Feral Jundi

Monday, April 2, 2012

Maritime Security: Guards, Razor Wire Help Keep Somali Pirates At Bay–NATO

Filed under: Maritime Security,Somalia — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 4:33 PM

The rate of successful hijack attempts had “almost returned to pre-crisis (2007) levels.”
John Steed, a former head of the United Nations counter-piracy unit, has said a major reason for the drop in the number of vessels hijacked is that the pirates got so rich last year.
But increased use of armed private security guards, and other defences like pirate-pummelling water pumps and razor wire are also helping reduce the number of successful attacks on merchant ships.
“Armed security guards on board the merchant vessels is very effective means of protecting them,” Rear Admiral Sinan Azmi Tosun, the commander of the SNMG2 said. “We welcome all these protection measures.”

The significance of this article is that a Rear Admiral thinks armed guards on boats is a good idea. That our industry is making a difference, and NATO leaders are recognizing that. Pretty cool and check it out below. –Matt

 

Guards, razor wire help keep Somali pirates at bay – NATO
April 2, 2012
By Daniel Fineren
The hijack success rate for Somali pirates has dropped sharply in recent months, a NATO official said on Monday, due in part to more merchant ships turning to armed security guards, razor wire and water pumps to protect themselves.
Improved international cooperation on combating piracy on land and at sea – covering an area four times the size of the Arabian peninsula – has been the cornerstone of efforts to tackle a problem costing the world economy up to $12 billion a year, a spokesman for NATO’s counter-piracy force in the Indian Ocean said.
“Only six vessels have been pirated for ransom in the last eight months, compared to 36 in the preceding eight,” Lieutenant Commander Mehmet Elyurek told reporters on board the TCG Giresun, the Turkish flagship of the force that operates off the Horn of Africa.
The rate of successful hijack attempts had “almost returned to pre-crisis (2007) levels.”
John Steed, a former head of the United Nations counter-piracy unit, has said a major reason for the drop in the number of vessels hijacked is that the pirates got so rich last year.

(more…)

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Quotes: The Interior Ministry In Kabul Depends On 282 Foreign Advisors, And 120 Are Contractors!

Filed under: Afghanistan,Industry Talk,Quotes,Strategy — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 2:25 PM

     The Interior Ministry in Kabul has 282 foreign advisers working there, according to the NATO Training Mission Afghanistan, which placed them in the ministry. Of the 282 advisers, 120 are contractors, costing $36 million a year, paid for by the U.S. government. The rest are made up of 119 U.S. military and U.S. government civilians, and 43 from other coalition countries…..

     …..Several Interior Ministry officials, serving and retired, were complimentary about the work of the foreign advisers. One mid-ranking security official, who didn’t want to be named because he wasn’t authorized to speak to reporters, said that corruption would be “many times” greater if the foreigners weren’t present. 

     That last part of the quote up top is what I was focused on.  If you read through the article below, you hear all sorts of negative comments about the services of this foreign advisory group, to include bashing the contractor element. Of course those corrupt souls in the Afghan government would bash these pesky foreign advisors that would report on their greedy activities…. To me, this advisor crew is vital to the war effort, by helping to minimize the amount of corruption in this government.  Imagine if there was no adult supervision?

    Also, DynCorp and MPRI were listed as some of the top contractor advisors, which is interesting.  MPRI is like a retirement home for retired military officers. So it would make sense that this collection of military mind power and experience would be directed towards a very crucial part of the war.  And that is getting the Afghan government on it’s feet, and trying to make it look good in the eyes of the people.  A tall order if you ask me.

     This also indicates to me the strategic importance of contractors.  The US and NATO could have insisted on having an all federal or military group of advisors.  But they do not have that capability, and they have had close to ten years to try and develop an all government force.  As you can see, private industry has been able to answer the call just fine, and a majority of this group is composed of smart and very capable contractors, doing a very important job.

     It is also an example of the ‘blended workforce’ concept. This advisory corps has 162 government and military advisors in it, so they too can contribute in building the Afghan government, as well as keep track of and manage the advisory corps and it’s efforts. A federal/public partnership, or blended workforce is what you call this. You see this arrangement with other areas of war zone contracting, like with the WPS program–a federal handler, overseeing a contractor security team. Hopefully this blended workforce concept does not impede the advantages of private enterprise, or decrease the strength of government oversight. It should complement both, and the end result should be something everyone can support.-Matt

  

Afghans rely heavily on foreign advisers as transition looms

By Saeed Shah

Nearly 300 foreign advisers, most of them Americans, work at Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry, and hundreds more work in other government departments, a reliance on foreign expertise that raises doubts about the viability of the West’s exit strategy.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai will announce later this month his plans for “transition” from heavy international involvement in Afghanistan’s governance and security to local control. But the number of civilian advisers in the ministries suggests that either Afghans lack the ability to govern themselves or that the international community is trying to run the administration itself, more than nine years after the U.S.-led invasion of the country.

There’s no clear plan to reduce that number.

Foreign advisers in the Interior Ministry, for example, appear to outnumber the senior Afghan officials they serve.

The Afghan government’s capacity to execute plans is so lacking it will spend only half of its $1.5 billion budget for economic development projects this fiscal year, according to the Ministry of Finance — despite the desperate need for investment in education, health and other basic services.

(more…)

Monday, February 14, 2011

Industry Talk: NATO–740 Trainers Still Needed For Afghan Forces

Filed under: Afghanistan,Law Enforcement — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 3:53 PM

     Boy, that is a ton of trainers needed. What is really crazy is this is how many trainers are needed, on top of the massive billion dollar contract the Army has already with DynCorp for ANP/MoI facility and training? Amazing.  I can tell you one thing though, if NATO cannot produce these trainers, DynCorp certainly will.

     If you are a retired police officer, or out of work for whatever reason, I suspect that your experience and qualifications will be in high demand for awhile over there. Between this requirement and the UN stuff, or CNTPO stuff you will have plenty of opportunities. –Matt

NATO: 740 trainers still needed for Afghan forces

DynCorp International LLC Awarded Afghan Training and Mentoring Contract Valued at up to $1 Billion

NATO: 740 trainers still needed for Afghan forces

By DEB RIECHMANNSunday, February 13, 2011

More nations are pledging support, yet NATO still faces a shortage of 740 trainers needed to get Afghan soldiers and policemen ready to take the lead in securing their nation, the coalition’s top training official says.

Needed most are 290 police trainers, including those to work in new training centers opening in Afghanistan this year, U.S. Lt. Gen. William Caldwell, the commander of NATO’s training mission, told The Associated Press in an interview Saturday.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai wants his nation’s police and army to take the lead in protecting and defending their homeland by 2014, a deadline that will be reached only if the training effort – already on a fast track – gets even more support from NATO and other nations. Caldwell said the coalition wants to have the additional 740 trainers in place by this summer.

(more…)

Friday, December 17, 2010

Industry Talk: Army To Award 1.6 Billion Dollar Training Contract For Afghanistan Before New Year

Filed under: Afghanistan,Industry Talk,Training — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 10:18 AM

     Wow, this contract is a big one. Also, thanks to Danger Room for posting an update on this contract. In the past I posted a deal about the transition of this contract from CIVPOL to CNTPO, and how DynCorp got edged out of the party when they were excluded under the new program. Then they protested and won the right to be a vendor, and this is where we are at now. It is a battle of the titans for a huge training contract.

     This is also important to the war effort because as I have reported in the past, NATO tends to make promises it cannot keep.  There are 900 training positions still open because of this lack of commitment. That is not good, and especially if the war strategy is highly dependent on getting the Afghan forces to a size and level of competency where they can take over the security of their country. Yet again, it will be contractors picking up the slack as NATO falters. –Matt

Edit: 12/21/2010- Here is the latest with this contract.  DynCorp just got hooked up. Here is the quote:

“Danger Room has confirmed that DynCorp, one of the leading private-security firms, has held on to a contract with the Army worth up to $1 billion for training Afghanistan’s police over the next three years. With corruption, incompetence and illiteracy within the police force a persistent obstacle to turning over security responsibilities to the cops by 2014, NATO has revamped much of its training efforts — except, apparently, the contractors paid lavishly to help them out.

The details: DynCorp will provide security personnel to train the Afghan cops at 14 different locations across the country. Those trainers will support the NATO training command run out of Kabul by Lt. Gen. William Caldwell in getting the police into an “independently functioning entity capable of providing for the national security of Afghanistan,” the Army’s Research Development and Engineering Command says in the award. The contract runs for two years and earns DynCorp $718.1 million, but an option to re-up for a third year brings the total price to $1.04 billion.”

Quote From Danger Room:

“Before the New Year, the Army will finally award a much-delayed $1.6 billion-with-a-b contract for a private security firm to supplement that NATO training command’s efforts to professionalize Afghan cops. That bid touched off a bureaucratic tempest between Blackwater/Xe Services and DynCorp, which held an old contract for the same job, as well as the State Department and the Army.

But not for much longer. The Army’s Contracting Command is in “the very final stages” of selecting the firm for the bid, Col. John Ferrari of the NATO training command tells Danger Room. “We’re expecting an announcement before the end of December, sometime in the next week or two.”

The contract is for “mentoring, training, and logistics services” to backstop Ferrari’s efforts, placing security contractors in embedded positions with the Afghan interior ministry and police units themselves, according to the terms of the bid. More than 80 firms have registered as “interested vendors” on the federal website announcing the contract. NATO is trying to build a 134,000-strong Afghan police force by October, and it’s short 900 trainers promised by U.S. allies.”

——————————————————————

R–NATO Training Mission Afghanistan/Combined Security Transition Command Afghanistan (NTM-A/CSTC-A) Afghanistan Ministry of Interior (MoI) & Afghan National Police (ANP) Support Requirement

Solicitation Number: W91CRB10R0059

Agency: Department of the Army

Office: Army Contracting Command

Location: RDECOM Contracting Center – Aberdeen (RDECOM-CC)

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Logistics: US And NATO Making Deals With Russia, A New Rail Line, And Getting Closer To Dropping Pakistan Routes

Filed under: Afghanistan,Logistics,Pakistan,Russia — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Matt @ 3:32 PM

     At the moment, about half those supplies come through Pakistan. The Pakistanis only closed, for about a day, one of the two main routes. About 30 percent of the supplies come in via Central Asia railroads, and another comes from the Black Sea, via rail to the Afghan border. The remaining 20 percent comes in by air. But some of that may be shifted to the Central Asian route, which is much safer (from bandits, bad roads and the Taliban) than the Pakistan routes.

     The U.S. and NATO supplies coming in via railroad from Western Europe, go through Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, to Afghanistan. This approach costs $400 a ton to get supplies into Afghanistan, versus three times that to truck it in from Pakistani ports, or $14,000 a ton to fly stuff in. This Central Asian route has been under negotiation since 2003, but Russia kept agreeing to it, and then withdrawing cooperation. What has finally compelled Russia to cooperate in the last year is the growing problems they are having with heroin and opium coming out of Afghanistan into, and through, Russia.-From Strategy Page

    Boy, this latest deal with Pakistan shutting down the border after the cross border accident is any indicator as to how unstable the logistics route is, then news like this should be good for the US and NATO. Although any deals they make with Russia will have to piss off Georgia, whom has contributed forces to the war effort. It is also risky to now make Russia a partner with all of this, because they could play games with the rail system. I guess they would be the best route to go with out of the two bad options available.

    The other point is that Russia is very smart when it comes to leverage and negotiations. The more we have issues on the Pakistan border with crucial logistics, the more the coalition is up against the wall to use a different route–and they don’t have many options. Especially when cost is increasingly becoming an issue. So at this point, Russia is going to negotiate all types of sweet deals in regards to NATO and how it impacts Russia. I just hope that whatever deals we strike up, that the US and NATO don’t get screwed in the long run. Russia knows it has the cards.

    On the flip side, I just posted a deal on Russia thinking about using private security firms for their companies overseas. I could see them utilizing these types of paramilitary forces for work in Afghanistan, if in fact the US and NATO could convince them to participate. Russian troops in Afghanistan would be too much to ask I think. You never know though and I never cease to be amazed with this stuff.

     I also mention private industry as a better option because of all of the Mi-17s that Afghanistan is buying up. Russia would be a good choice for instructors and maintenance types in these contracts to ensure that Afghanistan gets a good value. Plus, the Russians wrote the book on using the Mi-17 in Afghanistan during their war there and these Mi-17s are familiar to the Afghans. Most of all, there is the maintenance of these aircraft post war.  Poor countries with little in the means of parts or repair capability, will really appreciate the durability, cost and simplicity of this aircraft when everyone is gone and packed up.

     Afghanistan will also appreciate all of these railroads coming into their country, because that will make it significantly cheaper for investors to do business there.  The US and NATO will enjoy a cost savings as well, just as long as Russia is happy, and the Taliban can be put in check in the north. We will see how it goes. –Matt

Afghanistan’s First New Railroad On Track

Screw Pakistan

Russia, NATO Plan Joint Afghan War Initiative

Afghanistan’s First New Railroad On Track

October 14, 2010

by Charles Recknagel

From the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e Sharif to the Uzbek border, the land runs flat with barely a hillock to block the way.

It is perfect terrain for building a railway. So, since Afghanistan inaugurated construction of its northern rail line in May, progress has been fast.

Now, the Uzbek company contracted to lay the track has completed almost all of the 75-kilometer line. According to the schedule, the construction should be finished by the end of this year.

If so, Afghanistan will get its first railroad in more than 100 years. That is when a former monarch, Amir Abdurrahman, banned rail lines as potential invasion routes.

Officials say the railroad will speed up freight deliveries across the Uzbek border dramatically.

(more…)

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