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 USJFCOM to partner with NATO for training exercise
U.S. Joint Forces Command and NATO’s Allied Command – Transformation will partner during a November command post exercise to support the training of the Afghan National Army.
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By Robert Pursell
USJFCOM Public Affairs
(SUFFOLK, Va. – Sept. 25, 2008) --U.S. Joint Forces Command (USJFCOM) and NATO’s Allied Command – Transformation (ACT) will partner during a command post exercise (CPX) to support the training of the Afghan National Army (ANA) this fall.
The Combined Security Transition Command – Afghanistan (CSTC-A), responsible for the overall training of ANA, requested USJFCOM’s Joint Training Directorate and Joint Warfighting Center (J7/JWFC) and ACT to assist in the planning and execution of the exercise.
NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) will also participate in the exercise, slated to begin this November in Kabul, Afghanistan.
USJFCOM’s Army Col. Mike Rose, CENTCOM desk officer at J7, explained the purpose of the exercise.
“What we’re going to try to do is go into the national military command center of Afghanistan and train them in how we report, how we handle incidents, how we plan for future operations,” he said.
Exercise organizers are planning for the event to help develop an ANA training and exercise capability to include an ANA exercise and training organization, structure, and schedule. Rose explained the current situation of ANA and how the exercise will improve it.
“This is a command post exercise that we’re going to use to train the Afghan National Army general staff because the Afghan Army was built from the bottom – up with platoons, companies and battalions that are excellent and corps headquarters that actually move the battalions in the field,” he said. “What we’re trying to do is take the tactical level of the Afghan Army and link it to the strategic level, the general staff which works for the civilian leadership.”
Rose said because this is a CPX, there will not be a lot of troop movement. Most of the training will involve scenarios where the ANA general staff will use real world communications systems.
“You won’t see a lot of troops moving because it’s a command post exercise. Basically, what you’ll see is Afghan officers with their U.S. or Canadian, NATO mentors training in staff operations,” he said.
Rose explained the main reason CSTC-A asked for the support of USJFCOM’s J7 was to help with the scenario development and exercise control.
“That’s really why we’ve been asked to come in is because we do a lot with scenario development. In this office here, all of the [joint task force] headquarters that are deploying to Afghanistan or Iraq, we do their mission rehearsal exercises. This is in our area of expertise,” he said.
Rose said an objective is to keep the exercise technically simple and easily understandable. Then it is up to the ANA to decide how they want to go forward.
“That’s something that the ANA can continue to do on their own” he said. “We’re actually going to try to use what they have in place already to run the exercise.”
Hungarian Army Maj. Gabor Lorincz, an ACT observer inside the exercise control cell, explained his role in the exercise.
“We’ll assess the training level of the general staff and explore ways to support CSTC-A for upcoming exercises and to see how NATO can have a greater role in this event.”
Lorincz said the Joint Analysis and Lessons Learned Centre, the focal point in NATO for analysis of operations, exercises, training and experimentations and for the collection of lessons learned, will also be on hand to look at how the main exercise goal was achieved and possible ways ahead.
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