News of the Force - Saturday, September 4, 2010 - Page 2

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                                     Saturday, September 4, 2010 - Page 2

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Report: U.S. to 'tolerate' Afghan corruption

    

    U.S. military commanders in Afghanistan are developing a strategy that would tolerate limited corruption but target large-scale abuses, The Washington Post reported late yesterday.

    Citing unnamed senior defense officials, the newspaper said Pentagon officials had concluded that the Taliban insurgency was the most pressing threat to stability in Afghanistan rather than corruption. They also believe that a sweeping effort to stamp out corruption would create chaos and a governance vacuum that the Taliban could exploit, the report said.

    "There are areas where you need strong leadership, and some of those leaders are not entirely pure," the paper quotes a senior defense official as saying. "But they can help us be more effective in going after the primary threat, which is the Taliban."

    Graft is a major issue in Afghanistan, which is rated by international monitor Transparency International as second only to lawless Somalia on its scale of the world's most corrupt countries.

    Afghan President Hamid Karzai has ordered a review of the two anti-corruption bodies, the Major Crimes Task Force and the Sensitive Investigative Unit, which have been operating for 18 months with the help of foreign advisers and with mostly U.S. funding.

    U.S. State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said the United States was "in touch with the Afghan government" about the departure of the deputy attorney general, adding he had been doing "vitally important" work in fighting corruption.

    Sen. John Kerry, after meeting Karzai earlier this month, said the Afghan government must show progress on eradicating corruption or risk losing U.S. support. Approval of nearly $4 billion in U.S. aid to Afghanistan is being blocked amid fears that U.S. money is being siphoned off by Afghan officials.

    The United States has almost 93,000 troops in the country, who along with 48,000 NATO soldiers are battling a Taliban-led insurgency.

 

Chitwood out as Civil Air Patrol's national vice commander; Gen. Courter is winning the 'culture war'

    

    A corrupt core that has had its tentacles wrapped around the Civil Air Patrol (CAP) for at least a dozen years has seen its grip significantly loosened as the CAP's annual conference National Board (NB) meeting rolled out this weekend in San Diego, Calif.

    The Civil Air Patrol’s national vice commander, Brig. Gen. Reggie Chitwood, yesterday lost his bid for re-election to a fourth term in office. CAP national commander Maj. Gen. Amy S. Courter finally has a second-in-command who is in her camp.

    Col. Chuck Carr, the CAP's Great Lakes Region commander, replaces Chitwood. Carr was one of two candidates who had Courter’s endorsement. The other was Bill Charles, who has held numerous senior positions in the CAP.

    There was a big field of candidates and worry that split votes might give Chitwood another win. Through the ballots Chitwood held a consistent 27 votes while the rest of the votes consolidated, finally with enough of a majority to elect Carr.

    The election not only removes Chitwood from the national vice commander's slot, but removes him from any voting boards, including the Board of Governors (BoG). Chitwood is the prime suspect for vicious and distorted leaks from the BoG to Ray Hayden, owner of CAP Insights, a web page that has been supporting Chitwood.

    Hayden has himself reported recently receiving a cease and desist order from an attorney for Gen. Courter. Hayden is a former member of the CAP who had his membership terminated for cheating on U.S. Air Force Air University Command and Staff College exams for ousterd former CAP national commander Tony Pineda and two of his cronies. In an unprecedented move that received national media attention, Pineda was removed from office, and stripped of his rank and his membership in late 2007.

    Hayden has not been a member of the CAP for a few years, and has no first-hand experience of the CAP whatsoever, except with members of the Chitwood camp, who source him.

    Chitwood was a Pineda appointee, though he did win two subsequent squeaker elections in his own right. NOTF likes to think our coverage of Chitwood over the past year has played a role in his ouster. We understand that when the candidates were presenting, Chitwood was asked pointed questions, one or two that may have been informed by NOTF's coverage - questions Chitwood did not answer.

    Often - but not necessarily - the person who is in the vice commander’s slot in the last year of a national commander’s tenure succeeds to the commandership. Chitwood's loss at least weakens his bid for the national commander's slot next year. If Chitwood should take the national commandership, that would probably mean the undoing of all Gen. Courter and her team have worked to establish. This is a sign Courter’s positive legacy may be sustainable.

    NOTF regards this election as another big win for Gen. Courter in a nasty culture war that has raged since she took office three years ago. Gen. Courter has been working to establish a culture of accountability and professionalism in the CAP. She has worked smartly, valiantly and persistently against entrenched corruption on all sides, which is now falling back. She has worked while under constant personal attack.

    In March of this year, according to one of those leaks from the BoG, she persuaded Sen. Carl Levin, chairperson of the Senate Armed Services Committee, to order an investigation of the CAP. That investigation is still underway. We have no news of it yet.

    The fact that Chitwood was allowed to run tells NOTF two additional things. First, NOTF had hoped for changes to the CAP's governance model that would allow the national commander to name his or her own second-in-command. Chitwood is not the only vice commander who has sabotaged a national commander in the CAP, and America learned separate elections don't work in 1796. Second, this means that apparently Chitwood is not under investigation and therefore has not and cannot be disciplined for his constant efforts to undermine the national commander, his role in leaks from the BoG, etc. This was a bit of a surprise to us - but stay tuned.

    The Chitwood loss is, nevertheless, a Courter win. It indicates that all the efforts of the corrupt core to muzzle Gen. Courter and to engage in every possible political maneuver to compromise her and take her down have failed.

    In other news from the National Board:

    NOTF has been told that closed-door meetings have been running since Tuesday. The CAP is not video-streaming the proceedings of this NB as it has most others, for reasons we do not know. We suspect - but don't know - that quite a few battles may have been won behind those closed doors and before the full NB formally convened.

    We understand that the Membership Action Review Board (MARB) heard the appeal of Rhode Island Wing Commander Gagliardi against his recent removal. We hear Gagliardi won the appeal. This is disappointing, but no surprise. Most members of the MARB are appointees of Gen. Rick Bowling, a former CAP national commander and chair of the CAP's BoG. As NOTF has reported, Bowling has been at the very center of CAP corruption going back at least a dozen years and he is a big player in the same corrupt core that brought you Pineda, Kauffman and Chitwood. MARB members hold their positions for life - or until they resign.

    The MARB is the last stronghold of the "Corrupt Ones." Over the past year, we have seen more and more actions appealed to the MARB, where the decisions of the Courter team have been reversed. Our informants at the National Board meeting tell us there is ongoing discussion about replacing members of the MARB. We do not yet know what it would take to make that happen, probably a change to the Constitution and By-Laws of the CAP.

    The MARB also recently reversed the removal of John Tilton from the BoG, as NOTF has reported. CAP Insights blamed Courter for this allegedly improper removal, however, it was not Gen. Courter who personally removed Tilton - that was done by a vote of the NEC.

    It is not clear that the MARB's action was proper. NOTF understands a closed-door meeting of the NEC may begin to deal with this issue. The MARB is appointed by the CAP's BoG. We believe the NEC can request action of the BoG.

    Tilton was appointed to the BoG by Pineda and has been supported by two successive chairs of the BoG,  Bowling and Hopper. The reversal of Tilton's removal by the BoG probably means that Ned Lee was pushed back off the BoG.  Ned Lee is a long-term CAP member, a Spaatz cadet who met his wife in CAP.  Lee is a superior court judge from California.  There is a hope that Lee would succeed Hopper as the chair of the BoG, bringing professional judicial experience and an appreciation of governance issues to the CAP. Lee, by the way, was appointed by Gen. Courter and is representative of the high caliber of leadership Courter is trying to bring to CAP affairs.

    Over recent months, there have been substantial changes to the BoG membership, with the result that the body is no longer controlled by the "Corrupt Ones."

    NOTF’s respect and admiration go out to Gen. Courter and her team for what they are accomplishing under very difficult conditions. CAP members are metaphorically dancing in the streets, if the blogs are to be believed.

    Please grant NOTF permission to exercise gloating rights for its role in throwing a spotlight up on corruption in the CAP. NOTF was the first to publish the cheating issue that brought Pineda down after our story went out on the wires and was published worldwide.

    We understand our exposure of the genealogy of corruption in the CAP has been useful.  (See our online archives: Message #7011, Sept. 21, 2009). And we are more than a little proud to crow that our reading of the tea leaves around last year’s NB is proving accurate and influential.

    The Civil Air Patrol is a private, congressionally-chartered corporation that acts as an Auxiliary of the U.S. Air Force when requested by the Secretary of the Air Force. Head-quartered at Maxwell AFB, Ala., its Web site is at www.gocivilairpatrol.com .

 

National Guard soldiers return from Afghanistan

    

    There were tears and hugs yesterday at a welcome home celebration for 60 members of the Alabama Army National Guard.

 

A Busch Stadium send-off for Navy recruits

By Jim Corvey, NOTF-St. Louis

    Yesterday, about 100 U.S. Navy recruits were sent off to basic training in a traditional St. Louis send-off.

    In the 52nd annual "Cardinal Company" ceremony, the recruits were sworn in wearing red shirts. They had a picnic with their families at the Soldiers Memorial yester afternoon, then marched to Busch Stadium.

    An enlistment ceremony was held on the field before the game (last night against division rival Cincinnati), the group watched the game, and then headed off to basic training to applause from the appreciative crowd.

    The St. Louis Cardinals and the local Navy recruiting office have been holding "Cardinal Company" since 1958.

 

Japan set to dispose of chemical arms in China
    Japan is finally moving to dispose of chemical weapons left in China by the Imperial Japanese Army at the end of World War II.

    Munitions are to be blown up and chemicals rendered harmless in a mobile disposal facility set up in the capital city of Jiangsu Province, officials said. A ceremony to mark the start was held last Wednesday.

    Japan to date has unearthed about 48,000 chemical munitions across China, a fraction of the estimated 400,000 that the Japanese military dumped as its forces fled the country.

    This is the first time for the disposal work to be carried out. Japan plans to destroy some 36,000 munitions kept in Nanjing, formerly Nanking, within the next 12 months. It also plans to widen the scale of operations to encompass other Chinese cities.

 

Michigan Guard unit being deployed

    

    Friends and family will bid farewell to approximately 70 Michigan Army National Guard soldiers from the Charlotte-based Headquarters Battery, 1st Battalion, 119th Field Artillery, on Tuesday, Sept. 14, as they depart for Fort McCoy, Wis., and then Iraq for a 12-month tour of duty.

    The departure ceremony will be held at 9 a.m., at the Eaton County Fairgrounds' grandstands in Charlotte, with a parade through downtown at 10 a.m.

 

Air show comes to Martinsburg

    

    About 40,000 people a day are expected to attend an air show this weekend at West Virginia's Martinsburg Air National Guard Base.

 

USS Hawaii arrives in Yokosuka
By Lt. Lara Bollinger, USN, Commander Submarine Group 7 Public Affairs 
    

    The Virginia-class fast attack submarine USS Hawaii (SSN 776) arrived at Yokosuka Naval Station, Japan, yesterday, marking the very first time in the U.S. 7th Fleet's history that a Virginia-class submarine visited the region.

    With a crew of approximately 130, Hawaii is on its first Western Pacific deployment. The boat's scheduled deployment will give Hawaii's crew the opportunity to conduct a multitude of missions and showcase the latest capabilities of the submarine fleet.

    "My crew has worked very hard to train in preparation for this important deployment," said Cmdr. Steve Mack, Hawaii's commanding officer. "I'm proud that my submarine is the first of its class to ever deploy to the Western Pacific region, and I'm looking forward to completing all assigned tasking over the next few months."

    For Culinary Specialist 3rd Class Andrew Myers, this is his first deployment. "This is my first time to ever set foot in Japan, and I'm very excited to experience the culture and sights of this beautiful country," said Myers.

    Measuring 377 feet long and weighing 7,800 tons when submerged, Hawaii is one of the U.S. Navy's newest and most technologically sophisticated submarines. The state-of-the-art submarine is capable of supporting a multitude of missions, including anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface ship warfare, strike, naval special warfare involving special operations forces, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, irregular warfare and mine warfare.

 

General seeks to build professional, sustainable Afghan forces

By John D. Banusiewicz, American Forces Press Service

    

    Building Afghan security forces that are capable, professional and sustainable is going to take a long time, but also is key to long-term success, the general who leads the NATO training mission in Afghanistan said in Kabul yesterday.

    U.S. Army Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell, IV, explained the effort to reporters traveling with Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, while Mullen was in a series of private meetings at the U.S. Embassy and the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF)'s headquarters.

    When he stood up the NATO training mission there in November, Caldwell said, the enormity of the challenge was quite evident. No Afghan army or police training commands existed. The only standard for graduation from basic training was starting the course and still being there on the last day of training. Most police received no real training. The ethos that guides professional military forces was absent in the Afghan security forces. Recruiting was low, and attrition was high. In fact, Caldwell said, the Afghan army had "negative growth," recruiting only 800 new soldiers in September 2009 while losing more than 2,000 through attrition.

    With a target today of growing the Afghan security forces by 55,000 members to 306,000 by December 2011, Caldwell said, the current attrition rates indicate that 141,000 new members must be recruited and trained. If attrition improves, he added, the recruiting requirement would ease accordingly.

    The focus of the NATO training mission for its first 10 months has been to turn those trends around and lay a foundation for the professionalization of Afghanistan's security forces, the general said. The Afghan army now has had a training command for six months.

    "It's going like gangbusters," Caldwell said. "We've got the right advisors and they're working with them. They've appointed a good Afghan commander, and they are taking control of the training for their Afghan army." A training command for Afghan police was activated in May, and a commander has just been appointed, Caldwell said, and the Afghan police now have a good code of conduct.

    Afghan police have a reputation for being corrupt, Caldwell said, citing reports of police officers shaking people down for money, using tactics such as setting up illegal checkpoints and charging people to pass through them. When he found out that police officers were being paid far less than a living wage, he said, he understood how that could happen. "We had set the conditions so that a policeman was not even able to make a basic minimum wage by serving his country," Caldwell said. Now that police make a decent wage on a par with their army counterparts, he added, the incentive for corruption diminishes and police have a sense they are part of a professional force that is a viable career option.

    Soldiers and police now can receive additional incentive pay for serving in dangerous areas, as well as longevity pay raises that reward them for continuing to serve.

    And trainees now must meet standards. The weapon qualification rate for Afghan soldiers and police at the end of basic training is now 97 percent. "That's just as good as the U.S. Army," Caldwell noted. The 3 percent who don't qualify at that point receive more training and then qualify.

    Leader development is a limiting factor in building professional forces, Caldwell said, and the training mission has taken on that issue as a top priority, greatly increasing capacity to train soldiers and police officers to become effective leaders.

    Another limiting factor is literacy, the general said, noting that 80 percent of the recruits can't read or write. "It's real hard, especially for us, to comprehend that they couldn't even write their names and they didn't know any numbers," he said. Weapons accountability is impossible, he noted as an example, when the soldiers or police can't read the serial number and know whether they have the right weapon. If a recruit can't read the list of equipment he was supposed to be issued, the general added, he won't know if the person issuing the equipment is holding equipment back to sell on the black market, so the crime goes undetected.

    When the NATO training mission stood up in November, some Afghan recruits were enrolled in optional literacy programs, but no mandatory programs existed, Caldwell said. Now, 23,000 members of Afghanistan's security forces are in mandatory literacy training designed to give them a third-grade reading level. That number will be 50,000 in December, he added, and is expected to be 100,000 on any given day by June.

    In the effort to move Afghan forces toward self-sufficiency, Caldwell noted, a basic level of literacy becomes especially important as training goes beyond infantry skills and starts to include more specialized areas such as transportation, maintenance and medical disciplines.

    Another challenge is finding qualified Afghan instructors, the general said. Hiring only Afghan instructors, he explained, is critical to building the enduring capability that is key to long-term success.

    And training doesn't end when Afghan units finish their formal training, Caldwell said. The vast majority of operations now involve Afghan units working alongside ISAF partners, so their training continues as they learn on the job from professional forces.

    Though the progress has been considerable in 10 months, Caldwell said, it will be a long time before the Afghan security forces have matured to the point at which they can see to all of their training, recruiting and retention needs without help and field professional and sustainable forces on their own.

    "Our mission is not one that is done by next summer, or even next December," Caldwell said. The need to continue growing and professionalizing the Afghan forces will remain for some time, he added.

 

Trainers build new Afghan health system

By Judith Snyderman, Defense Media Activity

    For hands-on medical professionals it is very difficult to stand back and watch others deliver care. Yet, that is precisely the job of some 250 members of a nine-month-old medical training advisory group serving in Afghanistan.

    "That is our pathway to transition here, to help the Afghans perform and to increase their capability, not by doing it for them, but rather by advising them and stepping back," U.S. Air Force Col. (Dr.) Schuyler K. Geller said during a Sept. 2 "DoD Live" Bloggers Roundtable discussion.

    Geller is the command surgeon and commander of the medical training advisory group at Camp Eggers, NATO Training Mission-Afghanistan/Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan.

    Geller said one of first things incoming advisors get is a medical mentor's manual that describes their role, "not as a clinician, not as a nurse, not as a technician, but as a trainer."

    He said mentors are often embedded in Afghan army and police hospitals, and at regional hospitals. The largest facility and the premier training institution for Afghan nurses, doctors and combat medics, Geller said, is the 400-bed National Military Hospital in Kabul.

    The time and effort required to become proficient in medical fields is intensive, Geller said. For instance, he said, "the physicians' training program in Afghanistan takes a 12th-grader and puts them through a seven-year training program."

    Geller said officials are working to recruit more Afghan doctors, nurses and other medical specialists to bolster the country's medical force. He pointed out that the goal is not just to train Afghan health care workers, but to train them as instructors who will be able to carry on and sustain the effort independently. Geller cited impressive progress on that front.

    "We will be able to transition in October the combat medic training, the medical officer's basic training, the medical sergeants or NCO training program and the logistics training program, entirely over to the Afghans," he said.

    Geller said he anticipates completing the transition of the remainder of nursing, physician assistants, biomedical maintenance, preventative medicine, lab, X-ray and other training programs by 2013.

 

Marine follows family heritage

By Cpl. Ned Johnson, USMC, Regimental Combat Team 2

U.S. Marine Corps Sgt. Dominick Valerio, a squad leader with Company K, 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, teaches a casualty evacuation class in Sangin, Afghanistan, Aug. 27. Valerio views every moment with his squad as an opportunity to teach them something new, preparing them for the challenges that await them. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Ned Johnson)

 

    U.S. Marine Corps Sgt. Dominick Valerio said he joined the military because the men in his family have always defended America's freedom.

    "My grandfather served in World War II, and both my uncles are Vietnam vets," said Valerio, a squad leader here with Company K, 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment. "My brothers also serve in the Army."

    Having served in the Marine Corps Security Forces, Valerio said he likes teaching young Marines. Though he always knew he would end up in the military, Valerio said the Marine Corps' "dragon slayer" commercial convinced him to become a Marine.

    Valerio said he wanted to emulate a member of his family who serves as a Marine infantryman, known in military vernacular as a "grunt."

    "My brother-in-law is with the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines, and is a 'grunt,'" said Valerio, a 22-year-old native of Phelps, New York. "I knew I wanted to be an infantryman and I told the recruiter I would do nothing else."

    After completing basic infantryman training, Valerio was given the opportunity to receive advanced training when he elected to work in security forces rather than a regular infantry line company. "As a 'Security Forces' Marine," Valerio said, "I went to the Urban Assault Leader's Course, Joint Fires Observer Course, Infantry Squad Leader's Course, and a ton of other schools."

    Lance Cpl. Ryan Kinne, a team leader with Company K, said he appreciates Valerio's mentorship. "He will teach you anything you want to know, if you ask," said Kinne, a 21-year-old native of San Antonio, Texas. "He's given us classes on calling for fire, medical evacuation procedures and lots of other things."

    Valerio said his teaching style is anything but conventional. "I like to use physical training to teach Marines," he said. "We might go on a run and I can tell when everyone needs a break, so I'll stop and teach them something important."

    Valerio said he also incorporates other types of physical training into his instruction, like carrying a litter and other tasks Marines may have to perform under fire.

    In Afghanistan, Kinne said, Valerio's training sessions have had a positive impact on the battlefield. "We have taken casualties and we have had to transport them to a landing zone and call in a casualty report," he said. "That's where the training paid off."

    Kinne said Valerio's "people" skills help him to connect with his Marines. "He is very well-spoken,' Kinne said of Valerio. "He can explain something no matter who you are."

    Other Marines who know Valerio, like Lance Cpl. Joshua Matthews, a team leader with Company K, say his physical courage, military skills and teaching ability have gained him the respect of his subordinates and superiors.

    But Valerio also has earned his Marines' trust because of his moral courage, Matthews said. "My favorite thing about him as a squad leader is that he sticks up for his Marines," Matthews said of Valerio. "Even at the risk of getting himself in trouble, he has stood beside Marines that he thought were in the right."

 

 

 

                                       Just how the hell did this happen?

                                            

      

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