The military's effort to build a seasoned corps of expert officers for the Afghan war, one of the highest priorities of top commanders, is off to a slow start, with too few volunteers and a high-level warning to the armed services to steer better candidates into the program, according to some senior officers and participants. The groundbreaking program is meant to address concerns that the fight in Afghanistan has been hampered by a lack of continuity and expertise in the region among military personnel. But some officers have been reluctant to sign up for an unconventional career path because they fear it will hurt their advancement - a perception that top military leaders are trying to dispel as they tailor new policies for the complex task of taking on resilient insurgencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Each military branch has established career paths, and the type of focus envisioned by the program would take people off those routes.
The difficulties with the program came to light when the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, in an unusual rebuke within the Pentagon's uppermost circle, chided the chiefs of the four armed services three weeks ago for not always providing the best people. The program - which is expected to create a 912-member corps of mostly officers and enlisted service members who will work on Afghanistan and Pakistan issues for up to five years - was announced with much fanfare last fall. So far, 172 have signed up, and Admiral Mullen has questioned whether all of them are right for such a critical job...
More at The New York Times.
Comments
For Eric V: Program has a 17.5 month dwell period. You do a 12 month deployment, dwell for 17.5, then deploy again for a 10 month period. You do a 5.5 month pre-deployment training block which includes culture, COIN (Mr. Dave Kilcullen personally teaches a 4 day COIN seminar to each AFPAK Hand class) and 16 weeks of language training. 82% of the students attain 1/1 or better language proficiency during training.
Between deployments you will generally be assigned to DC, Tampa, Fort Bragg, Norfolk VA. The program has a number of seats available at Senior Service College and other Masters Degree programs that you can be picked for to attend between deployments. Some guys are doing ILE between deployments. There are briefs floating around that have this information -- Branch Managers have them. I know a lot of guys in the program are happy with it. Some guys are doing some really cool stuff. I don't think there's a catch, you just have to like this kind of work close to the locals.
M.R.,
I'm a Warrant and while Big Ranger's comments were out of line, certain aspects of his post were correct (the part concerning SMEs that are not required to punch the same tickets as O's to remain competitive). Unfortunately the NCO system now pretty much parallel's the officer's career track (with required ticket punchs), and if the kids at Fort Rucker get their way the Warrants will soon be following a similar path.
It is my view that the officer career path (with the exception of the rapid promotions at the junior ranks to keep folks in, but in effect preventing them from getting sufficient muddy boots time at the tactical level) is relatively effective for developing commanders and senior staff officers who need a broader understanding of the Army-military as a whole. On the other hand, developing parallel career tracks for Warrants and NCOs just because the officer system works for officers, will destroy the essence of what NCOs and Warrants are supposed to be, and that is specialists in their areas that enable their officers and organizations to be successful.
Bringing it back to the subject at hand, I think picking the right folks for this AFGPAK mission regardless of rank is essential, but for the reasons listed above the best officers will not get selected, so why not open the door to the "right" NCOs and Warrants? For this work they would have to be frocked (think our culture is bad about rank, it is much worse in most developing nations, the more primative the society the greater the distance between the officer and enlisted), or better yet, we would all go in simply as military advisors without rank (except for some key directors-commanders).
Imagine the value that a strong experienced infantry Platoon Sgt could bring to the table? Of course he'll need the opportunity to make E8-E9, and I seriously doubt that will happen with our current system.
There is a lot of talk in the Pentagon about how we should organize for irregular warfare, etc., but unfortunately that talk hasn't changed our career tracks much, and until it does it is business as usual. Even Special Forces suffers from the same cookie cutter approach to career development. We'll pull CPTs off teams just as they're gaining real experience, MAJs shift jobs too quickly to punch their tickets in KD positions, etc. The only folks getting back to the fight on a regular basis are the Warrants and NCOs.
Didn't mean to go on for so long, but after reading the posts above it is extremely frustrating that we have changed so little since 9-11. Bill
I am actually very interested in the program still, but it won't be able to until a couple of years. I have to knock out my command time in a Stryker Recon Troop which I also have a deployment to OEF soon. So it will be two years before I can volunteer. I personally like deploying (going on 3rd) and these two with the AFPAK hands will be pretty candy compared to on the line. The other thing is puts my family in Florida (CENTCOM). This is big for mamma who doesnt' mind me deploying as long as we are in the south. Why would the brass on the top take away from a guy like me for having a non-traditional track with the amount of experience I have? Post AFPAK I'm thinking 3ID at Stewart or back to 101st. Previous experience is with 4-101 in East Baghdad and 1-1CAV in Sadr City. Im currently in a Stryker BDE so I have been a member of a IBCT, HBCT and an SBCT. This will give me experience above BDE level, so I think it would make me more well rounded. Would some O-6 think that I couldn't hack it on a promotion board? Really?? I think it would show that I am talented enough to work with other services and other nations armies. I just want to contribute to the effort!
Does anyone know what the dwell time is between deployments? And if they assign you to the Joint Staff, CENTCOM, etc... will you spend the rest of your career there?
Like many I don't mind deployments, this actually sounds a hell of alot more interesting than the typical post XO/S3 job of pushing powerpoint, and the chnace to stabilize my family sounds appealing, but what's the catch?
Ok...really could not let this one go.
Big Ranger:
I assume you are a Warrant Officer. I am a Commissioned Officer, so here we go:
I am not 100% sure of the meaning of your post, but it looked an awful lot a slap in the face to commissioned officers.
FYI, we don't "demand" more money - we get what Congress gives us - just like you. We get paid more than the enlisted folks - just like you.
Not sure what "prerequisites" means. Perhaps you mean "preconditions". In any case, I have never known any officer to demand preconditions to any assignment. We simply go where it says on the orders....just like you.
As far as demanding promotions...you may have heard (or not), but we live in an "up or out" Army, which means that if we don't get promoted, we get booted. That being the case, (and having families to take care of), it seems only prudent that any assignment we take should offer a reasonable opportunity for promotion so that we can keep providing for said family.
Perhaps you should have educated yourself on this facet of the officer management system prior to posting your comment?
You conclusion leads me to infer that you view commissioned officers as greedy and selfish in contrast to the altruistic Warrant Officer Corps of "Technial(sic) Experts" who have forsaken all material gain for the greater good of service to country?
Allow me to be blunt: what a load of garbage. The rank on your collar and the total on your paycheck doesn't have anything to do with your patriotism. These simply reflect choices made on the best way for each individual to serve.
This "your patriotism is tied to your paycheck" crap is old. Try coming up with a real idea.
How many Warrant Officer billets were authorized and posted?
Funny thing about Warrant Officers: they don't demand more money, perquisites, or promises of assignments and promotion beyond their Peter-principle-factor.
Warrant Officers volunteer to become Subject Matter / Technial Experts in order to maximize their professional contribution to their service and their country.
Wonder who performed the MDMP COA development for this one?
So, let me get this straight:
- its a similar to a FAO program, so your options are the region--working 12+ hours a day 7 days a week--or a high level HQ with a war on--working 12+ hours a day 7 days a week.
- half the time you are going to be in either an unaccompanied position or at best adult dependents only
- there is no promotion path, or command
- you could find yourself in a dead end career pattern after five years (or a lot less, like 18 months, depending on POTUS)
I am SHOCKED, SHOCKED, I tell you, that there are not enough takers
But, perhaps the CJCS is really shocked, since he is from a service that can't spell FAO given an F and an A and filled less than half its attache billeets even in the 90s.
48J here.
Not sure what the issue is here. The Af-Pak Hands program was announced only a short while ago. It does take time to fill such billets.
Then again, part of the problem may be the the follow-on CONUS assignments. It is my understanding that a Af-Pak Hands member would, upon returning from A'stan or Pakistan, have to serve in DC, at CENTCOM, or some other joint HQ. That's enough to turn me off to AfPak Hands though initially I was quite interested in the program.
Additionally, there might be many interested parties trying to get into the program but HRC (or the personnel geeks for the other services) are dragging their heels on allowing people to volunteer in order to fill those "critical" slots we hear about (like staff weenie at 2 ID).
It has been my impression that the definition of "highest priority assignment" (like MTT/ ETT....or AfPak Hands) differs significantly between what the Chairman says and what HRC says. For example: several of us tried to extend our stay in A'stan because we enjoyed the advisor assignment but were told (by HRC) not only "no" but that we would also be redeployed early. This despite A'stan being short 2400 advisors and TTs being the "highest priority assignment".
Things that make you go.."hhmmm..."
The Army personnel system can't make a program like this appealing to anyone who hopes and works for service beyond Lieutenant Colonel. 10+ years ago OPMS created "functional areas", a "basic branch-like" structure which supplanted the Cold War combat arms, combat support, and combat service support personnel groupings with Maneuver, Fires, and Effects; Operations Support; and Force Sustainment. The FY09 Colonel Promotion Board primary zone selection rate for Operations Support (OS) Category LTCs was 42.9% with officers of Maneuver, Fires, and Effects selected at 55.2% and Force Sustainment at 54.9%. These OS promotion rates have been consistently declining each year. Service in Afghanistan and Iraq appears the biggest discriminator for Operations Support as analysis revealed officers previously serving in MTOE units have been consistently passed over for promotion to O6. Any Soldier signing up for the AF-PAK program should understand that while the CJCS and COMISAF understand its importance to our national security, promotion boards (and new bosses) don't like non-traditional career paths.