SOCOM and the CIA

[Uboat509]

Interesting article here. I can't say that I like the idea personally. I don't see this ending well.

Special Forces soldiers and Central Intelligence Agency operatives could soon be moving seamlessly between the military and intelligence realms if Congress follows advice it received Tuesday.

The special operations community and the CIA each would benefit from a much closer integration of their personnel, Roger Carstens, a recently retired Special Forces lieutenant colonel who is a non-resident fellow at the Center for a New American Security, and Robert Martinage, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, told a hearing of the House Armed Services Committee’s terrorism, unconventional threats and capabilities subcommittee.

Martinage, who authored an 82-page report titled “Special Operations Forces — Future Challenges and Opportunities” that was published in November, argued for “increased institutionalized cooperation between the CIA and SOCOM [i.e. U.S. Special Operations Command], including hybrid career paths, so people could go back and forth between the two.”

“Ideally, personnel should not only be able to move back and forth from CIA stations and SOF ground units, but also to compete for selected mid- and senior-level leadership positions in either organization,” Martinage said.

SFC W

[Ken White]

who left a Group to go to the Agency. Different jobs...

[ODB]

Any ODA's beating down the door to get an Agency guy on the team? IMO looks like another one of those survival tactics. HUMIT, well you guys can fill in the rest, will not go into details.

I got a thought, why not utilize SF as the Agency's Ground Branch?

I do believe I read/heard somewhere that McCain wanted to transform the 2 into some kind of hybrid organization, going back to the OSS days.

I will stay with my initial assessment, survival.

Lastly, why does everyone want someone else's piece of the pie? Everyone wants to be shooter nowadays.

[Ken White]

to violence....

[ODB]

others on here make reference to your wisdom through years alive, but will spare you any further remarks.

For anyone who has a lot of time on their hands the entire report can be found here LINK

And for those PowerPoint Rangers out there LINK

[Ken White]

Shooter oriented from the word go...

He advocate more SF oriented to the Arab World and the ME/South Asia. he also notes that it takes time to build SOF people -- one presumes he's given some though to the facts that by the time his reorganization is complete, it may no longer be needed and that his total focus on the Islamic issue -- which is not our only problem -- may lead us into not being ready elsewhere.

That's a shortsighted and wrong headed approach.

I did get a laugh out of this quote:

"Additionally, the 75th Ranger Regiment and 160th SOAR frequently operate under the control of JSOC."

[ODB]

he also notes that it takes time to build SOF people

He does but I took it to be tinged with sarcasm:

What makes SOF special? The short answer to this question
is: carefully selected, highly trained personnel that can conduct
challenging missions that often exceed the capabilities of
general purpose forces. However, the rigorous and lengthy
selection, assessment and training required to create SOF has
a downside: small force size. A truism within the SOF community is that special operators cannot be mass-produced. (Bold for my emphasis)

I did get a laugh out of this quote:
Quote:
"Additionally, the 75th Ranger Regiment and 160th SOAR frequently operate under the control of JSOC."

Oh, if only most knew what was truly happening within JSOC these days, goes back to my previous statement: Lastly, why does everyone want someone else's piece of the pie? Everyone wants to be shooter nowadays.

I cannot agree with the shifting of forces focus as well. When one looks globally, Russia is awakening, Central/South America are running right up there with ME, so I personally do not see reorganizing focus as a good thing.

Finally, many know my thoughts on MARSOC, and my belief that it was a money grab........still wondering about this....maybe someone can enlighten me.

Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC)
• MARSOC is a recent addition to SOCOM
• Still not fully stood up
– Currently at around 1500 personnel
– Building to 2600
• Will eventually consist of three primary elements
– Marine Special Operations Advisory Groups (MSOAGs)
• Formerly know as Foreign Military Training Units (FMTUs)
• Focus on FID
– Marine Special Operations Battalions (MSOBs)
• Organized into deployable companies that focus on DA and CT
– Marine Special Operations Support Group (MSOSG)

Looks a lot like organizations already in existence.

[Uboat509]

Oh, if only most knew what was truly happening within JSOC these days, goes back to my previous statement: Lastly, why does everyone want someone else's piece of the pie? Everyone wants to be shooter nowadays.

Nowadays? This is hardly a recent phenomenon. Everybody wants to be John Rambo when they join SF. Most adjust to the reality of what we do. Some don't. Some don't have to.

SFC W

[ODB]

Nowadays? This is hardly a recent phenomenon. Everybody wants to be John Rambo when they join SF. Most adjust to the reality of what we do. Some don't. Some don't have to.

SFC W

Find it funny when I ask a guy after his 4-5 years in the Army, why he is getting out and they reply "SF isn't what it use to be"......... We are our own worst enemy.

What I was referencing in my previous post are those "color" guys.

[George L. Singleton]

..who is Air Force but enjoyed the purple suit world, I think the SOCOM/CIA interoperability is already there and works just fine.

In days of yore (mid-1960s) the US Embassy in Karachi, Pakistan CIA In-coountry team was headed by a CIA pureist or careerist, but his Deputy was a retired Navy Commander (05) who had been a pilot.

As the then USAF Liaison Officer for the US Base at Badabur, Peshawar, in the NWFP part of Pakistan (then West Pakistan) the National Secuity Council was our uppermost command structure. We had CIA involvement with our U-2 survelliance site associated with our base, as well as Army Security Agency involvement with our USAF Security Service communications (over the horizon communications intercept intel)... across the Arabian Sea in several North Africa nations we had related Naval Intel field sites (small, communications related) as well.

History repeats itself, people are forever trying to feather and refeather their career and economic nests by various forms of mixing and matching. Nothing new here, really.

I do like the role and good work which the Navy SEALS have as a key part of USSOCOM, but the Army and Air Force Special Forces play equally important integrated and inter-related roles also.

You youngsters know today's structure and world of SF, etc. much better than us old coot retirees so I will shut down. But, history repeats itself, we hope for the good, but not always is that the outcome.

[William F. Owen]

..who is Air Force but enjoyed the purple suit world, I think the SOCOM/CIA interoperability is already there and works just fine.

I concur from the stand point it seemed to work just fine back in the 1960's and with the NSA as well. I know at least 3 old SOG guys who went to work for "civilian SF" and then went back on the Teams. Of course everyone knows the sad story of George Bacon!

[Boot]

He does but I took it to be tinged with sarcasm:



I did get a laugh out of this quote:
Quote:
"Additionally, the 75th Ranger Regiment and 160th SOAR frequently operate under the control of JSOC."

Oh, if only most knew what was truly happening within JSOC these days, goes back to my previous statement: Lastly, why does everyone want someone else's piece of the pie? Everyone wants to be shooter nowadays.

I cannot agree with the shifting of forces focus as well. When one looks globally, Russia is awakening, Central/South America are running right up there with ME, so I personally do not see reorganizing focus as a good thing.

Finally, many know my thoughts on MARSOC, and my belief that it was a money grab........still wondering about this....maybe someone can enlighten me.



Looks a lot like organizations already in existence.

I'm not a MARSOC apologist or even part of them. I did serve in Force Recon back in the 90's. From what I was told by some, one reason for MARSOC was to get the DA and more importantly Deep/Distant Reconnaissance specialty of Marine Recon. Also remember the Marine Corps back in the eighties opted not to send anyone to USSOCOM as it feared it would lose those assets to USSOCOM. Fast forward to the 2000's, Det 1 was tested under NSWG and was very successful however was DA not FID or the such. The Marine Corps had the opportunity to become part of USSOCOM and opted for it, so now you have MARSOC. We now have our SOF, which wasn't the case with Marine Recon as it wasn't a USSOCOM asset, even though Force Recon was pretty comparable to other SOF type organizations. I know from speaking to some there, they are constantly evolving and I don't think the final version of MARSOC has shown itself. Hope this helps.

Boot

[ODB]

My initial thought was what are we trying to do now. But after thinking about this off and on all day, I started to come around. I can see the benefits on both sides, if (and that's a big if) both sides played together right. As I looked from a historical perspective, IMO the two have complimented each other quite well in the past and to some degree the not so distant past. May be more of the same issues all organizations are currently going through. Seems many think they are inventing some new great thing, only to realize it has exsisted before, but was forgotten. I'm still digesting the full report and may think differently afterwards.

Additional thought is that maybe we aren't thinking a big enough change. Bring all of the services SOF and the National Level Assets into one organization. Part of the problem with multiple entities is the inner fighting and trying to prove their worth over the next, what if we did away with this issue? Might be too bold of a move and rub quite a few people wrong along the way, but would the endstate ultimately be more effective Intel/Operations?

Boot, thank you for the historical perspective, sheds some of that light I was looking for.

[Uboat509]

This whole thing is a symptom of the idea that if one is good then two must be better. If closer cooperation between SF and all the various Intel agencies is good (and it is) then actually assigning ODAs to one or more of those organizations must be better (it is not).

There is some discussion of this over at PS.com. BLUF while there is certainly overlap between what SF does and what the civilian Intel agencies do, they are not interchangeable. They have very different missions, very different cultures and very different pools of manpower that they draw from.

SFC W

[John T. Fishel]

on original sin. "Once upon a time" , COL William O. Donovan, Coordinator of War Information was granted license by Pres FDR to create a full blown intel agency. Donovan borrowed a great deal from the British but concluded that having a separate intel collection/analysis agency (MI6/SIS) and covert action/paramilitary agency (SOE) was inefficient so he combined the capabilities in the OSS. This "original sin" was incorporated in the National Security Act of 1947 when the CIA was created. It has been, IMO, responsible for all sorts of mischief such as the Bay of Pigs, among other dumb ops.

Fast forward: The Intel Reform Act of 2004 did not rectify the original sin. So, combining military SOF with CIA will likely compound the error. What needs to be done, IMO, is to separate CIA's paramilitary capability from the intel collection and analysis functions, preferably in a new organization that is civilian run, similar in function to SOE. I would also keep it separate from SOCOM although there could be much work done together under an OPCON authority.

Cheers

JohnT

[Tom Odom]

on original sin. "Once upon a time" , COL William O. Donovan, Coordinator of War Information was granted license by Pres FDR to create a full blown intel agency. Donovan borrowed a great deal from the British but concluded that having a separate intel collection/analysis agency (MI6/SIS) and covert action/paramilitary agency (SOE) was inefficient so he combined the capabilities in the OSS. This "original sin" was incorporated in the National Security Act of 1947 when the CIA was created. It has been, IMO, responsible for all sorts of mischief such as the Bay of Pigs, among other dumb ops.

Fast forward: The Intel Reform Act of 2004 did not rectify the original sin. So, combining military SOF with CIA will likely compound the error. What needs to be done, IMO, is to separate CIA's paramilitary capability from the intel collection and analysis functions, preferably in a new organization that is civilian run, similar in function to SOE. I would also keep it separate from SOCOM although there could be much work done together under an OPCON authority.

Cheers

JohnT

Agreed, John T. We went through an episode of this in the 1980s. I researched and wrote about some of it in the 60s and again in the 70s in the Congo/Zaire. It also tends to give CIA its bifurcated personality although completely as part of that comes froom the clan side.

Best
Tom

[zenpundit]

"What needs to be done, IMO, is to separate CIA's paramilitary capability from the intel collection and analysis functions, preferably in a new organization that is civilian run, similar in function to SOE"

Not all paramilitary covert ops should look like a raid by Delta Force. Sometimes- maybe often -the government might want a very quiet and unobtrusive operation that while requiring a limited use of paramilitary skills to be done quietly by people who have plausibly blended into the environment. That blending requires the sort of cultural/in-country familiarity of experienced collections personnel or diplomats.

For that reason I'm not sure that rigid organizational separation is a great idea unless you intend to also slide ppl with the right experience into place.

Sort of like they are talking about in the news article.

[George L. Singleton]

Trial and error, whatever works, use it and do it.

[Ken White]

doing just that.

That's why Winston noted "You can always trust the Americans to do the right thing -- after they have tried every conceivable alternative."

OTOH, whenever we try to organize things, we generally screw it up -- ad hocery is what we do best.

[ODB]

the experiences and knowledge here on SWJ.

What would be the advantages to doing this and why?

What would be the disadvantages to doing this and why?

Lastly if you had complete control what would you do to reorganize our current system?

Understand the limitations of open source, so may not be able to be to detailed, but looking to see different perspectives and experiences.