There’s been “significant” progress in the NATO Training Mission-Afghanistan (NTM-A), but the goal is for enduring achievement once the transition of national security responsibility is passed to the Afghan government by the end of 2014, the commander said.
“It has to last,” just a transition is not enough, said Lt. Gen. William Caldwell, commander of NATO NTM-A, and commander of Combined Security Transition Command, Afghanistan.
Questions he continually asks include: “how to achieve transition and make it last, and how do we know the investment is worth it.”
Since he took over the training mission, Caldwell sees “echoes of the past” everywhere, destroyed or abandoned and broken down military vehicles, all that’s left of an Afghan government and its armed forces of some 15 years ago. He doesn’t want to see that happen after the U.S. and international efforts.
That’s the message Caldwell brought to the Association of the United States Army Institute for Land Warfare (ILW) breakfast yesterday during a trip to Washington where he spoke earlier in the week at The Brookings Institution and been heard on National Public Radio, among other forums.
In Brussels yesterday in his last NATO news conference, Defense Secretary Robert Gates also said there had been progress improving the capabilities of the Afghan National Security Force (ANSF) “particularly the Army both in numbers and in quality.”
The Afghan National Army has grown as the training force builds Afghan formations and prepares them to take over. There are 296,000 now, but “the mission is not yet done,” Caldwell said.He said he expects some number of U.S. trainers to be on the ground until around 2016-2017, but that’s not a firm timeframe.
At the 2009 Lisbon Conference, the international community set a goal of October 2011 for a force of 305,000.
Part of the effort to have the transition endure is to institutionalize training with the creation of “national standards not only for the army but most recently for the police forces,” he said.
Additionally, it is important that ANSF have the right equipment and infrastructure, thus “capable, affordable and sustainable weapons,” Caldwell said. The United States and its international partners have made large investments in equipment that meets that criteria.
The bottom line on equipment procurement, he said, was “is it right for Afghanistan?” And that applies to everything they do. For example, jets and tanks are no longer being bought because they’re not needed to handle ANSF missions.
ANSF is focusing on building a light infantry force, and achieving its growth goals will allow it to “slow down its growth and truly focus on the quality our force,” Minister of Defense Gen. Abdul Rahim Wardak wrote in a Special Edition: Afghan National Army, Shoulder to Shoulder, a NTM-A publication available at the ILW breakfast.
Providing a safe and secure environment will allow the nation to “thrive,” Wardak said.
Another way toward providing an enduring post-transition era is through literacy. Caldwell said. When he arrived in 2009 he didn’t think it was part of his portfolio; now he’s a major literacy booster.
“We know through testing that of every new recruit that comes into the army and police today, only one out of 10 can read and write,” he said. Now literacy is part of “every single training program” NTM-A conducts. More than 32,000 Afghans are in various training programs, and everyone takes two hours of literacy every day, “Literacy is the essential enabler for everything we’re doing,” he said. “Without it, we will not succeed.”
To date, NTM-A has trained “just over 90,000 young men in how to become literate,” he said. It is the basic ability to read and write so they can function, properly account for things, write a report, read their pay statement; and ensure they have the right weapon because they can read and understand the serial number.
It’s hard to describe how meaningful it is to have a basic level of literacy, he said, relating a story of how an excited young Afghan soldier came up to him, waving his fingers in the air, saying “I knew I had a lot of fingers…there’s 10!”
“Training, education and experience make a great force,” he said. The security force has the training and education, now they need more experience.
There’s an Afghan proverb, Caldwell said, “if you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go with others.” That’s how it works in Afghanistan. It’s a U.S. and international effort supporting Afghanistan as it becomes a self-reliant partner nation.