Download or read book Human Terrain Teams written by Christopher J. Lamb and published by . This book was released on 2013-06 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study explains the performance of Human Terrain Teams, why the large majority of commanders found them useful, and why collectively they did not ameliorate-much less reverse-growing cross-cultural tensions between U.S. forces and Afghans. It examines the tremendous challenges the Human Terrain Team program faced in starting and rapidly expanding a non-traditional military capability, and why some challenges were met successfully while others were not. First, a historical analysis explains how external forces and management decisions affected team performance. An organizational analysis then explains the variations in team performance by examining the teams with variables substantiated by previous studies of small cross-functional teams. Finally, all available commander observations on Human Terrain Team performance are analyzed to better determine why commanders were satisfied or dissatisfied with their teams. The insights from the three analyses-historical, organizational and commander assessments-are then integrated. The results demonstrate that Human Terrain Teams had to overcome numerous organizational limitations to perform well, but that they were able to meet the expectations of commanders who did not fully appreciate the optimum role the teams could play in an integrated counterinsurgency strategy.

Download or read book The Human Terrain System written by Christopher J. Sims and published by Department of the Army. This book was released on 2015 with total page 528 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Human Terrain System embedded civilians primarily in brigade combat teams (BCTs) in Iraq and Afghanistan between 2007 and 2014 to act as a collection and dispersal mechanism for sociocultural comprehension. Set against the backdrop of the program's evolution, the experiences of these social scientists clarifies the U.S. Army's decision to integrate social scientists at the tactical level in conflict. Based on interviews, program documents, material from Freedom of Information Act requests, and secondary sources, this book finds a series of limiting factors inhibiting social science research at the tactical level, common to both Iraq and Afghanistan. Complexity in integrating civilians into the military decision-making cycle, in creating timely research with a high level of fidelity, and in making granular research that resonated with brigade staff all contributed to inhibiting the overall effect of the Human Terrain System. Yet, while high operational tempo in contested spaces complicates social science research at the tactical level, the author argues that there is a continued requirement for a residual capability to be maintained by the U.S. Army. Related items: Other resources produced by the Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/agency/1609 Weapon of Choice: U.S. Army Special Operations Forces in Afghanistan can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/products/sku/008-029-00431-3 Counterinsurgency Leadership in Afghanistan, Iraq and Beyond can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/products/sku/008-046-00274-6 Surging South of Baghdad: The 3d Infantry Division and Task Force MARNE in Iraq, 2007-2008 can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/products/sku/008-029-00522-1 Iraq and Persian Gulf Wars collection can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/catalog/us-military-history/battles-wars/iraq-persian-gulf-wars Training Humans for the Human Domain can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/products/sku/008-000-01173-7 Paid to Perform: Aligning Total Military Compensation With Talent Management can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/node/49300/edit The Effective Use of Reserve Personnel in the U.S. Military: Lessons From The United Kingdom Reserve Model can be found at this link: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/products/sku/008-000-01100-1 Afghanistan War collection can be found here: https: //bookstore.gpo.gov/catalog/us-military-history/wars-conflicts/afghanistan-war

Download or read book Human Terrain System written by Christopher J. Sims and published by Declassified Press. This book was released on 2018-04-19 with total page 186 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: To avoid the footpaths which may have been mined with improvised explosive devices (IEDs), Ryan Evans, a U.S. federal civilian, was walking across a wheat field in Babaji, Helmand Province, in the spring of 2011. Evans was attached to the Royal Highland Fusiliers (2 Scots), C Company, a heavy infantry patrol tasked with providing security in the vicinity. Begun 2 years earlier, the Helmand Food Zone Program was a form of development intervention which offered subsidies, seed, and fertilizers to farmers who replaced lucrative opium cultivation from poppies with growing and harvesting wheat and vegetable crops. Babaji had been in the control of insurgents until a few months earlier and had not received any assistance from the program during the previous year; consequently, there were tensions between the community and British forces. As Evans and the patrol emerged from the field, an Afghan man sitting nearby, clearly irate, shouted in Pashto that the British soldiers had wanted the farmer to grow wheat instead of poppy, and then the same British soldiers walked through their fields. At the immediate level, the encounter demonstrated the direct link between conflict, food security, and local trade, but conflict has many interrelated and mutual dependencies such that the anecdote is instructive on myriad broader milieus. Where, for example, is the tipping point that makes a civilian value creating an expression of discontent to a heavily armed patrol above his immediate physical security? Do livelihoods and cultures affect military strategies? Are there interdependencies between insurgencies, societies, and economies? Does the language of war require a sociological grammar in order to be understood? Armed conflict is a human enterprise such that, by extension, understanding of the human dimension in a given area of operations should be thought integral to planning successful operations...

Download or read book Social Science Goes to War written by Montgomery McFate and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2015-01-11 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Human Terrain System (HTS) was catapulted into existence in 2006 by the US military's urgent need for knowledge of the human dimension of the battlespace in Iraq and Afghanistan. Its centrepiece was embedded groups of mixed military and civilian personnel, known as Human Terrain Teams (HTTs), whose mission was to conduct social science research and analysis and to advise military commanders about the local population. Bringing social science - and actual social scientists - to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was bold and challenging. Despite the controversy over HTS among scholars, there is little good, reliable source material written by those with experience of HTS or about the actual work carried out by teams in theatre. This volume goes beyond the anecdotes, snippets and blogs to provide a comprehensive, objective and detailed view of HTS. The contributors put the program in historical context, discuss the obstacles it faced, analyse its successes, and detail the work of the teams downrange. Most importantly, they capture some of the diverse lived experience of HTS scholars and practitioners drawn from an eclectic array of the social sciences.

Download or read book Social Science Goes to War written by Montgomery McFate and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2015-01-11 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Human Terrain System (HTS) was catapulted into existence in 2006 by the US military's urgent need for knowledge of the human dimension of the battlespace in Iraq and Afghanistan. Its centrepiece was embedded groups of mixed military and civilian personnel, known as Human Terrain Teams (HTTs), whose mission was to conduct social science research and analysis and to advise military commanders about the local population. Bringing social science - and actual social scientists - to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was bold and challenging. Despite the controversy over HTS among scholars, there is little good, reliable source material written by those with experience of HTS or about the actual work carried out by teams in theatre. This volume goes beyond the anecdotes, snippets and blogs to provide a comprehensive, objective and detailed view of HTS. The contributors put the program in historical context, discuss the obstacles it faced, analyse its successes, and detail the work of the teams downrange. Most importantly, they capture some of the diverse lived experience of HTS scholars and practitioners drawn from an eclectic array of the social sciences.

Download or read book The Human Terrain System written by Christopher J. Sims and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2015-12-24 with total page 522 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The announcement that the Human Terrain System (HTS) was brought to a close in the fall of 2014 met with a flurry of responses. Commentators assessed the character and content of the social science research program and several identified plausible legacies that it may bequeath U.S. Armed Services. Often the conclusions therein were mixed, hinting instructively at the absence of a strong empirical record of the program. Therefore, this book is a welcomed larger study of the HTS, one of the first investigations to delineate the experiences of former program members, chart the stance of the American Anthropological Association, and gain engagement both from the U.S. Training and Doctrine Command, and a manager from the first primary contractor, BAE Systems. As a scholarly assessment of the complex interplay of these perspectives, the book becomes part of an attempt to find a platform for collaboration and discussion on what has become a profoundly polarizing subject.

Download or read book The Tender Soldier written by Vanessa M. Gezari and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-08-13 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Part of the Pentagon's most daring and controversial attempt since Vietnam to bring social science to the Afghanistan battlefield, three tough-minded American civilians find their humanity tested and their lives forever changed by this little-known mission.

Download or read book Social Science Goes to War written by Montgomery McFate and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Military Anthropology written by Montgomery McFate and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-01 with total page 503 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In almost every military intervention in its history, the US has made cultural mistakes that hindered attainment of its policy goals. From the strategic bombing of Vietnam to the accidental burning of the Koran in Afghanistan, it has blundered around with little consideration of local cultural beliefs and for the long-term effects on the host nation's society. Cultural anthropology--the so-called "handmaiden of colonialism"--has historically served as an intellectual bridge between Western powers and local nationals. What light can it shed on the intersection of the US military and foreign societies today? This book tells the story of anthropologists who worked directly for the military, such as Ursula Graham Bower, the only woman to hold a British combat command during WWII. Each faced challenges including the negative outcomes of exporting Western political models and errors of perception. Ranging from the British colonial era in Africa to the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Military Anthropology illustrates the conceptual, cultural and practical barriers encountered by military organisations operating in societies vastly different from their own.

Download or read book Human Terrain written by Emily Bullock and published by . This book was released on 2021-08 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Soft Counterinsurgency Human Terrain Teams and US Military Strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan written by Paul Joseph and published by Springer. This book was released on 2014-06-06 with total page 119 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Soft" Counterinsurgency reviews the promises and achievements of Human Terrain Teams, the small groups of social scientists that were eventually embedded in every combat brigade in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Download or read book Up Down and Sideways written by Rachael Stryker and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2014-08-01 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using a “vertical slice” approach, anthropologists critically analyze the relationship between undemocratic uses and abuses of power and the survival of the human species. The contributors scrutinize modern institutions in a variety of regions—from Russia and Mexico to South Korea and the U.S. Up, Down, and Sideways is an ethnographic examination of such phenomena as debtculture, global financial crises, food insecurity, indigenous land and resource appropriation, the mismanagement of health care, andcorporate surrogacy within family life. With a preface by Laura Nader, this isessential reading for anyone seeking solid theories and concrete methods to inform activist scholarship.

Download or read book American Counterinsurgency written by Roberto Jesús González and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critiques the Pentagon's Counterinsurgency Field Manual, which offered a blueprint for mobilizing the cultural expertise of anthropologists for the war in Iraq. Explores the ethical and intellectual conflicts of the Pentagon's Human Terrain System, and probes the increasing militarization of academic knowledge.

Download or read book Uncommon Ground Rethinking the Human Place in Nature written by William Cronon and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 1996-10-17 with total page 564 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A controversial, timely reassessment of the environmentalist agenda by outstanding historians, scientists, and critics. In a lead essay that powerfully states the broad argument of the book, William Cronon writes that the environmentalist goal of wilderness preservation is conceptually and politically wrongheaded. Among the ironies and entanglements resulting from this goal are the sale of nature in our malls through the Nature Company, and the disputes between working people and environmentalists over spotted owls and other objects of species preservation. The problem is that we haven't learned to live responsibly in nature. The environmentalist aim of legislating humans out of the wilderness is no solution. People, Cronon argues, are inextricably tied to nature, whether they live in cities or countryside. Rather than attempt to exclude humans, environmental advocates should help us learn to live in some sustainable relationship with nature. It is our home.

Download or read book US Army s Human Terrain System 2008 2013 written by John Stanton and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Mapping the Human Terrain in Afghanistan written by Kevin R. Golinghorst and published by Createspace Independent Pub. This book was released on 2012-09-16 with total page 78 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the initial invasion in 2001 through the ongoing counterinsurgency (COIN) operations in Afghanistan, the U.S. Army has been challenged with truly understanding the socio-cultural dynamics of the local populace which has become known as the human terrain. The foundational theory, historical examples, and evolving military doctrine related to COIN has continually emphasized the importance of a population-centric approach but has often lacked the necessary detail on how this can be accomplished. In an attempt to help fill this void, the U.S. Army established the Human Terrain System (HTS) in 2006 which met initial resistance and developmental challenges as a new proof of concept program. While concurrent efforts by the Civil Affairs community with their Civil Information Management (CIM) initiatives have made steady progress, the full civil common operating picture at varying levels has yet to be realized. Lastly, the entire Joint, Interagency, Intergovernmental, and Multinational (JIIM) community also has much to offer in providing a whole of government approach to understanding the human terrain in Afghanistan. Therefore, the U.S. Army must first integrate both programs, HTS and CIM, internally and then direct increased collaboration within the external JIIM community in order to develop a more comprehensive approach. The ultimate success of combined COIN operations in Afghanistan and the long-term stability of the country depend on the ability to understand this complex human terrain.

Download or read book Is There a Better Home for the Army s Human Terrain System written by Scott A. Schmunk and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ""The future of HTS is unclear," writes Roberto J. Gonzalez, Associate Professor of Anthropology at San Jose State University and staunch critic of the United States Army's Human Terrain System (HTS). With the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan drawing to a close and military budgets projected to tighten significantly over the next decade, the professor's statement couldn't be more timely and relevant. Initiated in 2006 as a quickly developed capability to fix the military's admitted lack of sociocultural knowledge about the peoples and regions in which it was deployed, the HTS program quickly became hailed as a vital, and emphatically non-lethal, tool in counterinsurgency operations by some while likewise being decried as a wrongful use of social science by others. ... Given present controversy and the benefit of hindsight to reflect on nearly six years of HTS successes and failures, the uncertainty surrounding the future of HTS and its affiliation with the military must be addressed. The ensuing discussion focuses on providing a potential solution."--Abstract.