Feral Jundi

Friday, April 5, 2013

Industry Talk: Equipment Drawdown From Afghanistan An ‘Enormous’ Undertaking

Filed under: Afghanistan,Logistics — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 10:13 PM

And contractors will be a very important part of that drawdown, much like they were in Iraq. The problem with Afghanistan though is how difficult it will be to actually get this stuff out of the country, just because it is a landlocked nation and the roads out of town are through some rough and dangerous country. At least Iraq had easier roads to navigate on and plenty of port access.

What is interesting with this deal is the decision making process to ship the item or leave it in Afghanistan for whomever– all because of cost. How much stuff they leave in this country is the question, and I imagine it will be quite a bit. –Matt

 

Equipment drawdown from Afghanistan an ‘enormous’ undertaking
By Hendrick Simoes
March 23, 2013
With the pace of NATO’s drawdown from Afghanistan accelerating, the international coalition is faced with the unprecedented task of removing tens of thousands of tons of equipment and vehicles from a country still very much at war.
For the U.S. military, moving 35,000 vehicles and 95,000 shipping containers full of cargo to various bases in America or overseas is easier said than done.
Maj. Gen. Kurt Stein, commander of the 1st Theater Sustainment Command, said during a visit to Kuwait last month that getting the supplies and equipment out of Afghanistan will be an “enormous” mission.
“It will be historic, it’s nothing like we have ever done in the history of our military.” The 1st TSC has a leading role in the equipment drawdown, or as they refer to it — “retrograde.”
Afghanistan is landlocked, and transit routes to the nearest seaport in Pakistan are long, politically tenuous and vulnerable to attack. The alliance’s northern supply route, snaking overland through Central Asia and Russia to Poland and the Baltics, also is difficult due to the logistics of coordinating truck and rail transport.
Stein, who also oversaw the pull-out of equipment from Iraq, said there could be no comparison between the complexity of the two operations.

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Monday, March 25, 2013

Industry Talk: US Embassy In Iraq Reducing Staff From 10,500 To 5,500 By End Of Year

Filed under: Industry Talk,Iraq — Tags: , , , — Matt @ 10:01 AM

Wow, that is a pretty substantial cut in personnel. Although from the sounds of it, there will still be a significant security force to support the fewer than 1,000 diplomats that remain. Which makes sense, because the embassy is still a large area to cover down on, regardless of how many folks are in it.
If anything, the reduction in security folks would be WPS personnel who would normally provide PSD teams to go out into the countryside. But even that might not see too much of a reduction just because the diplomats that are left, still have to go outside the wire. I also wonder how many missions they were really doing ever since the troops pulled out and the threats not going away in Iraq? If anyone with an inside track on this would like to comment, feel free to do so below.
I also think it is telling that we have had this massive presence at the embassy in Iraq, and the return on investment has been so poor. Meaning recently, Secretary of State John Kerry visited Iraq and got into it with Iraq about their policy of supporting the Assad regime with cargo/weapons flights coming out of Iraq into Syria. Obviously this is a source of contention, and Iraq could care less what the west wants them to do. So much for having a thousands of diplomats and a $750 million dollar embassy? lol –Matt

 

Massive American Embassy in Baghdad cutting staff sharply decade after war in Iraq began
March 20, 2013
A decade after the start of the war in Iraq, the American diplomatic footprint here is shrinking fast.
As recently as a year ago, the immense U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and other sites around the country were staffed by more than 16,000 personnel. Today, that number has fallen to about 10,500, U.S. Ambassador Robert Stephen Beecroft said this week.
By the end of the year, Beecroft said he expects to have just 5,500 employees in Iraq. Most of them will be security personnel and other outside contractors assigned to support the fewer than 1,000 diplomats who remain. More cuts are expected beyond the end of the year.
“That number will continue to go down. . And they’ll go down largely on the contracting side,” Beecroft said in his residence on the heavily guarded compound on the banks of the Tigris River.
The sprawling, fortress-like U.S. Embassy officially opened in early 2009 at a cost of more than $730 million as the largest American mission in the world. But it has been under pressure to cut costs.
The downsizing in many ways reflects how sharply wartime assumptions about the extent of American influence in Iraq have shifted since construction on the Vatican City-sized compound began in 2005. Sweeping reconstruction and nation-building efforts championed early on are much less of a priority today, even as Iraq’s Shiite-led government forges stronger ties with neighboring Shiite powerhouse and U.S. foe Iran.
America still has influence here, with Iraq-based diplomats and officials in Washington in frequent contact with Iraqi political and military leaders. But Washington was unable to win Iraqi guarantees that would have allowed a continued military presence — something that deprived the U.S. of important leverage in Baghdad, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta recently told a government watchdog.

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Thursday, February 28, 2013

Industry Talk: DynCorp International Honors Defense Of Freedom Medal Recipients

Filed under: Industry Talk — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 8:17 PM

Speaking on behalf of the Department of Defense was Lieutenant General William N. Phillips, and from the Department of State were Ambassador Patrick Kennedy and Ambassador William R. Brownfield.
“There about 17,000 DynCorp personnel serving in a combat theater today. They are serving alongside our warfighters and protecting our freedom. Bottom line – contractor personnel and all they do remains vital to our nation. We depend on them, we rely on them, and they are extraordinary for their execution of the mission,” Phillips said.

Good on DynCorp for honoring their fallen and I certainly hope other companies will follow the same path, if they haven’t done so already. I have written in the past about the process companies and families/friends of the fallen can go through in order to get the Defense of Freedom Medal for their fallen and I highly encourage folks to do this. We must honor the sacrifice of the fallen….

I was also intrigued by this bit of news that came out during the ceremony. The State Department will be building a memorial to honor civilians/contractors that were killed, defending the DoS in the war. Very cool.

During his remarks, Ambassador Brownfield announced that, later this year, the Department of State will unveil a new memorial at the U.S. Department of State to honor civilian personnel, including contractors who have lost their lives serving on police training missions abroad.
“On the thirteenth of May this year, with the support, assistance and my personal gratitude to Under Secretary Kennedy, I hope we will unveil and dedicate a memorial to all those civilian police personnel who have given their lives up in overseas operations,” said Brownfield.

With that said, I certainly hope the new Secretary of State John Kerry will be in attendance, once this memorial is unveiled and dedicated? Better yet, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry and the new Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel should all be in attendance. Because all of them owe their lives to the brave actions of security contractors who rescued them off a mountain in Afghanistan! For that matter, most of congress and our senior leadership should be in attendance–past and present, because most of them have been protected by contractors in some capacity in Iraq or Afghanistan, and at some point in this long war. –Matt

 

 

DynCorp International Honors Defense of Freedom Medal Recipients
February 28, 2013
DynCorp International hosted the families of 17 employees who were killed while serving U.S. government missions abroad as they received the Department of Defense’s Defense of Freedom medal, posthumously recognizing the contributions their loved ones made for their country. The honorees were killed while working on U.S. Department of State police training missions in Iraq and Afghanistan between 2004 and 2011. The award recipients’ families, representatives from the Department of State and Department of Defense, along with nearly 200 DI personnel were in attendance at the ceremony held February 11, 2013, in the Washington, D.C. area.
Speaking on behalf of the Department of Defense was Lieutenant General William N. Phillips, and from the Department of State were Ambassador Patrick Kennedy and Ambassador William R. Brownfield.
“There about 17,000 DynCorp personnel serving in a combat theater today. They are serving alongside our warfighters and protecting our freedom. Bottom line – contractor personnel and all they do remains vital to our nation. We depend on them, we rely on them, and they are extraordinary for their execution of the mission,” Phillips said.
During his remarks, Ambassador Brownfield announced that, later this year, the Department of State will unveil a new memorial at the U.S. Department of State to honor civilian personnel, including contractors who have lost their lives serving on police training missions abroad.
“On the thirteenth of May this year, with the support, assistance and my personal gratitude to Under Secretary Kennedy, I hope we will unveil and dedicate a memorial to all those civilian police personnel who have given their lives up in overseas operations,” said Brownfield.
Steve Gaffney, chairman and CEO of DynCorp International, placed a special emphasis on the family members who were in attendance, “Each of the 17 individuals who we honor tonight had a profound and lasting impact – not just on our company but on our country – and we often talk about their bravery and strength. But I also want to highlight the bravery and strength of those family members who are here tonight, and who continue to share the stories of their loved ones.”
The Defense of Freedom Medal, the civilian equivalent of the military’s Purple Heart, was presented to the families of the following DI personnel:
Roland Carroll Barvels of Aberdeen, S.D.
Brett Patrick Benton of Dry Ridge, Ky.
Brian Morgan Brian of Camden, Ark.
Michael Wayne Butler of Rembert, S.C.
Mike Dawes of Stilwell, Okla.
Arsenio Ducusin Domingo of Wadmalaw Island, S.C.
Richard Thomas Hickman of Cave Springs, Ga.
Leon Vincent Kimbrell of Boiling Springs, S.C.
Deborah Dawn Klecker of Redman, Ore.
Rudy Guerrero Mesa of Maxwell, Texas
William Lawrence Juneau of Orange County, Calif.
Douglas Stephen Thomas of Lexington, S.C.
Robert McDonald Timmann of Tallahassee, Fla.
Donald Bruce Tow of Lake Havasu, Ariz.
Darrell Leroy Wetherbee of Raymond, Maine
Gary Wayne Willard of Resaca, Ga.
Ronald Austin Zimmerman of Glenwood, Ind.

Link to post here.

Saturday, February 9, 2013

Publications: Contractor Support Of USCENTCOM AOR, 1st Quarter FY 2013

Filed under: Afghanistan,Industry Talk,Iraq,Publications — Tags: , , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 11:21 PM

For those looking for the source of this data, here is a link to the DASD Program Support that puts these reports together every quarter. They have been very useful and I have put everyone of them into my Scribd if you would like to reference and check this stuff out.

William over at Danger Zone Jobs has been tracking this data over the years and he has put together some excellent graphics showing exactly what the trends are over the last seven quarters.

Interesting stuff and check it out below. –Matt

 

Contractor Support Of USCENTCOM AOR, 1st Quarter FY 2013 by Feral Jundi

Monday, November 26, 2012

Afghanistan: The Discussion On Troop Numbers Beyond 2014

Filed under: Afghanistan,Iraq — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 11:03 PM

A Wall Street Journal report, meanwhile, said top Obama administration officials want to keep about 10,000 American troops in the country – a midpoint in the range of options that Allen presented to Panetta, which the newspaper said varied from 6,000 to 15,000.
Many observers have said the Afghan government is unlikely to be able to take over logistical operations, air support and other facets of the current war, in addition to the training and counterterrorism missions foreign troops would provide.

As the article pointed out below, a solid number is premature. But you can definitely point to a ‘range’ of what we are looking at in the quote up top.

The other thing to think about with this stuff is the logistics requirements of Afghanistan beyond 2014. We have given the Afghans a military force that requires some serious upkeep, and especially the aviation assets. Couple that with the idea that most Afghans have a poor reading capability (hence cannot read a manual to fix or maintain whatever), that it will take someone with outside expertise to continue to assist. That is where contractors will come in.

I also look at Afghanistan’s means of financially supporting this military as the west exits. Where will the revenue come from to pay salaries and maintain this military and government?  So economics plays into this, and I think the west will continue to support Afghanistan well after we are gone. So yet again, with western dollars comes western contractors to support the Afghans.

One final point is Iraq and how that turned out, might be a scenario for Afghanistan. Meaning we purposely depended upon Iraq to use their parliament to come up with a SOFA, knowing full well that parliament would not support immunity of any sorts for US troops in their country. It is a smart political move by the US administration, who wanted fully out of Iraq, because they knew that Iraqi politicians did not want to be known as the leaders that wanted US troops to stay. Some would say we pulled out prematurely in Iraq because of those politics and not because of a logical withdrawal plan–but that is another discussion and only time will tell with that country.

So if we start doing actions that put the full decision of troops staying in Afghanistan, into the hands of Afghans and not just one main leader, then we might see an exodus of troops from Afghanistan much like how Iraq turned out. Just because Afghan politicians do not want to be viewed as the folks that supported foreign occupiers to stay. (May is when a new SOFA is to be decided upon…) Any SOFA that does not have troop immunity in it, is a sure sign that we will be exiting, and contractors will be the only ones left standing–just like in Iraq. –Matt

 

Pentagon: Discussion of troop numbers remaining in Afghanistan ‘premature’
By CHRIS CARROLL
November 26, 2012
The Pentagon says it plans to tell the White House within weeks how many American troops military leaders believe will be needed in Afghanistan after 2014 to train local forces and continue to target al-Qaida.
With NATO’s formal combat role set to end in just over two years, the United States — along with its NATO allies and the Afghan government — is keen to define a postwar presence well in advance, avoiding the precipitous pullout and security problems that came with the end of the Iraq War.
The troop calculations, however, have to achieve a delicate balance that weighs military capability against the U.S. public’s weariness of continuing conflict – and meets Afghan expectations of the residual force.
The troop strength recommendation will be based on options presented in recent weeks by Marine Gen. John Allen, the NATO commander for the war, to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. The final decision has yet to be made, officials said.

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