Corps Level Advisor Platform for Afghanistan

In 2014 the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) will implement its shift to "functionally-based Security Force Assistance". With the withdrawal of ISAF troops to minimal levels (possibly 10,000) by the end of the summer there will be less advisors to advise and assist the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF). In order to get the most bang for the buck ISAF plans on concentrating on higher level advising schemes - working primarily at the ANA corps and ministry level. The composition of the advisor organization at the corps level is spelled out in something ISAF calls the "Corps Level Advisor Platform". This platform depicts the SFAAT composition of military and civilian advisors and trainers. The SFAAT organization is detailed to include the specific advisor teams and the ranks and military occupational specialties of the advisors on the team. You can view the organization chart of the "Corp Level Advisor Platform" on pages 48-49 of the recently released (January 2014) Security Force Assistance Guide 2.0.

203rd Corps SFAAT Provides Assistance In SoK Area

Security Force Assistance advisers provide advice and assistance to a variety of organizations within the Afghan National Army (ANA), Afghan National Police (ANP), Afghan military and police institutions at the regional and national level, and to the Afghan ministries (principally MoI and MoD). At left is a picture of U.S. Army Captain Jeffery Burgett advising a LTC and COL; of the 203rd Corps in the corps tactical operations center. (U.S. Army photo by PFC Dixie Rae Liwanag Feb 13, 2014).

Australia's Role in Afghanistan Changes to Advising

Australia's role in Afghanistan has taken many forms from advising the police to providing special operations troops for direct action missions. One of the most important missions, providing security for Uruzgan province, is now complete. The Australians have withdrawn from Uruzgan where the Afghan National is now in the lead for security. Australian troops continue to have an advisory role with the 205th Corps and in Regional Command South. In addition, the Australians continue to advise and train at the Afghan National Academy and the Afghan Special Police Unit. Read more in "Australia's Role in Afghanistan Shifts to Advisory", Defense News, February 10, 2014.

National Guard Agricultural Assistance Program in Afghanistan

Since 2006 the United States Army National Guard has been fielding agricultural assistance teams to various locations in Afghanistan. Their task is to work with individual farmers and agricultural officials to modernize and improve agriculture in Afghanistan. The 15 states in the program are mostly agriculturally-oriented states in the Midwest and South. One of the latest agricultural teams to deploy was from the Nebraska Army National Guard. This Afghan Agri-business Development Team worked with their Afghan counterparts in Helmand province - home of much of the poppy cultivation that feeds the Afghan drug trade. Read more on the Agri-business Development Team from Nebraska in "Sowing seeds of hope: Nebraska Guard team mentors Afghan ag officials", Omaha World-Herald, February 4, 2004.

Lessons Observed vs Lessons Learned: How We Fail to Properly Train Advisers

Jason Fritz, a senior editor at War on the Rocks blog has published online an article about the difference between "lessons observed" and "lessons learned". The writer served as an adviser in Iraq a few years back and compares his preparation and training with those advisers from the Vietnam era. No lessons learned there; although there was plenty of lessons observed. Of course this adviser selection and training problem exists even today with the selection for the SFAATs for the Security Force Assistance mission in Afghanistan. Read more in "Lessons Observed on Lessons Observed: IEDs, Advising, and Armor", War on the Rocks, February 3, 2014.

Adviser to APPF Describes His Work

A member of the Civilian Expeditionary Workforce (CEW) provides us insight into his duties and responsibilities as an adviser to the Afghan Public Protection Force (APPF). Read more in "Analyst gets top honors for work in Afghanistan", Robins Air Force Base News Release, January 31, 2014.

Selection and Training of Advisors

The conflict in Afghanistan has evolved from population-centric counterinsurgency and partnering with the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) to Security Force Assistance (SFA). The conduct of SFA means that advisers are mentoring, training, assisting, and advising their Afghan counterparts. The success of the SFA mission depends on the quality and training of the adviser. Read more about this in "Giving Advising its Due", Small Wars Journal, January 22, 2014.

Directed Telescope: Element of Effective Command

All organizations have an established hierarchy of leadership and structure. This is especially true of the military. The armed services have several lines of communication within its organization. There is the commander's line of communication - messages and instructions passed from commander to commander up and down the organization. Then there is the functional or staff method of organizational communication. Operations officers exchanging information with other operations officers up and down the entity. Other staff sections do the same - the communications, medical, personnel, and logistics officers communicate with each other. Let's not forget the enlisted chain of communication - senior NCOs, SGMs, and CSMs. In addiction, there are several other informal methods of communication available to commander and staffs.

Filtering. However, there is also a "filtering" process that takes place in the military communication process. Subordinate commands will pass up information, reports, and briefings to the higher headquarters (whether commander to commander or staff section to staff section) that have been diluted or sanitized. There are many levels to a military organization. Within the Army you can start at the platoon level, through company, battalion, brigade, division, and all the way to corps and beyond. At every level bad news is watered down and good news emphasized. Ultimately, the higher headquarters is making plans and decisions based on skewed reporting.

Timeliness. In addition to the filtering problem there is the timeliness of the reporting. Information becomes stale as time goes by. Some problems can be fixed immediately if the higher echelons know about a problem. Then again, some problems will get only bigger if no remedy is taken to alleviate the situation.

Commander's Intent. In addition to the "filtering" and "timeliness" dilemma there is the difficulty of ensuring that a commander's intent is actually being followed at the lower levels.

Directed Telescope. Commander's through the ages have struggled with the problems associated with filtering, timeliness, and intent. One remedy used is the 'directed telescope'. The directed telescope can take the form of a commanders' aide, adviser, special staff officer, or liaison officer. The directed telescope has been used throughout military history by commanders around the world. It was a common tool used by Alexander the Great, during the Napoleonic Wars, American Civil War, World War I, and World War II; allowing commanders to cut through the haze of the battlefield and staying informed on what was really happening on the ground without the adverse effects of filtering and time.

A Discontinued Aspect of War. It would seem that the use of 'directed telescopes' (or anything resembling the function) has been discontinued by the U.S. military since World War II. There is scant evidence that this function has been replicated during the conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, Persian Gulf War (1991), Iraq War (2003-2001), and the current Afghan conflict. In Afghanistan, however, there is a small organization that was formed in 2009 called the COMISAF Advisory and Assistance Team (CAAT). The CAAT provides this 'directed telescope' service.

Read more on this topic in The Directed Telescope: A Traditional Element of Effective Command, by LTC Gary B. Griffin, Combat Studies Institute, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas published in 1985. The document is available at the link below:
http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/cgsc/carl/download/csipubs/griffin.pdf

SFA Adviser Selection Criteria Survey

Afghan War News is conducting some research on Security Force Assistance Adviser Selection Criteria. To that end we are sponsoring an online survey and request that personnel who have served as an adviser in the past (or are now presently advising) in Afghanistan take the survey. You can view more information about the survey, its purpose, and instructions at the link below. The survey is anonymous, does not collect personnel identification, and takes about 2 minutes to answer the ten easy questions.

www.afghanwarnews.info/sfa/adviser-selection-criteria-survey.htm

Medical Advisers with 3/10 Mountain Assist ANSF

FORWARD OPERATING BASE LIGHTNING, Afghanistan – At just two months into their deployment to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, Spartans, are hard at work, alongside their Afghan National Security Force counterparts as they continue to assume responsibility for the defense and security of their nation.

The Spartan brigade is currently tasked with advising and assisting the Afghan National Security Forces. To this end, the brigade has been providing the Afghans with mentorship and support in their effort to develop a capable and comprehensive medical corps. The goal is to establish a unit that can provide care for its personnel, from basic combat life saving skills, to advanced trauma care, consistently throughout Afghanistan.

Read more: http://www.dvidshub.net/news/118994/spartans-foster-medical-partnership-with-afghan-counterparts#.UtHg_p5dV8E#ixzz2q8iw3jns

The Advisor Role in Afghanistan in 2014

Each ISAF Commander comes into his one year (sometimes a little longer) tour in Afghanistan hoping to carry the football down the road a little further . . . and to shape the war effort as he sees fit. General McCrystal brought in Counterinsurgency, General Petraeus brought with him Population-centric Counterinsurgency and Partnering, General Allen introduced Security Force Assistance, and now General Dunford has now focused ISAF on Functionally-based Security Force Assistance. So what will the small number of troops in Afghanistan be doing in 2014? Well, they will not be doing much fighting (hopefully) and they will be helping the Afghans to be able to sustain their force into the future years as the Coalition presence diminishes even further. A recent blog post spells this out quite clearly for us. See "Future of Advising in Afghanistan", Flashpoint Blog, American Security Project, December 23, 2013.

Last Combat Troops from Australia Leave Afghanistan

The Australians have provided combat troops to the Coalition in Afghanistan since early in the war starting in 2001. Although Australia will leave some advisors (about 400) in place it has withdrawn the last of its combat troops. Much of the Australian effort was in the Uruzgan province in south central Afghanistan. Read more about the Australian withdrawal in this news report from BBC.

U.S. Drawdown Proceeds as Afghan Forces Become More Competent

The Regional South Commander, MG Abrams, recently stated that U.S. troop levels in the south are going down as the ISAF forces move from joint operations with the Afghan National Security Forces to an advise and assist role (SFA). Read more in "U.S. Troops Advise Afghan Forces as Drawdown Proceeds", American Forces Press Service, March 13, 2013.

SFAAT Team Leaders and Company Commanders in the SFA Mission

A recent magazine article in Army Magazine published in the February 2013 issue entitled "SFAA: Creating New Challenges & Opportunities for Army Units" has captured the ongoing dilemma of fielding SFAAT teams to Afghanistan from standing Brigade Combat Teams or BCTs. The Security Force Assistance Advisor Teams or SFAATs are taken out of a brigade using commanders and staff. For instance, a team leader of an SFAAT advising an ANA kandak (battalion) is supposed to be a major (0-4). Frequently, the 0-4 position is filled with a captain. This captain is usually a company commander. The captain most times hand-picks the remaining 11 members of his SFAAT from within his company. If his team deploys to Afghanistan and his company stays home (Fort Hood, Fort Campbell, or wherever) he is most likely turning his company command and platoon leadership to junior officers and NCOs. If the SFAAT deploys to Afghanistan with the brigade (the bde deploys as an SFAB) then his company is likely to deploy to another location (COP or FOB) than where his SFAAT goes.  Just think of the C2 and support problems either scenario poses (brigade deploys or stays in U.S.). You can read more about the challenges facing company commanders who are assigned as SFAAT team leaders in the magazine article at the link below.

www.ausa.org/publications/armymagazine/...

South Carolina Agricultural Team Redeploying from Afghanistan

An Army National Guard agriculture team from South Carolina will soon be returning from it's tour in Afghanistan. While in Afghanistan the team has built teaching centers and aided more than 300 farmers in its Afghan agricultural development mission through the help provided to Afghan farmers to improve their crops and livestock methods. Read more in "SC Guard unit wrapping up Afghan agriculture help", ABC News 4, February 9, 2013.

SFAAT Provides Assistance to OCC-R for OCC Foundation Course in Laghman Province (RC East)

Graduates of the OCC Foundation Course
hold the completion certificates.
(Photo Spc. Philip Steiner)

The Security Force Assistance Advisory Team or SFAAT advising the Operation Command Center - Region or OCC-R in Laghman province has successfully assisted the OCC-R in the conduct of a Operation Command Center Foundation Course.  This 21-day course is designed to teach Afghan ANP and ANA students topics such as map reading, computer work, and intelligence fusion. The OCC-R SFAAT is based on FOB Gamberi and works along side the OCC-R Afghan staff on a daily basis.  The foundation course will go a long way to ensure that the Afghan members of the OCC-R (and OCC-Ps) will be able to function independently of U.S. military advisers (SFAATs) at some point in the near future.

You can read more about the OCC-R and the OCCP Foundation Course in "Afghans leading the way in Laghman province", DVIDS, February 6, 2013 at the link below.

http://www.dvidshub.net/news/101541/afghans-leading-way-laghman-province

SFAAT Mission in Afghanistan

A large number of a new type of advisory unit are being deployed to aid in the transition of coalition combat troops out of Afghanistan. The advisory teams are called Security Force Assistance Advisory and Assistance Teams or SFAATs. The concept was developed by the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) staff and approved by COMISAF (General John Allen) last fall. The first teams were notified over the winter of 2011 for an upcoming deployment in the spring of 2012.

Most of the teams are being deployed as part of a new concept called Security Force Assistance Brigades or SFABs. These SFABs are understrength brigade combat teams (BCTs) with about half of their authorized manning. The SFAATs are formed into 9, 12, or 18 man teams depending on the type of Afghan unit they are advising.  All SFAATs are assigned interpreters who assist them in the advisory effort.  In addition, those units advising Afghan Uniform Police (AUP) or Afghan Border Police (ABP) are assigned Embedded Police Mentors (EPMs). The EPMs are provided by a DynCorps contract.

For more information on SFAATs visit the link below:

http://www.afghanwarnews.info/units/sfaat.htm

Fort Polk Trains 4th Infantry Division Soldiers for Advisory Role in Afghanistan

Teams of military personnel from the 4th Infantry Division are training for the Afghan advisory effort they will take part in at the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk. They train on a number of scenarios at a mock Afghan village that has Afghan role players. Read more in "New advisor teams key to US exit from Afghanistan", News-Leader.com, March 21, 2012.

How Advisors Can Regain Trust in Afghanistan

Fernandao Lujan, a U.S. Army Major, wrote a piece recently about how to re-establish trust between Afghans and the U.S. military. Lujan is a Special Forces officer, has spent some time in Afghanistan as an AfPak Hand, speaks a little of the language, knows some of the culture, and spent much of his Afghan trip working with Afghan military units as a member of the Counterinsurgency Advisory and Assistance Team (CAAT). He offers advice for those military members who will work in an advisory role in Afghanistan over the next several years.  Read Lujan's article in "How to get Afghans to trust us once again", The Washington Post, March 2, 2012.

Shifting to "Advise and Assist Role" in Afghanistan

Leon Panetta's recent announcement that the U.S. will move from a "combat' role to "advise and assist" role in Afghanistan in mid-2013 has caught some observers by surprise and spurred a flurry of commentary.  Read one online article entitled "US troops in Afghanistan: How big is shift from 'combat' to 'assistance'?", The Christian Science Monitor, February 2, 2012.