LtGen
Martin E. Dempsey: Thanks, [MajGen William Nash, USA (Retired)] Bill. I�m glad you mentioned "T1" [Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Abdul Mohsin al Tuwaijiri], who was the deputy commander of the Saudi Arabian National Guard. Because for me he, like for you, he was a father figure to me. And one of the very first things he told me when I went to him and said, what is it I think I should take away from this first meeting with you? And he said, well, general, remember that a camel is unaware of the curve of its own neck. Now, of course, I acted as though I completely understood what he meant, but it took me some time to actually figure out what he was suggesting to me. And what he was doing was sort of foretelling the fact that over the course of my time in Saudi Arabia, he would be trying to educate me on "us" while at the same time educating me on "them." And it was a very profound period of time in my life as I sat at the side of "T1" to learn about us from the perspective of our friends and allies in that part of the world.
We continue to learn and we act at great peril if we don�t continue to learn in the process of trying to advance our common interest. That�s where I�d like to start actually. If Admiral Fallon were here, and he sends his regrets, he would tell you that this topic, security cooperation, is truly the key to long-term stability in the 27 nations that we describe as the central command area of operation. And there are 27 countries, as you know, organized into, really into three subregions � the "Stans," the larger Arab world, as you�ve defined it, and of course the Horn of Africa.
And when you look at a region that�s that diverse, but at the same time has so many resources, and that�s not just oil and natural gas, but rather human resources, you seek or try to find some common theme around which we can all coalesce and agree that there is goodness in working together. And about the only one you can really come up with with any consistency is stability. So then, the key becomes to try to approach these very diverse nations with the common idea of how can we help stabilize those parts of the country that are causing not only problems for you, but in the case of some of the ungoverned spaces where these transnational threats tend to gravitate and then emanate out of. And of course, there are many places in the CENTCOM AOR where that is possible.
And so, security assistance, or as he describes it, as CENTCOM describes it, as building partner capability in support of common interest, is where Admiral Fallon sees his theater strategy building upon. So I think what I can bring to this group and this discussion today is not necessarily any more about the theory of security cooperation, but let me share some experiences with you on putting it into practice in various countries throughout the region.
The greatest challenge we have in establishing a common basis for security cooperation is actually agreeing on the threat. That�s true whether you are in Saudi Arabia or whether you�re in Iraq or whether you�re in Afghanistan and I could list the other 24 nations. One of the bullets on Tony�s [Dr. Anthony Cordesman] slide said that the war on terror does not lend itself necessarily to the, to a common identification of the threat. And that is absolutely true.
Inside Iraq, for example, as we discussed with Prime Minister Maliki�s government, and we discussed the threat of al Qaeda; we discussed the threat of insurgents; we discussed the criminal threat. We discussed the threat of the IRGC presence of Iran. You can be sure that those conversations that at times we find common ground, but at many other times, we do not. And that�s been true through the entire duration of our mission in Iraq and remains true today. Identifying the threat, agreeing upon the threat, and then agreeing what to do about it is the most difficult challenge of all in establishing a common base for security cooperation.
My experience in Saudi Arabia is that it is also true there. And of course, I was there � well, actually, I got there on the 18th of September, 2001. But it took several years � and Ambassador Jordan knows this � for the Saudi government, for the House of Saud, to come to grips with the fact that they had an internal problem as well as external threats.
Once they did come to that conclusion, by the way, they�ve acted very aggressively and very cooperatively to address that problem. But it took time to bring them to that point. Prior to that point, when I would approach them about building light armored vehicle units or a quick reaction capability, or whatever it was � there was a menu of things we discussed � we would always get into a discussion about the threat. And you can imagine prior to 2001, their definition of the threat emanated principally from the possibility that Israel would become expansionist or try to influence them in some way. And so, we didn�t see it that way clearly, and we constantly had to shape and merge and find common ground even with our allies, the Saudis.
We managed to do it. But make no mistake about it that some of those procurements that you�re talking about that from our perspective were absolutely a waste of time, from their perspective were very much in their national interest. So there is that challenge of identifying a common threat.
Secondly, we tend naturally to mirror image those militaries and now police forces. I�m glad to hear you mention that we have to be more inclusive of all security forces, not just military forces. We tend to mirror image those other nations with whom we deal and expect of them similar agility, flexibility, deployability than we expect of ourselves.
We learned that lesson in Iraq, you may remember, the first time we tried to move a battalion from one part of Iraq to the other. And when it failed to move, of course, it was reported initially as just the complete mutiny on the part of the Iraqi army. It was actually anything but that. It was they�d never been trained to do that. They�d never done it in their history. There was no training plan to prepare them; no monetary incentive to incentivize them; no end date for their deployment. I mean, we actually, in retrospect, gave them conditions that I don�t think we would have been able to accomplish. And so, the risk of mirror imaging is a real one.
When we built the authorization for leaders in the Iraqi army, we built it at about the same ratio that we expect a leader-to-led ratio in our army. That made sense at the time until we realized quickly two things. One, we couldn�t possibly fill it to that ratio, because those leaders were just simply not available. And secondly, that�s not the tradition out of which they came. The Iraqi army never in its history delegated authority to the point where it might need 250 leaders in a battalion of 800 as we delegate authority.
We delegate authority to a sergeant that would absolutely cause a normal human being to crumble under the weight of the responsibility. That�s not necessarily what our counterparts do. And so, where we find ourselves today is we�ll often report that the Iraqi army is not ready because it doesn�t have enough leaders.
Well, my contention is, yes it does, because it has enough leaders to run the military the way they will run it. And over time, they will begin to � they would like to emulate us, by the way, which is a very positive thing. But it�s going to take time to do that. And in the interim, it doesn�t mean they�re incapable or it doesn�t mean they�re in any way dragging their feet. But we do mirror image in a way that I think can be problematic to our long-term development over there.
Third, I�ll call it the sustainability imperative. Shame on us if we build something that then the host nation can�t sustain. Now, in building these military capabilities around the region, we have to be careful with that, because, you know, we have a very robust economy and we have years of experience in sustaining that which we build, whether it�s infrastructure, whether it�s manpower, whether it�s equipment.
What we found is that the Iraqi army that we brought back in � and we did bring back large numbers of it � had come from a history where you essentially used a piece of equipment until it broke and then you received another one. Or, if you needed three police cars, for example, you might procure five, because you use the parts from the other two to make sure three will run. And I�m not mentioning that in any pejorative sense. That�s the way they did it.
And so, when they started to stand up on their feet, that�s the way they started to do it. Well, we were, of course, aghast. Remember the mirror imaging issue. We mirror imaged. How could that happen? That�s impossible. We must have preventive maintenance. We must have long supply chains of parts and warehouses filled with supplies. Well, maybe not. And so, what we�ve been trying to do as we adjust is determine what right looks like in their terms, not in ours.
But we continue to be aware of the fact that as we work with, for example, the Lebanese armed forces now or Pakistan�s military, although they may aspire to a certain piece of equipment, if it�s not sustainable, if they can�t absorb it with their budgetary resources, then we have a choice. And the choice is we will continue to sustain it in perpetuity potentially, or we will provide for them that which they can afford to sustain over time.
The third one or the fourth one, I should say, is balancing the ability of our host nations, our counterparts, to absorb what we�re providing, and not maintain control of it so long that they become dependent. Again, that�s not pejorative. It�s human nature to suggest that if you will continue to do the job for someone, they�d be foolish not to allow you to do so. I think there is a parenting analogy here somewhere, and I�m not sure I got that right either as I raised my own children.
But the point is, as we help these countries build their militaries, there has to be a constant thought at transitioning it; that�s obvious. And there�s a delicate balance. It�s a complex balance between their ability to absorb what we�re providing or helping them provide and then not waiting so long that they become dependent on the assistance. And that�s exactly what General Petraeus and others are trying to balance in Iraq right now, as I did for the last three years.
And finally, the thing that doesn�t get much attention, but we have to be aware of is, what I would describe as the potential for an erosion of trust. If you take all of the things I�ve mentioned previous to this � the mirror imaging challenge, the imperative of sustainability, the balance of absorb and depend � and then you put into position a young soldier, airman, sailor, or Marine who is on his fourth or fifth rotation into Iraq, and he may not perceive the kind of progress that he thinks he should see at this point in the mission, that generates the potential for an erosion of trust, because that young man and even some very senior men and women will begin to believe that our counterparts are just not trying hard enough. And when that happens, and trust erodes, then we�re on the path to some genuine problems down the road.
And this is not unique to the Iraq experience, the Afghanistan experience. I think it is one of the factors we should always remember as we conduct security cooperation and then make it a point that we identify a potential problem for an erosion of trust and either consciously allow that trust to erode or stop the slide, because we have to be very careful of that.
Okay, let me break for a second there on that part and talk briefly about the mechanics of security cooperation, because there are some things that we do inside of our government that do not make it as easy to execute these programs as they should be. One of them is we have stove-piped authorities. There�s money available for police, for army, for special forces, for counterterror, and probably three or four other categories. They�re all stove-piped; very difficult for one person to access them all; done that way, I�m sure, for a purpose. That purpose should be revisited, in my view, in order to make the authorities available in a much more efficient way so that the person on the ground responsible for conducting these cooperative enterprises has access to the funding authorities he needs or she needs.
Secondly, this is no surprise. Most of those kind of funding authorities tend to be one-year money. Most of the things we try to do with security assistance are not one-year programs. They�re long-range programs. We�re in the process of trying to work with Iraq on a ten-year program. Very difficult for us to articulate to them how we intend to help with that if I can only be guaranteed of money a year at a time.
And finally, the foreign military sales process � and this is common knowledge; it�s been in the media that we�re dissatisfied with the pace at which it progresses. Notifications, delays, contracting requirements under the foreign acquisition regulations � all of those things need to be streamlined so that as we identify this common threat, identify what we�re going to do about it, that we can respond.
Many of these countries, as they approach foreign military sales, are not just coming to us to shop for a particular piece of equipment. It�s a program. It�s a long-range aspiration to end up with a military strategy. And so, they�re actually looking at us as their acquisition strategy broadly from boots to armored vehicles. And when they look at us as their acquisition strategy and we continue to look at the process as isolated sales, we then set expectations � or they set expectations � that we can�t meet. And that can become a problem, which leads to the other thing, which is the erosion of trust and we�re off to the races. So that�s kind of the mechanics of security cooperation.
It�s been my pleasure to be part of this board. And I look forward to the questions.
Transcript courtesy of the National Council on US-Arab Relations
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Bio - LtGen Dempsey - Deputy Commander, US Central Command
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