"Let's be clear that North Korea's "willingness for talks" doesn't mean an openness towards good-faith negotiation, but rather a discussion of the terms of US capitulation to a new status quo defined by Pyongyang's priorities and prerogatives."
- Edward Oh
"It is always dangerous for soldiers, sailors or airmen to play at politics. They enter a sphere in which values are quite different from those to which they have hitherto been accustomed" - Winston Churchill
1. Douglas Lute, Former Afghan War Czar, On Report About What Americans Knew About War
2. The U.S. Special Operations Forces will soon be able to see through walls
3. World trade without rules? US shuts down WTO appeals court
4. War Books: Major General Mick Ryan's 2020 Reading List
5. Why the U.S. Needs to Keep Training Foreign Militaries
6. Military medical malpractice victims could see payouts from Defense Department under new compromise
7. How the Pentagon will experiment with 5G
8. More retirees, family members to be booted from military hospitals under Pentagon reform plans
9. Unwelcome on Campus: National Security, Public Service, and the Misguided Effort to Block the CIA's University Recruitment
1. Douglas Lute, Former Afghan War Czar, On Report About What Americans Knew About War
NPR's Audie Cornish talks with Douglas Lute, former Afghan War czar for the Bush and Obama administrations, about a Washington Post report, which claims the public wasn't told the truth about the war effort.
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
We didn't have the foggiest notion of what we were undertaking. That was what Douglas Lute, the Afghan war czar during the Bush and Obama administrations, told the U.S. government. Lute's job, once described by Vice President Cheney, was to...
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY: In effect, sort of ride roughshod, if necessary, over the bureaucracy to make sure we get the job done.
CORNISH: But behind the scenes, the U.S. struggled with military strategy, goals and spending. And today, The Washington Post published the transcripts of interviews of hundreds of key players taken by the special inspector general for Afghanistan Reconstruction that revealed those concerns, including one with Douglas Lute. He joins us now.
Welcome to the program.
DOUGLAS LUTE: It's good to be with you.
CORNISH: So your contributions essentially lead this story. You told an interviewer at this inspector general's office - known as SIGAR - that you, quote, "bumped into an even more fundamental lack of knowledge that the U.S. was devoid of fundamental understanding of Afghanistan, that we didn't know what we were doing." Can you talk about when you bumped in to that lack of knowledge, at what point in the gig?
LUTE: Well, I appreciate, first of all, and your listeners will appreciate that that's a pretty stark, blunt statement. And it was made in the context of a off-the-record private interview inside the government in an honest attempt to be introspective. That is a government effort to look at the government and how we were doing in Afghanistan. So forgive my bluntness. But the fundamental point remains. My experience is, over a period of 10-plus years watching and working on Afghanistan closely, that we failed to accumulate a deep understanding and expertise about Afghanistan that would then empower our strategy making.
CORNISH: I want to jump in here because there's another thing that came up. One army colonel said, quote, every "data point was altered to present the best picture possible." Quote, "surveys, for instance, were totally unreliable, but reinforced that everything we were doing was right, and we became a self-licking ice cream cone." As you said, these are candid assessments. Were you aware of or party to any effort to use data to mislead the public about the state of U.S. progress in Afghanistan?
LUTE: No. My experience with regard to collection of data and reporting on progress or lack of progress in Afghanistan is an experience of candor, of bluntness and speaking truth to our senior leaders.
CORNISH: Then why would a colonel who is, again, speaking to an inspector general's office say this, say look, like, most of the data we presented was manipulated or at least was not presented in a fair way to give people a true assessment of what was going on, especially as you're face of the war - right? - for the White House?
LUTE: Well, Audie, I'd think you'd have to ask that individual, but I'm not familiar with - and I didn't - I'm not party to any attempt to obscure or hide the lessons or deceive anyone, but rather to take a hard, long look, persistent look at what was going well and what wasn't.
CORNISH: Because you have John Sopko, the head of the federal agency that conducted the interviews, acknowledging to the Post - because the Post got these documents by filing a FOIA - right? - they weren't really volunteered.
LUTE: That's right.
CORNISH: He says, quote, "the American people have constantly been lied to." Do you agree with that assessment?
LUTE: No, I don't agree with that assessment. I think that every approach that I know of to communicate progress in Afghanistan by senior American political officials and military officials has always been couched as, on the one hand, we're making progress, but on the other hand, the challenges are severe. So I've always seen, especially if you look back at the statements by President Bush and President Obama, this sort of balance between optimism and skepticism or optimism and realism.
CORNISH: Just a few seconds left - you were in a position of power during two administrations. Looking back, what more could you have done to raise alarms?
LUTE: So there are two things in particular that I carry away as personal lessons. One was that we tended to over-rely on military tools, on the military means, and we, thereby, counter - discounted political, economic and diplomatic tools. And then second of all, we didn't stay on the job long enough to build continuity and, in turn, expertise to understand a problem as complex as Afghanistan.
CORNISH: That's Douglas Lute, former Afghan war czar for the Bush and Obama administrations. He's now a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School.
Thank you for your time.
LUTE: Thank you.
2. The U.S. Special Operations Forces will soon be able to see through walls
Playing games and dealing with the villains and vampires popping out from behind walls and bookcases is the theme for horror movies, but for U.S. special operation forces, hidden compartments are not entertainment. In the world of special forces, they are representing obstacles to a successful mission. The mission objective is to capture bad guys or seize documents and weapons. And on a house raid in hostile territory, there isn't a lot of time to go tapping on walls to find a hidden stash.
That's why U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) works on a detector that can quickly spot where the loot is hidden. The goal of
the research project is to develop a handheld device that can detect hidden chambers in an average-sized room (168 square feet) and at a range of about 6.5 feet during sensitive site exploitation, or SSE, operations.
The sensor should be able to penetrate to a depth of 2 feet and have enough battery power to run for forty to fifty minutes. However, while it needs to detect hidden spaces, it doesn't need to scan the contents inside.
"It doesn't have to 'see' through a metal surface/container; the presence of a metal chamber in a wall would be a suspicious indication," SOCOM says.
Sensors that detect the presence of humans, such as infrared, acoustic or radar, already exist or are being developed. But current technology is either too bulky or too complicated, according to the SOCOM. But developing a handy device poses technical challenges. SOCOM indicates that the sensor must be able to differentiate between normal spaces in a wall, such as a gap within studs, and hidden compartments. It also must be able to function with a variety of building materials, including brick, cinder block, concrete, wood, and sheetrock. "The system should be able to distinguish suspicious hidden cinder block openings vs normal cinder block voids in normal wall construction," SOCOM adds.
And the device has to be easy to use and reliable.
"For the operator to be willing to carry/operate an additional system, along with all of his other equipment, the system performance needs to be high; a system with low detection rates or high false detection rates will be left behind," SOCOM points out.
SOCOM suggests that cutting-edge technologies such as modern radio frequency transmit/receive modules, advanced computer vision algorithms and modern computer processors may enable a solution to be found. The research proposal did contain links to a Wikipedia entry on the ground-penetrating radar, and a Florida company called Ground Hound Detection Services that detect the presence of underground utilities before construction begins in an area.
3. World trade without rules? US shuts down WTO appeals court
to the tune from REM: "it's the end of the world (trade organization) as we know it."
World trade without rules? US shuts down WTO appeals court
AP · by JAMEY KEATEN and PAUL WISEMAN · December 9, 2019
GENEVA (AP) - Global commerce will lose its ultimate umpire Tuesday, leaving countries unable to reach a final resolution of disputes at the World Trade Organization and instead facing what critics call "the law of the jungle.''
The United States, under a president who favors a go-it-alone approach to economics and diplomacy, appears to prefer it that way.
The terms of two of the last three judges on the WTO's appellate body neared their end at midnight Tuesday. Their departure will deprive the de facto Supreme Court of world trade of its ability to issue rulings.
Among the disputes left in limbo are seven cases that have been brought against Trump's decision last year to declare foreign steel and aluminum a threat to U.S. national security and to hit them with import taxes.
The WTO's lower court - its dispute settlement body - can hear cases. But its decisions will go nowhere if the loser appeals to a higher court that is no longer functioning.
Without having to worry about rebukes from the WTO, countries could use tariffs and other sanctions to limit imports. Such rising protectionism could create uncertainty and discourage trade.
"We are in a crisis moment for our global trading system,'' said U.S. Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-Fla, who sits on the House Ways and Means subcommittee on trade. "As of tomorrow, the court will cease to exist.''
The loss of a global trade court of final appeals, Murphy said, is "really dangerous for American businesses.''
The panel is supposed to have seven judges. But their ranks have dwindled because the United States - under Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Trump - has blocked new appointments to protest the way the WTO does business.
Trump and his top trade negotiator, Robert Lighthizer, are especially vociferous critics of the WTO. They argue that the trade organization constrains America's ability to counter unfair trading practices by China and other countries.
Even other countries have complained about the WTO's system for settling trade disputes. Critics say that cases take too long to resolve, that the panel often overreaches in its rulings and that the Geneva-based agency is ill-equipped to deal with the challenge posed by the Chinese economy's unconventional blend of capitalism and state control.
Getting the WTO to reform is difficult because it requires consensus from its 164 member countries. Trump is willing to use America's economic and political clout to shake things up in a way that smaller countries couldn't.
"Where the United States is completely alone is the approach they've taken, (which) is to say: 'We're just going to blow this thing up,' " said Bernard Hoekman, an economist at the European University Institute.
The impending shutdown was met with dismay by several WTO member countries.
Zhang Xiangchen, China's ambassador to the WTO, said in a statement that he was marking the occasion by wearing the black tie his wife had given him for funerals. Letting the "lights go out'' at the appellate body, at least temporarily, Zhang said, is delivering what is "no doubt the most severe blow to the multilateral trading system since its establishment.''
The EU's WTO ambassador, Joao Aguiar Machado, said in a statement, "The very idea of a rules based multilateral trading system is at stake." The EU, he said, "will not support, and will not condone, a system slipping into power-based economic relationships.''
The EU and other countries have been working to set up an ersatz appellate body - including some former members of the existing appeals panel - to arbitrate future trade disputes. But that's just a stopgap. And it is uncertain how many countries might join in.
The WTO was set up in 1995 to write and regulate the rules of global trade. Earlier, countries had complained that the United States was using its clout as the world's No. 1 economy to unilaterally impose trade sanctions and to strong-arm other countries into limiting exports to America. (During the Reagan administration, Lighthizer was involved in arranging such "voluntary export restraints.'')
For its part, the United States wanted more access to foreign markets.
The WTO's dispute settlement process, including the Appellate Body, was meant to establish that written rules, not arbitrary power, governed global trade.
But the process has proved cumbersome. The appellate panel is notorious for missing deadlines, a problem that worsened as it lost judges. It is supposed to rule within 90 days but last year needed an average of 395 days to issue decisions.
Since 1995, 592 cases have been brought to the WTO (124 by the United States, the No. 1 complainant); the appellate body has issued 120 rulings, covering 162 of those cases. Most of the rest were dropped or resolved outside the WTO process.
Still, a former WTO appellate judge, Peter Van den Bossche, now a professor at Switzerland's University of Bern, last week called the WTO's dispute settlement process "a glorious experiment with the rule of law in international relations.''
Its shutdown, he said, would leave countries and companies contending with "the law of the jungle ... the law of the strongest ... and that will hurt us all.''
___
Paul Wiseman reported from Washington.
4. War Books: Major General Mick Ryan's 2020 Reading List
War Books: Major General Mick Ryan's 2020 Reading List - Modern War Institute
Editor's note: For the past two years, Maj. Gen. Mick Ryan has compiled a reading list for professional development that the Modern War Institute has published. Each of these has been widely read, and we're thrilled to present the newest installment of his list. Many readers will be familiar with Maj. Gen. Ryan from social media, and for any who are not, be sure to follow @WarInTheFuture on Twitter-one of the best resources available for professional development.
Welcome once again to my annual reading list (previous editions are
here and
here). There are some "carry over" resources and classics, but many new ones as well.
Reading is an indispensable element of membership in the
profession of arms, and indeed for all national security practitioners. It provokes us to think outside of the day-to-day duties that often absorb us. It allows us to develop an understanding of the larger context of our profession-national policy, strategic cultures, military strategy, and societal issues-which impacts on the training for, and conduct of, military operations and wider national security affairs. Reading also provides the practitioner with an excellent opportunity for vicarious learning, through studying the "breadth and depth" of our profession.
This single-page list of readings and other PME (professional military education) resources is not designed as a comprehensive reading program. It is, however, a small collection of resources for those who wish to begin (or re-engage in) their voyage of exploration in the many tenets of our profession. And it is not just books. It is a wider range of other resources that allows the military professional to connect into a global discourse on professional education and development. This permits us to reach out to fellow travelers seeking enlightenment about the profession of arms and national security issues.
I have again included several science-fiction novels that feature themes that are relevant to the military. I have
written previously about why military officers should read sci-fi, and have collaborated with Nate Finney on two
sci-fireading lists. Given the small number of sci-fi books I included, this might be the most controversial aspect of this list-there is no
Starship Troopers or
Enders Game. I don't think these are bad novels. From my perspective, I just find the
Old Man's War series,
The Forever War and the recent
Murderbot series by Martha Wells more relevant, enjoyable, and interesting. And they have been useful for students in our
Perry Group elective at the
Australian War College.
This year, I have included just one film on my list. I will admit some bias in its selection.
Danger Close is an Australian film released in 2019 about the
Battle of Long Tan during the Vietnam War. The battalion involved, the 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (
6RAR) is one I served with in East Timor in 2000, and whose soldiers served with my task force in Afghanistan in 2006-2007. It is a terrific film about leadership and battlefield ambiguity, the nature of service, and the last full measure of devotion.
Senior members of the military, as stewards of our profession, must provide the leadership, direction, and incentives that nurture the follow-on generations of military leaders. I trust that this list goes part way to fulfilling this duty, and that it is useful for individuals in their self-study and
unit-based PME programs. I hope too that it provides a good
line of departure for those who wish to
re-energize their reading and professional study habits. I look forward to hearing what everyone thinks.
Books
Classics:
Strassler, R. (ed),
The Landmark Thucydides Sun Tzu,
The Art of War Von Clausewitz, C.
On War
The Profession of Arms:
Brown & Leonard (eds),
Why We Write Huntington, S.,
The Soldier and the State Hackett, J.,
The Profession of Arms Finney & Mayfield (eds),
Redefining the Modern Military Murray & Mansoor,
The Culture of Military Organizations White, C.E.,
The Enlightened Soldier
Learning from Military History:
Fox, A.,
Learning to Fight Fredrick, J.,
Black Hearts Heuser, B.,
The Evolution of Strategy McCrae, M.,
Coalition Strategy and the End of WW1 Brands & Edel,
The Lessons of Tragedy Murray & Millet,
Military Innovation in Inter War Period Slim, W.,
Defeat into Victory Wohlstetter, R.,
Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision Yoshikawa, E.,
Musashi
Contemporary Issues:
Bricker, D.,
Empty Planet King, A.,
Command Krepps, S.,
Taxing Wars Qiao & Wang,
Unrestricted Warfare Shanks Kaurin, P.,
On Obedience Singer, P. and Brooking, E.,
Like War Cheung, Tai Ming,
Forging China's Military Might White, H.,
How to Defend Australia
The Future:
Gray, C.,
The Future of Strategy Harari, Y.N.,
21 Lessons for the 21st Century Payne, K.,
Strategy, Evolution and War: From Apes to AI Russell, S.,
Human Compatible: AI & the Problem of Control
Military Fiction and Sci-Fi:
Haldeman, J.,
The Forever War Scalzi, J.,
Old Man's War (series)
Wells, M.,
All Systems Red (series)
Mick Ryan is an Australian Army officer. A graduate of Johns Hopkins University and the USMC Staff College and School of Advanced Warfare, he is a passionate advocate of professional education and lifelong learning. He is a science fiction fan, a cricket tragic, and an aspiring (but very average) writer. In January 2018, he assumed command of the Australian Defence College in Canberra, Australia.
5. Why the U.S. Needs to Keep Training Foreign Militaries
I concur. We should not overreact to this tragic incident. If it was a terrorist incident the intent may be for us to overreact and shut down foreign military training. I have personally benefited from IMET and the relationships developed in US military schools with foreign officers. In one instance a classmate of mine was instrumental in support US operations 16 years and then again 21 and 22 years after we were in school together. And there are many other instances of linking up with foreign classmates in their home countries and those relationships facilitated military operations in support of US national interests.
Why the U.S. Needs to Keep Training Foreign Militaries
As the U.S. Navy reels in the wake of a horrific shooting at an
iconic naval base in Pensacola, Florida - the heart of naval aviation - many voices are asking why we do have foreign militaries training here in the United States. In particular, this shooting, conducted by a Saudi Arabian Air Force 2nd lieutenant, has echoes of 9/11 when 15 of the 19 attackers were Saudi Arabian nationals. Why was this Saudi air force lieutenant here? And what should we be doing to improve the process of vetting and monitoring these foreign students in the heart of our national security structure?
There are a series of vital reasons why we have well over 5,000 officers and enlisted troops in the U.S. from over 150 countries on any given day, which range from facilitating foreign military sales to cultural engagement to building coalitions.
When I was a young junior officer in the Navy in the mid-1970s, I was sent to a missile school in Great Lakes, Michigan. Alongside my class of about 15 officers and enlisted was a similarly sized class of Iranian naval students. At the time, we were allies with the Iranians under the Shah of Iran and they had purchased four advanced guided missile destroyers and the Iranians were there to learn how to operate them. That class of Iranians were anything but religious in character - they were often seen closing the bar in the officer's club and always ran up the biggest tabs there.
Over the course of several months, I got to know several of them very well and learned a great deal from them about Iran itself. As my long career unspooled, of course, Iran went from a U.S. ally to an implacable foe. But what I learned from those students about Iran - its imperial dreams, its sense of historical entitlement throughout the larger Middle East, their version of Shi'a Islam, its economy, and how its military operated - has been hugely important for me. This kind of cultural integration pays big dividends for the US military over time - when we learn about other militaries in the relatively relaxed framework of training, we often learn a great deal.
Another key reason is quite simple: to encourage other nations to buy U.S. technology, from high performance jets to air defense missiles to warships and tanks. While the US operates with a strict set of oversight rules guiding what technology can be transferred and to whom, most nations want US defense technology and many of the sales come with appropriate training. This is valuable not only for the obvious economic benefits, but also for interoperability between allies, partners and friends. When a majority of NATO members, for example, purchase communication systems from us, it makes alliance command and control far easier. Likewise if many of our partners operate U.S. aircraft like the F-16 or the new Joint Strike Fighter, the F-35, our common air defense is vastly better.
Finally, the personal connections that ensure are occasionally profound. To give two examples, when I was a mid-grade officer I attended the premier military institution, the U.S. National War College at Fort McNair. Through that connection, I met mid-grade officers in the Polish and Israeli militaries. One was later the Chief of the Polish defense forces, General Franciszek Gagor. When I was Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, that connection was pure gold. The other was a tall Israeli paratrooper who looked a lot like Clint Eastwood. His name was Benny Gantz, and he went on to be the head of the Israeli armed forces and now is possibly
the next prime minister of Israel. He remains a close friend today. Even in this world of high-speed communications, social networks, and teleconferences, personal contact still trumps everything.
One question in the aftermath of the Pensacola shooting is obvious: vetting. There will be a thorough investigation, and the key finding will almost certainly be an analysis of where the system failed to vet the shooter, as well as those who had any knowledge of his intent before the incident. We'll have to wait for those results, but knowing the military well, I believe there will be an even tighter set of standards applied - from deeper social network investigation, to increased records analysis in the home country, to increased law enforcement cooperation on both the civilian and military side.
It is worth noting the instinctive and instantaneous acceptance of the
Saudi king's reaction to the shooting by President Trump. Given his extreme skepticism about pronouncements from other allies (including most recently at the NATO summit), it is odd that Trump is so quick to support the Saudis, especially given the circumstances here. The President should take a more measured approach in assessing the incident until FBI and other investigations into possible terrorism connections run their course.
Will things always go smoothly with foreign military students? Of course not and Pensacola is only one example - we have seen drunk driving incidents, fatal collisions, desertions, sexual encounters, and many other occasional failures. But the overwhelming number of encounters produce real cultural learning, promote technological integration with allies and occasionally create a personal relationship that pays dividends over long decades of service - a pretty good return on investment.
The move would not overturn the controversial legal precedent known as the
Feres Doctrine, a 1950s Supreme Court decision cited repeatedly by lower courts to block troops from seeking damages for war-related injuries or on-duty accidents.
But the provision, expected to become law when the authorization bill is adopted by both chambers in coming days, would for the first time attempt to redress what outside advocates have labeled a grave injustice for suffering military families.
Legislation to overturn a ban on troops suing the military for medical malpractice still faces long odds.
By: Leo Shane III
In the legislation, lawmakers noted that although the move "does not change or repeal the Feres doctrine, it authorizes the Secretary of Defense to allow, settle, and pay an administrative claim against the United States for personal injury or death ... that was the result of medical malpractice caused by a Department of Defense health care provider."
Defense Department officials have long resisted any change in the Feres Doctrine standard, arguing that on-duty military deaths are already compensated through military death gratuities. Allowing families to sue for extra damages, they argued, would create a different value system for different service members' deaths.
They also expressed concerns that any change could allow frivolous lawsuits or legal second-guessing of some battlefield decisions.
But House lawmakers had included a full Feres repeal in their draft of the legislation earlier this summer. Senate lawmakers opposed the idea, and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., had refused to waive his committee's jurisdiction on the issue to allow it in the final compromise bill.
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Instead, the legislation now includes the new military claims settlement process. Most claims would be limited to under $100,000, although the secretary could authorize larger payouts in some circumstances.
All claims would have to be filed within two years of the incident, and payouts would not cover the costs of attorney's fees or future loss of income.
Justice Clarence Thomas blasted the decision as a mistake by the courts that deprives service members of justice.
By: Leo Shane III
Exactly how the secretary would determine which claims would be grants remains unclear. The legislation does specify that any claim awarded "is not allowed to be settled and paid under any other provision of law."
Defense officials will also provide annual reports to Congress on the payouts for the next five years.
House lawmakers are expected to vote on the $738 billion defense authorization bill measure on Wednesday, and the Senate early next week. The legislation has passed Congress for each of the last 58 years.
The Pentagon announced the four bases in late October where it plans to roll out initial testing around 5G high-speed, high-bandwidth networking protocols. Now, military leaders have begun to describe in greater detail the types of experimentation they have in mind, and what they hope to achieve.
"5G offers high speeds, quicker response times and it can handle many more wireless devices than 4G technology. Ultimately, 5G will provide ubiquitous connectivity for people and devices," said Joseph Evans, technical director for 5G in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering.
Evans described the specific plans for testing 5G capabilities at the four initial installations. At Joint Base Lewis-McChord, planners will be look at ways in which 5G can support augmented reality and virtual reality. At Hill Air Force Base, they'll be looking at the ability to support dynamic spectrum sharing, a tool for switching between 5G and existing 4G assets.
At Naval Base San Diego and at Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany, they'll be looking at 5G's speed and bandwidth as a means to support "smart warehouse" functionality.
Telecom experts said it makes sense for DoD to play a leading role in exploring the possibilities surrounding the emerging network protocol.
"Hosting development and testing on government sites solves a couple of problems," said Patrick Filkins, senior research analyst with IDC's network infrastructure group. With front-line experimentation, "the U.S. government remains in the loop to any new innovations. The government also can retain some control over what innovations are kept in-house, or allowed to creep into the broader defense market."
Defense officials said these initial tests will help to position the military to adopt 5G as these networks become more readily available. "DoD needs experience in 5G if we are going to take advantage of 5G's ubiquitous connectivity," Evans said.
At the same time, early experimentation by defense experts could help industry to accelerate deployment of 5G. "DOD controls electromagnetic spectrum and real estate on military installations, which will allow industry to roll out technologies quickly and conduct robust experimentation," Evans said. "This gives industry the opportunity to mature technology in a low-risk environment and accelerate deployment of commercial capabilities."
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It will take a few months to ramp up the testbeds. "Right now, we're doing site surveys and assembling project management teams. Installation of equipment needed to conduct testing and experimentation won't take place until the spring of 2020," Evans said. "The type of equipment will depend on the type of experiment on the base."
Evans said he expects the lessons from this initial round of testing to provide critical information to defense and industry on how to build the 5G ecosystem. "We will learn what works and what doesn't, and that will inform how to do the things we want to do better going forward," he said.
In the long run, the outcomes of these tests could drive enhanced connectivity and superior performance across a range of defense functions.
"Ultimately, 5G will provide ubiquitous connectivity for people and devices. We believe that the military that masters ubiquitous connectivity will maintain overmatch," Evans said. "That mastery will require the ability to fully leverage 5G's power for our mission, while ensuring that we are able to spoil any attempts by our adversaries to use it against us."
Getting there will require a team effort. The Pentagon plans to collaborate with the Federal Communications Commission, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, and other government agencies. The long-term plan is "to collaboratively produce a 5G architecture with commercial industry that will ultimately connect everyone and everything," Evans said.
8. More retirees, family members to be booted from military hospitals under Pentagon reform plans
Yes I am biased. Our family receives outstanding military medical care as a retiree. I do not want that to change
More retirees, family members to be booted from military hospitals under Pentagon reform plans
As the Department of Defense continues to streamline and transform its military health system, more military hospitals and clinics will stop taking retiree patients, their families and even some active-duty family members, according to the Defense Health Agency director.
At the annual meeting of AMSUS, the Society of Federal Health Professionals, in National Harbor, Md., Lt. Gen. Ronald Place told attendees that after the Pentagon completes its assessments of its medical facilities and their contributions to readiness, more non-active duty beneficiaries will be transferred to Tricare networks. Until the report is completed, however, there's no way of knowing how many retirees and family members will be forced to leave military treatment facilities or which hospitals and clinics will be affected.
Place said as installations undergo personnel fluctuations and changes in mission, military health facilities will adapt, and those changes are likely to affect non-uniformed beneficiaries.
He cited recent changes at Fort Knox, Kentucky, Fort Jackson, S.C., and Fort Sill, Okla., that downgraded those posts' military hospitals to outpatient clinics - a reconfiguration that resulted in the disenrollment of retirees, retiree family members and some active duty family members from those facilities.
"I do anticipate more of that happening in the future," Place said. "I'm not talking about tomorrow, I'm not even talking about next week. But as an evolving organization, we will have changes."
The Pentagon is three years into a massive health transformation that will place all military hospitals and clinics under management of the Defense Health Agency and reorganize the services' medical forces to focus primarily on supporting active-duty personnel and operations.
As part of the plan, the Army, Navy and Air Force expect to trim 17,944 uniformed medical billets from their ranks, and the Defense Health Agency is assessing all military medical facilities, weighing whether to expand some and close others that "do not offer now, and will not be able to offer in the future, a platform for maximizing capabilities," Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs Thomas McCaffery said.
As the system focuses more on force readiness, the Defense Department is weighing options for its next generation of Tricare contracts, which are expected to handle more non-uniformed beneficiaries.
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The fiscal 2017 National Defense Authorization Act dictated the changes, but DoD's failure to be transparent about the effort, which includes being a year late on a report on the future of each military medical treatment facility, has some lawmakers worried.
In a House Armed Services hearing Dec. 5, Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Military Personnel, and ranking member Rep. Trent Kelly, R-Miss., said they found that in some areas, including San Francisco Bay and Seattle, family members can't get timely appointments at military facilities, nor is care available in the community.
The civilian healthcare networks in those areas, Speier said, "either lack the capacity or are unwilling to admit Tricare beneficiaries" because the markets are "oversaturated."
"DoD seems intent on gutting our military health system and calling it an efficiency," Speier told military health officials, including McCaffery, Place and the services surgeons general.
"I believe the department may be viewing [reforms] as a cost-saving exercise," Kelly agreed. "It is crucial that prior to any reductions in medical treatment facility services, DoD fully understand the civilian network capability to absorb those patients."
Military medical system changes are expected to have a "huge impact"
By: Karen Jowers
McCaffery assured lawmakers that while the principal mission of the military health system is to enable force readiness, that includes military families and retirees.
"After all, while service members who deploy must be medically ready to do their jobs, they also need to know that their families back home are cared for and that, in retirement, they will receive a health benefit that recognizes the value of their service," McCaffery said.
Rep. Susan Davis, D-Calif., wasn't satisfied with the answers, saying the changes are a "great source of anxiety for our families."
"What's the strategy? What's the plan? How do we make certain that as we move further into Tricare for beneficiaries that there are is a "there" there for them and they are not going to lose benefits that they have already had?" Davis said.
As part of the transformation, the Army has begun shedding at least 6,935 medical billets, the Navy, 5,386, and the Air Force, 4,000 - all medics. The cuts are occurring in phases, starting this year with the elimination of vacant positions. In fiscal 2021, additional personnel reductions will be taken to meet the goals.
At a conference for federal health providers, Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio, proposes a new structure for the military health system.
By: Patricia Kime
McCaffery said at AMSUS that the report on the medical treatment facility restructuring plan, which was due to Congress in December 2018, will be submitted to Congress "very soon."
He said under the plan, some facilities may be expanded while others will close.
"We need to be open to right-sizing MTF services capabilities to ensure that we're using finite resources most efficiently while not compromising our ability to meet mission," McCaffery said.
Lawmakers told McCaffery and the services to tread carefully when considering personnel cuts and closures.
"You talk about near peer and future threats, let me tell you what, civilians don't go downrange," said Kelly, a brigadier general in the Mississippi Army National Guard, "That takes guys and girls in uniform to get our soldiers to the right level of care in that magic hour."
9. Unwelcome on Campus: National Security, Public Service, and the Misguided Effort to Block the CIA's University Recruitment
Interestingly I know a number of CIA officers from Wellesley. One of the things the school has been known for is leadership. Many graduates from Wellesley have proven to be very successful leaders in many fields to include the intelligence community. I concur with the author.
Unwelcome on Campus: National Security, Public Service, and the Misguided Effort to Block the CIA's University Recruitment - Modern War Institute
mwi.usma.edu · by Caroline Bechtel · December 10, 2019
Last month, according to
reporting in the
Wellesley News, the Central Intelligence Agency called off a scheduled information and recruiting session at Wellesley College after the school's career center warned the agency of "potential event disruption." A petition signed by some two hundred current students and alumnae had been circulating before the event scheduled for November 13,
calling for Wellesley to "permanently disallow the CIA and other organizations which engage in similar repression and human rights abuses-including but not limited to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, etc.-from the on-campus recruiting process."
The information session's cancellation is especially disappointing to me because I have Wellesley professors and alumnae to thank for inspiring me to pursue a career in public service. I can't help but see the parallels between last month's effort to exclude the CIA and other government agencies from on-campus recruiting and the deeply misguided closures of campus ROTC programs in the 1960s and '70s. The story of ROTC's exile from and return to universities like Harvard and Yale teaches an important lesson: when college administrators acquiesced to anti-ROTC protesters' demands to kick out ROTC, this didn't have any measurable effect on policy, but it did make things more difficult for students who wanted to pursue careers in national security.
Banishing ROTC from campus made it burdensome, and in some cases impossible, for students from certain schools to join the military while still continuing their studies. Before Harvard welcomed back Navy ROTC in
2011 and Army ROTC in
2012, Harvard students had to commute to MIT or Tufts University for all their military science classes, meetings and trainings. Harvard athletic facilities were
not available to them for training, as they were to recognized student organizations, and students personally bore the
transport costs of participation in the program. At Yale, students had to travel over an hour to the University of Connecticut for training. Thankfully, cadets and midshipmen at schools without ROTC programs persevered. They commissioned through other schools' programs and became officers and public servants. But they never should have borne this burden in the first place.
In recent years Harvard and Yale have been providing more institutional support for students interested in public service, which makes the recent incident at Wellesley is all the more disappointing. The threat of protests raised a real barrier that's keeping students from learning about and working for the CIA. Opportunities to speak with CIA representatives are hard to come by. The "Contact" section of the CIA's website
states that the agency does not "routinely answer questions about employment beyond information on this Web site." Current employees don't identify themselves as intelligence officials online, so LinkedIn isn't particularly helpful for students considering careers in intelligence. While the CIA does list job openings and internships on its website, an on-campus recruiting event is the best chance many students have to learn about careers with the agency.
It's understandable that young and sincere critics want to reform these institutions, but they shouldn't prevent their peers from learning about them. Instead, they should consider that it might do more good to encourage their like-minded colleagues to join US intelligence agencies and advocate for changes from within. Barring the way for their classmates is unproductive and does real harm to their career prospects.
Administrators have a role to play, too. They can do their part by keeping open access to government employment. When recruiting sessions are threatened by protesters, administrators shouldn't give in to the pressure. Instead, they should stand up for students interested in public service and move the event to a safe location. It's too bad that didn't happen at Wellesley, but at least the career center offered to connect interested students directly to CIA recruiters even though the event was canceled.
Our public institutions won't disappear overnight if some students at top universities turn up their noses at them and disrupt their campus outreach. But the government will lose opportunities to recruit talented, hardworking students who want to serve their country. This disconnect between university and government ultimately endangers the health of both. In recent years, the reopening of ROTC programs at places like Harvard and Yale has provided hope that one of America's many wounds is finally healing. Let's not dash those hopes.
Caroline Bechtel is an officer in the US Army and an alumna of Wellesley College. The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
If you do not read anything else in the 2017 National Security Strategy read this on page 14:
"A democracy is only as resilient as its people. An informed and engaged citizenry is the fundamental requirement for a free and resilient nation. For generations, our society has protected free press, free speech, and free thought. Today, actors such as Russia are using information tools in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of democracies. Adversaries target media, political processes, financial networks, and personal data. The American public and private sectors must recognize this and work together to defend our way of life. No external threat can be allowed to shake our shared commitment to our values, undermine our system of government, or divide our Nation."
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