Interagency Operations
Directives / Handbooks / Doctrine / TTP
National Security Presidential Directive 1: Organization of the National Security Council System
Presidential Decision Directive 56: Managing Complex Contingency Operations
Complex Contingency Operations Handbook
Interagency Management of Complex Crisis Operations Handbook
Generic Political-Military Plan for a Multilateral Complex Contingency Operation
JP 3-08: Interagency Coordination During Peace Operations
(Joint)
JP 3-57: Joint Doctrine for Civil-Military Operations
MCWP 3-33.1: Marine Air-Ground Task Force Civil-Military Operations
Other Interagency Related Reference Material
Lessons for the Interagency from Past Complex Contingency Operations -
Glossary of Interagency and Multinational Terms
Interagency Abbreviations and Acronyms
Areas of of Responsibilities of US Government Agencies
Issues / Concepts / Lessons / Links
The Joint Interagency Coordination Group: The Operationalization of DIME - Lieutenant Colonel Harold Van Opdorp, USMC. Small Wars Journal article, July 2005. Current United States National Security policy documents and future global trends drive the requirement to create and maintain an operational level organization to integrate the four elements of national power: diplomatic, informational, military and economic (DIME). From the policy perspective, one can trace the requirement to operationalize DIME to National Security Presidential Directive 1 (NSPD-1), released 13 March 2001 and the National Security Strategy (NSS) of the United States of America. NSPD-1 lays down the organization of the National Security Council System to accomplish this task. The national security policy infrastructure turns to the National Security Strategy of the United States for overall direction. Last published in September, 2002, the NSS describes a world where, “America is now threatened less by conquering states than we are by failing ones. We are menaced less by fleets and armies than by catastrophic technologies in the hands of the embittered few.” The desire to avoid another attack against the United States like the September 11 attacks serves as the largest catalyst for United States intervention abroad. However, the ever-present crisis related to basic humanitarian failures throughout the world will continue to lead to increased U.S. involvement globally that will require the need to integrate the elements of national power at the operational level. In the 1990s, the United States experienced a three-fold increase in the number of ‘complex emergencies’. Future trends identified in the National Intelligence Council’s 2020 Project indicate that the number of complex emergencies will continue to increase, particularly in the Sub-Saharan Africa region and significant parts of Southeast Asia. These trends lead one to believe that the United States will become more involved in regional crises around the world in the interests of its national security. Critical to the success of the United States in this regard will be its ability to operationalize the elements of its national power in order to meet its national security needs? By establishing a Joint Interagency Coordination Group focused on integrating the elements of national power at the operational level, the United States can better prepare itself for successful execution of complex emergencies and stabilization and reconstruction operations in the coming decades.
Are We Ready For an Interagency Combatant Command? - Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Naler, US Marine Corps. Joint Force Quarterly article, Issue # 41. As the United States conducts the war on terror, it is evident from experience, doctrine, and strategy that the conflict will not be resolved solely through either military strength or diplomatic maneuvering. The combination of all instruments of national power allows the United States and its allies the full spectrum of options to respond to and deter terrorist and conventional threats. Is the Nation agile enough to respond globally, short of a major theater war? The operations conducted after September 11, 2001, in the Philippines and Central and Southwest Asia prove that we can respond, but are we postured to sustain this war and, at the same time, prepare for future conflicts? This article argues that an integrated civil-military combatant command is the model for the United States to deter and defeat adversaries and engage regional partners in the 21st century. Properly structured to include interagency representation, a combatant commander’s headquarters and associated staff would provide the nucleus for interagency reorganization.
Harnessing the Interagency for Complex Operations - Neyla Arnas, Charles Barry, and Robert Oakley. National Defense University Center for Technology and National Security Policy paper, August 2005. This paper attempts to catalogue and describe the known models for interagency cooperation for stabilization and reconstruction (S&R) operations. The models in existence and under discussion can be grouped in terms of their focus on different aspects of the interagency process, as well as on different aspects of S&R. We recognize that S&R operations take place in an international arena, hence have limited the focus of this paper on models that address how the United States Government (USG) should achieve unity of effort. Defining an efficient, commonly understood model to guide USG actions is a necessary first step to coordinating S&R operations with other international, national, and non-governmental actors. This paper does not explore the various modes of providing humanitarian assistance, although those activities are almost always important elements of any operation preceding and accompanying military actions, as was seen in Afghanistan and in South Asia with tsunami relief. Humanitarian assistance employs some of the same interagency assets, including the military. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has the lead to provide humanitarian assistance and has significant resources in material and personnel on call
Aligning the Interagency Process for the War on Terrorism - Professor Bert Tussing and Dr. Kent Hughes Butts. US Army Center for Strategic Leadership Issue Paper, June 2005. Charges have been levied, from both inside and out of the United States government, that the War on Terrorism is currently encumbered by an interagency process ill-suited for the task. That process, developed for the challenges of the Cold War, is characterized by “stove pipe” operations and resourcing initiatives in an era that demands an efficient integration of efforts for results. Endeavors to address failed/failing states, reconstruction and stabilization, and other diverse efforts focused on the underlying conditions that foster terrorism appear to be disjointed, with no central authority (save the President himself) to direct them. While the National Security Council (NSC) is tasked “to advise the President with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign and military policies related to the national security,”2 critics contend that it has neither the charter nor the authority to mandate interdepartmental cooperation. As a result, parallel but separate agency concerns ripe for synergistic gains remain isolated, with no means of orchestrating limited ways and means towards the most effective set of ends in our strategies for combating terrorism.
The State Department Office of Reconstruction and Stabilization and Its Interaction With the Department of Defense - Colonel John Buss, USA. US Army Center for Strategic Leadership Issue Paper, June 2005. Over the past 15 years, the United States has been involved in seven major post-conflict reconstruction and stabilization operations.1 The ad hoc responses that characterized U.S. stabilization efforts in these missions have often proven inadequate. On each mission, our government has struggled to provide a responsive and enduring solution. The consequences have been the unnecessary loss of life, damage to infrastructure, and higher eventual costs for reconstruction and stabilization. Our unpreparedness to respond to the instability in post-war Iraq has met with sharp criticism. In response to these failings, the Bush administration established the U.S. Department of State (DOS) Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization (S/CRS). This paper will analyze the functions of S/CRS, examine the organization’s relationship with the military, and offer Department of Defense (DOD) policy recommendations to improve the interagency cooperation with this new organization.
The Nine Principles of Reconstruction and Development - Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Natsios, USAR. Parameters article, Autumn 2005. The US foreign assistance community is in the midst of the most fundamental shift in policy since the inception of the Marshall Plan at the end of World War II. The events of 11 September 2001 suddenly and unexpectedly forced the United States to confront a historic challenge equal in magnitude to the Soviet threat of the Cold War. The tragedy initiated a series of changes leading to the most extensive government reorganization since the Truman Administration created the National Security Council and the Department of Defense. No agency has undergone a greater degree of internal review and transformation than the US Agency for International Development (USAID). For better or worse, USAID is on the front lines of the dominating news stories of the day, whether engaging in reconstruction work in Afghanistan or providing tsunami relief in South Asia. This renewed prominence is not an accident. On the contrary, President George W. Bush’s Administration has made development work a national security priority; the September 2002 National Security Strategy underscores development as one of three strategic areas of emphasis (along with diplomacy and defense), and clearly states that “including all of the world’s poor in an expanding circle of development—and opportunity—is a moral imperative and one of the top priorities of US international policy." This new development climate has brought about internal recognition in the agency that it requires a more uniform and consistent set of guiding principles, and that these principles must accurately reflect how USAID approaches development from all levels—from day-to-day project operations to high-level policy decisions. Drawing on more than 40 years of institutional development experience and building on a series of recent policy strategies, including U.S. Foreign Aid: Meeting the Challenges of the Twenty-first Century and the Fragile States Strategy,2 this article presents the Nine Principles of Reconstruction and Development, comprising ownership, capacity building, sustainability, selectivity, assessment, results, partnership, flexibility, and accountability. The purpose of this article is to introduce and analyze the Nine Principles of Reconstruction and Development to the military community.
Interagency Transformation, Education and After Action Review (ITEA) - The ITEA is a federally funded program that seeks to improve coordination among the executive departments and agencies responsible for crisis planning and response. The National Defense University (NDU) has been designated by the Contingency Planning Policy Coordination Committee (CP PCC) of the National Security Council as the Lead Agent for establishing a program of education and training which addresses the need for multi-agency coordination and planning for complex crises. The educational and exercise program that formalizes this requirement is managed by the National Strategic Gaming Center, a division of the Institute for National Strategic Studies, and is based upon research and surveys of the interagency community. The ITEA program seeks to improve crisis response among agencies and departments of the US government.
In the Wake of War: Improving U.S. Post-Conflict Capabilities - Brent Scowcroft, Samuel Berger and William Nash. Council on Foreign Relations report, July 2005. Two years after the United States invaded Iraq, the turmoil there is a daily reminder that winning a war also requires winning the peace. A dramatic military victory has been overshadowed by chaos and bloodshed in the streets of Baghdad, difficulty in establishing security or providing essential services, and a deadly insurgency. The costs—human, military, economic—are high and continue to mount. For some years, foreign policy experts have debated the desirability and necessity of intervening in “internal” conflicts. In today’s world of failed states, terrorism, proliferation, and civil conflict, the trend is clear: the United States will often be drawn into complex situations when they affect its national security or its conscience. Without improved capacities and better organization, the United States will waste time, energy, and critical resources putting together ad hoc responses that may imperil military gains. This Task Force calls on the president to make improving America’s post-conflict reconstruction and stabilization capabilities a top foreign policy priority. More specific recommendations include: preparing the U.S. military to undertake post-conflict missions; putting together a coherent military and civilian interagency effort under the leadership of the National Security Council; making the State Department the lead agency for the civilian side of post-conflict reconstruction; appointing the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) as the agency responsible for managing daily operations in the field; and strengthening the capacity of the intelligence community to play a larger and more useful role in supporting stabilization efforts.
The National Security Policy Process: The National Security Council and Interagency System - Dr. Alan Whittaker, Frederick Smith and Ambassador Elizabeth McKune. National Defense University paper, 2004. This paper is about the national security decision-making process. Although decisions affecting our security have been made since the birth of this nation, the foundations of the current system were laid immediately following World War II. This paper briefly summarizes how the process has evolved since its creation under President Truman. It describes the organizational structure and defines the roles of the key departments and agencies, including that of the National Security Council staff. Readers should keep in mind that the processes described in this paper reflect, in general, the operation of the national security interagency system. However, at times, individuals and circumstances will produce idiosyncratic ways of doing business. Finally, the paper comments upon how the interagency process is incorporating new organizational structures associated with homeland defense.
Interagency Cooperation: PDD 56 and Complex Contingency Operations - Lieutenant Commander William Hamblet (USN) and Major Jerry Kline (USAF). Joint Force Quarterly, Spring 2000. Presidential Decision Directive (PDD) 56, “Managing Complex Contingency Operations,” mandates reform in the joint/interagency coordination process. It recognizes that the United States will continue to conduct complex contingency operations (CCOs). Greater coordination is required to appropriately bring all instruments of national power to bear on all such operations. Those who have served in these operations can attest to the friction and failure caused by poor planning and the lack of interagency coordination. Although PDD 56 takes a significant step toward incorporating planning mechanisms to achieve unity of effort, the program is in its infancy and in some aspects falls short of the President’s intent.
Joint Interagency Cooperation: The First Step - Colonel Matthew Bogdanos, USMCR. Joint Force Quarterly article, 2005. This article traces the development of the CENTCOM JIACG through two wars, using it as a case study to highlight the need for better and institutionalized interagency coordination at the operational level, and concludes with practical recommendations for using “every tool in our arsenal” to reduce the likelihood of future terrorist attacks.
Beyond Goldwater-Nichols - Center for Strategic & International Studies web page / portal. The Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986 addressed a huge problem that plagued our armed forces: the demonstrated inability of the military services to work effectively together as a joint team in conducting military operations. Beyond Goldwater-Nichols (BG-N) is a three-phased effort to explore the next era of defense reform. Its primary goal is to develop an integrated set of practical and actionable recommended reforms for organizing both the U.S. military and national security apparatus to meet 21st century challenges. As part of its outreach to build the case for necessary reforms, the BG-N study team serves as an honest broker among the various stakeholders, including between and among the Defense Department (DoD), the State Department, the White House, and the Congress, as well as among the various parties in DoD. In support of the project, the BG-N study team regularly convenes a wide and diverse body of largely former, deeply experienced military, defense and non-defense officials to seek their judgment on a wide range of pressing issues.
Reconstructing Iraq: Challenges and Missions for Military Forces in a Post-Conflict Scenario - Dr. Conrad Crane and Dr. W. Andrew Terrill. US Army Strategic Studies Institute monograph, January 2003. With the winds of war swirling around Iraq, it is time to plan for its post-conflict reconstruction. To assist such planning, this study proposes a construct for identifying the postwar missions to be accomplished following a victory over the Hussein regime and suggests the time phasing for the accomplishment of specific tasks. The interagency planning for Haiti, which produced a detailed list of post-crisis tasks and responsibilities well in advance of any possible combat, was an excellent approach. Still, that operation eventually failed because civilian agencies proved incapable of completing the mission once military forces left, due to inadequate resources or inflated expectations. Recent experiences In the Balkans and Afghanistan have demonstrated the potential assistance that can be provided by international and non-governmental organizations, though coordination with them can be difficult. In Iraq it will also be important to lessen military involvement as expeditiously as possible, so interagency planners must be sure that governmental, non-governmental, and international civilian organizations are ready to perform assigned tasks when required. The primary problem at the core of American deficiencies in providing post-conflict capabilities, resources, and commitment is a national aversion to nation-building. U.S. leaders must accept this mission as an essential part of our national security and better tailor and fund the military services and civilian governmental organizations to accomplish it. This will take considerable manpower and money.
Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson on the Bush Administration’s National Security Decision Making Process - Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, US Army (Ret.). Audio and video of speech given 19 October 2005 at the New America Foundation. Colonel Larry Wilkerson joined General Colin L. Powell in March 1989 at the U.S. Army’s Forces Command in Atlanta, Georgia as his Deputy Executive Officer. He followed the General to his next position as Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, serving as his special assistant. Upon Powell's retirement from active service in 1993, Colonel Wilkerson served as the Deputy Director and Director of the U.S. Marine Corps War College at Quantico, Virginia. Upon Wilkerson’s retirement from active service in 1997, he began working for General Powell in a private capacity as a consultant and advisor. In December 2000, Secretary of State-designate Powell asked Wilkerson to join him in the Transition Office at the U.S. State Department and, later, upon his confirmation as Secretary of State, Secretary Powell moved Wilkerson to his Policy Planning Staff with responsibilities for East Asia and the Pacific, and legislative and political-military affairs. In June of 2002, the Director for Policy Planning, Ambassador Richard Haass, made Wilkerson the associate director. In August of 2002, Secretary Powell moved Wilkerson to the position of Chief of Staff of the Department.
Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson on the Bush Administration’s National Security Decision Making Process - Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, US Army (Ret.). Text of speech given 19 October 2005 at the New America Foundation.
Interagency and Political-Military Dimensions of Peace Operations: Haiti - A Case Study - Dr. Margaret Daly Hays and Rear Admiral Gary Wheatley (USN, RET.). National Defense University Press book, 1996. This report is the product of a workshop organized for the National Defense University's Center for Advanced Concepts and Technology (ACT) by Dr. Margaret Daly Hayes and RAdm Gary F. Wheatley USN (Ret.) of Evidence Based Research, Inc. (EBR), supporting ACT. Dr. Richard E. Hayes of EBR chaired the meeting. The workshop was prompted by the dramatically different emphases apparent in two separate renditions of the Haiti experience_one by a civilian and one by a senior military officer. These different perspectives suggested that a comparison of interagency and civilian-military planning concerns during the buildup to Operation Uphold Democracy might provide useful insights for ACT's on-going examination of command arrangements in coalition and military Operations Other Than War (OOTW). The workshop was attended by senior officials of both civilian and military agencies. More senior civilians attended than senior military, an indication, perhaps, of the growing recognition that interagency command and control needs to be seriously addressed.
Haiti: A Case Study of the International Response and the Efficacy of Nongovernmental Agencies in the Crisis - Leslie Benton and Glenn Ware. In 1990, a military coup ousted the democratically-elected president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The United States led the international response to the coup, Operation Uphold Democracy, a multinational military intervention meant to restore the legitimate government of Haiti. The operation enjoyed widespread support on many levels: the United Nations provided the mandate, the Organization of American States (OAS) supported it, and many countries participated in the multinational force and the follow-on United Nations Mission in Haiti (UNMIH). International, regional, and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) worked with the multinational force and later the UNMIH to restore the elected government and to provide humanitarian assistance to the people of Haiti. This article focuses on the latter aspect of the international response–the delivery of humanitarian aid. It closely examines the methods of interorganization coordination, with particular attention given to the interaction among NGOs and the United States military. An examination of that relationship indicates that the infrastructure the military used to coordinate with the NGO community–the Civil Military Operations Center (CMOC)–was critical to the success of the humanitarian mission. Because both the military and the humanitarian community will probably have to work together again in humanitarian assistance operations in response to civil strife, each community must draw on the lessons of past operations to identify problems in coordination and to find solutions to those problems.
Deep Coalitions and Interagency Task Forces - Lieutenant General Martin Steele, USMC. Naval War College Press article, Winter 1999. It may even be time to review the 1947 National Security Act—the basic national security organization that served us so well during the Cold War. Although this specific proposal has had mixed reviews, nearly all agree that times have changed, that today is truly not like yesterday, and that we must take a hard look at our "organization for combat." We need to bring together all the elements of national power, looking beyond the Defense Department—to the State, Commerce, and Justice departments, to other government agencies, business, academia, and the myriad of nongovernmental and private voluntary organizations that operate globally but have complementary goals and share common values. Some are fearful of such a leap into uncharted water, but we hope that the needed debate will begin soon. Otherwise, the current strategic inflection point will be a huge missed opportunity. We are ready to explore what military professionals can do to establish "deep coalitions" applicable to solving the operational challenges of the three-block war.
Interagency Operations Centers: An Opportunity We Can't Ignore - Thomas Gibbings, Donald Hurley and Scott Moore. Parameters article, Winter 1998. This article briefly examines the US government's interagency culture, looks at how the military anticipates or reacts to civil-military operational requirements, and proposes a change to standard practices in such matters. Our proposal involves establishing a full interagency team within the headquarters of each US regional commander-in-chief. The teams eventually could be empowered to have primary responsibility for planning, coordinating, prosecuting, and sustaining US interagency responses in their regions. The goal would be to improve reaction time to such requirements and to reduce, if not eliminate, the effects of communication stovepipes that exist between civilian agencies in Washington and their members operating abroad. This is more than an exercise in communication technologies, however, for it could involve devolution of a measure of authority from Washington to the representatives of federal agencies assigned to the headquarters of the regional commanders-in-chief. It suggests a permanent cultural change within the Washington bureaucracy.
Toward a Concept of Strategic Civil Affairs - Kurt Muller. Parameters article, Winter 1998. The history of conflict is littered with examples of military success that ultimately failed to achieve political aims. In exploiting victory, political and military leaders alike have sometimes failed to recognize justice and equity as necessary components of peaceful relations among states. If our intent is to avoid war, then at the end of a conflict we must create the conditions for peace, rather than for subsequent strife. If we are to overcome strategic myopia, we must address the civil sector. During war, international law endeavors to protect the populace from excessive threats to life and property. Failure to ensure noncombatant immunity may prolong a conflict, repress a struggle until a later generation, or draw additional belligerents into a war. At a minimum, it encumbers post-conflict reconciliation. Strategic leaders, civilian and military alike, must therefore look beyond the array of opposing military forces to the relationship that should emerge among belligerents once the conflict ends. A comparison of military end-states is necessary but not sufficient to meeting political objectives. The key to any post-conflict vision of relations among states is the civil sector.
Civil-Military Marriage Counseling: Can This Union Be Saved? - Adam Siegel. Special Warfare article, December 2002. Since the early 1990s, a plethora of international interventions — from Somalia to East Timor to Afghanistan — have forced civilian and military actors to unite in what have proved to be unhappy marriages. Cross-cultural misunderstandings and tensions within these civil-military shotgun marriages have led many on both sides to long for a divorce. Unfortunately, because civil-military operations are today’s — and likely tomorrow’s — reality, the international community isn’t a no-fault state! This article focuses on the military aspect of the relationship to show several commonly held military views of civilian organizations that can undermine cooperation in the operational environment.
Defense is From Mars, State is From Venus - Authors not given. Two pillars of our national security strategy - Department of State (diplomacy), and the Department of Defense (military) - are increasingly thrust together in peacekeeping, peace enforcement, and humanitarian missions such as Bosnia, Haiti, and Somalia to develop and implement agreements or programs for achieving foreign policy goals. Although these two agencies take their direction from the President, and are not the only agencies involved in foreign policy, they are critical members of the overall team. Both were unprepared for the dramatic shift in the domestic and international landscapes following the Cold War, particularly those that occurred so quickly, and both have scrambled to define their new roles.
Center for Civil-Military Relations - US Navy Naval Postgraduate School. The CCMR site contains overviews of programs as well as student papers and studies.
Civil-Military Operations - Appendix A to draft document Small Wars 21st Century, 2004. Small Wars are distinguished from large conventional conflicts in part by the degree to which the commander considers the civil dimension of military operations. Because the political dimension remains paramount in Small Wars, MAGTF and subordinate commanders must focus on civilian considerations in and around the battlespace, instead of solely orienting on the destruction of an adversary’s military capacity. In fact, in many Small Wars, the main effort will focus on what are called Civil-Military Operations since the civilian populace may be the center of gravity.
Complex Civil Military Operations - John Gentry. Naval War College Press article, undated. The military aspects of such complex national endeavors have been labeled, somewhat inadequately, as “low-intensity conflicts” or “military operations other than war.” Such operations have significant civil-military components. That is, in these operations armed forces have objectives or employ means that directly involve local civilians and civil institutions, including governments. In such cases American military personnel typically work closely with civilian employees of other U.S. government agencies, international organizations (including foreign-aid agencies of other governments and components of the United Nations), and nongovernmental organizations. Virtually by definition, the participation of such a variety of groups makes these operations complex.
Complex Emergencies: Under New Management - Mark Walsh and Michael Harwood. Parameters article, Winter 1998. It was clear to some in the US peace operations policy community during the late 1980s and early 1990s that there were serious, recurring problems in preparing for and conducting international crisis intervention missions. In the early years, the military frequently developed its plans independently of the other government agencies involved in a crisis. When identifying tasks and the resources to perform them, the absence of links between the civilian and military components of these missions led to undesirable outcomes: neglect of civil police requirements and other law and order functions, resource imbalances between humanitarian relief initiatives and military operations, and lack of attention to human rights considerations. The uncoordinated planning produced serious differences in assumptions, concepts, policy recommendations, and plans.
National Power and the Interagency Process - George Raach and Ilana Kass. Joint Force Quarterly, Summer 1995. Inhibitions about using force can distance the military from participation in interagency decisionmaking. As a result other instruments of national power may be exhausted before serious attention is given to the unique capabilities of the Armed Forces, and then only with a deep sense of having failed in employing other means. The interagency process, especially when military planners are involved throughout, can represent a significant force multiplier, but it suffers from deficiencies in methods, actors, and structure. Military officers, accustomed to a settled and demanding system of staff work, may be frustrated by governmental mechanisms which are known for elasticity and ambivalence. But the military should remain engaged in the interagency process both to make it more effective and to ensure that the military voice is heard at the table. Officers can educate the interagency community about military capabilities and, more importantly, about the limitations of force.
Nation Building: The Inescapable Responsibility of the World's Only Superpower - James Dobbins. Rand Review article, Summer 2003. We at the Rand Corporation have compiled what we have found to be the most important lessons learned by the United States in its nation-building efforts since World War II. Not all these hard-won lessons have yet been fully applied to America's most recent nation-building efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. We define nation-building as "the use of armed force in the aftermath of a conflict to underpin an enduring transition to democracy." We have compared the levels of progress toward this goal among seven historical cases: Germany, Japan, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan. These are the most important instances in which American military power has been used in the aftermath of a conflict to underpin democratization elsewhere around the world since World War II.
The Role of the Political Advisor in Peacekeeping Operations - David Lange. Parameters article, Spring 1999. A major theme of Clausewitz's work On War was that military considerations are subordinate to the political point of view. The primacy of political influences in the conduct of war understood by Clausewitz in the 19th century equally applies to peacekeeping operations today. The negotiations that led to the cessation of hostilities in Bosnia demonstrated the truth of Clausewitz's observation. The successful application of NATO's military power created the conditions for diplomacy to achieve a political end. And as the international community works with Bosnia to build a multi-ethnic, democratic society, NATO's military presence continues to serve political goals.
Civil-Military Operations in Peace Operations: The Case of Kosovo - Thomas Mockaitis. US Army Strategic Studies Institute monograph, October 2004. The U.S. missions to Bosnia and Kosovo and the current operation in Iraq make it clear that winning wars accomplishes little if we cannot also win the peace. The strategic goals for which the wars are fought can only be achieved if the follow-on mission leaves an occupied territory more stable and democratic than before. Civil-military cooperation (CIMIC) is the key to achieving such stability. This study is based on field work in Kosovo, supported by several years of research on peace operations. Its principal value is as a historical record of where the U.S. military was with regard to CIMIC in the 1990s. Much progress has been made, though more remains to be done. The study concludes with general recommendations for all militaries engaged in humanitarian intervention and specific suggestions for improving the U.S. approach to CIMIC.
Today It’s Gold, Not Purple - Scott Moore. Joint Force Quarterly, Autumn / Winter 1998-99. Jointness—the purple paradigm—although a work in progress is outdated and insufficient. Contemporary civil-military operations require a smarter, more complementary approach to global turmoil. Terrorism, counternarcotics operations, peacekeeping missions, sub-state threats, and counterproliferation exceed the capabilities of any one Federal agency.
The RMA and the Interagency: Knowledge and Speed vs. Ignorance and Sloth? - David Tucker. Parameters article, Autumn 2000. The Joint Staff knows why interagency coordination does not occur. According to a Joint Staff memorandum, "in the past it has been extremely difficult to achieve coordinated interdepartmental planning" for two reasons: other agencies of the US government do not understand "systematic planning procedures," and each agency has its own approach to solving problems. The State Department, for example, values flexibility and its ability to respond to daily changes in a situation more than it values planning, while the CIA is reluctant to coordinate for security reasons and the former US Information Agency held Defense and the CIA at arm's length for fear that it would be seen as a mere dispenser of propaganda. If we are to have interagency coordination, the memorandum warns, "these inhibitions of other governmental agencies must in some way be overcome. Furthermore, the Joint Staff has been aware of the obstacles to interagency coordination for a long time. The memorandum just quoted was written in 1961. This long-standing concern helps explain, no doubt, the worry expressed when the military contemplates the future. A report on Army After Next (AAN) experimentation comments that "the diversity of the interagency, with each agency having its own culture, hierarchy, bias, misperceptions, and unique perspectives, makes unity of effort difficult." These problems, compounded by "low technical and procedural interoperability, and the absence of a common vision," create "formidable obstacles" to interagency coordination. Both Joint Vision 2010 and Joint Vision 2020 make similar points about the interagency process, leading to a similar conclusion: interagency coordination is hard to achieve.
Interaction Between Military and Civilian Assistance Providers in Afghanistan, September 2001-June 2002 - Randy study, 2004. Description and evaluation of relief, reconstruction, humanitarian, and humanitarian-type aid efforts in Afghanistan during the most intense phase of military operations, from September 2001 to June 2002. The efforts were generally successful, but there were serious coordination problems among the various civilian and military aid providers. Critical issues, both positive and negative, are identified, and a list of recommendations is provided for policymakers, implementers, and aid providers, based on lessons learned.
U.S. State Department and U.S. Marine Corps: Partners for the 21st Century - J. Noel Williams. US Marine Corps Center for Emerging Threats and Opportunities paper. This paper explores how, through the judicious use of U.S. embassies, the United States Marine Corps, in cooperation with the U.S. State Department, can improve and expand cultural awareness, increase situational awareness for the national command authorities through improved intelligence collection, and provide an information infrastructure to facilitate a seamless communications architecture for the introduction of U.S. forces ranging from evacuation of noncombatants, to humanitarian operations, to full scale military intervention by a joint task force.
What Went Wrong in Iraq - Larry Diamond. Foreign Affairs article. With the transfer of power to a new interim Iraqi government on June 28, the political phase of U.S. occupation came to an abrupt end. The transfer marked an urgently needed, and in some ways hopeful, new departure for Iraq. But it did not erase, or even much ease at first, the most pressing problems confronting that beleaguered country: endemic violence, a shattered state, a nonfunctioning economy, and a decimated society. Some of these problems may have been inevitable consequences of the war to topple Saddam Hussein. But Iraq today falls far short of what the Bush administration promised. As a result of a long chain of U.S. miscalculations, the coalition occupation has left Iraq in far worse shape than it need have and has diminished the long-term prospects of democracy there. Iraqis, Americans, and other foreigners continue to be killed. What went wrong?
The Civil Military Operations Center in Operation Uphold Democracy (Haiti) - Major Aaron Wilkins, USAF. US AIr Force Air Command and Staff College research paper, March 1997. In a relatively short period of time, the Civil Military Operations Center (CMOC) has grown in prominence and is now regarded in joint doctrine as the synergistic bridge which focuses the efforts of military and civilian organizations toward achieving a common unity of effort. Through the lessons learned and oral testimonies compiled by various joint staff, unified command, and US Army organizations, I was astounded to learn just how far we’ve come in so short a time, not only in formalizing the CMOC concept into doctrine, but also in developing an interagency planning process as a result of the planning shortcomings and lessons learned from some of the major military operations this decade. In hindsight, the CMOC was very effective during Operation Uphold Democracy in Haiti.
CORDS / Phoenix: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Vietnam for the Future - Mr. Dale Andrade and Lieutenant Colonel James Willbanks, US Army. Military Review article, March - April 2006. As the United States ends its third year of war in Iraq, the military continues to search for ways to deal with an insurgency that shows no sign of waning. the specter of Vietnam looms large, and the media has been filled with comparisons between the current situation and the “quagmire” of the Vietnam War. Differences between the two conflicts are legion, but observers can learn lessons from the Vietnam experience—if they are judicious in their search. For better or worse, Vietnam is the most prominent historical example of American counterinsurgency (COIN) - and the longest - so it would be a mistake to reject it because of its admittedly complex and controversial nature. An examination of the pacification effort in Vietnam and the evolution of the Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS) program provides useful insights into the imperatives of a viable COIN program.
Revisiting CORDS: The Need for Unity of Effort to Secure Victory - Major Ross Coffey, US Army. Military Review article, March - April 2006. According to the National Strategy, weekly strategy sessions at the highest levels of the U.S. Government ensure that Iraq remains a top priority. At the operational level, the “team in Baghdad—led by Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and General George Casey—works to implement policy on the ground and lay the foundation for long-term success.” Each of the eight pillars have corresponding interagency working groups to coordinate policy, review and assess progress, develop new proposals, and oversee the implementation of existing policies. The multitracked approach (political, security, and economic) to counterinsurgency in Iraq has historical parallels with the Civil operations and Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS) program of the Vietnam War era. established in 1967, CORDS partnered civilian and military entities engaged in pacification of Vietnamese rural areas. The program enhanced rural security and local political and economic development and helped defeat the Viet Cong (VC) insurgency. Significantly, CORDS unified the efforts of the pacification entities by establishing unity of command throughout the combined civil-military organization. Lack of unity of effort is perhaps the most significant impediment to operational-level interagency action today. The victorious conditions the National Strategy describes might be unachievable if the interagency entities present in Iraq do not achieve unity of effort. To help achieve unity of effort, Multi-Force–Iraq (MNF-I) and the nation should consider adopting a CORDS-like approach to ensure integrated action and victory.
The Minimize-Maximize Continuum and the Civil Military Operations Mission - Adam Siegel. Special Warfare article, Summer 2000. This article attempts to explain the dynamic nature of civil-military interactions and to plot them on a “minimize-maximize” continuum. The placement of interactions along the continuum will depend upon the type of operation and the circumstances of location and time. To help readers understand the minimize- maximize concept, we examine “pure” combat operations (in Clausewitzian terms) and, at the opposite end of the spectrum, we will examine humanitarian assistance operations and disaster-relief operations. Next, we will turn to more complex situations that military forces might encounter during peace operations (such as Operation Uphold Democracy in Haiti or Operation Joint Endeavor in Bosnia) or during complex humanitarian emergencies (such as Operation Restore Hope in Somalia or Operation Provide Comfort in Northern Iraq).
Humanitarian Knowledge Management - Dennis King, US State Department. Conference proceedings, April 2005. International complex humanitarian emergencies present numerous challenges to aid organizations trying to manage data, information and knowledge about any given situation or event. Humanitarian aid organizations should be able to identify what critical information they need, where to find it, what are the major gaps, and how best to share, present and disseminate this information. These challenges can be addressed through improved knowledge management. The faster and more efficiently humanitarian aid organizations are able to identify, collect, distill, analyze and manage the vast corpus of what they need to know, the more effectively they can plan for and respond to natural disasters and complex emergencies and the more lives are potentially saved.
Intelligence Challenges of Civil-Military Operations - Adam Siegel. Military Review article, September / October 2001. The international community has intervened many times in recent years amidst complex emergencies deriving from some form of armed conflict. In these operations, military commanders have discovered numerous obstacles and requirements different from what they might have expected in a “traditional” war-fighting operation. The arenas of information, assessment and intelligence present some of the greatest changes. This article examines some of these changes, with a particular emphasis collecting information on and analyzing changes in the civil sector as part of the military operation. The article suggests some command and control developments to deal with the information, analysis, and intelligence challenges that a military commander will encounter in a complex emergency.
US Military Interaction with Humanitarian Assistance Organizations During Small-Scale Contingencies - Major David Hinson, USAF. US Air Force Air Command and Staff College thesis, 1998. How effectively does the U.S. military interact with humanitarian assistance organizations and what avenues exist for improving these relationships? During recent military operations other than war (MOOTW), now known as small-scale contingencies (SSC), the U.S. military has worked with numerous humanitarian assistance (HA) organizations such as nongovernmental organizations (NGO), private voluntary organizations (PVO), and international governmental organizations (IGO) like the United Nations. These organizations are often on site and actively working prior to the military’s arrival within the region. As a result, there are many ways that HA groups and the military can assist or complement the efforts of each other. Many experts predict that these types of SSC efforts will increase in the foreseeable future. Assuming this is the case, increased and improved interaction between military and HA organizations will become imperative. This paper is the result of a literature review conducted to examine recent U.S. military interaction with HA organizations in regional conflicts such as northern Iraq, Haiti, and Bosnia. The primary sources include periodicals, books, government and private reports, doctrine and online sources in the 1990s. It also draws on the author’s personal experience supporting HA efforts in northern Iraq as a member of Operation Provide Comfort.
Inclusion of Non-Governmental Organizations in Interagency Training, Education, and After Action Review Program - ITEA Analysis and Recommendations paper. Humanitarian and peace operations require resources that often extend beyond the capabilities of the USG. There are many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that focus on disaster relief and humanitarian assistance as their primary mission. Furthermore, these NGOs are often operating in trouble areas prior to the USG and remain after the USG departs, to assist with recovery and sustainable development. In formulating its response, the interagency community must account for the certain presence of NGOs. Similarly, a program of interagency training and education for complex contingencies should not ignore the role of NGOs. In order to represent real world conditions, a comprehensive system of interagency education needs to incorporate NGO needs and capabilities.
Humanitarian and Peace Operations: NGOs and the Military in the Interagency Process - Lisa Davidson, Margret Hayes and James Landon. National Defense University report, December 1996. This report documents the latest in a series of workshops and roundtables organized by the National Defense University's Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS) Directorate for Advanced Concepts, Technologies, and Information Strategies (ACTIS). These meetings bring together operators, planners, researchers, and analysts to identify and examine selected aspects of command and control in contemporary Military Coalition Operations and Operations Other Than War (OOTW) and to advance the process of developing one or more Mission Capability Packages (MCPs) to support combined and coalition operations.
Links for Further Research:
Interagency Transformation, Education & AAR (National Defense University)
Agency for International Development (US Department of State)
Center for Democracy & Governance (USAID)
Office of Reconstruction and Stabilization (US Department of State)
Humanitarian Information Unit (US Department of State)
Center for Disease Control and Prevention (US Department of Health and Human Resources)
Congressional Research Service
Federal Bureau of Investigation
