Embrace Reality and Shape the Future

Abstract

General Tony Zinni recently wrote, "I felt that if we were more aggressive and did a better job of planning and coordinating engagement programs -- military, diplomatic, economic, cultural, etc. -- we could truly "shape" a more stable, secure, and productive environment in troubled regions of the world." The United States needs an institution or entity to fill the capacity void at the tactical level of diplomacy. The U.S. Marine Corps is uniquely suited to conduct operations across the engagement spectrum. Although there are other U.S. military organizations that are better suited to conduct specific missions, the Marine Corps' true uniqueness lies in its general-purpose utility in being a force for all seasons. DoD discusses what broadly defines engagement in terms of security cooperation, but this unnecessarily narrows the possibilities of what the Marine Corps can do to promote U.S. interests abroad. The Marine Corps is following the DoD lead as it too focuses its institutional energy on building military-to-military training capacities. The Marine Corps should seek to fill the tactical diplomacy void with an engagement strategy that takes a holistic approach. The Marine Corps has yet to fully explore the potential benefits for it as an organization of developing robust engagement capabilities. The Marine Corps needs to make at least four specific changes to improve its non-kinetic capability sets and its ability to perform effective ESCO. The Marine Corps should create MAGTFs specifically designed to conduct ESCO; increase its capacity to employ critical Military Occupational Specialties; expand the breadth and depth of civil-military operations (CMO) training; and establish a Headquarters Marine Corps (HQMC)-level Civil-Military Operations Center (CMOC) to collaborate with other agencies and organizations, especially USAID.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2008
Accession Number
ADA490718

Entities

People

  • P. R. Roberson Jr.

Organizations

  • Marine Corps University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Biomedical
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Human Systems
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Amphibious Operations
  • Commerce
  • Department Of State
  • Employment
  • Governments
  • Humanitarian Assistance
  • Interagency Coordination
  • Military Exercises
  • Military Operations
  • Military Organizations
  • Military Science
  • Military Training
  • National Governments
  • National Security
  • Personnel Management
  • United States Southern Command
  • Warfare

Readers

  • Joint Military Operations and Doctrine.
  • Maritime Combat Support and Expeditionary Logistics.
  • Strategic Security Studies