ANSF Assessments - CUAT and RASR

One of the critical functions of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) is to conduct assessments of the capability of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) to perform their mission across a variety of functional areas to include manning, equipment and training. For a number of years ISAF used the Commander's Unit Assessment Tool (CUAT). In July 2013 ISAF Joint Command (IJC) replaced the CUAT with the Regional ANSF Status Report (RASR). IJC says the RASR replaced the CUAT because the ISAF senior leadership found the CUAT to be "difficult to read, inconsistently applied, and not useful". However the usefulness of the RASR will be called into question as time goes on. When the RASR was implemented in 2013 there were over 50,000 U.S troops in Afghanistan - many of them conducting the Security Force Assistance mission as Security Force Assistance Advisor Teams or SFAATs. Currently (as of February 2014) there are 32,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. If the Bilateral Security Agreement is signed then there will likely be about 10,000 troops available for the counter-terrorism mission and to continue the Security Force Assistance mission past December 2014. However, the advisory footprint would be small concentrating on the ANA corps and ministries (MoI and MoD). An accurate assessment of the ANSF will be problematic at that point. The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has provided a report on the RASR and has some recommendations to ensure a adequate ANSF assessment process is in place for the post-2014 environment. You can read the report entitled "Afghan National Security Forces: Actions Needed to Improve Plans for Sustaining Capability Assessment Efforts", SIGAR 14-33 Audit Report, February 2014 at this link.