiarization Program (RCLF) which is PME. This evolved out of the Marine Career Regional Studies Program (MCRS)

An article about MCRS from September 2008

The idea behind this was that no matter where a MAGTF was tasked to go, there would be a few Marines in the unit that had been studying the area. The Sergeant's knowledge would not be at the level of the Major but it would be enough to cover basic culture/language for the AO on the small unit level. Through many meetings MCRS became RCLF; the meetings have been painful. Identifying the language requirement per rank has been the hardest part because some people just can't learn a second language and linking it to PME means linking it to promotion. Linking a language to a region has also been tough. RCLF has not been signed yet, I think that once it has been signed we will have a better azimuth to shoot specifically for requirements. The junior ranks (E-1-E-4) will be getting general culture awareness courses not specific to an AO;

Rudy with the rusty rifle in the third rank that never gets the word, be advised, culture is out there and you need to be aware that scratching your rearend in public will get laughs here...outside of here, people will be offended.

Predeployment Training Program (PTP). Most people a familiar with this concept and it is the easiest to get requirements for but it requires white space on the training schedule that is hard to get. We have been using multiple methods to conduct language/culture training that usually gets tested during a Mojave Viper type training event at 29 Palms before the unit deploys. I specifically manage computer based language/culture software training devices that have been used for PTP.

The third approach is the Security Cooperation MAGTF.

A pretty good article can be found here.

The idea behind this is that Rudy joins a Regiment that has a specific AO that he can focus on. While many are saying that this is a new idea, it basically follows along the lines of the UDP cycle of the early to mid 80's (From Camp Lejuene, 2nd Mar had NATO Northern flank, 6th Mar had Okinawa, 8th Mar had Med Floats). A diffence the 80's and now is that once the unit gets to its AO, small units would be task organized to saturate the AO;

Battalion sets up CP in Rota....fireteams, squads, platoons get sent to various countries in Sub Saharan Africa.

A big difference is that Rudy spends most of his career with the Regiment (sound familiar?).

The intent is that while Rudy is in the third rank he meets Francois from the third rank in the other country's military and establishes a friendship. A few years later Sgt Rudy goes back and links up with Capt Francois and maintains the friendship. Eventually Rudy may become a SNCO....Francois may become the President.....a long term lasting Lawrence type relationship is the goal.

[Commando Spirit]

Nichols, that's great stuff and is probably a winning solution for a military with spare capacity and the numbers that the US enjoys. The articles are very useful and if nothing else the ability to compare the way in which a much larger Armed Force is able to target its resources will be an interesting debate in my thesis. Unfortunately, the British Army is only a little over 100K strong (and likely to get smaller in the 2010 Strategic Defence Review) and so there is no spare capacity to enable our personnel to target their learning in this way.

That said, perhaps it is actually that the organisational culture of the British Military hierarchy is not sufficiently mature to approach the issue in tis way?

As an aside I completed an exchange exercise with CGSC a few years ago and the Rudy/Francois model does have some potential. The falling down point is that us men (and I mean men in particular) are rubbish at staying in touch with friends - so my wife says anyway!!

Many thanks for the links to the articles.

[nichols]

Unfortunately, the British Army is only a little over 100K strong (and likely to get smaller in the 2010 Strategic Defence Review) and so there is no spare capacity to enable our personnel to target their learning in this way.

This is where the UK acquisition bubbas need to get together when they are developing new training devices. Your total active duty manpower for October was just under 180k. I've seen contractors deliver training systems to individual units and being paid by those units for use only in those units. Specific to the Corps' language and culture stuff, we contract .mil wide licenses but pay USMC only license costs. UK MOD hould probably look aty contracting for the total force which in the long run will bring the price down.

We are beginning to get the Operational Language & Culture Training System (OLCTS). This consists of an initial language/culture acquisition via desktop of server, a sustainment piece for the iTouch, and a mission rehearsal piece for the first person shooter game. I was briefing/demonstrating these capabilities to members of the UK Army 2 weeks ago at I/ITSEC. It could have been just a drive by from the Brits but they were saying that they intended on getting this capability to thier units.

[Commando Spirit]

This is where the UK acquisition bubbas need to get together when they are developing new training devices. Your total active duty manpower for October was just under 180k. I've seen contractors deliver training systems to individual units and being paid by those units for use only in those units. Specific to the Corps' language and culture stuff, we contract .mil wide licenses but pay USMC only license costs. UK MOD hould probably look aty contracting for the total force which in the long run will bring the price down.

We are beginning to get the Operational Language & Culture Training System (OLCTS). This consists of an initial language/culture acquisition via desktop of server, a sustainment piece for the iTouch, and a mission rehearsal piece for the first person shooter game. I was briefing/demonstrating these capabilities to members of the UK Army 2 weeks ago at I/ITSEC. It could have been just a drive by from the Brits but they were saying that they intended on getting this capability to thier units.

I've seen, and used, the iTouch software a couple of weeks ago and it looks very good (I think those you spoke to were from my own branch!!) I'm under the impression that UK is asking for non-US phonetics to be looked into?

Not sure where you got the 180K from though - I suspect that is British Military rather than British Army? Army hasn't been that big since the cold war!!

[nichols]

I've seen, and used, the iTouch software a couple of weeks ago and it looks very good (I think those you spoke to were from my own branch!!) I'm under the impression that UK is asking for non-US phonetics to be looked into?

Not sure where you got the 180K from though - I suspect that is British Military rather than British Army? Army hasn't been that big since the cold war!!

Yes to the phonetics, the UK is thinking about doing this specifically for Pashtu & Dari. Australian MOD is looking at the same type of modifications.

180k was total active forces from last month....MOD site

[jenniferro10]

The instructor makes a huge difference.

As it is currently practiced, doctrine prevents the Sgt. without a degree- but with years of experience training polic officers in Iraq or Afghanistan, from leading or designing the sort of training that is actually relevant to our military's needs. However, the PhD with no recent field experience in the region is qualified. In fact, I am aware of an instructor meeting that description in the system right now that has spent a career studying Ireland, has no military experience, and is teaching an Islam-specific knowledge course.

The USMC CAOCL says (and I agree): "Instead of generalist historians, religion specialists, and journalists, younger personnel who combined recent operational experience with academic study, site visits, and debriefing of returning units conducted the training. In this respect, cultural trainers have been working to shorten the lessonslearned feedback loop from deployment to
deployment…he or she must be a Soldier or Marine who has recently deployed operationally to the AO in a job requiring ongoing interaction with the indigenous population--the division combat operations center watch officer from OIF-I will not do. MOS is not important here; interaction with Iraqis on a regular basis is." (“Advances in Predeployment Culture Training: The U.S. Marine Corps Approach”, Barak Salmoni and Paula Holmes-Eber)

[nichols]

The instructor makes a huge difference.

As it is currently practiced, doctrine prevents the Sgt. without a degree- but with years of experience training polic officers in Iraq or Afghanistan, from leading or designing the sort of training that is actually relevant to our military's needs.

I don't fully agree with your statement but the outcome is the same. We really don't have a doctrine for culture & language. We have some attempts at Training & Readiness manuals but nothing that we can turn to and say 'This is what we train to.'

There are lot of junior Marines and NCOs leading and designing training that hits the target culture, from my experience, this has been going on since at least 1981. The major issue is that there is no doctrine so the training being done on the small unit level stays at the small unit level.

When the culture specialist are highered to conduct training, the KSAs play into the highering process. Ultimately, because there isn't a clear defined doctrine the instructor usually is highered on a subjective basis.

[Commando Spirit]

The instructor makes a huge difference.

Agreed; the instructor is fundamental in all of this. These whizzo online or computerised trg solutions are fine for most but in my experience military personnel prefer to be talked to and be able to ask questions, that can't be done to an iTouch. The technical kit is a great back up, or reminder once deployed, but it does not and cannot replace a face-to-face frank discussion.

I anticipate that someone will jump on that with simulation examples; yes they do work for dvr trg and some scenarios, but as those who have done considerable work with 'indigenous populations' will know that there isn't a driver manual for it and so we have the adage of 'train for certainty; educate for uncertainty.' In the Contemporary Operating Environment it is great, and entirely appropriate, that service personnel 'know' what to do when things get noisy, or how to call in CAS but it is the thinking person that we need, who can do the 'so what' and understands the wider implications of that same air strike.