pj:

Agree with a lot of what you are saying, but, if he was actually a senior civilian official with, say, a tour or two in Afghanistan, and enough visibility to the big picture, I would be more comfortable with both the press attention and the message.

I only spent a year in Iraq, but was probably one of the most well-traveled civilians in Northern Iraq doing a lot of intensive research. Having said that, my research was in a particular field and a particular region in which I still, at best, know enough to know what I don't know.

To project that limited knowledge (especially the amount gleaned from four months into my tour) into a strategic view of the entire national, international, civilian and military effort, would, in my opinion, be quite an unreasonable stretch.

Notwithstanding, there are plenty of folks on this site who know that my opinion of the civilian side of these efforts is less than optimum, and justifies substantial critique and evolution. So, in that context, his criticisms, applicable to the levels he experienced are actually pretty consistent with many things I believe.

One of the bigger debates that I beleive should raise concerns to higher ups is in fact the question of how DoS selects, deploys, supports, and interacts with "so-called" contractors, who are actually supposed to be subject mater and specialty skills experts brought in to fill knowledge and resource gaps in the civilian effort. They are special federal appointees, not contractors, nor foreihgn service officers.

This affair really raises the issue of whether they (or he as an individual within that class) are being properly recruited, deployed, supported, and engaged to the civilian mission.

Maybe I am wrong, but if the civilian surge was actually intended to connect experienced civilians (not ex-military and foreign service officers) to the mission of expanding the reach and capacity of government to its people, what was this guy doing there?

If the answer is that the civilian surge was not able to be staffed in the manner as advertised (thus the facade of military dual-hatting versus actual civilians), then we need to re-examine that surge, not conceal it by alternate military staffing.

The UN, by comparison, in Iraq used a lot of different techniques to drive adequate civilian staffing. One example was to use civilian experts who had an on-going and deep knowledge of the area, but came and went over a longer period: three to six month per year on the ground over five years. Another was to anchor the operation in Jordan, a safe country nearby, from which civilians rotated in for three weeks at a time.

Most civilian experts on that kind of an assignment (known as hotelling) could actually get more done at the anchor (better internet, freer movement, more resources like CAD engineering), and use the on=ground time to research, contact and deliver. As a civilian "expert" I was always taught to leave enough downtime to "think" about a problem (plan twice, build once), than to just push a fast, expedient answer in as is more appropriate, and necessary to a military battle tempo on the ground.

Anyone familiar with routine local/regional government processes understands that a County Executive or Public Works manager may routinely initiate a "cycle" of scoping, evaluation, preliminary design, public or organizational review and feedback, then, and only then, proceed to retain design strategies (whether engineering or systems) from which final design action programs may start (final engineering/construction, bids for computer systems implementation, etc...). These things happen over months and years using appropriate experts sequencing in and out of projects over their course.

If we can't understand how to effectively plan around, staff, and deliver routine civilian processes, then there is something fundamentally wrong with our civilian surge process. How do we deal with that?

Perhaps, if the answer is that security precludes civilian effectiveness, we should acknowledge that, and not pretend to Clear, Hold and Build, but just Clear, Clear and Clear, without pretending that clear is a step to something else that we are not delivering.

Instead, I fear we have the worst of all worlds right now on the civilian side. Short-term assignees (Yes, one year is a short-term for civilian projects of note in a field where most real solutions might take five years to plan and implement), often not qualified in the designated subject areas, with no structured process or support, or plan to align effective civilian consultative and a capacity building processes in a competent and effective manner.

So, does the Hoh affair raise important issues for me? Yes. But that phase of the debate was not brought to the table yet.

Steve