In Harmonium

Posted By Marc on March 2, 2009

MAJ Ben Connable’s recent article in Military Review (April, 09) is well worth reading (hat tips to Kerry Fosher and Max Forte).  Max has already posted selective quotes from it, but I think it is better to read the entire article (Max would probably agree – it’s that limit on the blog format).

In essence, MAJ Connable argues that there are two options surrounding the adoption of cultural knwoledge by the US forces: an internal adoption (i.e. internal education) and an external adoption (i.e. contractors).  Of the two, he argues that it is more important to have the capability internally in part, he notes, because much of it is already there in the FAO (and other) programs.

In general terms, I quite agree with MAJ Connable – the US forces (and Canadian Forces as well, but that’s another story…), should have organic specialists in “culture”.  I think that the FAO program is an excellent base upon which to build, although I also think that it is important for that information to spread throughout the forces, since “culture” is of equal operational importance at the level of Corporal.  I can hear the objections now – “We already have so much we have to train them on!”, “We have no time”, “We already have the HTS”, etc., etc. ad nauseum.

You know, this is not the first time that the issue of culture and culture training in a military organization has shown up.  Very broadly, there are four major situations where cultural knowledge is extremely important for a military organization (there are many others for other types of organizations):

• in a “predictive” role (i.e. trend tracking before conflict);
• in a counter-insurgency, conquest, or occupation;
• in an “alliance” situation (i.e. multi-national coalitions working together); and
• in an advising situation.

NB: I have purposefully left off any covert operations from this list.

Now one of the really important things to realize is that the requirements for depth and breadth of cultural knowledge in each of these situations is different.  From simplest to most complex, in terms of knowledge depth and breadth, the list goes:

• knowledge of allies
• knowledge of locals and opponents (COIN)
• knowledge for advising
• knowledge for prediction

Let me go through my reasoning for this order (BTW, comments and critiques most welcome).

knowledge of allies

This is the simplest type of cultural knowledge for one simple reason: allies tend to already “know” one another, at least in terms of mutual story telling and, more importantly, there is usually organizational support available to resolve cultural differences.  Other considerations include the pre-existing perception that you are “on the same side”, etc.

knowledge of locals and opponents (COIN)

A more complex type of knowledge, and one that slides up and down the scale of social organizational complexity.  While stereotypical knowledge can serve as a base, it is not enough to meet the needs of such a campaign.  Indeed, the lack of cultural knowledge can lead to military disaster.  Unlike the knowledge required of allies, this type of operation requires a short-term predictive analysis capability (“short term” being defined as 1-5 years in the future) which, in turn, means that cultural knowledge must include both static (stereotypes, stories, etc.) and dynamic (e.g. organizational change, long-standing patterns, etc.) knowledge.

knowledge for advising

Knowledge for advising is more complex still, simply because it requires both dynamic knowledge and, more importantly, self-knowledge.  Furthermore, the danger of imposing one’s worldview on a group that you are advising is readily apparent.

knowledge for prediction

Knowledge for prediction is the most complex since it requires both static and dynamic knowledge of multiple cultures and their mutual interaction effects.

Placing knowledge internally or externally

In general, when I said I agreed with MAJ Connable that cultural knowledge should be organic, I was talking about types 1 and 2.  For advisors, the knowledge requirements would be higher.

All of this brings us to the point that there is a limit to cultural knowledge training for the military; a point of diminisihing returns on the time invested.  Beyond this point, and I’m not quite sure where it should be placed at the moment (probably right around the “advising” area), large amounts of additional knowledge could and, probably, should be brought in via contractors of one from or another (whether they are Gov’t employees is also irrelevant; they are not organic members of the military).

Category: Human Terrain System (HTS)
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