Re: OT THE NOT SO REAL DEAL ON IRAQ -- ADMINISTRATION'S MISMANAGEMENT PAINF
The entire Washington Post article:
U.S. Directive Prioritizes Post-Conflict Stability
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 1, 2005; Page A21
A broad Pentagon directive issued this week orders the U.S. military to be
sure, the next time it goes to war, to prepare more thoroughly for picking
up the pieces afterward.
More than a year in the making, the directive represents an ambitious
attempt to bring about a fundamental, permanent widening in what U.S.
troops are trained and equipped to do. Accustomed to focusing primarily on
combat operations, U.S. forces under the new order must now give
post-conflict stability operations similar priority, which means they must
be ready in foreign countries to carry out such tasks as developing
political institutions, establishing judicial systems and reviving
economic activities.
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"Stability operations are a core U.S. military mission that the Department
of Defense shall be prepared to conduct and support," the directive says.
"They shall be given priority comparable to combat operations and be
explicitly addressed and integrated across all" Pentagon activities.
The revised policy follows widespread criticism that the Pentagon
neglected to plan sufficiently for the aftermath of the 2003 Iraq
invasion. Not only did conditions in the country turn out worse than
anticipated -- in the form of a fierce insurgency and mammoth
reconstruction challenges -- but early Pentagon hopes of being able to
hand off a large share of responsibility to U.S. and foreign civilian
organizations and to Iraqis proved overly optimistic.
As a result, the U.S. military in Iraq has been badly stressed to come up
with the skills, equipment and troops to ensure security and begin
rebuilding the country. The difficult experience has driven home the
lesson that U.S. forces cannot always depend on others to step forward and
help manage stability tasks.
"Many stability operations are best performed by indigenous, foreign or
U.S. civilian professionals," the directive says, reflecting the
Pentagon's sentiment still that it need not always lead in this area.
"Nonetheless, U.S. military forces shall be prepared to perform all tasks
necessary to establish or maintain order when civilians cannot do so."
The 11-page directive, signed Monday by acting Deputy Defense Secretary
Gordon R. England, assigns long lists of specific responsibilities to the
Pentagon's various civilian branches, military services and regional
commands.
For instance, it instructs the Pentagon's undersecretary for personnel to
develop methods for recruiting people for stability operations and to
bolster instruction in foreign languages and cultures. It orders the
undersecretary for intelligence to ensure that "suitable" information for
stability operations is available. And it directs the undersecretary for
policy to create a "stability operations center" and submit a semiannual
report to the secretary of defense.
These and other measures appear to go a long way toward addressing
shortfalls highlighted in a critical study last year of the Pentagon's
approach to stability operations. The study, done by the Defense Science
Board, a Pentagon advisory panel, concluded that though U.S. forces are
good at winning conventional battles, they have tended to give short
shrift to managing the aftermath.
One of the reasons for this, experts inside and outside the Pentagon said,
has been the assumption among military planners that U.S. forces could win
wars quickly, then withdraw from combat zones.
"In the 1990s, the talk, every time we were going to deploy something,
was, 'What's the exit strategy?' " said Andrew F. Krepinevich, executive
director of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. The focus
in war games, he recalled, was: "How do we get forces to places quickly?
It was assumed they wouldn't be there long."
But the Iraq conflict has made clear that a rapid exit is not always
possible. Warning that Iraq may not prove an exception, the Defense
Science Board recommended that stability operations be made an explicit
mission of the Defense Department and treated with the same seriousness as
combat operations. That led Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to order
the directive, senior aides said.
Craig Fields, who co-chaired the study, expressed satisfaction yesterday
with the directive, an unsigned draft of which was reported on last week
in the New York Times. "It covers a lot of ground, and it's in the right
direction," he said.
At the same time, Fields noted that the release of the directive is only
the start of change. Acting on it, he predicted, will "take a lot of
effort over a long time."
Some defense scholars have urged the Pentagon to create constabulary units
and other specialized forces to handle stability operations, saying that
such troops could be kept abroad longer and provide skills not easily
developed in conventional troops. But military commanders have considered
the idea impractical, and Pentagon officials involved in drafting the new
directive rejected it.
"As we looked at that question," said Jeffrey "Jeb" Nadaner, the deputy
assistant secretary for stability operations, "we felt it was better to
have the skills across the force."
Nadaner said the biggest sticking point during drafting of the document
came in deciding who should monitor compliance. One option still being
given serious consideration as recently as a few months ago involved
putting a large committee in charge. But that was ruled out as too
cumbersome, and the job ultimately went to the Pentagon's policy office.
"The idea is to get information frequently and directly to the secretary
of defense so he could track the progress of change," Nadaner said. "If
it's going through a big committee, there could be a lot of processing and
a lot of delay."
Asked how much instituting the directive will cost, Nadaner said: "It
shouldn't cost a whole lot, in the sense that it's not about the
procurement of major weapons systems, which generally are your most costly
things. It's about reshaping a lot of current activities."
The entire Washington Post article:
U.S. Directive Prioritizes Post-Conflict Stability
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 1, 2005; Page A21
A broad Pentagon directive issued this week orders the U.S. military to be
sure, the next time it goes to war, to prepare more thoroughly for picking
up the pieces afterward.
More than a year in the making, the directive represents an ambitious
attempt to bring about a fundamental, permanent widening in what U.S.
troops are trained and equipped to do. Accustomed to focusing primarily on
combat operations, U.S. forces under the new order must now give
post-conflict stability operations similar priority, which means they must
be ready in foreign countries to carry out such tasks as developing
political institutions, establishing judicial systems and reviving
economic activities.
Who's Blogging?
Read what bloggers are saying about this article.
The Impolitic
Over at Teekay???s
Rogers Post
Full List of Blogs (15 links) »
Most Blogged About Articles
On washingtonpost.com | On the web
"Stability operations are a core U.S. military mission that the Department
of Defense shall be prepared to conduct and support," the directive says.
"They shall be given priority comparable to combat operations and be
explicitly addressed and integrated across all" Pentagon activities.
The revised policy follows widespread criticism that the Pentagon
neglected to plan sufficiently for the aftermath of the 2003 Iraq
invasion. Not only did conditions in the country turn out worse than
anticipated -- in the form of a fierce insurgency and mammoth
reconstruction challenges -- but early Pentagon hopes of being able to
hand off a large share of responsibility to U.S. and foreign civilian
organizations and to Iraqis proved overly optimistic.
As a result, the U.S. military in Iraq has been badly stressed to come up
with the skills, equipment and troops to ensure security and begin
rebuilding the country. The difficult experience has driven home the
lesson that U.S. forces cannot always depend on others to step forward and
help manage stability tasks.
"Many stability operations are best performed by indigenous, foreign or
U.S. civilian professionals," the directive says, reflecting the
Pentagon's sentiment still that it need not always lead in this area.
"Nonetheless, U.S. military forces shall be prepared to perform all tasks
necessary to establish or maintain order when civilians cannot do so."
The 11-page directive, signed Monday by acting Deputy Defense Secretary
Gordon R. England, assigns long lists of specific responsibilities to the
Pentagon's various civilian branches, military services and regional
commands.
For instance, it instructs the Pentagon's undersecretary for personnel to
develop methods for recruiting people for stability operations and to
bolster instruction in foreign languages and cultures. It orders the
undersecretary for intelligence to ensure that "suitable" information for
stability operations is available. And it directs the undersecretary for
policy to create a "stability operations center" and submit a semiannual
report to the secretary of defense.
These and other measures appear to go a long way toward addressing
shortfalls highlighted in a critical study last year of the Pentagon's
approach to stability operations. The study, done by the Defense Science
Board, a Pentagon advisory panel, concluded that though U.S. forces are
good at winning conventional battles, they have tended to give short
shrift to managing the aftermath.
One of the reasons for this, experts inside and outside the Pentagon said,
has been the assumption among military planners that U.S. forces could win
wars quickly, then withdraw from combat zones.
"In the 1990s, the talk, every time we were going to deploy something,
was, 'What's the exit strategy?' " said Andrew F. Krepinevich, executive
director of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. The focus
in war games, he recalled, was: "How do we get forces to places quickly?
It was assumed they wouldn't be there long."
But the Iraq conflict has made clear that a rapid exit is not always
possible. Warning that Iraq may not prove an exception, the Defense
Science Board recommended that stability operations be made an explicit
mission of the Defense Department and treated with the same seriousness as
combat operations. That led Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to order
the directive, senior aides said.
Craig Fields, who co-chaired the study, expressed satisfaction yesterday
with the directive, an unsigned draft of which was reported on last week
in the New York Times. "It covers a lot of ground, and it's in the right
direction," he said.
At the same time, Fields noted that the release of the directive is only
the start of change. Acting on it, he predicted, will "take a lot of
effort over a long time."
Some defense scholars have urged the Pentagon to create constabulary units
and other specialized forces to handle stability operations, saying that
such troops could be kept abroad longer and provide skills not easily
developed in conventional troops. But military commanders have considered
the idea impractical, and Pentagon officials involved in drafting the new
directive rejected it.
"As we looked at that question," said Jeffrey "Jeb" Nadaner, the deputy
assistant secretary for stability operations, "we felt it was better to
have the skills across the force."
Nadaner said the biggest sticking point during drafting of the document
came in deciding who should monitor compliance. One option still being
given serious consideration as recently as a few months ago involved
putting a large committee in charge. But that was ruled out as too
cumbersome, and the job ultimately went to the Pentagon's policy office.
"The idea is to get information frequently and directly to the secretary
of defense so he could track the progress of change," Nadaner said. "If
it's going through a big committee, there could be a lot of processing and
a lot of delay."
Asked how much instituting the directive will cost, Nadaner said: "It
shouldn't cost a whole lot, in the sense that it's not about the
procurement of major weapons systems, which generally are your most costly
things. It's about reshaping a lot of current activities."
