Foreign Policy Magazine of 3 December 13
featured an article “Army Investigates Itself” about the visit of Maj. Gen. Chen Dongdeng, the PLA's director
of military engagement to the US Army Combined Arms Center (CAC) at Fort Leavenworth. (See this link which is
also the photo source http://complex.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/12/03/army_investigates_china_spy_incident_that_involves_no_secrets#sthash.kWqvpMx4.mmUZiqRJ.dpuf).
The US Officer in the photo is LTG David G. Perkins, the Commander of the US
Army Combined Arms Center.
The
US Army routinely engages with other military organizations around the world.
These military to military engagements, “mil to mil” in defense parlance are
part of doing business. Of course, the nature of the exchanges, the content of
the conversations and the materials viewed, exchanged or even talked about vary
depending on the nation, timing, and the individuals.
From
a personal perspective, I found my time at SFOR HQ in Sarajevo as one of the
highlights of my military career because of the opportunity of working with
NATO officers from all over the alliance. I gained appreciation for their nation’s
military and gained a profound understanding of the common bond among most
military personnel. Consequently, I view mil to mil exchanges as generally good
thing.
Concern
was raised in the Leavenworth matter because of “the aggressive way” that the
Chinese were asking for copies of military manuals. While (according to the
article) the manuals in question were unclassified and available to the public,
the incident caused the Army to re-think about its administrative management of
this particular mil to mil exchange and perhaps others.
An
obvious question is: “if the manuals are unclassified and available – what’s
the big deal?”. Certainly handing over the manuals would save the guests the
time and bother of finding them, but there’s more to the story.
In
my experience, those whose native language doesn’t use the standard alphabet
need more time to translate English into say Arabic, Chinese, Korean or
Russian. Also I have found that Asians in particular would much rather study a
diagram to determine the nature of the subject matter and the nuances behind it
than read volumes or consume PowerPoints. Consequently, providing a manual
would be a significant time saver and foster learning.
Manuals
of course are only part of the story. The key is often the Tactics, Techniques
and Procedures (TTP) that take the doctrine and put it into practice. Knowing
the manual may actually be a handicap if the practitioner on the ground tends
to ‘wing it’ as is often the case. For example in Bosnia US 1st
Infantry Division CDR, MG David Grange was his own PSYOP Officer who created
and distributed “PSYOP” materials as he saw fit.
Of
course, these requests work two ways. By knowing which manuals were requested,
the CAC should be more aware of Chinese interests and should be able to share
the knowledge throughout the allied military establishment.
I
suspect that MISO and IO were high on the request list, but of course that
information isn’t mentioned.
In
thinking about mil to mil exchanges, it would appear that the sponsor of the
foreign military needed to have a work plan that would state the purpose of the
exchange, the benefits to the US military, the subjects to be discussed,
materials to be exchanged and of course a security risk analysis. The risk
analysis being the most important ingredients in the mix and perhaps the first
step in the approval process.
In
the case of MISO, I’m not convinced that such an exchange with the PLA is a
good idea.
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