Welcome to one. See a podcast.
This is Jack today. We have Brian Hancock as the
guest host. Brian is interviewing Marine,
Major Robert Boudreau, and attorney and civil Affairs
officer who deployed with the 31st meu, being an attorney for
the federal government in his civilian career, Rob.
Wanted me to note that the interview is an informal
discussion that represents only his views and does not represent
the views of the United States government Department of
Defense. The Marine Corps or any other
components. So beyond that, there's a lot of
great stuff. So enjoy the show.
Thank you. Mayor of Rio and again, welcome
to the show. I understand that you just
recently returned the 31st meu and that's a 31st has a somewhat
unusual mission that they perform for the core and also an
interesting relationship with the 3rd Marine Expeditionary
Force are met that they Port. Tell us a little bit about that.
Yeah. Thanks Brian.
Sure thing just to provide a little bit of context at the
time I deployed, I was a civil Affairs Detachment Commander
with fourth civil Affairs group out of Miami Florida.
So that's a reserve unit. I served there for about four
years now, attached to the 31st meu, as an augment of a civil
Affairs Detachment. So looking first at the 31st meu
and three math, and where they fit into the competition.
Continuum think it's helpful to look at the maps mission
statement, which is that the MEP provides the United States with
a forward-deployed force and Readiness.
In the Theater as a globally. Responsive expeditionary and
fully scalable Marine, air-ground, task force, that is
a magnet have capable of generating deploying and
employing, forces for crisis response, forward presence,
major combat operations, and campaigns remember is
headquartered in Okinawa. So, when you think about what
the Marine Corps is currently doing in the Pacific region,
can't ignore what that means. Per having, you know, large
headquarters element out there in that strategic location.
The 31st meu is similarly headquartered on Okinawa.
Now for those less familiar with a magnet ask what that looks
like. The mag tap is made up of an
aviation Logistics, infantry combat and headquarters element.
So those four elements they can come in different sizes so to
speak. So we mentioned scalable, a
method you're looking at like a division level.
You've got the vision level unit supporting it the next session
on the load. That would be a brigade.
So three Meb 3rd. Marine Expeditionary Brigade is
also headquartered out there and then below that is the 31st meu.
So the 31st meu has an infantry battalion in aviation Squadron
illegitimate Essex baton supporting at as well as the
headquarters element. So the view is also going to be
paired up as an Expeditionary Unit.
It's paired up with a navy, amphibious group.
So when the Navy patrols with am you attached together?
Their embarked on, you know, several ships, prepared for
whatever Naval operations need to be conducted.
So typically a mess has three, subordinate news and run that
are really high Tempo. So whereas the other Muse,
typically go through a one-year period of work up Patrol, the
31st meu, does it every six months.
So you're talking really compressed timelines to get them
you to integrate with the Navy presence and activity within the
Pacific. So whether that means partnering
with the Japanese self-defense forces to conduct training or
engaging in humanitarian operations, in response to
tropical storms or participating in joint.
Multinational exercises, you know, at some examples, the 31st
new is always ready to execute whatever mission is called for
in the moment. Now, looking for a little bit
more at the 31st meu and how it views itself is considers
itself. The premier crisis response
force in the Pacific. Its motto is ready partner.
Dat lethal. Which I think summarizes pretty
much what they're trying to accomplish and how they view
their their strategic importance in the world.
So thinking about that phrase. Ready, partnered and lethal.
I think there's a lot you can unpack as to how the mute eyes
into the National Security strategy.
And as that trickles down Through the defense strategy
than the Pacific strategy and the Mew is really the technical
translation of what the objectives in those strategies
looks like. So as we think about what the
competition landscape looks like and what it means not just for
the Marine Corps, but for the United States to maintain that,
persistent forward presence to build credibility in the region
as a partner of choice and to be ready as a crisis response
Force. The 31st meu is really the tip
of the spear for the Marine Corps.
Thanks for that major Bordeaux fascinating Mission and that
persistent forward presence. Since of the 31st meu, puts them
in an ideal position to I was a suspect managed, the increasing
number of worldwide crisis and national disasters, were having
that are resulting in humanitarian, assistance
disaster relief. We could obviously drop the 82nd
by are very quickly, but if we drop those army forces in there
as opposed to the Marines off the Mew, they would suck
resources out of the limited resources available in a crisis,
whereas some you can can leave This year, do good work not been
resources and then return to the ship.
So that is an increasingly critical mission that you've
been part of. Can you tell us a little bit
about your specific role in that mention, as well, as how you
prepared in that work up or the mission?
Yeah, absolutely. I'll break down the two parts of
that and first talk about what the Civil Affairs mission was.
So within the view in the occult a little bit informal because
you know, civil Affairs is kind of a bolt on and capability in
many ways. But where we shook out as we
became part of the S3 operation section and then specifically,
we fell inside the operations in the information environment, the
oie cell. So any effects that we saw to
achieve were coordinated with the Lido.
IE Planner on my patrol, we had a major, whose chopped over to
us from three Meg. That's a marine information
group that sits in Okinawa that supports pre-med and then within
the oie cell, we also had our public affairs, folks, or as the
Marine, Corps has rebranded it strategic Communications or
comps. So we had our public affairs
team, as well as a technical information operations officer
and a psychological operations team as well.
So when we embarked that was our unit and everything that we were
looking to accomplish would go directly into the operations
section and that's how we integrate across a MAG tap in
addition. We also had a Space Marine.
Yes, those exists. We had a Space Marine coming
augment us when we're underway from space force.
Looking at the 31st Muse, Mission and particularly where
we think civil Affairs has a fit into the competition.
Next, I knew that I'd be wearing two hats thinking about
readiness and major. Focus of the 31st meu is to
certify. Every embarking subordinate unit
in the ability to conduct them. Use Mission, essential tasks.
So what that meant in, Practical terms for me, is that I had to
be ready to be a utility player. So, within the operation
section, I wear two hats, I was both we civil Affairs, planner
as well as the current op so cool.
Large extent as a doorknob. So, you know, I had to maintain
a focus on training and operations and short window, you
know, who needs to be where? Where, where we had folks
located? We need to support etcetera and
then as the Civil Affairs planner, I was also responsible
for, you know, keeping an eye on the world coordinating with
other units in the area. Usaid other folks things that
we're going on in the Civil environment and making sure that
those considerations were integrated in all aspects of
planning executing both in terms of actually going on the patrol
as well as training, we'll get more into that in a little bit
here. So, then shifting to the second
part of your question, about preparing for the deployment as
many deployments go, there is nothing perfect or ideal.
Deal about it but you know Semper Gumby Marines adapt, they
work, whatever they've got and they go after the mission so.
Well, we were called a Detachment in the table of
organization. Realistically that just meant to
packs, so it was me and a sergeant and that makes up our
Detachment. So I knew from the start that if
we were called on or as we were called on to execute civil,
Affairs tasks, we'd be really relying on everyone else in the
mag tap as well as many partners that we were able to coordinate
with on the outside to be able to achieve out size effects.
And then, another interesting aspect, Was that I was paired up
with a marine from a different unit, so we didn't have any
experience, drilling, or conducting field exercises, any
of that stuff together prior to meeting during pre-deployment
training in California. So, I was paired with Sergeant
Lee a Henning. She's an ncos are civil Affairs,
specialist out of third, civil Affairs, group, and Great Lakes.
In hindsight, it was actually terrific match.
So starting heading like every other Marine had cross-training
to civil Affairs. Her prior specialty was
artillery. So she understood effects up
until the point of coming into civil Affairs effects for her,
always understood in a kinetic context.
So, what an artillery round is accomplished thing, as opposed
to what effect is a particular message, having a population
group. But through that lens, she was
able to integrate well with our psyop team with roie, folks
looking at At achieving effects in the information environment
as opposed to physical environment getting more into
the specifics of work up. You know is fairly routine.
You're talking going to shooting ranges, talking to the docks,
making sure that your damaged or missing gear is taken care of.
But the other thing we want to do is make sure that we had a
good rip the transfer of authority with the folks that we
were replacing. So not only did we get on Zoom
calls with the outgoing civil Affairs Detachment, I found out
who the, the previous three Detachment commanders were going
back foot patrols. And I reached out to every
single one of them and said, hey, give me your after-action.
And let me know what to expect. What are the patterns?
Like, in the new, what were the, some of the things you're able
to accomplish things you left behind?
What can I expect? And make sure that I'm
integrated both of the battle rhythms, and can the real world
as we get ready for the patrol. So a lot of information all at
once, but I think some parts of it were fairly routine, but
other aspects. We want to make sure that we
left the Civil Affairs, footprint.
As soon as we got to the meal, I'd like to dig into the work up
just a little bit more in the training, we do that a lot in
both the Army and the Marine Corps, we have a number of
traditional challenges that I suspect you're cracking.
And when we go to us, particularly validate civil
Affairs capabilities at service level and Joint little
exercises. These exercises often don't
contain a lot of civil Affairs, content, and typically, they
lack the analytical strength and staff.
To model complex, civil systems and the resulting impacts from
fires and maneuver. Did you experience this in your
work up? And if so, what did you do about
it in my time? At for keg, we went through the
same concerns. So the CAG supports tabletop
exercises in California in North Carolina to math out there at
the training center in San Diego.
And, as you point out, these are, these are routine problems
where there's not necessarily a focus.
Sure that civil Affairs is hitting their mess.
Depending on you know, how many folks we sent to support these
kind of exercises often times, we're able to decide what
additional training value were able to achieve on our own.
You know, we're not trying to outshine anybody or anything
like that. A lot of his internal and just
trying to make our profession work better.
But we start building those things in ourselves.
So whether it's, you know, anticipating possible, injects
or creating our own internal frag owes to create our own
civil considerations, those are things that we think about right
from the start. So, whereas your service level
or your joint folks, are Often focused on achieving Battlefield
dominance or solving complex Logistics problems.
Or hey, how do we integrate this new capability?
We're looking early at. Hey, here's where civil Affairs
are likely to plug in, in the scenario.
Here's, you know, things that we should start anticipating and
let's make this more meaningful for ourselves.
Even if the mag tap isn't necessarily thinking in terms
of, hey, where is civil Affairs? Kind of fit and how do we make
sure that those guys trained up? So to give you a real simple
example, as we went through the certification exercises for
them, you to be able to check the box that hey, they're ready
to go out on patrol. The Like, telling that was with
us, he'll be 31. They were the lead element to
conduct assessments supporting a humanitarian assistance survey
team a Hast as part of a notional Disaster Response
scenario during one of the certification of Illusions.
So with them, you did and where VA guys take a greater role in
this as we were reaching out. So, Nina Kessler usaid civil,
military liaison. She works closely with the mask
with the mad with him. You we reach out to her and
said, hey, would you like to participate in this, you know,
can you help the new make this train more realistic and need is
Tastic? No matter who she's talking to
within 15 minutes, you just received a mini Jayhawk like,
you know, what usaid does, you know, it does ask for
responsible, collect for the US and now, you understand
specifically. Hey, here's how the military
plugs in the other thing we did was we created our own scenario
in Jack's. For example, we drafted for a
ghost, you need to anticipate that based on the scenario.
There's going to be a displaced persons problem.
They're going to deal with whether that's setting up a
display civilians camp or you know considering how this is
going to interfere with maneuver or with other Disaster Response.
You know we had Relationship working the step process.
I go to the CLD 31 top. So when I say, hey you got some
down time out there in the field, consider using this, and
they were grateful for that because they also understand
that if we're thinking about the problems are going to face, it's
going to make them more effective.
If we have to conduct civil Affairs asked real world.
So, by creating these in D X, we would develop our own civil
Affairs concept of operations which we're kind of internal.
So when I say internal it gave us a product to share with the
oie folks so near in a planning session or sending out.
Augment to support the half the oie folks could look at you and
say, hey now I know exactly what you're doing because I've got
two here in front of me. I can take this, I can take your
objectives and I could now build those into the larger oie
picture and then it's also available to be disseminated to
them. You.
Another thing that we touch on briefly is integration so we
were lucky to have some really enthusiastic folks from the Mig
that are really excited about getting out and doing things in
the information environment and civil Affairs opens up a lens
that often times they're not able to to use as much as they'd
like because many of the authorities.
At the Meg has to go through to conduct oie becomes an obstacle.
You're talking multiple layers of review, authorization,
authorities, potentially. The highest levels of level of
government. Civil Affairs does not
necessarily have those sorts because so military operations,
their inherent in any military task.
So when you have somebody whose job is to think about, hey,
where can we use this capability and it affects the information
environment, it creates a lot of value there for the Meg.
Something I've wanted to ask you because I could see this is a
risk to Mission or maybe as an opportunity, when you have an
expeditionary Force, like the Marine Corps in actual terrain,
where disasters and conflict happens, seems to me you could
move from what started as a training mission to dealing with
a real-world events. Very quickly, just just a very
almost a flick of a switch. Did you experience?
Is that at all in your time on the 31st meu.
How did they prepare for? What is a foreseeable potential
risk to Mission? Yeah, absolutely.
So we did have exactly that experience for contacts.
The Muse, when they go through the certification for patrol
actually go through three. Iterations of exercises do for
us or certification pipeline, if you will, that cycle went over
the Christmas and New Year's holidays.
And during that time, there was a real world typhoon that came
up. So you already Add kind of a
foundation of trust because um, you had already been through
that initial step of going through variety Mission sets
together and then what do you know here's a potential
humanitarian disaster that we could be called on.
So as you can imagine, it's going to go through the exact
same steps you did in training if you did it, right?
Do we train like we fight or do we fight like we trained?
You know, hopefully, we're on the right side of that equation.
So for us, it was the same thing we bring in all the staff, all
the planning staff. And we go through the RTP to
planning process and start thinking about, hey, you know,
who are we going to have to call back?
Who's going on leave? Who's not on the, what is it?
The asset Readiness for the Squadron, do we have all of our
vehicles ready to go? What is the timeline look like?
What's the the time-space distance?
How long is it going to take us to get to this particular
region? So we work through it just like
in training and we're going to go through all the
considerations fill out the the 60 70, 80 percent solution,
whatever information we have available, go through that and
be ready for this potential real world mission which could
interrupt the patrol cycle. But as you point out, that's why
we're there to do the real world stuff, the training gets us
there and makes this more ready. But the other day with are not
just two The boxes or hit the wickets.
Our job is to be to be ready to respond.
Something that comes to my mind, you are likely tracking in 2017,
Congress passed the women, peace and Security Act and Laser DOD
created implementation guidance for that in 2020.
And civil Affairs has a big role in women, peace and security.
Did you do anything or your team, do anything with the
women, peace and security lines of effort during the 31st news?
Is deployment. And if so, could you share some
lessons learned in that area for the rest of the Civil Affairs
community? Absolutely, as you put it out
women, peace and security is the framework for approaching
vulnerable populations in general.
So the ACT focuses specifically on women and girls and a
fundamental concept there is that can't achieve stability
anywhere if you ignore the voices of literally half your
population, if you cut the women and girls out of the
conversation or you're not protecting their interests
ensuring basic human rights, then you're never going to
achieve lasting stability. So the Marine Corps has various
military occupations. Especially MLS codes there's
additional ones within civil Affairs but for planning which
is a Of course, as well as for being a female engagement
officer or female engagement specialist.
So I had been through the training the summer before my
deployment to obtain the female engagement officer MLS.
So WPS was something that was very familiar to us that pork
egg. And we had all started thinking
about how does this affect our mission?
What are the things we should be thinking about?
So during our pre-deployment training, me and Sergeant
Henning, actually assisted her with going through the training
to get the female engagement specialist MOS.
And I also Basically laid out as a challenge like, hey, this is,
this is a real cool, evolving area of civil Affairs.
You know, let's see what we can do to bring this from you and
make it part of their mission. So, what we did at the, the Mew
is we basically try to find a way to make that part of the
typical considerations but also to make it almost a function.
So I think with this really plays out from the example of
female engagement teams, as many of our listeners are going to be
familiar with during the war on terror, the Army, the Marine
Corps created, what we called female engagement team.
So these were Basically tailor-made, civil Affairs teams
that were responsible, specifically for going out and
talking to females in the village, the moms, you know, the
tribal leaders wives, the girls teenagers getting information
about what trying to find out what additional things are going
on that. The intelligent folks weren't
able to get to traditional means.
But also looking specifically at what those needs were the women
were facing. That weren't necessarily being
understood by military leadership.
So using that model. And I talked about the
Afghanistan drawdown, it's funny because female engagement team.
Get a rebirth in the United States of all places with the
50,000 or so Afghan refugees that came in.
So at the different bases that we had brought refugees to Fort
McCoy Wisconsin Fort Lee in Virginia, Quantico at each of
those locations. There were female engagement
team stood up to support the refugees.
Help them through the resettlement process, addressing
particular needs that were there.
So what we did for them, you understand that the view is
really looking at the global theater, strategic level
competition. We thought that a provisional
female engagement team capability would Be a good fit.
So you know, kind of the example, the technical examples
I'm talking about going out and talking and finding out what the
medical needs or the supply needs are in a particular
Community. That's not necessarily something
that the muses doing every day but it's something that needs to
be ready to do. So what we did was we created an
off-the-shelf basically capability for them.
You and created an sop that could be used in two ways.
First of all, as a planning tool to integrate the WPS
considerations in planning, but also to have put the team would
look like, here's something you can actually be You every time
the magnet goes out and rebuild. Team on getting a team to be
used where those targeted targeted civil Affairs,
activities need to be conducted. So the SOP that we created, this
is something that we actually submitted to the Marine Corps
Center for Lessons Learned. So anyone with a CAC who's able
to access the website can go there.
And again search for 31st. Meu people to get me a team and
you'll find our sop co-founder after-action from the patrol as
well. But in that sop you go through
planning considerations. So a lot of these that we
borrowed from NATO and then Army Publications we go line by line
like hey here are the questions that you should be asking.
Asking during an opt during an operational planning team
meeting here are some of the considerations you should have.
And then on the other side of that, it was a female engagement
team. Actually going to look like as a
tactically employable effective, small unit.
Well let's look at some of the considerations for selecting
team members. What particular skills should we
be looking at four Marines and sailors that could be called on
to be part of that team? What are the training package
look? Like, are the language things
that we need to work through where we going to get
interpreters. Do we need to do a shooting
package to make sure that they're able to provide internal
security, things of that nature. So then the female engagement
team would have to focus is really first being ready to
conduct those tailored missions if you will.
But also to integrate with the planning staff and say you're
the just one considerations that you need to think about through
the women, peace and security lands and we were really
fortunate on the patrol. We actually got to look at this
real world. So, going back to your earlier
this year, 2022 around April, I had the opportunity to
participate in site surveys in the initial planning conference
for exercise common dog 6, which was ultimately can Ducted in in
the Philippines back in October about six months after I had the
opportunity to go down. But what I did over those two
weeks was I was like hey this is an opportunity to actually look
at WPS objectives, you know. So whether it's looking at hey
how was the u.s. modeling integration and diversity?
How will we modeling that for our partners?
So at the planning conference we had folks obviously from the
Philippine Marine Corps Navy. We had Marines Services
represented there. We have Republic of Korea
Marines who were there and then there were other nations are
looking to be involved as well. So that actually gave a a
practical opportunity. Like, hey, let's, let's look at
what WPS looks like. So not only are we modeling WPS
and what those values look like, and she look like to the rest of
the world. What can we do to encourage our
partners? And so there was no template for
this, but I wrote up in assessment Basically number
format, here's the considerations.
Here's the objectives that we're looking to achieve through the
WPS for framework. You know, it's laid out, their
Duty guidance, and here are my observations.
And what I did with that was I shared it with higher.
So not only is it internal to the new.
So it became a reference for the next Patrol.
Definitely conducted the exercise, but it's something
that was shocked to hire. So, like you folks are looking
at activities all over the world.
Here's my observations of how we did and how our partners are
doing with this particular exercise.
So we're actually able to push that up multiple levels all the
way up to and opaque on staff. And I think there were
appreciative that honestly, folks, down to our level, we're
even thinking about it. So it was well received and then
in addition to that to kind of put the bow on what we try to
accomplish during our Patrol Sergeant heading and I co-wrote
a paper see mobile engagement teams and what sustaining that
really looks like in a competition text.
And we're looking forward to that being published in the
January 20, 23 edition of the Marine Corps Gazette, great
material. I look forward to reading some
of those articles myself. I believe you and start heading
a publishing several to Aid to One thing I always have to ask,
of course, touches on assessments.
This is a very hot area for Department of Defense.
And historically, civil Affairs has struggled to deliver
scientifically valid measures of effect that this Fair number of
measures the performance. But measures of Effectiveness
has been somewhat Elusive and it's a complicated problem, set
involving collection, analysis and elements of presentation.
Can you tell us what type of assessment you were able to
conduct in the 31st meu and what do you see as Is the next step
in moving. The science of see a Mo E
forward. Absolutely.
And thinking about, you know, looking specifically at civil
Affairs, one of the constant struggles is trying to determine
realistic and useful measures of performance.
You know, that's your data that your raw data, what do we
actually accomplishing? What are we getting out?
Is our messaging getting out, are we conducting a sufficient
number of engagements? We actually doing things, we
need to be doing and then coupled with that, is that the
measures of Effectiveness which feeds into assessments?
Like not only, are we doing the tasks that we're order to do and
we're trying to do effectively, but are we Publishing the
ultimate objective. What is it at the end state that
we're trying to reach? So I think one of the things we
always struggle with is, especially with typical
deployment Cycles as you're looking at shortened time
Horizons. So for us, it's a six-month
Patrol. What can we realistically expect
for particular activities that we're doing?
Are we taking the right view of what we're doing and what we can
accomplish, when you think about the information environment,
you're really talking about influencing hearts and minds and
probably getting folks, to understand what we're trying to
accomplish, and are they actually coming on board with
that Shiva? We wanted to, I think what?
That translates down to for civil Affairs is not just about
collecting data, but you need to look at Trends over a period of
time. When you think about, you know,
to give a simple example, you know, taking an assessment
framework, where you're looking at, did we achieve the
objective? We are looking to do, you know,
breaking down a problem set, applying a civil Affairs lens
and then try to understand whether you're achieving the
objectives that you want. Being a specific example.
Like bombed-out power plants in particular area, you know, are
we getting electricity on? Mine, are we measuring that in
terms of dollars, spent for local community?
Get a certain number of kilowatts pumped out this
particular Community. Okay?
That's that's a nice data point. But are we achieving the
longer-term objectives? It's hard to put a scientific
brand of her stamp of approval, if you will all that, because a
lot of that is kind of softer skills.
That's a lot of what civil Affairs deals with a soft
skills, as much as we'd like to use that data analytics driven
stuff. Sometimes we know what right
looks like through experience. Here's how we know we're being
effective in this particular area because our partners
invited us back and a lot of those effects that you're
looking at is getting translated up over time to things that have
strategic level impact. So I understand that I'm kind of
giving you a shotgun answer to your question, but for us when
the Civil Affairs community, and I think kind of always working
through those, you know, fundamentals and making sure
that you're capturing what you're doing.
Turning it over to the folks who were placed you and making sure
that information is disseminated being analyzed and then pushing
enough higher where appropriate, those are the kind of realistic
expectations. I think from a Marine Corp.
Effective, trying to make sure that our measures of
Effectiveness are being met. And then over time, if a process
of being followed, right? Your assessments are going to
build off that, where you going to be able to see.
This is what the objective was. Here's the exercise timeline,
here's the things, we're trying to accomplish.
Hey, here's what this community looks like nowadays, here's
what's happening when we want to go and do things there?
Here's their attitudes, things like that.
You got to look at it from a whole lot of mgtow, of whole of
service, every environment. Every domain approach, it's
going to matter what cam straps doing, it's going to matter
what, you know, our You folks are doing, we're going to have
to take all that information into account when you're when
you're ultimately going through the assessment process and
seeing if you've been effective assessments are just a very
thorny problem, but funding now is often tied with demonstrating
return on investment through assessment.
I so I suspect will be returning to this conversation many times
in civil Affairs. One of the perennial problems.
Of course, is, if one appointment, produces some civil
effects, it sometimes takes years to fully realize the
potential of that. Years later, the follow-on units
don't assess. Oftentimes what was done by
previous units. We don't have that continuity
for long-term assessments when we need to figure out that you,
that better I think is an Enterprise within Department
defense. I have one last question for
you, one of the third novel things.
The Marine Corps has done is they've done some key
Investments of tanks and other assets to build new formations
aligned to the realities of Modern Warfare, particularly in
us and opaque on one of the innovations that they've come up
with. With is the Marine littoral
regiments or mlr. And they have a new operating
concept called expeditionary, Advanced base operations.
He ABO, what do you see from your Foxhole as the role of
civil Affairs in the mlr as well as within the E ABO contract?
Sure thing and to lean on another weak analogy, but common
phrases. We're building.
The airplanes were flying it, right.
So we have the doctrine. We've got all these things that
are coming out, right? The naval operating concept
forces on 2030 ebo, so, yeah, lots of learning going on at all
levels of the Marine Corps civil Affairs, especially recognize
when we have such a tiny footprint.
I think the most important thing from my perspective for civil
Affairs is that the small unit training is where it's going to
have kind of an outsized impact. So when you're looking at Get
operations, you're talking about, potentially to squad team
size elements and diverse locations.
How do you make sure that those folks are conducting civil
military operations to the extent?
They need to to make themselves more effective.
Well it's gonna depend on that smallest unit trainings, just to
put a fine point on it. I can tell you right now every
infantry battalion out there every test for officer.
Their supply guys are all thinking about, hey, how am I
going to get stuff to my guys in the field when they going to be
kind of left on their own to deal with and inevitably, what
that means is that hey there's going to be a lot of activity.
That civil environment. Do they have the tools that they
need? Are they able to interact the
way that they need to? Are they getting the information
about the Civil environment that they need to?
So, there's a lot of layers on that and it's going to be tons.
And tons of really good work that civil Affairs folks are
going to be able to provide support those missions as they
come up. But in addition to that, it puts
the onus on civil Affairs, folks, to make sure that the
training is getting out so that we've got a small contingent of
civil Affairs, Marines, they can't be everywhere at once.
How do I make sure that this specialized capability Is being
executed and is available to the small unit that's in a distance
location that I'm not able to get to right away.
So, I think there's three kind of legs to this.
First of all, you've got your preparation of the battlespace,
right. You've got ipb intelligence
prep, well, feeding into that, as your symbol preference battle
space. So thinking about who the
players in the area, what are the people groups?
What are the languages? Was the economy look like, what
are those really important factors that are going to matter
to distributed units? Or do they need to be ready for?
So that's step. One is not only going to get a
break from the to, but we need to make sure that civil affairs.
What considerations are being built into that product, into
that information is disseminated on top of that, we want to make
sure that people are understanding civil military
operation tasking. So just because you're sending a
team out to do whatever mission. That may have kinetic aspects.
You also need to be aware that they're in a civil environment.
Now, it's on that small unit leaders to understand what civil
Affairs tasks. He may be required to accomplish
the making sure that that's understood by the staff and is
built into the orders development process.
And then finally, I already had on this training is going to be
everything. Making sure that that folks are
Are are ready to execute when the time comes.
I'm standing download. I am smarter by the minute,
listening to you. Tell us how you have succeeded
in the mission set that you're provided giving the audience, a
number of things to think about, as well as some documents that
have been published and our upcoming Publications.
If they want to review more, appreciate everything that
you're doing for us. We got to remember that we're
one team, doesn't matter what uniform you wear.
We always do everything joint combined.
Thanks for coming on the show today.
Number five, I really appreciate it, guys.
Thanks for listening to the one. See a podcast, your guest host
today was Brian Hancock, who interviewed Robert Boudreau will
have their information in the show notes.
Additionally, we have more marine and see interviews coming
up. So stay tuned and please
subscribe. Like, share, tell all your
friends. This is Jack have a great day.
Thanks for listening to the one. See a podcast, your guest host
today was Brian Hancock, who interviewed Robert Boudreau will
have their information in the show notes.
Additionally, we have more marine and see interviews coming
up. So stay tuned and please
subscribe. Like, share, tell all your
friends. This is Jack have a great day.