Great, Thanks! Now What?

This blog grew out of a question I posed during my director's philosephy introduction that he gives to all newcomers. My organization is dedicated to building Afghanistan's security forces. The projections have increased significantly in the last few months with targets for the Afghan National Army (ANA) and Afghan National Police (ANP) projected to be over 130,000 and 109,000 respectively by October, and a total increase to over 300,000 by 2011. That's a huge undertaking, and is a key to one of the three "T"s (Transition) that our leadership has touted as themes in our operations. Obviously, the goal of transition is critical to ensuring Afghans can begin to take control of their country, and enabling coalition forces to draw down and eventually leave behind what will most likely be a token force (if any) in the country.

The question I asked was, "Who is planning the transition?" It turns out, at least from what we can see at our level, there is little central control over the transition plans. Instead it's left up to individual organizations working with the ANA and ANP. This question hit me after I learned that the leading ANA communicator, Major General Ali, had seen his first computer only 5 years ago! I wondered if we (who are so heavily dependent on our automation) were training a force that could be sustained by the Afghan Government after we left, and if the influx of international aid was decreased (current aid figures are in the neighborhood of $57 billion, over 4 times the 2009 national GDP of $13.32 billion). A computer system is an energy hog, and in a country with significant power shortages this can lead to serious problems. Generators are options, but even they are costly when you consider the amount of fuel required to keep them running. What good will a computer lab do if it takes down the whole power grid? Will the systems we're contracting to build and employ here fall into disrepair as soon as the funding well dries up?

The answer is we need to ensure we're not necessarily cultivating the best forces and practices available, but the best forces and practices for Afghanistan. As my director pointed out, the Afghans need either very high (inexpensive/energy efficient/easily repaired or replaced) technology, or very low technology (proven systems that don't rely on modern capabilities). I heard a story of a contractor who installed a state-of-the-art, completely automated fuel pumping station. It allowed one person to fill a fuel truck with the push of a button from an observation tower. When the contractor returned to inspect the system a year later, he found most of the wiring/computer systems had been scavanged, and the Afghans were operating the system manually. That system probably wasn't what was best for the Afghans.

While any social scientist will argue that the state's primary function is to provide security, a country's development can't stop there. I hope that everyone working towards the transition is considering how the Afghans will operate once we leave. We need to find a way that allows them to make their system work. We can't be training them to operate our way, we need to help them develop "the Afghan way".

Oh, and by the way, we got another conex!

- This is thinking ahead in Kabul signing out

Hey, that's my conex!

As any real estate professional will tell you, the most significant value of real estate is location. "Location, location, location," is the over-used cliche' that means a rundown row house in the center of a popular section of Gotham City is inevitably worth more than a larger, well-maintained farmhouse in the middle of Nowhereville, Nebraska. It's a simple matter of supply and demand. There are simply more people who will pay for the former crack house in Gotham, a short walk to the new metro station, Starbucks Coffee house, and the latest Thai restaurant than the little house on the prairie where you have to drive to your neightbor's place to borrow a cup of sugar, and the closest restaurant is the 10-year-old Applebee's 20 minutes away.



While I wouldn't dub Camp Eggers in Kabul, Afghanistan a booming metropolis, the space on this camp is quite limited, and the residents are plenty. Therefore, demand for real estate around here mirrors that of the row house. I run what is the equivalent of a shipping and receiving function for communications equipment. We order, receive and store many computers, printers, shredders, televisions, etc., and prep/ship them to the remote regions of Afghanistan where coalition forces set up offices to help in training new Afghan Army and Police recruits. Needless to say, the equipment doesn't just zip in and out of here in a day. We need space to store it until we can arrange the complicated logistics to ship it via aircraft or convoy. We store the equipment in conexes (basically large shipping containers) located throughout the camp. A recent surge in equipment deliveries pushed our storage capacity (3 conexes) to a max. We've had to cram extra equipment into every nook and cranny in our work space to keep it safe from the elements and anyone looking to pilfer U.S. Government property. We even stored some new Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) phones in our director's conference room. In the middle of this storage crisis I asked my hard-charging resources Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) to try and find another conex for our abundance of equipment.

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In the military we often conduct what we call "drug deals." These have nothing to do with the posession or sale of illegal substances. A military "drug deal" occurs when two units mutually benefit from helping each other out (all above board and within regulations, of course). Well, when I followed up with my resources NCO after a few days, he told me he was able to arrange a "drug deal" to get us a new conex. The owner of the conex needed a new computer and monitor. While he normally wouldn't be on the top of our list for distribution, we had plenty of supplies and we needed the space, so we agreed to furnish him with said equipment in exchange for access to the new conex...a win-win situation! This was 2 days ago.



Today I asked about the new space, and what our plan was to move our equipment into it. It turns out the conex we were promised was already full...it was full of our OWN equipment, none the less! I was so distraught that I went immediatly to consult my NCO in Charge (NCOIC). I was so consumed with trying to solve our newly resurfaced storage problem, that the obvious question of what had become of our computer and monitor slipped my mind. My savvy NCOIC quickly pointed out that we had already provided the equipment. The thought that immediately jumped into my mind was, "We've been had!" We were bamboozled into trading our collateral for our own storage conex! My regards go out to our friend who may be reading this on his new computer and monitor. Next time, I'm inspecting the conex before we provide our services.



This is Duped in Kabul signing out!