Word of the Day - Kinetics

June 22

One of the most interesting aspects of working in a mixed civilian and military (aka CivMil) environment is exploring the stereotypes that exist about each group, and how accurate or inaccurate they are. Among the most enjoyable and positive aspects of the training has been the chance to better understand what these preconceptions are, and make some tiny inroads on bridging what can be a yawning gap.

Broadly speaking, civilians, who are assumed to all work for the Department of State (though we have terrific folks from USAID, Dept of Agriculture, DHS, DEA and others doing great work overseas) are presumed to be long on education, short on common sense, and prone to giving extended erudite discourses permeated with polysyllabic terminology, but lacking clear purpose or goals.  Our military brethren are categorized as rigid drones who take a linear approach to even the most complex issues, addressing the ambiguity and uncertainties not with cogent analysis and reflection but with additional PowerPoint slides.

Acronym of the day - KLE

June 20

Today was a “crawling” day, meaning our instructors pushed, pulled coaxed and carried us through the exercise to help us get accustomed to the “battle rhythm” of the exercise.  The planning for the KLE took hours – covering the priority topics of engagement, mission objectives, contingency planning, logistics, movements, staging , and more.  We had  KLE with tribal elders (mostly Afghan Americans recruited to play the part) – who greeted us warmly, served us tea, then proceeded to lay into us with a litany of grievances, both real and otherwise, involving civilian casualties caused by a NATO airstrike, and an apparently endless list of demands/requests for development projects and other assistance.  Then things went south as tribal tensions were laid bare, accusations flew and voices went up.  I was deeply disappointed my Dari is so rudimentary that I couldn’t follow the conversation and pick up what clearly pass for four letter words in that context.  Luckily our SecFor (security forces) aka our military escort refrained from  intervening to pull us out Navy Seal style, which they are clearly dying to do (and which I suspect I will be tempted to indulge them with). Once the theatrics were complete we were on hugging terms and looking forward to working together.  If these cats are half as authentic as they look and sound I’m going to really enjoy the genuine warmth and hospitality that radiates from them. 

(KLE = Key Leader Engagement – or for old fashioned folks like myself "meeting")

Happy Fathers Day

June 19, 2011

Highlights - Today was a an atypical, but enjoyable way to celebrate fathers day.  True to stereotype our military hosts begin the day early and have things carefully planned out.... 

With helmets to cushion the fall I didn’t mind being turned 180 degrees and told to scramble out.  The dropkick from a colleague who didn’t look to be having fun falling on his head could have been painful if not for the recently acquired IBA (individual body armor).  It’s heavy, its hot, but his steel toed boot bounced off it.  I’m thinking it would might make a nice comforter.   Anyhow – I was relieved that it wasn’t too hard to “egress” since an MRAP, sticky seatbelt and water are a lethal combination (happened recently in theater) – and that leaves out the issue of locking the door from the outside.

As a bonus for survival we got a chance to familiarize ourselves with a beretta.  I was feeling pretty cool that I knew how to shoot a pistol having honed my skills as a teenager who spent untold hours shooting at squirrels with a pellet pistol (and never actually hitting one).  We were set up in a big warehouse on a virtual range which is basically like those terrorist-in-training games at the arcade that “responsible fathers” don’t let the kids try out, but which leaves our Y chromosome aching to blast a hole in something, preferably an innocent bystander.

MRAP rollover training video