Upon further reflection and comments from two of my FAO colleagues, I decided to delete my recent post titled, "How the Government is Blocking the Next Greg Mortensen." As I've written before, it requires great care and discernment to maintain one's professionalism as a military blogger. I believe military bloggers can serve a useful function by thoughtfully critiquing military policies and suggesting improvements, but at some ill-defined point, this may cross over into unprofessionalism. I intended my recent post as a critique of something I believe has serious implications for the military's cross-cultural competence, but it may have gone too far. In its place, I offer a brief summary.
I wrote approvingly of Admiral Mullen's much-discussed piece Strategic Communication: Getting Back to Basics, which urges Americans to focus on the right actions rather than just the words. He also praises the humanitarian work of Greg Mortensen (of Three Cups of Tea fame) and urges military officers to follow Mortensen's example by entering into two-way conversation with other cultures to learn about them.
I applauded Admiral Mullen's article and ideas, but pointed out that the US government imposes strict controls on where and how military members can travel to the places and countries that most need American engagement. A US military officer has far lesson freedom to travel than a civilian. Some strategically important regions (like Lebanon and the West Bank) are off limits entirely. When US officers do obtain authorization to travel to these places, it is generally under a protective government umbrella that separates them from the population. As a US military officer I have inside access to international relations at the government level, but my ordinary civilian friends have far greater access to ordinary populations than I ever will. So long as these restrictions in place, I am concerned about the US military's ability to develop relationships and expertise in many of the regions that need it the most.
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Just came accross this entry through a tweet -- very interesting to me. I am also a military officer (currently Reserve), also blog and have second thoughts about it, and also absolutely respect and believe in what Greg Mortensen is doing. I am currently trying to decide whether to join a Civil Affairs unit to Afghanistan. The more I learn the more I think that even in Civil Affairs, I will not be able to do what I think the military should be doing: Greg Mortensen-type stuff (living with the people, wearing local clothes, eating local food, figuring out how we can best help them, building schools and bridges and centers for women to meet and work together, etc.) I fear that I will be incredibly frustrated at having my hands tied if I go as a Civil Affairs officer. I'd be under an infantry officer's command... Who knows what missions I'd end up having to go on.
So... is there a role for the military in the 3-cups-of-tea approach to "fighting terrorism"? One thing that struck me in his book is that he turned down millions of dollars, so as to not be associated with the military. If that's the case, is there anything that we can do, or should we all just go home?
Would love to hear your thoughts.
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