PMC in COIN (general theme)

[Schmedlap]

Have you looked into how the military was professionalized in the 1960s/1970s? Military academy slots were valued and given to sons of prominent individuals. Universal conscription was acquiesced to, perhaps because service in the military was not a horribly low-paying job compared to the value that the young men could provide to their family through their labor on the family land. Officers were sent abroad to the Soviet Union for professional education. Obviously, recreating that system might be difficult, but there might be lessons that can be gleaned from the old system.

[huskerguy7]

This is one of the long poles in the tent. What exactly is oversight and where is it coming from? What are those complete interactions? Aren't they a lot like the purposeful application of armed violence, which by all our sensibilities is supposed to be the monopoly of the state and we're now going to sublet? It is a different situation with the ANA than, e.g., a deadly force situation in a law enforcement role (though some of those contractors are sworn LE officers).

Interactions: I believe that if PMCs were contracted, operators deployed would have military and/or law enforcement experience, plus their additional training from their companies. These operators would help train and mentor their ANA counterpoints. Training activities would include things like teaching soldiers how to properly maintain their weapons, providing solutions to questions that ANA soldiers may have, and assisting their ANA counterparts with strategic decisions during firefights. They would also provide and mentor the ANA officers.

In these contracts, PMCs would not act as an "offensive force." I would disagree with that; it makes it a completely different situation. Thus, they would only use their weapons in self defense roles, if they are even armed. As an anonymous official familiar with the industry told me said "in a mentoring role they would use their weapons in self defense, if they were indeed carrying any." An OMLT consists of 13-30 members for a batallion. These contractors would likely be spread throughout the batallion anyways; they wouldn't be a special unit attached with more capabilities.

Oversight: This is the more challenging issue. History has shown that sometimes, when PMCs are left unattended with no authorization, they don't act how they are contracted to. When I think of oversight for this kind of operation, two ideas come to mind: evalulating the work performed and placing someone to watch over (or even command) the civilian OMLTs. The ISAF could investigate the civilian OMLT operations to determine if the contractors performed like they should. However, I think it would be better to have one person affiliated with the US government in place and in charge. This could be either someone from the DoD, or could be an officer from the Army or Marines. Depending on the contract, this officer would be in a position to command or just monitor the civilian OMLTs.

It is easy to handwave a hell no, particularly in the Blackwater / Xe aftermath. It is also easy to neuter the role of an ETT to some sort of garrison Title X organize, train, and equip +/- debrief for which there are clear contractor roles, and then fall in love with this outsourcing idea.

Yes, as we have seen, despite their successful operations (that are sometimes overlooked), some companies aren't responisible enough to conduct PMC operations. However, some companies have demonstrated success. For example, Northrop Grumman has been training the Saudi National Guard and many militaries of third world jobs-they've done a good job.

This part is the "business" part, you need to weigh not only the price, but the moral's of your "partner." This is where knowledge of PMC's employees, history, experience, leaders, and culture is important. The US has encountered bad press with PMCs simply because it has failed with this part.

With regard to the sticky part of the tip-of-the-spear combat advisor -- what are the precedents, issues, and sacred cows that you feel are most relevant? Is that role going to be at the root of the future ANA ETT?

I apologize if I misunderstood your question here. I believe that there are two main issues with the idea of civilian OMLTs. First, the reactions of these groups when their ANA "Kandak" does come under fire. Will they take control and turn into an elite unit or will they help their counterparts with advice? Hopefully the latter, but if this did happen, the oversight in place would catch it and the PMC would be disciplined. Second, how these PMCs will interact with ISAF forces. Some of the tasks performed by OMLTs includes medevacs, acting as FACs, and calling in airstrikes. Only some PMCs minimally possess the capabilities to perform some of these tasks. Thus, it will be necessary to insure clear communication between the "pilots" and operators.

Have you looked into how the military was professionalized in the 1960s/1970s? Military academy slots were valued and given to sons of prominent individuals. Universal conscription was acquiesced to, perhaps because service in the military was not a horribly low-paying job compared to the value that the young men could provide to their family through their labor on the family land. Officers were sent abroad to the Soviet Union for professional education. Obviously, recreating that system might be difficult, but there might be lessons that can be gleaned from the old system.

I have not looked into this and am not familiar with it. It is definitley something I would be interested in learning more about.

[Pete]

PMCs could conduct training on weapons, tactics and the operation and maintenance of equipment at Afghan military installations, but I doubt that they could accompany Afghan units during field operations or function as a de facto chain of command in the field. When contractors are participants in military operations it introduces a new organizational interface, with the military and its civil servants on one side and the contractors on the other. Sometimes when a contractor does what needs to be done to accomplish the mission it can create awkward situations after the fact if each action they take has not been explicity requested in writing by a contracting officer or his representatives.

In 1998 I attended a preproposal briefing conducted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Transatlantic Branch for the Balkans peacekeeping force support contact--Brown & Root was the incumbent and they also won the recompete. The contracting officer, a retired USAF O-5 from HQ, U.S. Army Europe in Heidelburg, told us we were not to fulfill any request for support unless it had been authorized by him or his subordinates in writing. He said division commanders and their staffs would periodically visit their brigades deployed overseas and tell contractors verbally to do various things--put linoleum on the floor of a dining facility or to pave a parking lot, things like that--thereby driving costs through the roof. Officers had no authority over contractors, he said; only contracting officers and their designated representatives did. You can imagine the resentment that policy caused at the grass-roots working level. "I'm in the Army, you're a contractor, and I just told you what to do. Don't give me any double-talk. Am I making myself clear?"

I worked in DoD support contracting as a technical writer in the DC area for 16 years. As I see it, DoD only likes contractors at the colonel and above level because they provide a quick augmentation to their work forces. At the worker-bee level, most military personnel and DoD civilians despise contactors and regard them as being overpaid rip-off artists.

[John T. Fishel]

MPRI trained the Croation Army under contract to the GOC (but with the approval of the USG) in the 1990s. Their trainees were successful. MPRI had a USG contract in Colombia that was less successful as was one in Iraq. In Iraq, the MPRI leader was COL (ret) Jim Steele who had run the USMILGP in El Salvador and the Military Support Group in Panama. So, it is possible to use contractors who, depending on the circumstances, may or may not be effective.

Another partial precedent is found in the PRTs where contractors (from other agencies) arefully integrated into the teams and follow the orders of the PRT chief. Applicable law differs between USG agencies.

I see few conceptual problems with the approach used in the PRTs although there may be legal ones for DOD. I do see a major conceptual problem in the MPRI approach where we turn over to a private corporation decisions that are properly those of the USG. No reflection on the patriotism etc of MPRI princiaps or employees but they are not responsible to the govt or the people of the US for actions that may be necessary but are not spelled out in the contract (see Pete's post).

cheers

JohnT

[IntelTrooper]

In my neck of the woods, Blackwater provided what was basically a PMT to finalize training of Afghan Border Police, including actual work in the field. One brigade commander welcomed their participation and in an AO suffering from severe manpower and asset shortages, they filled a vital role in actioning our intel (that is, they were the only entity in our battalion AO that could/would move on time sensitive targets). The mentors seemed to make sure the training was adequate beforehand that they could mostly hang back and let the ABP officers do the op with limited interference, offering advice or guidance where necessary.

After a new brigade RIPd in with a more... risk averse commander, the Blackwater mentors were essentially confined to their remote COP and only allowed to hold that ground. From what I hear, 4th ID had to do a lot of clean up after they replaced that brigade due to the inaction of a year...

I don't know all the details of what exactly their contract dictated, but they seemed to fill the mentor role without serious incident. As far as command and control, the AO commanders were still in charge with USFOR-A elements often providing communications support in case air or other assets became necessary.

[Entropy]

IMO PMC's should only be used, if at all, for training the basics in garrison. They should not accompany ANA out on any operations because then they de facto become an offensive force.

Regardless, the solution to manpower shortages is to get more manpower. Mentoring the ANA is supposed to be one of our primary tasks - if we don't have the military manpower for it then we don't have our priorities straight.

[IntelTrooper]

Regardless, the solution to manpower shortages is to get more manpower. Mentoring the ANA is supposed to be one of our primary tasks - if we don't have the military manpower for it then we don't have our priorities straight.

Absolutely agreed.