Blending into the mindset of the Human Terrain

[davidbfpo]

I too am finding this thread hard to follow.

A couple of points I'd make:

1) Where is there a suitable environment for such urban area training, complete with Third World conditions and a living supportive population? I can only quickly think of Morocco, only as 'Blackhawk Down' was filmed there. Mmm, would Puerto Rico, Costa Rica and such small places oblige?

2) It took a long time for NATO armies in Germany, before the end of the 'Cold War', to acknowledge urban operations (Berlin excluded) and build small training villages. Venues that could be adapted for pre-Ulster deployment.

3) Is training without soldiers en masse an acceptable alternative? Sounds almost like the "war rides" staff colleges pursue.

4) Are lessons truly shared and learnt about small wars, e.g. UK intervention in Sierra Leone (rural not urban I concede)? Is there a NATO facility that does this?

davidbfpo

[jenniferro10]

...it became painfully clear that all of us really are talking about the same thing with different words (as people much smarter than me have already pointed out). So, I'll offer this, in plain English:

1. Our terminology changes as our understanding of a problem becomes more refined. A great example is Jennifer Chandler's discussion of our military's fractured, incomplete definition and understanding of what culture is. This thesis was written in 2005. I think we can all point out several examples of the changing terminology (for the better and for the worse) since then. What's the problem with that? IMHO, evolution is a good thing. Change for change's sake is not.

2. Other than terminology/semantics, we've discussed the future of war and the possible role of our military in it. So far we have not discussed the corrolary implicit in the points of every person that's replied so far (at least, the ones that weren't pickin on people): how do we capture cultural information from the soldiers' experience, make it useful (operational) for the immediate future and in the decisionmaking going on way above that guy's head and for parallel operations of other branches and teams, and also feed it back into the training system?

[davidbfpo]

Jenniferro10,

Welcome to the SWC and an impressive first post too! Just had a quick look at the linked document, in particular the templates advocated. They appear to be what some police officers inherently acquire with time, plus now appear regularly in training material and what in the UK are called 'Community Impact Assessments'.

Perhaps some US "brothers in blue" will recognise the similarities?

I acknowledge there is a big difference between police based in the area and the arrival of the foriegn military in an operational area.

davidbfpo

[MikeF]

...it became painfully clear that all of us really are talking about the same thing with different words (as people much smarter than me have already pointed out). So, I'll offer this, in plain English:

1. Our terminology changes as our understanding of a problem becomes more refined. A great example is Jennifer Chandler's discussion of our military's fractured, incomplete definition and understanding of what culture is. This thesis was written in 2005. I think we can all point out several examples of the changing terminology (for the better and for the worse) since then. What's the problem with that? IMHO, evolution is a good thing. Change for change's sake is not.

2. Other than terminology/semantics, we've discussed the future of war and the possible role of our military in it. So far we have not discussed the corrolary implicit in the points of every person that's replied so far (at least, the ones that weren't pickin on people): how do we capture cultural information from the soldiers' experience, make it useful (operational) for the immediate future and in the decisionmaking going on way above that guy's head and for parallel operations of other branches and teams, and also feed it back into the training system?

The reason the Air Force, Army, Navy and Marines bicker amongst themselves is that they don't speak the same language. For instance, Take the simple phrase "secure the building".

The Army will post guards around the place.

The Navy will turn out the lights and lock the doors.

The Marines will kill everybody inside and set up a headquarters.

The Air Force will take out a 5 year lease with an option to buy.

v/r

Mike

[davidbfpo]

As if on cue, a UK MoD "spin" story on a new training facility in the Uk for Afghaanistan: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/news...n-Norfolk.html

davidbfpo

[William F. Owen]

.

2. Other than terminology/semantics, we've discussed the future of war and the possible role of our military in it.

I submit we have not discussed this. THIS IS the problem. We have a significant community who wish to paint a picture of future conflict that fits their desire to innovate and complicate. Central to this is their to change the military to fit their image of the future.

If armies did not do something in the past, it is extremely unlikely we need to do it today or even in the future.

how do we capture cultural information from the soldiers' experience, make it useful (operational) for the immediate future and in the decisionmaking going on way above that guy's head and for parallel operations of other branches and teams, and also feed it back into the training system?

If this means simple and effective education, I agree. You can teach any English speaking army how to interact with the Bedouin, in 1 day! That is, how not to unintentionally offend them. In 99% of cases, nothing more is needed.

Capturing operational lessons from conflict is pretty simple and their are at least 2 good examples of best practice, with a proven track record, so their is no need for anyone to invent anything new.

[Ken White]

...In 99% of cases, nothing more is needed.

Capturing operational lessons from conflict is pretty simple and their are at least 2 good examples of best practice, with a proven track record, so their is no need for anyone to invent anything new.

With an American cynical caveat to an optimistic British figure -- I'd say 90%. There will always be 10% who can muck up anything...

[jenniferro10]

...for all the "success stories" that you guys are pointing out, there seem to be many more failures. As I come accross them in the interviews I'm doing lately, I've noticed a pattern in the "Monday AM quarterback" discussion of why things happened the way they did: someone, somewhere, did not relate or document what they had learned.

There's a certain amount of that that's human and understandable. And, there are some people, it seems, that are making it a personal crusade to systematically collect and distribute cultural information that they are learning "in the field". But between contracted training classes ("owned" by their creators), and the scattered authority for creating and evaluating the cultural training US soldiers get, then I think it's to be expected that there's no real institutionalized method to avoid problems like the one I heard the other day: about 25 soldiers received language training specific to a particular region that, when they got there, was useless because all of the local people spoke a very dissimilar dialect. Not one person ever asked these guys: Hey, was your training useful? No? Why? What do they speak there, if not what we thought?

I became interested in this topic out of curiosity, and have been literally deluged by responses from enlisted folks. Anthropologists, history professors, and adult ed professionals are delivering cultural training to US troops, many of whom could probably teach the class themselves for 5% of the money in 10% of the time. People ask them about the functioning of their weapons, in order to improve the weapon or training to use it, but there's no similar system (outside of some informal loops, or "on paper" processes that aren't executed) to do the same for cultural training.

I remain open to discussing directly with interested parties...

[Ken White]

...for all the "success stories" that you guys are pointing out, there seem to be many more failures.

on this thread. If you're referring to comments on other threads, I'm sure there are some success stories -- and I'm equally sure there are far more failures.

That's mostly due to priority of effort followed by the size of the Armed Forces and a lot of bureaucratic impediments. It's also due to this phenomenon:

"...People ask them about the functioning of their weapons, in order to improve the weapon or training to use it, but there's no similar system (outside of some informal loops, or "on paper" processes that aren't executed) to do the same for cultural training."

Rightly or wrongly -- and I'm making no excuse, just telling you what 'is' -- the weapon is seen as important, the cultural training is seen as as nice to have by most (not all) at all ranks. 'Important' beats 'nice to have.' That also means there's no good answer to your original question re: how do we capture cultural information from the soldiers' experience, make it useful... and also feed it back into the training system. The issue isn't seen as important enough to make a full scale press on it -- which is what your query would entail. The system is too big and too broadly focused (which culture is important next year? In 2015? 2025?)

"...then I think it's to be expected that there's no real institutionalized method to avoid problems like the one I heard the other day: about 25 soldiers received language training specific to a particular region that, when they got there, was useless because all of the local people spoke a very dissimilar dialect. Not one person ever asked these guys: Hey, was your training useful? No? Why? What do they speak there, if not what we thought?

Bad, wrong -- but stuff like that happens frequently; not only with language or cultural training but with other even more important and more expensive training. A unit is destined to do something somewhere and before they arrive, events occur that mean a unit is needed elsewhere for a different mission. The planners have to weigh priorities and assign someone to the most important mission regardless of training. That again is not an excuse, just a reason. It shouldn't happen; we could certainly do better but it's a chaotic system, not a smooth machine and, again, the priority goes to life and death stuff, not aids to performance.

I'm old and long retired, so I can't talk about now with any facility, I can only tell you, based on experience, the 'why' of some things and wish you luck in your quest:

I remain open to discussing directly with interested parties...

[marct]

Hi Jennifer,

I remain open to discussing directly with interested parties...

I'm pretty sure that Ken has nailed the main reason - institutional (read "organizational cultural") bias / history. Evaluations such as what you are talking about are, strangely enough, rather tricky to do. It's pretty easy to ask "Did the gun fire" six months later after a mission. It's much harder to evaluate cultural training six months later.

Now, having said that, it is pretty easy to evaluate the spectacular failures of cultural training, such as the one you mentioned. But how about successes? With languages, some evaluation is possible or, rather, testing for language competencies is possible. That does not necessarily mean that the language can be used in the field (check out TOEFL scores vs the actual ability to network in a f2f setting).

"Cultural training" is even worse. All too often, it is 1-3 hours sandwiched in during the "real" stuff. Even if the students want more, they often don't have the time for more. All too often, the courses are canned - designed by a committee, delivered by anyone and, as the Bard opined, "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing". In the rare cases where you have a top notch instructor who knows the material well and is great at it (Paula Holmes-Eber comes to mind, but I know of others), you still have that institutional time limit.

Should there be a feedback loop to help improve the training? Yup, there should. The problem, of course, is that that type of training is often not evaluable by the students until after they have gone in the field, so such an evaluation often breaks down into a popularity contest in the infotainment field.

BTW, I'm not trying to be egregiously negative here . I'm just pointing out that there are some problems inherent in the evaluation process when you take subject matter that should be taught as education, not training, and attempt to apply evaluation criteria that were designed for training.

Cheers,

Marc

[William F. Owen]

The issue isn't seen as important enough to make a full scale press on it -- which is what your query would entail. The system is too big and too broadly focused (which culture is important next year? In 2015? 2025?)

Right on the money. Training should and education should focus on widely applicable fundamentals, to lay the bedrock for things that are deployment or mission specific. - and BTW in 1992 the British Army's Intelligence Corps deployed a recently qualified and fluent Mandarin speaker to Northern Ireland, not Hong Kong - because his "other" skills set was needed their. You can't tell the future.

BTW, I'm not trying to be egregiously negative here . I'm just pointing out that there are some problems inherent in the evaluation process when you take subject matter that should be taught as education, not training, and attempt to apply evaluation criteria that were designed for training.

I concur, but the formula to avoid the pitfall is that education has to be kept simple, relevant, and be delivered by someone the military community can trust, in language they can understand.

...and that means not using silly words and phrases, like "human terrain."