Advice for Advisors: 

Suggestions and 

Observations from 

Lawrence to the 

Present

Robert D. Ramsey III

Global War on Terrorism

Occasional Paper 19

Combat Studies Institute Press

Fort Leavenworth, Kansas

Advice for Advisors: 

Suggestions and 

Observations from 

Lawrence to the 

Present

by

Robert D. Ramsey III

Combat Studies Institute Press

Fort Leavenworth, Kansas
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Advice for advisors : suggestions and observations from Lawrence to the present 

/ [edited] by Robert D. Ramsey III.

 p. cm. -- (Global war on terrorism occasional paper 19)

 “CSI Occasional Paper, GWOT OP #19.”

 1. Military assistance. 2. Military assistance, American. I. Ramsey, Robert D., 

1946- II. Series.

 UA12.A348 2006

 355’.032--dc22

 2006028226

CSI Press publications cover a variety of military history topics. The views expressed 

in this CSI Press publication are those of the author and not necessarily those of the 

Department of the Army or the Department of Defense.

A full list of CSI Press publications, many of them available for downloading, can 

be found at http://www.cgsc.army.mil/carl/resources/csi/csi.asp.

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Fax: (202) 512-2250 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402-0001

ISBN 0-16-076875-6
iii

Foreword

CSI Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) Occasional Paper (OP) 19, 

Advice for Advisors: Suggestions and Observations from Lawrence to the 

Present, could not be timelier. While always a mission for some Army 

units, advising indigenous forces has become a major task for many Army 

units and for thousands of Soldiers, both Active and Reserve.

CSI is publishing this occasional paper as a supplement to Occasional 

Paper 18, Advising Indigenous Forces: American Advisors in Korea, Vietnam, and El Salvador. In that important study, Mr. Robert Ramsey distilled the insights gained by the US Army from its advisory experiences in 

Korea, Vietnam, and El Salvador. In this anthology, Mr. Ramsey presents 

14 insightful, personal accounts from those who advised foreign armies in 

various times and places over the last 100 years.

Unlike most of the monographs in our GWOT Occasional Paper 

series, this volume is an anthology. The articles are from past and present 

advisors, and they are presented without editing or commentary. Each 

one presents valuable lessons, insights, and suggestions from the authors’ 

firsthand experiences. Readers will thus make their own judgments and 

analysis in support of their unique requirements. 

We at CSI believe GWOT OP 19, like OP 18, will be of great value to 

Soldiers and units who are preparing to embark on an advisory mission and 

to those training organizations that are preparing Soldiers for this difficult 

and vital task. CSI—The Past is Prologue!

Timothy R. Reese

Colonel, Armor

Director, Combat Studies Institute

v

Contents

Page

Foreword ............................................................................................... iii

Introduction ..............................................................................................1

Reading 1. “Twenty-Seven Articles” by T.E. Lawrence .......................3

Reading 2. “The Nationbuilder: Soldier of the Sixties” by 

Captain Richard A. Jones ..................................................11

Reading 3. “American Advisors Overseas” by Edward C. Stewart ....17

Reading 4. “The District Advisor” by Captain James F. Ray ..............25

Reading 5. “Advisor and Counterpart” by Colonel Bryce F. Denno ...33

Reading 6. “Advising the Advisor” by Major Irving C. Hudlin ..........45

Reading 7. “Senior Officer Debriefing Report” by Major General 

John H. Cushman .............................................................49

Reading 8. “Some Advice for the Prospective Advisor” by 

Major David L. Shelton ....................................................65

Reading 9. “After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief” 

by Major Gregory T. Banner .............................................71

Reading 10. “From the Ashes: Rebuilding the Iraqi Army” by 

Major Mike Sullivan .........................................................87

Reading 11. “The Role of the American Advisor” by Major O. 

Kent Strader ......................................................................93

Reading 12. “Training Iraqi Forces” by Major David H. Marshall .....105

Reading 13. “Marine Foreign Military Advisors: The Road 

Ahead” by Lieutenant Colonel Andrew R. Milburn 

and Major Mark C. Lombard ..........................................111

Reading 14. “The American Military Advisor and His Foreign 

Counterpart: The Case of Vietnam” by Gerald C. 

Hickey .............................................................................119

About the Author ..................................................................................181



Introduction

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and 

some few to be chewed and digested.

—Francis Bacon, Of Studies

During the research for Global War on Terrorism Occasional Paper 

(OP) 18, Advising Indigenous Forces: American Advisors in Korea, 

Vietnam, and El Salvador, the author consulted numerous firsthand and 

secondary sources. Toward the end of the publication process for OP 18, 

the Combat Studies Institute decided that a collection of some of this material would provide useful reading for those involved in the advisory effort. 

The result of sorting through research materials is Occasional Paper 19, 

Advice for Advisors: Suggestions and Observations from Lawrence to the 

Present, a collection of 14 readings.

Often it is more useful to read an article or study in its entirety than to 

read a summary or a series of quotations from it. Ranging from World War 

I to the present, this collection of articles, after action reports, and a RAND 

study was assembled from documents written for advisors by advisors and 

experts in the field. With one exception, the readings are in chronological 

order. The first reading, a list of suggestions T.E. Lawrence wrote for his 

fellow advisors during the Arab Revolt, is often referred to today. The next 

six readings from the Vietnam era include articles from military publications and a 1972 after action report. An article and after action report from 

El Salvador follow the Vietnam readings. The next four articles address 

recent advisory efforts. The last reading is an important RAND study on 

advisor-counterpart relationships from 1965.

For those interested in previous advisory efforts, the bibliography 

of OP 18 identifies several firsthand and secondary sources. Additional 

firsthand accounts currently available in paperback books include Martin 

Dockery, Lost in Translation: VIETNAM, A Combat Advisor’s Story, 

the experiences of a battalion advisor; David Donovan, Once a Warrior 

King: Memories of an Officer in Vietnam, the story of a Mobile Advisory 

Team chief and senior district advisor; and Stuart A. Herrington, Stalking 

the Vietcong: Inside Operation Phoenix: A Personal Account, published 

previously as Silence Was a Weapon: The Vietnam War in the Villages. 

Firsthand accounts available in hardback books include John Cook, The 

Advisor: The Phoenix Program in Vietnam; Edward P. Metzner, More 

Than a Soldier’s War: Pacification in Vietnam; and John G. Miller, The 

Co-Vans: US Marine Advisors in Vietnam.
Just as with OP 18, the focus of this collection of readings has been 

on advisors and the challenges they confront. Hopefully those involved 

in advising will find that these readings deserve to be, in Bacon’s 

words, “tasted” and several perhaps even worthy of being “chewed and 

digested.”


Reprinted from The Arab Bulletin, 20 August 1917, BYU webpage, http://www.

lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1917/27arts.html.

Reading 1

Twenty-Seven Articles

T.E. Lawrence

T.E. Lawrence, the famous Lawrence of Arabia, wrote this 

piece for The Arab Bulletin in August 1917 to provide suggestions to his fellow advisors who worked with the Arabs in 

Arabia. Lawrence offered specific suggestions based on his 

personal experience reinforced by insights from his academic 

background and years of experience in the region. A detailed 

account of his experiences during the Arab Revolt appeared in 

Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph. His thoughts and insights 

remain useful today.

The following notes have been expressed in commandment form for 

greater clarity and to save words. They are, however, only my personal 

conclusions, arrived at gradually while I worked in the Hejaz and now 

put on paper as stalking horses for beginners in the Arab armies. They are 

meant to apply only to Bedu [Bedouin]; townspeople or Syrians require 

totally different treatment. They are of course not suitable to any other person’s need, or applicable unchanged in any particular situation. Handling 

Hejaz Arabs is an art, not a science, with exceptions and no obvious rules. 

At the same time we have a great chance there; the Sherif [Feisel] trusts 

us, and has given us the position (towards his Government) which the 

Germans wanted to win in Turkey. If we are tactful, we can at once retain 

his goodwill and carry out our job, but to succeed we have got to put into 

it all the interest and skill we possess.

1.	 Go easy for the first few weeks. A bad start is difficult to atone for,

and the Arabs form their judgments on externals that we ignore. When 

you have reached the inner circle in a tribe, you can do as you please with 

yourself and them. 

2. Learn all you can about your Ashraf [tribal name] and Bedu. Get to 

know their families, clans and tribes, friends and enemies, wells, hills and 

roads. Do all this by listening and by indirect inquiry. Do not ask questions. Get to speak their dialect of Arabic, not yours. Until you can understand their allusions, avoid getting deep into conversation or you will drop 

bricks. Be a little stiff at first.


3. In matters of business deal only with the commander of the army, 

column, or party in which you serve. Never give orders to anyone at all, 

and reserve your directions or advice for the C.O., however great the 

temptation (for efficiency’s sake) of dealing with his underlings. Your

place is advisory, and your advice is due to the commander alone. Let him 

see that this is your conception of your duty, and that his is to be the sole 

executive of your joint plans.

4.	 Win and keep the confidence of your leader. Strengthen his prestige at

your expense before others when you can. Never refuse or quash schemes 

he may put forward; but ensure that they are put forward in the first

instance privately to you. Always approve them, and after praise modify 

them insensibly, causing the suggestions to come from him, until they are 

in accord with your own opinion. When you attain this point, hold him to 

it, keep a tight grip of his ideas, and push them forward as firmly as possibly, but secretly, so that to one but himself (and he not too clearly) is aware 

of your pressure. 

5. Remain in touch with your leader as constantly and unobtrusively as 

you can. Live with him, that at meal times and at audiences you may be 

naturally with him in his tent. Formal visits to give advice are not so good 

as the constant dropping of ideas in casual talk. When stranger sheikhs 

come in for the first time to swear allegiance and offer service, clear out

of the tent. If their first impression is of foreigners in the confidence of the

Sherif, it will do the Arab cause much harm. 

6. Be shy of too close relations with the subordinates of the expedition. 

Continual intercourse with them will make it impossible for you to avoid 

going behind or beyond the instructions that the Arab C.O. has given them 

on your advice, and in so disclosing the weakness of his position you altogether destroy your own. 

7. Treat the sub-chiefs of your force quite easily and lightly. In this way 

you hold yourself above their level. Treat the leader, if a Sherif [local 

leader descended from Mohammed], with respect. He will return your 

manner and you and he will then be alike, and above the rest. Precedence 

is a serious matter among the Arabs, and you must attain it. 

8. Your ideal position is when you are present and not noticed. Do not 

be too intimate, too prominent, or too earnest. Avoid being identified too

long or too often with any tribal sheikh, even if C.O. of the expedition. 

To do your work you must be above jealousies, and you lose prestige if 

you are associated with a tribe or clan, and its inevitable feuds. Sherifs are 

above all blood-feuds and local rivalries, and form the only principle of 

unity among the Arabs. Let your name therefore be coupled always with 
a Sherif’s, and share his attitude towards the tribes. When the moment 

comes for action put yourself publicly under his orders. The Bedu will 

then follow suit. 

9. Magnify and develop the growing conception of the Sherifs as the 

natural aristocracy of the Arabs. Intertribal jealousies make it impossible for any sheikh to attain a commanding position, and the only hope of 

union in nomad Arabs is that the Ashraf be universally acknowledged as 

the ruling class. Sherifs are half-townsmen, half-nomad, in manner and 

life, and have the instinct of command. Mere merit and money would be 

insufficient to obtain such recognition; but the Arab reverence for pedigree

and the Prophet gives hope for the ultimate success of the Ashraf. 

10. Call your Sherif ‘Sidi’ in public and in private. Call other people by 

their ordinary names, without title. In intimate conversation call a Sheikh 

‘Abu Annad’, ‘Akhu Alia’ or some similar by-name. 

11. The foreigner and Christian is not a popular person in Arabia. However 

friendly and informal the treatment of yourself may be, remember always 

that your foundations are very sandy ones. Wave a Sherif in front of you 

like a banner and hide your own mind and person. If you succeed, you 

will have hundreds of miles of country and thousands of men under your 

orders, and for this it is worth bartering the outward show. 

12. Cling tight to your sense of humor. You will need it every day. A dry 

irony is the most useful type, and repartee of a personal and not too broad 

character will double your influence with the chiefs. Reproof, if wrapped

up in some smiling form, will carry further and last longer than the most 

violent speech. The power of mimicry or parody is valuable, but use it 

sparingly, for wit is more dignified than humour. Do not cause a laugh at a

Sherif except among Sherifs. 

13. Never lay hands on an Arab; you degrade yourself. You may think the 

resultant obvious increase of outward respect a gain to you, but what you 

have really done is to build a wall between you and their inner selves. It is 

difficult to keep quiet when everything is being done wrong, but the less

you lose your temper the greater your advantage. Also then you will not go 

mad yourself. 

14.	While very difficult to drive, the Bedu are easy to lead, if: have the

patience to bear with them. The less apparent your interferences the more 

your influence. They are willing to follow your advice and do what you

wish, but they do not mean you or anyone else to be aware of that. It is 

only after the end of all annoyances that you find at bottom their real fund

of goodwill. 
15. Do not try to do too much with your own hands. Better the Arabs do 

it tolerably than that you do it perfectly. It is their war, and you are to help 

them, not to win it for them. Actually, also, under the very odd conditions 

of Arabia, your practical work will not be as good as, perhaps, you think it 

is. 

16. If you can, without being too lavish, forestall presents to yourself. 

A well-placed gift is often most effective in winning over a suspicious 

sheikh. Never receive a present without giving a liberal return, but you 

may delay this return (while letting its ultimate certainty be known) if you 

require a particular service from the giver. Do not let them ask you for 

things, since their greed will then make them look upon you only as a cow 

to milk. 

17. Wear an Arab headcloth when with a tribe. Bedu have a malignant 

prejudice against the hat, and believe that our persistence in wearing it (due 

probably to British obstinacy of dictation) is founded on some immoral or 

irreligious principle. A thick headcloth forms a good protection against the 

sun, and if you wear a hat your best Arab friends will be ashamed of you 

in public. 

18. Disguise is not advisable. Except in special areas, let it be clearly 

known that you are a British officer and a Christian. At the same time, if

you can wear Arab kit when with the tribes, you will acquire their trust and 

intimacy to a degree impossible in uniform. It is, however, dangerous and 

difficult. They make no special allowances for you when you dress like

them. Breaches of etiquette not charged against a foreigner are not condoned to you in Arab clothes. You will be like an actor in a foreign theatre, 

playing a part day and night for months, without rest, and for an anxious 

stake. Complete success, which is when the Arabs forget your strangeness and speak naturally before you, counting you as one of themselves, 

is perhaps only attainable in character: while half-success (all that most 

of us will strive for; the other costs too much) is easier to win in British 

things, and you yourself will last longer, physically and mentally, in the 

comfort that they mean. Also then the Turks will not hang you, when you 

are caught. 

19.	 If you wear Arab things, wear the best. Clothes are significant among

the tribes, and you must wear the appropriate, and appear at ease in them. 

Dress like a Sherif, if they agree to it. 

20. If you wear Arab things at all, go the whole way. Leave your English 

friends and customs on the coast, and fall back on Arab habits entirely. It is 

possible, starting thus level with them, for the European to beat the Arabs 

at their own game, for we have stronger motives for our action, and put 
more heart into it than they. If you can surpass them, you have taken an 

immense stride toward complete success, but the strain of living and thinking in a foreign and half-understood language, the savage food, strange 

clothes, and stranger ways, with the complete loss of privacy and quiet, 

and the impossibility of ever relaxing your watchful imitation of the others 

for months on end, provide such an added stress to the ordinary difficulties

of dealing with the Bedu, the climate, and the Turks, that this road should 

not be chosen without serious thought. 

21. Religious discussions will be frequent. Say what you like about your 

own side, and avoid criticism of theirs, unless you know that the point is 

external, when you may score heavily by proving it so. With the Bedu, 

Islam is so all-pervading an element that there is little religiosity, little 

fervor, and no regard for externals. Do not think from their conduct that 

they are careless. Their conviction of the truth of their faith, and its share 

in every act and thought and principle of their daily life is so intimate and 

intense as to be unconscious, unless roused by opposition. Their religion 

is as much a part of nature to them as is sleep or food. 

22.	 Do not try to trade on what you know of fighting. The Hejaz confounds

ordinary tactics. Learn the Bedu principles of war as thoroughly and as 

quickly as you can, for till you know them your advice will be no good 

to the Sherif. Unnumbered generations of tribal raids have taught them 

more about some parts of the business than we will ever know. In familiar 

conditions they fight well, but strange events cause panic. Keep your unit

small. Their raiding parties are usually from one hundred to two hundred 

men, and if you take a crowd they only get confused. Also their sheikhs, 

while admirable company commanders, are too ‘set’ to learn to handle 

the equivalents of battalions or regiments. Don’t attempt unusual things, 

unless they appeal to the sporting instinct Bedu have so strongly, unless 

success is obvious. If the objective is a good one (booty) they will attack 

like fiends, they are splendid scouts, their mobility gives you the advantage that will win this local war, they make proper use of their knowledge 

of the country (don’t take tribesmen to places they do not know), and the 

gazelle-hunters, who form a proportion of the better men, are great shots 

at visible targets. A sheikh from one tribe cannot give orders to men from 

another; a Sherif is necessary to command a mixed tribal force. If there 

is plunder in prospect, and the odds are at all equal, you will win. Do not 

waste Bedu attacking trenches (they will not stand casualties) or in trying 

to defend a position, for they cannot sit still without slacking. The more 

unorthodox and Arab your proceedings, the more likely you are to have 

the Turks cold, for they lack initiative and expect you to. Don’t play for 

safety. 
23. The open reason that Bedu give you for action or inaction may be true, 

but always there will be better reasons left for you to divine. You must find

these inner reasons (they will be denied, but are none the less in operation) 

before shaping your arguments for one course or other. Allusion is more 

effective than logical exposition: they dislike concise expression. Their 

minds work just as ours do, but on different premises. There is nothing 

unreasonable, incomprehensible, or inscrutable in the Arab. Experience of 

them, and knowledge of their prejudices will enable you to foresee their 

attitude and possible course of action in nearly every case. 

24. Do not mix Bedu and Syrians, or trained men and tribesmen. You will 

get work out of neither, for they hate each other. I have never seen a successful combined operation, but many failures. In particular, ex-officers

of the Turkish army, however Arab in feelings and blood and language, 

are hopeless with Bedu. They are narrow minded in tactics, unable to 

adjust themselves to irregular warfare, clumsy in Arab etiquette, swollenheaded to the extent of being incapable of politeness to a tribesman for 

more than a few minutes, impatient, and, usually, helpless without their 

troops on the road and in action. Your orders (if you were unwise enough 

to give any) would be more readily obeyed by Beduins than those of any 

Mohammedan Syrian officer. Arab townsmen and Arab tribesmen regard

each other mutually as poor relations, and poor relations are much more 

objectionable than poor strangers. 

25. In spite of ordinary Arab example, avoid too free talk about women. 

It is as difficult a subject as religion, and their standards are so unlike our

own that a remark, harmless in English, may appear as unrestrained to 

them, as some of their statements would look to us, if translated literally. 

26. Be as careful of your servants as of yourself. If you want a sophisticated one you will probably have to take an Egyptian, or a Sudani, and 

unless you are very lucky he will undo on trek much of the good you 

so laboriously effect. Arabs will cook rice and make coffee for you, and 

leave you if required to do unmanly work like cleaning boots or washing. 

They are only really possible if you are in Arab kit. A slave brought up in 

the Hejaz is the best servant, but there are rules against British subjects 

owning them, so they have to be lent to you. In any case, take with you an 

Ageyli [tribal name] or two when you go up country. They are the most 

efficient couriers in Arabia, and understand camels.

27. The beginning and ending of the secret of handling Arabs is unremitting study of them. Keep always on your guard; never say an unnecessary thing: watch yourself and your companions all the time: hear all that 
passes, search out what is going on beneath the surface, read their characters, discover their tastes and their weaknesses and keep everything you 

find out to yourself. Bury yourself in Arab circles, have no interests and

no ideas except the work in hand, so that your brain is saturated with one 

thing only, and you realize your part deeply enough to avoid the little slips 

that would counteract the painful work of weeks. Your success will be 

proportioned to the amount of mental effort you devote to it. 

11

 

This article is used with the permission of Military Review, the professional journal of the Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. It was originally 

published in the January 1965 issue of Military Review, 63–67.

Reading 2

The Nationbuilder: Soldier of the Sixties

Captain Richard A. Jones

This early 1965 Military Review article written by Captain 

Richard A. Jones, a former ranger advisor in South Vietnam 

who had attended the language school at Monterey and 

who worked with the Civil Affairs Agency of the Combat 

Developments Command at Fort Gordon, Georgia, reviewed 

the advisory program developed in the early 1960s and offered 

recommendations for improvement in both the training and 

selection of advisors.

In early 1962 the United States Army was faced with a fast-breaking 

and new type of challenge in southeast Asia. The task was to reorient the 

thinking and to modify the training of large numbers of officers and men 

and to deploy them to Vietnam as advisors in the military effort to stem a 

rampaging and forgotten type of enemy—the guerrilla.

Considering the breath of the problem, the Army’s response and the 

response of all the US armed services was commendable. Schools were 

established and “shaken out” in a few weeks. The Military Assistance 

Training Advisor course at Fort Bragg was developed to give combat arms 

personnel a quick resume in lessons learned from the guerrilla wars of 

recent years.

Although inadequate, a sprinkling of culture, history, language, and 

politics in these courses indicated that the essence of the problem had been 

recognized. Virtually within weeks and with some degree of skill, soldiers 

who had spent years and careers thinking in terms of armored divisions 

and Honest Johns [missiles] were advising in tactics which had been in our 

military limbo since the Indian wars of the late 1800’s.

Time brought refinements. A few replacements were turned out with 

better language qualifications. The Civil Affairs School developed and 

launched a civic action course. A virtual deluge of counterinsurgency 

material began to appear in various publication media, and a general 

awareness of the implications of nationbuilding took place.
12

Troops Sense Difficulties

Troops in Europe began to sense the difficulties in fixing for 

destruction the phantom forces of the so-called wave of the future. The 

awesome prospect of a fundamental shift in the nature of global conflict, 

long promised us by a relentless enemy, struck home. The Army began 

to vivisect insurgency to discover its essence. The insurgency in Vietnam 

began to appear as more a symptom than an isolated malady.

Thus, we were reoriented. As it often is for the United States, it was 

a little late but, on the whole, not bad. We cranked out reams of lessons 

learned, and experienced and seasoned guerrilla fighters began rotating 

back to schools and staffs throughout the services. We know enough now 

always to face outward in our trucks, and we know that against guerrillas 

it is permissible to split artillery batteries. Militarily, we have shifted out of 

low gear. The challenge remaining is one of applied intellect.

Two Aspects

There are two aspects of our present counterinsurgency advisory 

commitments which place them beyond the pale of our experience. The 

first is the loss of control that must be faced in bringing power to bear. 

Pride, the chasm between cultures, and the strong independent sentiments 

of developing free peoples sometimes relegate the best recommendations 

that can be made to the category of barely tolerated free advice.

Our soldiers are deprived of command—the most necessary factor 

in influencing the action—although, curiously enough, they may still 

be charged with a large measure of the responsibility. Therefore, our 

leadership training must be almost completely recast. We must study and 

teach all the subtle nuances, all the Carnegie-like techniques of winning 

friends, and we must learn to be patient and to apply Lenin’s maxim of 

“one step backward, two steps forward.” Otherwise the advisor may face 

endless frustration and will be only marginally effective.

It must be kept in mind that the US advisor’s counterpart responds to 

forces and influences hardly imaginable to an uninitiated American. To 

achieve a degree of influence over his counterpart, however, the advisor 

must make judgments which have meaning in the light of his counterpart’s 

standards, customs, and aspirations. The complexity of the question of 

influence cannot be overstated.

Consequently, a second and related aspect has to do with the very 

scope of the problem. For a company grade officer of World War II, 90 

percent of his knowledge and effort could and should have been focused 

on tactics and related activities. A company grade officer in Vietnam ought 
13

to devote at least 50 percent of his counterinsurgency training time—up 

to a year—in learning the language. He should undertake well-developed 

and exhaustive courses in political lore, culture, and economics.

Such courses do exist in our service schools, but the paucity of hours 

and the placement on the schedules sometimes suggest a lack of real 

comprehension on the potential impact. One of the most encouraging 

signs in the Army today is that soldiers who have returned—and who 

have worked closely with their counterparts—have often developed a real 

understanding and even qualified respect for their counterparts’ problems 

and solutions. To cultivate this kind of understanding in our advisors before 

they go overseas might save six months or a year of frustrated effort.

Wider Application

These personal attributes are turning out, rather logically, to have far 

wider application than just in embattled southeast Asia. Long-dormant 

military forces in Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East are flexing 

new muscles in the field of nationbuilding, and US soldier-technicians 

and civic action advisors are being sent to help them. The same language 

capability, the same grounding in regional culture and economics, and the 

same concept of winning the civilians to their form of government are 

needed.

Because we are spread so thin, US advisors must be knowledgeable in 

many areas. We know by now that insurgent warfare is won or lost in the 

villages and hamlets, among the people. But are we spending millions and 

billions in a “war for the minds of men” only to train the one man who will 

penetrate the remote areas to be nothing but a tactical robot?

We must not. Whatever and whoever he is, if he gets there at all, he 

must be an ambassador and a nationbuilder as well as a soldier. U. Alexis 

Johnson has said that “In a very real essence there is no line of demarcation 

between military and nonmilitary measures.”

Unfortunately, the sound tradition which has guarded well the cleavage 

between the political and military roles now has bequeathed us an army 

whose thinking appears to be almost fanatically apolitical.

Advisor Duties

Yet, what precisely are the duties of the advisor whose counterpart is, 

as many are, both a tactical commander and a de facto military governor? 

Is the advisor to sever these Siamese twins mentally and to assume the 

nonexistence of one? Will the State Department, which normally has no 

such capability at all, send along another American to unravel the civil 
14

war? No. In fact, what usually happens is that the advisor sits quietly 

peeling a coconut after his counterpart doffs his helmet and takes up civil 

duties. Occasionally, some dauntless tactician ventures an opinion based 

on an approximate understanding of Anglo-Saxon traditions or the statutes 

of, say, Corn River, Iowa, where he grew up.

Many people will say that US advisors do not have the duty or even 

the right to interfere in civil matters. But military government is intended 

to expedite combat operations. And civic action, an enterprise which no 

developing nation locked in a guerrilla struggle can afford to ignore, may 

well be the only nationbuilding element which can penetrate deep into 

“pink” [hostile] territory. The advisor must comprehend what is happening 

so that he can tailor his military advice to fit the situation.

Perfection

There is a sentiment which may be attributable to one of our 

Government agencies that “an ounce of selection is worth a pound of 

school.” Perfection is becoming a common word in today’s Army. There 

are Army Training Tests conducted with the precision of a mazurka [Polish 

dance]. Incandescent nosecones plunge into the atmosphere and strike 

imaginary football fields in the ocean below.

But in the personnel field, one always suspects that the next planeload 

or shipload of replacements from the States will be met by a harried 

personnel clerk, shopping list in hand, whose only function is to match up 

the assortment of incoming military occupational specialties with those 

required that particular day. A photo image interpreter? Yes, one of the 

replacements squinting against the unaccustomed brightness of the sun 

went through a qualification course in 1952. A headquarters commandant 

for a division advisory detachment? That armor captain, he’s left over, he’ll 

fit the bill. Too bad he didn’t get here last week when we had a requirement 

for just the job he’s been holding for three years.

The time has come to introduce greater precision and, more important, 

greater thoroughness into our counterinsurgency personnel policies. Can 

we really train a young lieutenant for six weeks in civic action and expect 

him to be effective in any one of a half dozen countries in the western 

Pacific? Is he really equipped to face the well-indoctrinated and experienced 

Communist cadreman in Thailand, Vietnam, or Korea? Hardly!

The scratch response we developed in 1962 was remarkable under the 

circumstances, but it cannot be considered ultimate perfection. We must 

identify the areas of the world which will be in contention over the next 

decade so that the most time-consuming training—the language portion—
15

can be started now. The general nature of the social, economic, political, 

and tactical demands can be reasonably well isolated.

The task then becomes one of selecting the right individual for the 

job—the individual whose background, interest, and personality serve 

as bases on which to place the building blocks of extensive cultural 

background and economic problems and possibilities. The training might 

well be round out by a short period of indoctrination within the country, to 

accustom the advisor to local foods and to develop physical stamina under 

local conditions.

It could take two years. But can an uncommitted army find a better use 

of its time than to train and prepare? We must learn to think in terms of 

exhaustive preparation for what is really the most decisive arena in which 

we will contend.

We must realize that the undiluted military officer, accustomed to 

command and limited by tradition to military considerations, sometimes 

falls far short of qualifying for counterinsurgent warfare, where he alone 

often represents all the departments and activities of the United States.

17

This article is used with the permission of Military Review, the professional journal of the Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. It was originally 

published in the February 1965 issue of Military Review, 3–9.

Reading 3

American Advisors Overseas

Edward C. Stewart

Dr. Edward C. Stewart wrote this article for Military Review in 

1965. A veteran of the 84th Infantry Division in World War II and 

a holder of a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Texas, 

Dr. Stewart joined the Human Resources Research Office of the 

George Washington University in 1959. He focused on intercultural communication after 1962 and served as a consultant for 

the Military Assistance Institute at Fort Bragg, the Department 

of State Foreign Service Institute, the Peace Corps, the Agency 

for International Development, and the Business Council for 

International Understanding. In 1966 he returned to academia. 

He published American Cultural Patterns: A Cross-Cultural 

Perspective in 1972, which was revised with Milton J. Bennett 

in 1991. The following article offers insights into the difficulties 

of cross-cultural communication and stresses the often overlooked role of self-awareness of our American culture in that 

process.

Ever since the end of World War II, American military officers have 

gone overseas in large numbers to give advice and training to the military personnel of developing countries. The demands of these missions, 

in many ways subtle or intangible, are quite exceptional. The advisor, or 

trainer, is called upon to set aside his usual operational procedures as staff 

officer, or commander, and to work in a strange setting outside the military 

organization to which he is accustomed.

Not only is the military situation strange, but the human milieu—the 

psychological and social context in which he works—is also foreign and 

makes unexpected demands on the knowledge, patience, and practical 

wisdom of the advisor. His counterpart and coworkers speak a different 

language and have different customs and preferences—external differences which can be easily observed and described. Their very obviousness, 

however, often obscures more subtle differences in patterns of thought and 

modes of action, and in concepts about the world and experience, which 

affect the interaction of the advisor and his counterpart.
18

These cultural factors, which make up the distinctive nonmaterial 

heritage of a national or ethnic group—the cultural pattern—present 

obstacles to the process of communication and cooperation overseas. 

The difficulty in cross-culture communication and cooperation for US 

advisors overseas lies primarily in the disparity and conflict between the 

advisor’s own cultural pattern and that of his foreign counterpart, and only 

secondarily in the strangeness of the foreign ways. It certainly appears that 

the cross-cultural performance of the US advisor would be enhanced if his 

area training included instruction on the US cultural pattern as well as on 

the foreign pattern.

Cultural Awareness

The need for the US advisor to understand his own cultural pattern, 

as well as that of the host country, does not mean that his insight must be 

explicit and articulate. His cultural understanding may often be implicit, 

as when an advisor gears his actions to existing cultural differences, even 

though he is not necessarily able to describe the relevant aspect of either 

his own or the foreign culture. In this circumstance, the advisor perceives 

the cultural disparities at some intuitive level and acts accordingly.

Direct Participation

In other instances, although lacking cultural understanding, the advisor is successful through serendipity. A fortunate and accidental combination of cultural factors on one hand, and personality and behavior of the 

advisor on the other, may produce a result that would usually be expected 

only on the basis of cultural insight. The average American’s facility in 

establishing social relationships frequently creates favorable circumstance 

for giving advice, especially when it is followed by the American’s willingness to work with those at the lowest levels of an organization or group. 

Thus, in non-Western countries, US officers are often more effective in 

working with the enlisted men than with officers. Part of the reason for the 

success of the Americans rests with their greater willingness—in comparison to non-Western officers—to work with all ranks, even the lowest.

Success through serendipity may take strange forms; the experienced 

advisor learns not to count on it, for unwitting failure is probably far more 

frequent than unplanned success. An example of this type of success was 

given by an Ecuadoran administrator who supervised several Peace Corps 

volunteers in social welfare work. Because the volunteers did not speak 

Spanish fluently on arrival, they were forced to demonstrate rather than 

to give lectures, working directly with the Indians instead of supervising 

them.
19

The actions of the volunteers influenced their Ecuadoran counterparts 

to work along the same line. Although the Ecuadoran administrator recognized that demonstration and direct participation are typical American 

methods of instructing and influencing others, he pointed out that many 

Americans overseas become like their local counterparts, giving lectures 

and remaining aloof. In this instance, he felt that the Peace Corps volunteers’ lack of fluency in Spanish contributed, in part, to their success.

Cross-Cultural Incongruity

Many problems of US advisors overseas can be traced to the incongruities between American and foreign cultural patterns. When the US advisor is confronted with unusual cultural patterns, his lack of familiarity with 

them may lead to misunderstanding and friction. Americans, like members 

of any other culture, have their own cultural patterns which provide them 

with a comprehensive system of perceiving and understanding the world, 

and with preferred modes of action.

Whenever the individual finds the strangeness of life in a foreign 

country leading to uncertainty, he adopts hypotheses derived from his own 

cultural pattern to fit the new situation. Since these interpretations—based 

on his own cultural pattern—dominate, he is not likely to suspend judgment and action until he can fully understand the strange ways. Because 

his own ways seem to him normal and natural, he is likely to regard those 

of another culture as undesirable, unnatural, or immoral.

Consequently, the individual’s own pattern comes into conflict with 

that of the foreign culture. Any contingency he may meet, no matter how 

strange, is likely to lead to an interpretation according to his own pattern. 

Since the culture pattern itself is not precisely articulated, the tentative 

hypotheses are likely to be imprecise. The individual will, accordingly, 

spawn a crude interpretation and thereby reduce the ambiguity of crosscultural differences.

Examples of Incongruity

The ways in which people act toward each other reveal many instances 

of cross-cultural incongruity, since each culture has preferred standards 

which govern social interactions. American men, for instance, have wellmarked norms of displacement in space in regard to other people. When 

sitting in an audience, an American man does not ordinarily lean against or 

touch persons sitting next to him, because the act carries emotional or sexual meaning. In conversation, he stands at least an arm’s length from the 

other person. If he comes closer, the distance is charged with significance. 

Thus, the intensity of a cocktail party, the intimacy of a small crowded 
20

restaurant, and the camaraderie of people jamming a parade route, are all 

partly a result of the necessary proximity of the persons involved.

The inexperienced American overseas may become very uncomfortable when he talks to an Arab or a Latin American whose face is only a 

short distance from his own. Their proximity merely expresses a more personalized manner of interacting with other people; it is a custom, however, 

that is incompatible with American habits.

Another practice that may shock the American when he first observes 

it is the custom in many parts of the world—in Vietnam, for instance—for 

men to hold hands as an expression of friendship. While the American 

knows that the practice has no sexual significance for the Vietnamese, he 

cannot regard it with equanimity because his own cultural pattern gives 

him an interpretation of holding hands contrary to the Vietnamese meaning of the act. Both the Americans and the Vietnamese may well understand these different ways, yet each is likely to feel that his own way is the 

normal one.

An aspect of interpersonal relations found in US culture, which contrasts with non-Western ways, is the depersonalized manner of dealing 

with other people. The American places a high value on equality, informality, and depersonalized business relations. He takes an objective approach 

to his job, trying to remove his feelings from his work. Preferring standard 

and predictable ways of interacting with other people, he is unprepared for 

the personal mode of social interaction in other parts of the world. In the 

Middle East, in southeast Asia, and in other areas of the world, the business dealings that take place over a purchase are seen as a personalized 

way of doing business. The price of an article is not standardized, but is 

subject to bargaining between the seller and the buyer.

In non-Western countries, bargaining is a transaction between persons 

who, because they have about the same control over the situation, may be 

considered equals. Gift giving, especially a gift of money, is a personalized way of conducting affairs in which reciprocity is incomplete or nonexistent. The person who received money may reciprocate with his usual 

services, or he may not be expected to make any return at all.

Personalization in unequal situations—between superiors and 

subordinates—may be regarded as graft, corruption, influence peddling, 

or nepotism by the American. He tends to react with moral indignation 

forgetting similar instances in his own country. His sense of outrage prevents 

his recognizing that personalized superior-subordinate relationships are 

expected in many non-Western cultures. His anticipation that US money 

and material overseas will yield goods, services, or at least will not go into 
21

someone’s pockets is not necessarily shared by his counterpart. US money 

or goods, or even the advisors themselves, may mean to the counterparts 

a personalized gesture of good will from the US Government which does 

not require an accounting.

Area of Application

Various aspects of interpersonal relations in US culture provide precedents for understanding graft in other parts of the world. The tip, in some 

instances, has functions similar to graft. The main difference between the 

two is in the area of application. Whereas for Americans the tip is usually 

confined to personal services given by nonprofessional persons, people in 

other parts of the world extend the same kind of personal consideration to 

most activities.

This parallel between graft and the tip is not suggested to induce the 

American to regard graft as inevitable, but only to avoid reactions that will 

subvert his own purposes. For instance, he will anger many non-Westerners 

if he reacts to graft with moral indignation, because they accept what 

Americans call graft as part of social existence. They feel it is something 

not to abolish but only to curb. When an American reacts indignantly, as if 

graft can and should be eradicated, the non-Westerners may become angry, 

for they consider the American unrealistic and hypocritical.

Finding the Right Concept

The task of the US advisor is much easier if he can find a concept that 

is meaningful to him and that can be effectively translated into the language of his counterpart without causing confusion. Transferring concepts 

from one culture to another is more than the translation of words. Culture 

differences exist even when members of both cultures speak the same language, as in the case of Americans and the British, and require the same 

tact and understanding that is needed between the Americans and, say, the 

Chinese or Iranians.

The conflict between different cultural patterns can be so subtle that 

it may lead to misunderstandings difficult to unravel. Because the British 

and American cultures are very similar in most respects, no great difficulty 

arises in reducing the amount of discord between the two when translating 

the cultural items of one culture into the patterns of the other. When two 

cultures are very different, however, additional complications are introduced. The patterns of the two differing cultures may not be parallel and 

hence may lack analogous focal points.

Fortunately for the US military advisor, he is working in areas of 

activity for which his own culture offers clear parallels. In most military 
22

matters, the advisor’s activities can be considered as efforts to impose certain Western patterns of organization and action upon a different culture 

environment. Quite often it may be possible for the advisor to translate 

US concepts into familiar terms dealing with generalized ideas or acts and 

thereby produce the desired results.

Some time ago in Laos, a US military advisor attempted to motivate 

Lao soldiers by describing the squad, platoon, and company in terms of 

the family. This officer apparently recognized that the Lao might not have 

a national identification, that he could not readily identify himself with the 

army, and that he might not be motivated by a spirit of competition. The 

officer took advantage of the Lao soldiers’ attachments to their own large 

and extended families to supply the motivation which, with the American, 

is usually derived from competition, personal rewards, and satisfactions.

Basic Differences

In each cultural pattern, experiences are organized by means of certain concepts. Western European and US cultures, for instance, employ a 

subject-predicate relationship, clearly separating the agent both from his 

actions and the context in which they occur. These cultural focal points 

allow for the development of separate abstractions such as the individual, 

his feelings, and various kinds of activities in which he may engage.

Practically speaking, in the case of the military profession, the 

American can readily separate tactical and logistical problems and consider each problem by itself. An even more fundamental distinction can be 

made between military and political or social problems in a war like that 

being fought in Vietnam.

The Chinese, however, do not have clear parallels for such abstractions. They do not recognize the subject-predicate relationship, and do not 

clearly distinguish between the individual and his thoughts and feelings, 

the individual and his actions, and the context in which these occur. The 

Chinese mind is concrete and he is situation-centered to a degree unbelievable to the Westerner. He does not derive laws and principles that presumably govern events in the way that the Westerner does. In the writings of 

Mao Tse-tung we read that the laws of war are different according to the 

character of the war, its time, its place, and the nation.

Misunderstandings

Perhaps it is the Chinese trait of concrete thinking that induced one 

American writer to state that Mao’s: . . . theory has universal applicability 

only in its repeated warnings that every situation must be considered in the 

frame of its historic development and geographic setting.
23

Even though a word may be found to translate a concept from one 

cultural pattern to another, there is no assurance that an accurate and 

viable concept has been chosen in the second pattern that is equivalent to 

the original one. When two cultures are not parallel in their focal points, 

misunderstandings can occur and inaccuracies can be perpetrated by the 

application of familiar concepts in a foreign environment. Americans 

and other Westerners have taken political and social concepts such as 

nationalism, militarism, and the democratic system of elections, which 

are native to Western countries, and have attempted to apply them to the 

underdeveloped countries where they have different meanings.

The process of translating these ideas from one language to another is 

likely to fail of the desired intent. As an example, the Lao do not constitute 

a political entity in the sense that the Americans or Frenchmen do. The 

Lao villager, who identifies solely with his family and village, does not 

have the sense of being a national of his country in the same way as the 

American or the Englishman.

In regard to militarism, an officer in a Middle Eastern country is likely 

to represent the conservative feudal element of the society with an outlook 

and manner of life typical of his class. Elsewhere, as in Brazil, the military 

officer often represents the liberal intellectual whose attitude and position 

in his own society resemble that of militarists in other countries only in 

the uniform that others wear. Finally, an election in many non-Western 

cultures is more like a festival and celebration than a political campaign.

Serious Obstacles

Cross-cultural incongruities present serious obstacles to the US advisor, because he may not have the principles and concepts readily available that will help him understand his situation. He may become puzzled 

and confused if he does not recognize the cultural disparities; more likely, 

since his own cultural pattern provides him with possible interpretations, 

he will derive erroneous conclusions about the meaning of the situation.

Advisors in Laos, when faced with the tactics of their Lao 

commanders—which they call a game of tag—suspected the Lao officers 

of cowardice and, in some cases, of collusion with the Pathet Lao [Laotian 

Communist movement]. They apparently were not aware that one pattern 

of warfare in that part of the world is, in the American view, a matter of 

bluster, evasion, and deception, and hence such tactics do not necessarily 

represent cowardice or collusion.

Although the misunderstandings that can occur are many and varied, 

the instructor in area training who prepares advisory personnel for overseas 
24

work does not face an impossible task in giving advice and training. 

Interviews with advisors who have been overseas serving in various 

countries show certain similarities in the problems and difficulties that 

they regularly meet. The US cultural pattern, shared by all US advisors, 

provides one constant factor among all the competition and friction that 

develop between the American and the foreign ways. And although the 

widely separated countries to which Americans are sent each possess 

unique characteristics, they often differ from the American or Western 

culture in the same directions.

The primary objectives of the area trainer should not be limited to coping with information about the many different countries to which military 

personnel may be assigned. Rather, he should concentrate upon the development of concepts and principles that will help the student first to understand his own cultural pattern and then be able to translate it satisfactorily 

into the patterns of any country to which he may be assigned.

Sometimes the necessary interpretations can be carried out at a 

superficial level, but when the differences between the cultures are 

profound, the tactics of finding a common ground may be beyond the 

scope of commonsense concepts. It may require psychological or social 

analysis to discover the means for transforming the understanding of one 

cultural pattern into effective performance in another.
25

This article is used with the permission of Military Review, the professional journal of the Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. It was originally 

published in the May 1965 issue of Military Review, 3–8.

Reading 4

The District Advisor

Captain James F. Ray

Published in the May 1965 Military Review, this report of 

Captain James F. Ray, Nha Be District advisor in Gia Dinh 

Province near Saigon, was based on 5 months in one of the 

initial district advisor positions. Captain Ray, an infantry officer and Rhodes Scholar, described his experiences and offered 

suggestions for those involved in civil-military operations. On 

9 January 1965, Captain Ray was killed while participating 

in a night reconnaissance patrol. Three days later, Military 

Assistance Command, Vietnam, distributed his report to personnel in Vietnam.

Any attempt to discuss the position of the advisor to a district chief in 

Vietnam must perforce take account of the variety of the job as among the 

heterogeneous collection of districts which comprise the nation. Perhaps no 

other advisory role is so conditioned by the local situation which, indeed, 

together with the personality of the district chief himself, determines the 

limits within which the advisor functions.

Thus, in those areas where Viet Cong control is extensive and government suzerainty limited, one is strictly (as the terms of reference imply) 

a subsector [another name for district] advisor, a military advisor. But in 

others, where the military situation is more under control and the sphere of 

governmental involvement is accordingly broader, the scope of advisory 

activity opens to embrace not only security in the strict sense, but also the 

entire spectrum of public welfare and administration.

This paper, which attempts no more than a synthesis of my own experiences, is, therefore, a reflection only of conditions in Nha Be District, 

and may afford slim basis for generalization.

agrarian district

Nha Be is one of the six districts of Gia Dinh, and lies at the hub of the 

Hop Tac area. It has a population of some 55,000 in an area of roughly 100 

square kilometers of paddy land. Although contiguous with Saigon on its 

northern border, it is almost entirely agrarian. Over 90 percent of its work 
26

force is engaged in growing rice (of which, for water reasons, it gets but 

one crop annually). Roughly one-quarter of the district’s 34 hamlets are 

completely pacified, and the government is in effective military control of 

the remainder.

One Regional Force [local paramilitary unit] company is under the 

operational control of the subsector commander, who also directs the activities of over 400 Popular Forces. These troops establish ambushes each 

night and conduct small (two or three-platoon) operations virtually every 

day. Thus, the entire district is covered once every two or three weeks, and, 

in consequence, there are no permanent Viet Cong bases within our limits.

Viet Cong activity is confined to terrorism by indigenous guerrillas 

and raids, typically of squad size, by units based near the district’s borders. 

Roads are, in general, not safe at night; during daylight one can, with a 

small bodyguard, enjoy freedom of the district.

security problem

The major security problem derives from the presence in the district of 

a tank farm in which is stored petroleum, oils, and lubricants stock. A critical sector, Yeu Khu Nha Be, has been created which includes parts of Nha 

Be and Nhan Trac (Bien Hoa) Districts, and three Regional Force companies are under the operational control of the critical sector commander for 

the defense of the installation.

The Nha Be district advisor is additionally charged with overseeing 

the tank farm defenses. I, therefore, work with two counterparts. Since the 

problems of securing the tank farm can neither logically nor pragmatically 

be separated from those of defending the district, coordination of efforts 

between these two counterparts is a major focus of advisory effort.

Perhaps the nature of the job can best be described through an investigation of how the advisor’s time is spent. I have averaged nearly three 

hours daily with the district chief. In one sense, this is inadequate—it 

would have been far better if the two of us could have spent more time 

together outside the office, visiting hamlets and supervising the activities 

of pacification cadre, as well as conducting operations.

But the fact is that this district chief tied himself to his desk, in spite of 

strong advisory pressure to do some field supervision, and, under such circumstances, he had a limited capacity for absorbing advice. Of the many 

hours so spent, perhaps a fourth were concerned with matters of military 

security; the bulk of the reminder was addressed primarily to pacification problems and the administration of United States Operations Mission 

(USOM) projects.
27

de facto agent

In this regard, I have, in my dealings with the district chief, served as a 

de facto agent of USOM, alike in the drafting of projects, followup on the 

approval process, and supervision of their execution. Indeed, such matters 

have, in terms of time, formed by far the largest part of my job.

Additionally, my assistant and I have averaged two to three hours daily 

with subordinate district officials. Most military matters have been coordinated through the commander of the subsector’s Regional Force company, who acts as the deputy for security (although this position has not 

been formalized). One or more members of the advisory team accompany 

him on military operations whenever practicable. The subjects of advisory 

effort with him are essentially identical with the area of interest to advisors 

of any tactical unit.

Second, we have spent a great deal of time working with the aspirant 

[officer candidate] who directs the Hamlet Pacification Service. In his case, 

advice has amounted virtually to complete training in the responsibilities 

and techniques of his job. It has been through him, rather than the district 

chief, that the critical problem of translating reports, submitted by pacification cadre, into goods and services for the people has been directed.

Third, we have worked in some detail with the district police chief—

mainly in an attempt to influence his allocation of the manpower resources 

at his disposal, especially in the direction of increased emphasis on a program of population and resources control measures.

Finally, we have stayed in close contact with the subsector staff. Here, 

we have experienced some success in improving the functioning of the 

operations center, regularizing logistical procedures, and, perhaps most 

important, infusing the notion of staff coordination (even, on occasion, 

cooperation).

staff functions

Indeed, I have taken as a major objective of this team’s efforts the 

initiation of proper staff functioning with mission-type orders, intrastaff 

liaison, and the presentation of coordinated plans—the overambitiousness 

of which goal may be only too obvious to those having experience 

with the Vietnamese system of personal rule. Nonetheless, the degree 

of inexperience of subordinate district and subsector officials is the 

greatest obstacle in the path toward a viable, properly functioning arm of 

government at this echelon (with, perhaps, the exception of the obstacle 

posed by those who have too much experience). It may well be that over 
28

the long run the greatest contribution that our advisory effort makes at 

the district level will be in terms of the training of this new generation of 

officials.

Advisory work with the district chief and his staff has been accomplished almost exclusively by the team’s two officers. I have not carved 

out special areas of interest reserved exclusively for one or the other of 

us—rather, we have shared participation in all facets of the work.

The one specialized member of the team is the medical advisor, the 

extent of whose activities merits consideration in detail. Essentially, he 

has served as advisor to the District Health chief who has proved to be 

an exceptionally receptive counterpart. The medical advisor has averaged 

more than six hours a day with this man. Jointly, they have firmed hamlet 

sick call hours, corrected medical supply procedures, improved treatment 

records, and generally raised the standard of treatment and the number of 

patients seen daily. Also, the medical advisor has worked quite closely with 

USOM Public Health Division officials, most of whom have expressed 

surprise and pleasure at finding someone with his technical credentials 

permanently based in the district. Through them he has been able to obtain 

substantial material benefits for the district’s medical program.

refute doubts

The medical advisor would seem to have refuted the doubts which 

USOM is alleged to have voiced concerning his position. He has also 

worked as a military medic—for example, medical teams have, for the first 

time, begun visiting paramilitary dependent housing. He has organized 

training in the elements of first aid for selected Popular Force members, 

and has caused to be initiated supply procedures to obtain basic essential 

first aid supplies for each separate Popular Force unit.

Independently of his counterpart, the medical advisor has also performed treatment using US medical supplies, although certainly not on a 

routine basis. First, he has performed routine first aid for personnel living 

in the same compound with our team. Second, he has consistently been the 

first medic to arrive and administer emergency treatment when friendly 

forces have been wounded. He has probably done more than any other 

member of our team, both to create good will among the people for the 

United States and to enhance among the people the notion that their government is, indeed, for the people.

some success

The team’s operations sergeant, initially, was able to do little advisory 

work, most of his time being involved in the administrative and logistical 
29

support of our team, but he is now becoming quite active as a training 

advisor. Recently, we have enjoyed some success with the notion of training as a continuing requirement. Many of the operational weaknesses of 

the Regional and Popular Forces—most notable, the deplorable standard 

of marksmanship proficiency—can be corrected by training at the unit 

level. However, their most serious deficiency, the weakness of subordinate 

leaders, is rather beyond our capability for formal training. We are working out a modified Army Training Program built largely around individual 

and squad proficiencies for gradual presentation to these units.

The Regional Force companies defending the tank farm began training in December. The operations sergeant has been given the mission of 

acting as a kind of training sergeant to oversee the implementation of plans 

worked out between the commander and the senior advisor and, where 

appropriate, to assist in obtaining training aids or in presenting classes. 

Finally, he typically accompanies one of the maneuver elements on as 

many operations as practicable.

Having considered the nature of our work as it has evolved over a 

period of some four months, it is appropriate to examine some of the difficulties we have encountered.

The first of these is the language problem, although in this regard we 

have been particularly fortunate. I am able to communicate with both my 

counterparts in (a kind of) French; we have for some time had an interpreter 

which enables us to split our advisory effort; and the District Health Chief 

speaks a rudimentary English that suffices for routine purposes; therefore, 

we are able simultaneously to function in three separate directions.

language training

This is largely fortuitous. Probably a greater percentage of people at 

the district level do not speak English than at any other echelon in which 

we have advisors. The raw fact is that there can be no more advisors than 

there are people able to communicate. More than this, a district advisory 

team is constantly thrown into contact with “the common man”—hamlet 

chiefs, patients on sick call, policemen at checkpoints—with whom even 

a basic Vietnamese capability counts for a great deal. I consider it almost 

imperative to the success of the district advisory effort that as many district team members as possible get three months of language training, and 

that persons having this background receive priority in assignment to district teams. All our team members are currently studying the language, but 

in terms of available time it is decidedly a second-best solution.

Second, there is an inexorable urge to try to command through US 
30

advisory channels—a tendency noticeable at virtually all US echelons, 

however sincere their desire to resist it. It arises from a very proper desire 

to correct a myriad of deficiencies, and is nurtured by our system of inspections and reports. However laudable the motives which sustain it, it has to 

be resisted; whatever advantages it might yield in the short run would 

be more than offset by the more permanent harmful effects. We must be 

prepared to tolerate a certain level of inefficiency in the name of the larger 

goal: training the new generation to run the nation.

The third problem is one familiar to all advisors in whatever capacity, and follows from a tradition of centralized powers and personal rule. 

These have resulted in a lack of staff initiative and both introduce totally 

unnecessary delays and unresponsiveness into the system. They also have 

most unfortunate consequences whenever there is a power vacuum. I have 

unhappily experienced the replacement of a district chief—regrettable, 

essentially, because the manner of its execution left the district without an 

effectively functioning leader for nearly a month, a month characterized 

chiefly by marking time, if not actual regression.

logistical role

A fourth difficulty is a tendency on the part of some Vietnamese—

although, fortunately, neither of the two commanders—to consider the 

advisor as a combination genie and supply officer. This we have had some 

success in countering, largely through a stubborn insistence on making the 

Vietnamese system work. Some officials are still wont to think that requisitions are to be submitted to the advisor; we, therefore, have been at some 

pains to stress that our logistical role begins when someone in their system 

either delays or says “No.”

From discussions with other district advisors one gathers that many 

have experienced difficulties with their own housekeeping, although most 

of these appear to be the one-time function of initially getting organized. 

Since ours was, I believe, the first to be fully manned and equipped in the 

field, these transitional problems have by now been resolved, and our propinquity to Saigon makes it easy to solve such problems as arise. It would 

be most advantageous to have a second jeep, and we are less than convinced that a GRC-87 is the answer to the district team’s communication 

problems, although one can appreciate why teams are currently equipped 

as they are.

We have distilled certain conclusions from our experiences thus far 

which I would like to posit in the form of suggestions to be considered. 

The first concerns specialized training to be given district advisory personnel. Language training seems the single most important prerequisite for 
31

success; the foundation in the language given in a 12-week course would 

be indispensable. Most of the other background material needed could be 

woven into the fabric of the language course, and would ideally be presented using the case study method almost exclusively.

Second, I feel that the medical advisor should be accorded greater 

latitude—by which I mean extending him supplies of medicine commensurate with his state of training for his own use in treating Vietnamese, not 

as a competitor with their own supply system. He should also be given 

freer hand to participate, along with the District Health Chief, in providing 

proper outpatient medical care to the rural population. This, I think, would 

have a significant impact on what district teams can do to win support for 

the United States among the people of Vietnam.

In conclusion, I think there could be no finer job in Vietnam, in terms 

of the background one acquires in what President Johnson has called “the 

stubborn realities of the pursuit of peace.” The district advisory team is 

directly involved in three of our most pressing international problems: the 

delicacies of dealing with allies who desire our support while resenting 

any hint of interference; the grassroots administration of foreign aid (in 

terms of ensuring that our aid gets to the people who need it); and the military confrontation of Communist revolutionary warfare.

33

Reprinted, by permission, from Army, Vol 15, No 12, July 1965, Association of 

the US Army, 25–30.

Reading 5

Advisor and Counterpart

Colonel Bryce F. Denno

In this 1965 Army article, Colonel Bryce F. Denno, a decorated 

infantry officer from World War II and a former corps senior 

advisor in South Vietnam, offered practical advice for advisors 

on their counterpart relationship.

Despite admitted differences, the Soviet and Chinese communists 

have agreed time and again that “wars of national liberation” are not only 

desirable but inevitable. So we can reasonably expect that conflict of a 

type which has also been described as “revolutionary war,” “insurgency,” 

and “counterinsurgency” will occur again as it already has in Greece, the 

Philippines, Malaya, Vietnam, Algeria, and the Congo. It is equally reasonable to expect that the undertow of our national commitments and interests 

world-wide could pull us into these wars, as in Vietnam.

It is difficult to predict the form our involvement could take. It seems 

certain, however, that in many instances we would wish to avoid the risks 

and disadvantages (often military as well as political) which overt and 

active commitment of US combat units could entail. In Vietnam, we have 

developed a formula that permits us to lend substantial military assistance 

to the counterinsurgency effort of an ally without engaging actively in the 

fighting (until recently). The military assistance advisory group (MAAG) 

or military mission is a key element in this formula. It is a channel through 

which quasi-military as well as military materiel, services and advice are 

funneled to an ally fighting the insurgents. Further, it may decisively influence the strategy and conduct of an ally’s war of counterinsurgency.

The individual US advisor provides the MAAG or mission with its cutting edge. Usually he advises a native counterpart who is actively conducting counterinsurgency operations. The measure of an advisor’s success or 

failure is the performance by his counterpart. It follows that the advisor 

must learn how best to contribute to—and influence—that performance. 

The ability to advise a counterpart is an art which—as one authority on counterinsurgency has emphasized—has yet to be spelled out (and 

perhaps never will be completely) in field manuals. Yet, like leadership, 
34

it is a skill which presumably can be acquired through study and practice. 

This article will examine the relationships, in a war of counterinsurgency, 

between a military advisor and his counterpart and, hopefully, point up 

some of the techniques of effective advising.

ROLES OF THE ADVISOR

The military advisor has three roles involving different responsibilities and arousing differing loyalties which sometimes conflict.

Wearing his US hat, he is a member of a US military organization with 

a well-defined chain of command and familiar responsibilities. Within this 

organization, he receives and executes the orders of his superiors (which 

may not always be in accord with the orders his counterpart receives from 

his superiors). He supervises subordinate advisors. Among other duties, 

he must act unobtrusively but nonetheless positively as an “inspector 

general”—observing, evaluating and reporting on the performance of his 

counterpart and the unit to which he is attached.

Next, the military advisor wears the shoulder insignia of the unit he 

advises, figuratively and often (as in Vietnam) literally. Living, eating and 

working with officers and men of his host unit, the advisor soon regards 

himself as one of them. The sharing of common hardships and dangers 

forges between him and his native comrades in arms the potent emotional 

ties familiar to fighting men of any era or culture. The success and good 

name of his unit become matters of prime and personal importance to the 

advisor.

Finally, the advisor is interpreter and communicator between his 

counterpart and his US superiors and subordinates. He must introduce 

and explain one to the other, help resolve the myriad problems, misunderstandings and suspicions which arise in any human organization and 

which are compounded when men of starkly different cultures approach 

the supremely difficult task of waging war together. As has been demonstrated often in Vietnam, the American advisor who has quick and easy 

access to an influential counterpart can sometimes be the best possible 

means of communicating with him.

If an advisor is to be effective, he obviously must gain his counterpart’s 

trust and confidence. But this is only prelude to his major objective: 

inspiring his counterpart to effective action. In pursuing this goal, 

constantly, relentlessly, and forcefully—yet patiently, persuasively, and 

diplomatically—the advisor must recognized conditions which can benefit 

or handicap him.
35

INFLUENCES THAT FAVOR RELATIONS

One highly favorable condition is obvious. The very fact that US advisors have been introduced in numbers into a counterinsurgency war presumes that the host nation would probably suffer defeat except for our help. 

Nowhere will this realization be more acutely felt than among members of 

the local armed forces. For defeat could spell death or imprisonment—or, 

at best, exile—for many of these military professionals and their families. 

Thus, the military advisor at all levels can assume that his counterpart 

probably realizes the indispensability at least of American material assistance and, correspondingly, the desirability of cooperating with those furnishing the assistance. (It’s up to each advisor to convince his counterpart 

that his personal advice and assistance also are indispensable.)

Another favorable condition lies in the training and experience the 

US advisor brings to his task. True, he may well lack practical experience 

in counterinsurgency. Despite the thousands of Americans who have seen 

service in Vietnam and other counterinsurgency wars, we have not yet 

accumulated extensive operational experience in such combat comparable 

to that of the French and the British. However, many of our more senior 

advisors are combat veterans of World War II and Korea. They are qualified to adapt the battlefield lessons of those wars toward solving military 

problems of insurgency. Although our younger advisors lack combat experience, they are well equipped to assist their counterparts actively, especially in such matters as planning, training, and administration—fields in 

which even high-ranking military officers of underdeveloped countries are 

notoriously weak.

A third factor favoring American advisors is the fine educational 

backgrounds most possess. A good education has distinct prestige value in 

underdeveloped countries where the rare educated man is highly respected. 

I remember how helpful possession of a master’s degree was for one US 

advisor newly assigned to Vietnam. This officer was in the unfortunate 

position of relieving an outstanding predecessor who had enjoyed the 

unqualified confidence of his counterpart. “Just who are you sending me 

capable of replacing my present advisor?” was the attitude of this particular Vietnamese commander. When told the educational as well as the military accomplishments of the newcomer, he was satisfied—and impressed.

Despite these conditions favoring the advisor in his efforts to establish 

rapport with and to influence his counterpart, there are also many obstacles. Many stem from the distinctive nature of counterinsurgency warfare. 

In fact, the counterinsurgency environment exerts a profound and often 
36

subtle influence on relations between advisor and counterpart which—in 

the press of day-to-day activities—the advisor may fail to evaluate or even 

recognize.

ENVIRONMENT OF COUNTERINSURGENCY

As pointed out by one French authority (David Galula in Counterinsurgency Warfare), there has never been a short counterinsurgency war. 

Further, insurgency develops slowly, its violence gradually intensifying. 

By the time massive US assistance becomes necessary to save a nation 

riddled by insurgency, the war has been in progress for years and gives 

every promise of continuing indefinitely.

A contest of this type inspires attitudes quite different from the sense of 

urgency displayed by US fighting men in World War II who were impatient 

to “get the dirty job over and done with.” To the counterinsurgent, war 

becomes not merely an unpleasant interlude but a way of life—perhaps 

the only life he’s ever known. Adjusting to this life, he has learned to pace 

himself for the long pull he is certain lies ahead. He attempts to enjoy as 

many as possible of the delights of “normal living” (such as marrying and 

rearing a family). He does not regard “wartime service” as a temporary 

suspension of normal living—as his US advisor does. His resulting 

attitude is not always appreciated by an American advisor who resents 

what sometimes strikes him as his counterpart’s eight-to-five-o’clock 

attitude toward his nation’s supposedly life-or-death struggle.

The prolonged nature of the war also means that a counterinsurgent 

commander will serve with many successive American counterparts. My 

Vietnamese counterpart commanded a corps for five years, during which 

he had been advised by seven American colonels. The merits and drawbacks of extended tours for US advisors in a counterinsurgency war have 

been debated at length and warrant no elaboration here. The important 

thing, under the current policy of short tours for field advisors, is that the 

advisor understand the need to adjust rapidly to his counterpart and his 

job.

Another characteristic of counterinsurgency is its strong political 

flavor. Insurgency cannot gain a foothold and flourish among a people 

who are united politically under a strong and stable government. Thus 

the environment of counterinsurgency reflects political ills in the host 

nation which helped the insurgency get started in the first place. These 

may include political factionalism carried to disruptive extremes, nepotism, violent antagonisms among ethnic, religious and social groups, and 

chronic difficulty in maintaining a government which can gain the support 

of the people or even communicate with them.
37

In the internal struggle for political power within the host nation, it is 

inevitable that the armed forces will become involved. This is because control of the armed forces usually is indispensable to political control of the 

government. The involvement of the native military in domestic politics 

gives rise to practices which are unfamiliar and distasteful to a US advisor 

who has been raised in the strict tradition that military meddling in politics 

is the Great Taboo. He is shocked when he sees a military subordinate 

with powerful political connections challenge the orders of his superior 

with impunity. He is dismayed to learn that officers may be promoted on 

the basis of political loyalty rather than military competence. He may find 

local commanders deliberately willing to sabotage a military operation in 

order to discredit a political enemy. There is little an American advisor 

can or should do about this sort of thing except to keep himself as well 

informed as possible on local political maneuvering. If he does not, he’ll 

earn a reputation for naivété that will not enhance his prestige.

Another distinctive characteristic of counterinsurgency warfare is the 

emphasis by both insurgent and counterinsurgent on winning the allegiance and support of the people. Counterinsurgent military units take a 

major part of this effort through civic action as well as military operations. 

Clearly, an intimate knowledge of the people—their customs, mores, attitudes, values, taboos—is indispensable in conducting intelligent and effective civic actions. Here, the US advisor can be at a real disadvantage. Who 

is he—a foreigner—to challenge the judgment of his counterpart (even 

when that judgment is demonstrably faulty) concerning action designed to 

influence the counterpart’s own people?

EAST IS EAST . . . 

Even if there were no counterinsurgency warfare to exacerbate differences of viewpoint between an American advisor and his counterpart, 

deep cultural differences still separate them. In their approach to their jobs 

Americans are inclined to be pragmatic, systematic, direct, and urgent. 

These traits are particularly strong in our military professional. He is a 

doer, a man of action—a product not only of a do-it-now civilian society 

but of an even more demanding do-something-even-if-it’s-not-the-schoolsolution military society. In his profession he is evaluated by his ability 

not only to size up a problem quickly but to solve it with equal dispatch. 

Societies of underdeveloped countries usually produce military leaders 

who are less direct and more leisurely in discharging their duties. This 

difference is admitted even by our friends who are not always convinced 

that the US approach is right. For instance, a recent report of the Filipino 

Reserve Officer Legion, commenting on the Vietnamese war, said, “It is 

also quite evident that the rush-rush-rush nature of the American way of 
38

doing things simply is far out of mesh with the slow and deliberate Asian 

way of getting things done.”

Thus, when West impinges full force on East or South, the result can 

sometimes be not only failure of the twain to meet but resentment on the 

part of East or South and deep frustration for West. The important thing for 

the advisor to remember is that these cultural differences between him and 

his counterpart are real, and that he must take them always into account. 

This seems like gratuitous advice. However, it is sometimes ignored by 

the complacent advisor who has his counterpart “all figured out”—by 

American standards—and then is astounded when his counterpart does 

something “entirely out of character.”

Besides differing from his advisor culturally, a counterpart may often 

differ on matters of military doctrine. Many underdeveloped countries 

are former colonies. Today’s military leaders in these lands were trained 

in accordance with the doctrine of a former colonial power. They may 

be impressed by US material assistance but they may not necessarily be 

convinced of the value of our doctrinal advice. Some insist that it was 

our industrial might rather than any inherent superiority of military doctrine that was mainly responsible for our victory in World War II. Others 

may even refer pointedly to Korea, where the Chinese communists fought 

the United States to a standstill despite Yankee technological superiority. 

Occasionally, as in Vietnam, an American advisor will find himself with 

a counterpart who has fought as a guerrilla. It’s difficult to argue authoritatively that a former guerrilla knows less about fighting guerrillas than 

an advisor fresh from the States. In any event, it’s well for the advisor 

to remain open-minded on matters of counterinsurgency doctrine and to 

remember that doctrine has been know to stimulate difference not only 

among, but within, our own services.

ESTABLISHING GOOD RELATIONS

Despite the differences which separate them, most advisors can get 

together with their counterparts. Occasionally (even as in our own armed 

forces), a personality conflict will arise between advisor and counterpart. 

When this happens, it’s advisable to transfer that advisor as soon as possible. The advisor-counterpart relation is highly personal and will not long 

survive the clash of incompatible personalities. In this connection, relief 

of an advisor solely for incompatibility should carry no connotation of 

unsatisfactory performance, as is often the case in premature relief from 

other assignments. This should be made clear on the advisor’s record and 

he should not be penalized.

In establishing relations with his counterpart, the advisor must take 
39

the initiative, at least at the outset. His counterpart is usually preoccupied with his own problems and responsibilities. The advisor who waits 

for his counterpart to make the first move may well wait in vain. Most 

experienced advisors would probably agree that, especially in his initial 

overtures, it is important for the advisor to display evidence that he knows 

his stuff. For the advisor this time-honored phrase has implications that are 

quite different than those for the American military professional working 

among his own people. The advisor must not only know his business. He 

must know how to apply his knowledge toward solving the peculiar problems of the counterinsurgency—the non-military as well as the military 

aspects. Further, he must know how to communicate his solution to his 

counterpart in convincing as well as accurate fashion. Beyond this—and 

most important of all—he must know to stimulate his counterpart to act

on his advice.

Adapting US military doctrine and techniques to counterinsurgency 

situations is a constant challenge to the advisor’s imagination and ingenuity. He must resist the temptation to transplant completely the techniques 

taught at our combat-arms schools to counterinsurgency battlefields without determining whether or not they can be used there. He must also overcome the understandable tendency to react automatically against practices 

that differ from those he has been taught and has employed in all his 

service.

I recall that in Vietnam most of the field artillery in the I Corps area 

was deployed in “platoons” of two tubes or even a single tube at widely 

dispersed outposts. Since the artillery was organized in four-tube firing 

batteries, this practice created all sorts of problems in communication, 

fire direction, and supply. Certainly this pattern of deployment which 

violated US principles of concentrating artillery was guaranteed to make 

an American artilleryman cringe. Yet, in the jungle-covered mountains 

of the corps area—where roads are few or impassable during the rainy 

season, thus preventing rapid movement of artillery to where it is needed, 

and where bad flying weather often prevents close support by fighter 

aviation—this dispersal of artillery made sense. It was more important 

to have a little artillery fire available for most outposts than a lot of it 

for a few. In November 1962, the fire of a 105mm howitzer platoon was 

crucial in repulsing a Viet Cong regiment’s attack on a company outpost. 

This event convinced even the Doubting Thomases among the US artillery 

advisors. Not only did they accept the platoon as the normal firing unit, 

but they set about developing an organization that permitted it to function 

more effectively.

The first step for an advisor is to determine a desirable solution 
40

to a military problem. The second is to communicate that solution 

accurately, completely (and persuasively) to his counterpart. Obviously, 

command of the native language is highly useful here. Most experienced 

advisors stress the importance of learning at least a few phrases of the 

counterpart’s language—not only to facilitate communication but also to 

make a convincing display of the advisor’s desire to communicate better. 

The advisor can also teach English to his counterpart. This practice is 

especially prevalent in Vietnam where many natives are extremely eager 

to learn English. (Teaching English also affords the advisor an opportunity 

to meet Vietnamese in a social setting and to learn more about them.) 

Interpreters, although useful, have many drawbacks. Not only do they 

introduce inevitable inaccuracies into conversations but they discourage 

the frank exchange of views often permitted by a private talk between a 

counterpart and his advisor.

It is usually desirable for an advisor to reduce a conversation on 

important matters to writing for the use of his counterpart. This practice 

has three merits. It complements what the advisor has said, clearing up 

misunderstandings that might have developed. It gives the counterpart a 

memorandum especially useful if the matter is a complex one or if he 

desires to delay action on it. Finally, it lends formality and the authority of 

the written word to an advisor’s suggestion.

Perhaps most influential in affecting a counterpart’s reception of the 

recommendation of his advisor is not the intrinsic value of logic of the 

suggestion (although this is patently important) but what the counterpart 

thinks of the advisor. Does he trust him as a man as well as respect his 

professional ability?

TRAITS OF A GOOD ADVISOR

Earlier, in discussing the advisor’s roles, we said that he has different 

loyalties which can sometimes conflict. Without question, the advisor’s 

first loyalty is to his countrymen, subordinates as well as superiors. But he 

must also be loyal to his counterpart if he is to establish the mutual trust so 

crucial to a truly effective advisor-counterpart relationship.

The advisor reveals his loyalty in small but unmistakable ways. He 

overlooks no opportunity to give deserved praise to his counterpart—

before his own superiors as well as before those of his counterpart. He 

looks out for the legitimate interests of his counterpart—personal as well 

as professional. He avoids studiously the pernicious practice of criticizing 

a counterpart behind his back. He makes clear his pride in the achievements of the unit he advises.
41

The wise advisor also attempts to remain unobtrusive, consciously 

staying in the background and systematically directing the spotlight on his 

counterpart rather than on himself. Such conduct does not come naturally 

to many Americans reared in a society which teaches that if you don’t toot 

your own horn it may not be blown at all. As a practical matter, it’s not 

always easy—even for the reticent advisor—to avoid the glare of publicity 

in places like Vietnam where the American press is understandably anxious to report on the activities of our troops. However, the prudent advisor 

must appreciate the disastrous effect of words or actions suggesting that 

he, rather than his counterpart, is running the show—thereby causing his 

counterpart to lose face.

“Loss of face” is a hand-me-down cliché, derived from old Far East 

hands, redolent of Oriental mystique. It loses any aura of mystery it might 

possess as a concept, if we remember that Asiatics (as well as many other 

non-Western peoples) are less blunt than Westerners in their dealing with 

others and more sensitive to affront, real or imagined. The phrase describes 

among other things a loss of prestige suffered by one person through conduct by another which is usually considered tactless even by Western standards. For instance, if you are an advisor, you do not challenge blatantly 

or criticize the decisions of your counterpart in the presence of others. 

Voice your disagreements in private or, if this is possible, “suggest” other 

solutions that your counterpart might consider. Remember to recognize 

and praise the good features of proposals with which you disagree. Avoid, 

where possible, situations where you offer advice which conflicts directly 

with that given your counterpart by one of his subordinates. (If your counterpart chooses your solution, his subordinate loses face, if he disregards 

your advice, you lose face.) Don’t box in your counterpart to the extent 

that you appear to be forcing him to take action in your favor—especially 

if that action would be unpopular.

Despite the marked differences between societies of underdeveloped 

countries and those of the advanced West, certain basic human qualities are 

universally prized. An example is physical courage which gains immediate recognition and admiration among fighting men anywhere. Few advisors in a war of counterinsurgency, regardless of their rank or duty, need 

seek opportunities to display their courage. Danger is everywhere: in the 

city as well as in the countryside, in higher headquarters as in the platoon. 

The odds are small indeed that the average advisor, during a counterinsurgency tour, will not encounter at least one instance where his life will 

be threatened. When he does, he must conduct himself with an eye on his 

mission—avoiding extremes of caution or bravado.
42

His mission also guides him in making the often difficult decision 

as to where to station himself during combat. In most circumstances, he 

belongs at the side of his counterpart. But there are exceptions to this rule. 

His counterpart, shouldering often the responsibility of command, may 

be tied to the communications of a command post. If so, the advisor can 

often perform his most useful service during battle by visiting subordinate 

units (remembering to invite his counterpart’s staff officers to accompany 

him), observing the action in person, and reporting back to his counterpart 

with advice on what to do next. Here again, he should temper courage with 

judgment; his job is to advise, not fight.

In Vietnam today, the military advisor—Army, Air Force, Marine, and 

Navy—is gaining a reputation for quiet courage displayed in a professional 

rather than theatrical manner. On operations, as in training, he is with the 

unit he advises. He has shown no intention, during battle, of advising from 

the rear. Indeed, he is creating a highly favorable image that discredits 

the ancient communist propaganda cliché about effete Americans. It is 

significant that Viet Cong propaganda, scurrilous as it has been toward the 

American advisor, casts no reflection on his courage.

But it is not battle that will probably provide the advisor with his 

severest test. It’s a much more mundane thing: frustration. Any advisor, no 

matter how adaptable he is or how cooperative his counterpart, can expect 

to encounter frustration in large and frequent doses. In part, this is due 

to the nature of counterinsurgency warfare. Sometimes the advisor will 

accompany his unit on operation after operation without even encountering signs of an elusive enemy who usually vanishes in the face of superior 

force. The advisor will taste despair when he and his counterpart arrive 

hours—or even minutes—late, to find dead and wounded amid the smoking ruins of a friendly village. The young advisor who is unfamiliar with 

combat of any sort will not realize that in any military service—including 

our own—there is always a vast gap between what men are taught to do in 

combat and their actual performance. Until experience gives him a better 

appreciation of human imperfection, as revealed in the stress of battle, he 

may be dissatisfied—even bitter—over the way his unit fights.

There is another reason—probably the most important—for the advisor’s frustration. It stems from his role. He sees what he thinks should 

be done but he lacks the power to get it done himself. He can fight only 

by proxy, working through a counterpart who, as we’ve seen, speaks and 

thinks differently.

The antidote for frustration is patience, a virtue the advisor must cultivate consciously and constantly. All effective advisors do. Many, when 
43

they feel especially discouraged, go through a therapeutic exercise which I 

recommend. They compare the current state of the unit they advise with its 

condition a few months previously. This review usually reveals many worthy accomplishments by the counterpart (oftentimes stimulated by what he 

thinks are his own ideas) which the advisor has recommended. “Consider 

the long pull” is good advice to the advisor attempting to develop that 

most precious of traits: patience.

EXERTING PRESSURE

In emphasizing the need for patience, we are not suggesting that an 

advisor refrain from putting pressure on a counterpart to get things done. 

Prodding is recognized as a legitimate and acceptable practice by most 

counterparts. However, to prod successfully an advisor needs leverage—

a means, in addition to personal persuasion, by which he can impel a 

counterpart to move.

One way for an advisor to gain leverage is to enlist the assistance of 

his superiors. He should make it a practice when visited by a superior 

to brief him on major actions he is attempting to get his counterpart to 

undertake. The cooperative superior, with a little ingenuity, can “discover” 

a deficiency and add his weight to get it corrected. The advisor can also 

make use of his subordinates to broach desired action with counterparts on 

their level in the hope that they will influence their superiors. Of course, 

consistency among advisors is helpful.

In the beginning we remarked that we might be called upon to act as 

advisors in future counterinsurgency wars, as in the past. In such an event, 

it is important that we be able to draw upon sound and realistic doctrine 

developed from operational experience. We are creating such doctrine and 

we are refining and expanding our knowledge of counterinsurgency.

At the same time, we must not forget that this effort can go for naught 

if we fail to learn how to communicate our knowledge to our friends who 

are doing the fighting, and persuade them to accept our advice. These are 

the tasks of the military advisor and this is why he is so indispensable in 

any military assistance program.

45

This article is used with the permission of Military Review, the professional journal of the Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. It was originally 

published in the November 1965 issue of Military Review, 94–96.

Reading 6

Advising the Advisor

Major Irving C. Hudlin

Major Irving C. Hudlin, an infantry officer with Special Forces 

experience in Vietnam, Thailand, and Korea, wrote the following 

article for Military Review. Major Hudlin acknowledged the 

importance of professional competence for an advisor, but 

believed that the lack of empathy for his counterpart was the 

basic problem an advisor confronted.

Literally millions of words have been written on the role of an advisor. There are in existence as many ways to advise as there are varieties 

of beans.

But after all the analyses have been made and tabulated, several questions remain unanswered. What is an advisor? What is the basic problem? 

What type of advisor do we need? Are we using an age-old approach to a 

newly developed problem?

An advisor is an implanter of information and ideas. All other considerations must be subordinated to this purpose. An advisor is a mature, 

dedicated individual who exercises patience and perseverance in accomplishing his mission. An advisor is an individual who does not attempt to 

Americanize everyone he meets; rather, he helps people make of themselves what they want, not what the advisor wants.

Every advisor can truly be considered a teacher, a diplomat, and an 

ambassador of the United States throughout the world, yet the accomplishment of our advisory mission seems to become more elusive. The 

educational levels of our advisors are rising higher and higher, yet proportionately our understanding of man is dropping lower and lower.

Basic Problem

The basic problem, I feel, is the lack of empathy on the part of our 

advisors, our soldiers. In essence, it is understanding and appreciating 

another person’s viewpoint, ideals, mores, and objectives in life. In most 

cases, there is no compatibility except in the field of warfare.
46

Stereotypes of nations and of people often arise too quickly and are 

accepted by the advisor as fact, without a thorough investigation. The 

advisor tends to regard his counterpart as a national, not as an individual. 

Frequently, understanding is based on whether the counterpart accepts the 

advisor’s suggestion and not on frank, open, face-to-face discussion of 

the points in question. Often, as a last resort, the advisor uses bargaining 

power in the form of military aid to achieve his objectives rather than to 

establish a closer personal and working relationship.

If an advisor can place himself in the shoes of his counterpart and truly 

understand and appreciate the counterpart’s problems and frustrations, then 

he can assist in the alleviation of these problems and frustrations. Unfortunately, an advisor frequently arrives on the scene with preconceived ideas 

and charges full speed ahead without the slightest idea or care about the 

effect that it has on the counterpart.

Shaping the Individual

What does it take to shape the type of men we need to fill the role of 

advisors? We must consider the parents, the home, the environment in 

which he is reared, and, of course, his ideals, ambitions, and objectives 

in life. Intermingled with these are his religious beliefs and personal 

convictions.

In our modern society, torn with emotional crises which range from 

racial conflicts to attaining status, there is a great amount of pressure on 

the individual. Folkways and mores are crumbling, and the individual 

seeks the answer.

The US Army has made tremendous strides in shaping the individual 

through its schools and its social community. The war in Vietnam has 

demonstrated that we cannot win that type of conflict just by killing the 

enemy. We have to demonstrate by acts and deeds that the enemy cause is 

a false one. Above all, the advisor must be sincere, honest, and forthright 

in his relations with his counterpart. He cannot bless them in public and 

damn them in private.

We are still using the age-old approach to our newly acquired problem, and professional competence and military know-how are considered 

as the dominating factors in selecting advisors. From a strictly military 

viewpoint, this is a correct determination.

On the other hand, empathy on the part of advisors has seldom been 

formally encouraged as a need-to-have personality factor. Advisors who 

possess both empathy and knowledge are rare, indeed, but possessing military knowledge alone is not sufficient.
47

In order to instill in our advisors a better understanding of peoples, we 

must place more emphasis on such subjects as philosophy, psychology, 

sociology, and economics. These subjects should be mandatory requirements in all military schools. The time is not too late to train our advisors, 

our soldiers, in this school of thought. Our successes, particularly in southeast Asia, depend upon our advisors accomplishing their mission using 

knowledge gained through the study of these subjects.

The United States of America, in her role as a superpower, needs “super 

people” to carry out her world-wide mission. How do we obtain them? 

Certainly not in the myth of selective breeding. Psychology and sociology are not warlike subjects, but in counterinsurgency they are important 

factors in winning the hearts and minds of the people. A better grasp and 

understanding of this by our military personnel would help us to achieve 

our goals both at home and abroad.

There is really no difference in the basic nature of man whether he be 

American, Thai, Greek, Chinese, or Malayan. The basic problem lies in 

how we help him to achieve his basic goals. No man likes to be bought, or 

sold, or to have his mission overshadowed by open or veiled threats of aid 

being discontinued. A man likes to be considered as an individual, a man 

among men. He likes the respect due him according to his rank, position, 

and station in life. He wants recognition for his achievements in his steady 

climb toward his goal.

We need mature people as advisors, people who are soldier-diplomats. 

We do not need advisors who sacrifice their mission because of concern 

for efficiency reports and their chances on the next promotion list.

To be successful, we must go beyond the impersonal approach and 

tear down the fences with which we surround ourselves. We must sink our 

feet deep into the soil of the host country so that our planting will someday 

bring a bountiful harvest of peace.

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Reading 7

Senior Officer Debriefing Report

Major General John H. Cushman

The following end-of-tour report was submitted in 1972 by 

Major General John H. Cushman, senior advisor in the Delta 

region of South Vietnam. Looking back on his earlier assignments in South Vietnam, as well as his most recent tour as a 

senior advisor, MG Cushman stressed the importance of insight, 

of selection of advisors, of seeing things through Vietnamese 

eyes, and of the Vietnamese doing the job. He attached a copy 

of the letter of instructions that he provided his subordinate 

division advisors in the Delta.

HEADQUARTERS

DELTA REGIONAL ASSISTANCE COMMAND

APO SAN FRANCISCO 96215

MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

THRU: Commanding General

United States Army, Vietnam

APO 96375

TO: Assistant Chief of Staff for Force Development

 ATTN: FOR OT UT

Department of the Army

Washington, D.C. 20310

Country: Republic of Vietnam

Debriefing Report by: Major General John H. Cushman

Duty Assignment: Commanding General

 Delta Regional Assistance Command, USMACV

 Inclusive Dates: 14 May 1971–14 January 1972

 Date of Report: 14 January 1972
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MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

1. Introduction. The established purpose of this report, namely “to record 

and utilize the experience, knowledge, and insight gained by senior officers,” has led me to deviate from the suggested format and to set forth 

in a reflective vein certain major views held by me at tour’s end. These 

result not simply from the 22 months as an advisor in the Delta which end 

with this report, but also from two previous Vietnam tours. The reader 

interested in information responsive to the suggested format is referred to 

other, and excellent, material already available.

2. The Need for Insight. “Insight” is mentioned above. All too often 

insight is gained too late, and through adverse experience. I believe that 

great costs could have been saved in the Vietnam experience if our individual and collective insight had been better as things were developing. I 

claim no particular insight, but I do have some views on how insight can 

be gained.

Insight—or the ability to see the situation as it really is—is the most 

valuable asset an advisor can have. Intellect alone does not guarantee 

insight. Soldierly virtues such as integrity, courage, loyalty, and steadfastness are valuable indeed, but they are often not accompanied by insight. 

Insight comes from a willing openness to a variety of stimuli, from intellectual curiosity, from observation and reflection, from continuous evaluation and testing, from conversations and discussions, from review of 

assumptions, from listening to the views of outsiders, and from the indispensable ingredient of humility. Self-doubt is essential equipment for a 

responsible officer in this environment; the man who believes he has the 

situation entirely figured out is a danger to himself and to his mission.

I dwell on this because, while insight is the secret of good generalship in any situation, it is even more a requirement among the intangibles, 

nuances, and obscurities of a situation like Vietnam. Certainly the responsible officer must be a man of decision, willing to settle on a course of 

action and to follow it through. But the reflective, testing, and tentative 

manner in which insight is sought does not mean indecisiveness. It simply 

raises the likelihood that the decided course of action will be successful, 

because it is in harmony with the real situation that exists. I am convinced 

that the subjective insight into the conditions which actually prevail comes 

about only in the way I describe.

3. The Advisor. The above puts a special demand on the selection of 
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MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

advisors, especially at the level of colonel and above. The qualities which 

might make for effective, or even outstanding, performance as a battalion 

or brigade commander are not necessarily those which make the best advisor. A marked empathy with others, an ability to accommodate, a certain 

unmilitarily philosophical or reflective bent, a kind of waywardness or 

independence, and the like—these are often found in outstanding advisors, but may be frowned on in a troop chain of command situation. While 

it is entirely possible to find the man who excels both as commander and 

advisor, these men are too rare, and we need to look for good advisors who 

may not be all-purpose officers.

As Vietnam winds down, the natural tendency will be to pay less attention to the selection of senior officers for service there. The years ahead, 

however, are crucial ones and good advisors will be needed as much as, 

or more than, ever. An informal “selection board” or screening group, at 

DA [Department of the Army] level, made up of former advisors, which 

reviewed records and interviewed, even motivated, likely candidates, 

would be one way of insuring senior level advisor quality as well as indicating highest level interest. Further, the Military Assistance Institute at 

Fort Bragg, as the Army’s repository of advisory know-how, could be the 

location where this “selection board” meets, where the performance of 

successful advisors is made a matter of record, and where periodic and 

interesting seminars and orientation sessions for colonel and general officer level advisors could be run.

To further describe how I view the advisory function in the Delta, 

I have attached as Inclosure 1 a recent letter of instructions to the four 

division/special tactical zone senior advisors in MR4 [Military Region 4].

4. Through Vietnamese Eyes. Of course, the advisor must try to see the 

situation as it looks through Vietnamese eyes; This is part of the insight he 

strives for—not simply understanding the way Vietnamese in general look 

at matters, but also how his Vietnamese, his counterpart, does. What are 

the biases, constraints, pressures, and so on, that make up his real world? 

In all of this, the American has to understand that he is not Vietnamese. 

He is only temporarily in the country, and he will be exceptional indeed 

if in his tour he understands a small fraction of how Vietnamese look at 

their situation and themselves. But everything he suggests should be tested 

against the question “how does this fit into the Vietnamese way?”
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MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

Furthermore, it is very important to understand “the way things move” 

and to take advantage of natural movement. An example: Our Vietnamese 

friends want to stop supplies from being infiltrated ashore in coastal fishing areas. If they do this by denying native fishermen the opportunity to 

fish there, where they have fished for generations, and where their livelihood lies, this is unnatural and in the end self-defeating. But if they 

bring territorial security to the coastal area, populate it, outpost it, put PF 

[Popular Force] in the area, establish local government, and eventfully 

gain the loyalty of the population, the infiltration of supplies will come to 

an end. Furthermore, the fishermen will be on their side. Our US advisors 

must appreciate this type of point and make the natural forces operate to 

the advantage of the mission.

On the other hand, we have to recognize that the natural inclinations 

of the Vietnamese will on occasion work against their own objectives. 

An example: Village and district chiefs do not want to redeploy PF from 

pacified to contested areas; this is against the nature of the PF soldier, 

who likes to be home, and of the local authorities, who like the comfort 

of PF nearby. But if this redeployment outward from secure to insecure 

areas does not take place, the war can never be won. So a solution must 

be found; however, the solution can still be a “natural,” or as a minimum 

a “least unnatural,” solution.

The chemistry of this Vietnamese/US mix—this daily mingling of the 

counterpart with his views and the advisor with his—is what makes advisorship so interesting, and, when it produces a durable and good result, 

so rewarding and worthwhile. Each advisor is really alone in his environment. Because they are so intangible, he is not, as he is in most jobs, able 

to share with others his frustrations and his triumphs. (There are tangible 

and concrete ways to make things happen as an advisor, however, paragraph 9 of this report gets to that point.)

5. The Enemy. One area where insight still seems to be especially short 

is our understanding of the “enemy.” After all this time, he is still far from 

understood, and is again and again capable of surprise. A basic reason 

for this is that “he” is fundamentally different from “us,” including the 

Vietnamese on our side, and we do not adequately perceive this. We know 

few revolutionaries, we are little in personal contact with Communists, 

and thus we fail to appreciate their remarkably distinct and different, and 

impressive qualities. The antagonist, especially the cadre, in Vietnam lives 
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MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

in an environment completely different from ours, but by years of adaptation 

he is entirely at home, even secure and confident, in that environment. His 

environment is one of the hunted, yet one in which he can find protection 

among the people. It is an environment of night movement, clandestine 

communications, secret cadres, anonymity, rudimentary logistics, continual 

reconnaissance, careful study, patiently waiting for the right conditions, 

near perfect intelligence about “our side,” constant exhortation, a network 

of secret bases, discipline, fervor, dedication, adaptation to hardships, 

pride in not just survival but progress notwithstanding the other side’s 

possession of artillery, sensors, helicopters, B-52’s, fighter bombers, and 

other technical equipment of war.

Now, we should give due respect to all these qualities of his, but as 

we gain insight into his nature we can also perceive his vulnerabilities. 

Perhaps we can even come to realize that some of the more costly systems 

being deployed against him in the countryside are, and will always be, 

of little effect and we can put our energies and efforts where the payoff 

will be greater. For example, within MR4 the campaign to eliminate the 

enemy “minibases” in the countryside and to resettle formerly populated 

areas long contested or controlled by the enemy is striking his system in 

its most sensitive and vulnerable sector and will eventually be his undoing 

by depriving him of local guerrilla support.

6. The Vietnamese Must Do It. Probably the hardest thing for an 

American (even for advisors) in Vietnam to grasp completely is that, if our 

Vietnamese friends cannot bring this thing off, it is not going to get done. 

We cannot, and should not, do it for them. The US withdrawal has finally 

brought home this basic truth to our US rank and file in Vietnam. But, 

even at this stage, it is a hard truth to understand and accept completely 

and the full scope of what it means to advisors is still slow to penetrate. It 

means not simply that “the Vietnamese must do it.” It also means that we 

must still try to “show them how.” The job of the advisor thus becomes 

more complex, in that he has to figure out what he has to offer at this stage 

of the war. He can offer a great deal—analysis, systematic programs for 

achievement of objectives, independent evaluation, an outsider’s critique, 

plus friendly encouragement—all aimed at ultimate withdrawal of even 

this support and the Vietnamese doing almost everything on their own.

7. Motivation. If the responsible advisor is reflective, has intellectual 

curiosity, accepts self-doubt, and the like, this will inevitably lead him 
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SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

to ask, “Is this a worthy cause?” This question is fundamental, especially 

today when the assertion by figures in respected political, academic, and 

media positions that the cause is unworthy, discredited, or even immoral 

seems often to be accepted as fact.

Without going into a discussion, I simply say that I have thought a great 

deal about the subject and conclude that Vietnam has been, and remains, 

a worthy cause—worthy of the ideals, heritage, and efforts of the United 

States. To remain worthy of US participation, the effort must be conducted 

along lines which are morally and ethically justifiable.

We owe it to ourselves, our men, and our country to let discussion 

of the cause itself be out in the open and dealt with—so that responsible, 

moral, and upright men can be satisfied that their efforts are on the right 

track. From this enlightenment there proceeds improved motivation, and a 

solid and lasting basis for a sustained US effort in this country.

8. The Future for Vietnam. As I leave Vietnam, the North Vietnamese 

are once again on the offensive in Indochina—pressing hard in Laos and 

Cambodia and evidently building up for something in Vietnam. There 

will quite clearly be another time of test. As I look at the overall picture, 

albeit from a regional vantage point, it seems to me that, notwithstanding 

the current enemy offensive, there is a movement today in Vietnam along 

lines which have a reasonable chance of bringing about a satisfactory 

outcome—satisfactory from a (South) Vietnamese, a US, a Southeast Asia, 

as well as a “world peace” point of view. Parts of this mix are in fair shape; 

on others a good deal more needs to be done. Elements of the “program” 

are:

a. Stability of the Rear. This will come from an extension of pacification throughout the populated territory of the Republic of Vietnam, through 

improvement of the economic and social well being of the Vietnamese 

people, and through the growth of effective administration, of good local 

self-government, of local capacity for self-defense, and of community 

spirit in the hamlets and villages in the countryside.

These things are happening now, and they must be encouraged in 

every way possible, so as to establish a durable base from which the South 

Vietnamese society can deal with the threat from outside its borders.

b. Redeployment to Meet the Threat. The outside threat will remain 

well supported, intelligently conceived, and pressed on with strength, skill, 
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MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

and determination. The outside threat now represents by far the greatest 

threat to the security of the country. For the Vietnamese to deal effectively 

with this threat they must find the intellectual and moral toughness to prepare their divisions and mobile field forces for hard fighting, to move these 

forces ahead of time into the right positions, and to take the tactical offensive in a war in which they are on the strategic defensive. Redeployment 

also means that (at least in the Delta) RF [Regional Force] must be used 

outside province, so as to free divisions for use on the frontiers, outside 

the military region, or in Cambodia or Laos, and the PF must be either 

redeployed to less secure areas or eventually dissolved to support the 

economy, enter the PSDF [Peoples Self-Defense Force], and strengthen 

local administration.

c. Cambodian-Vietnamese Cooperation. Two fundamental truths 

dictate that there must be close cooperation between the South Vietnamese 

and the Cambodian government. First, to the North Vietnamese the war is, 

and always have been, an “Indochina War” in which the theater has been 

not only Vietnam and Cambodia but Laos as well. Second, the security of 

South Vietnam’s populous MR’s 3 and 4 requires that Cambodia not be 

in the hands of the enemy. There has been an encouraging development 

of cooperation across the borders. Much more remains to be done. The 

United States is in an excellent position to be the catalyst in this chemistry. 

The US authorities on both sides of the border are well aware of this matter and I raise the point simply to highlight its great importance.

d. Stifle Infiltration. Cooperation between South Vietnam and friendly 

elements in Laos may well be indicated also. In any event, some feasible 

and reasonably effective way must be found to limit the use of Laos territory as a supply and troop movement corridor into the open flank of South 

Vietnam. The war inside South Vietnam can now be dealt with, provided 

that the entry of troops and supplies from outside can be restricted to a 

fairly low level. I have no solution to offer; this has been out of my area of 

responsibility and familiarity. I mention it because I regard it as an essential component to a satisfactory outcome. (Coastal infiltration must also be 

restricted but it represents a more manageable problem.)

Movement along the above four lines will set up a long term situation 

in which it should be possible for the South Vietnamese to contain the 

threat indefinitely and for their country to grow in strength even in a time 

of hostilities. North Vietnam is prepared to wage war of indefinite length, in 
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SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

the expectation that South Vietnam is not or cannot be so prepared. When 

South Vietnam shows that it is also so prepared, a shift in the likelihood of 

an end to it all will quite possibly take place, and this war can end. But the 

outcome is by no means certain.

9. Getting Things Done. While insight and that sort of subjective appreciation of the way things are is important, the payoff in an advisory effort 

is in “getting things done” through the Vietnamese. The Delta advisory 

team has developed a management tool which has been fairly useful in 

making things happen toward desirable objectives. The nickname of this 

is “REVAMP,” which stands for “Redoubled Vietnamization and Military 

Professionalism.” In May 1971 we started this project by setting down the 

several major thrusts which made up an overall mission in the Delta. We 

called these “Level 1 Objectives.” They were:

a. Pacification. (or more accurately: Provide Support to GVN 

Community Development and Local Defense Programs.)

b. Turnover. (By this we meant “systematically turn over to the 

Vietnamese those things now being done by Americans.”)

c. Training. (Training is part of all Level 1 Objectives. In addition, 

we set it out separately because of its great importance and to achieve 

more emphasis.)

d. Improve RVNAF Military Operations. (All aspects of RVNAF 

military operations need improvement. Here our intention was to select a 

relatively small number of lines of action which had high priority and high 

payoff possibilities.) 

e. Cambodia Cooperation. (Included because of its decisive importance to mission accomplishment in the Delta.)

f. Orderly Phasedown of the US Effort. (All of the above were to 

be conducted in a time of reduction of the US presence in the Delta, both 

support forces and advisors, which reduction was itself to be done in a 

planned, orderly, and systematic manner. This is in large part what set up 

the interesting management problem.)

g. Professionalism in the Command. (Finally, and during all of the 

above, it was necessary to insure that the mission orientation, well being, 

conduct, appearance, and overall tone of US troops, both advisory and 
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SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

support, were at the highest standard. This was necessary not only for our 

own self-respect, but also to set an example to the Vietnamese.)

Each Level 1 Objective was broken down into several Level 2 

Objectives, and subordinate Level 3 Objectives were developed for most 

of those. A uniform and systematic approach was established toward the 

analysis and execution of program for these Level 2 and 3 Objectives, as 

well as a system for controlling the overall program.

REVAMP has been a successful management program and a useful 

tool for Delta mission accomplishment. Inclosure 2 [omitted] provides 

additional information. Those who are interested in further information on 

this management method may address their inquires to the Chief of Staff, 

Delta Regional Assistance Command, APO San Francisco 96215.

10. The Situation in the Delta. Finally, on my departure from Vietnam, I 

find the situation in the Delta encouraging in some respects, troubling in 

others, and satisfactory overall.

The Delta strategic plan is along sound lines, and the organization 

is good. Pacification is at work in the countryside and, if pressed on into 

the less populated and other still highly contested areas, will inexorably 

erode the enemy’s guerrilla strength without which he cannot survive. 

Leadership is generally good—superior at Corps, satisfactory overall at 

division/STZ, and, with only one serious exception, reasonably good at 

province. Problems exist—for example, redeployment lags in provinces, 

districts, and villages; shifts in tactics are not coming rapidly enough; infiltration continues; the village and hamlet levels of administration are still 

weak; training of forces is far below standard; and development is hampered by unnecessary and self-imposed bureaucratic entanglement. Unless 

there is a serious turn for the worse in Cambodia, a governmental upheaval 

in Saigon, precipitate withdrawal of US support, or some similar fundamental adverse change in the situation, I foresee continued progress in the 

Delta and eventual full mission accomplishment.

The best way to describe my views on the situation and outlook for 

Military Region 4 is to provide at Inclosure 3 [omitted], for comparison purposes, extracts of two letters written by me in recent months to 

Lieutenant General Ngo Quang Truong, Commanding General, IV Corps 

and Military Region 4. The latter letter was my “farewell assessment.”
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MACDR-CG 14 January 1972

SUBJECT: Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General John H. 

Cushman, RCS CSFOR–74

I should state in conclusion that my association as an advisor with 

LTG Truong has been highly rewarding. That this outstanding officer has 

gained increasing responsibility within the Vietnamese armed forces over 

the years is one reason for my belief that there is a good likelihood that our 

Vietnamese friends may be successful in the long run.

/S/ J.H. Cushman

3 Incl /T/ J.H. CUSHMAN

as Major General, US Army

 Senior Advisor, IV Corps/MR 4
59

INCLOSURE 1 to Senior Officer Debriefing Report of Major General 

John H. Cushman, CG, DRAC, 14 January 1972 (RCS CSFPR–74)

HEADQUARTERS

DELTA REGIONAL ASSISTANCE COMMAND

APO 96215

MACDR-CG 13 December 1971

SUBJECT: Letter of Instructions

Senior Advisor, 7th Infantry Division

Senior Advisor, 9th Infantry Division

Senior Advisor, 21st Infantry Division

Senior Advisor, 44th Special Tactical Zone

1. This letter of instructions contains my basic guidance for the execution of your responsibilities as senior advisor. It assembles and expands 

upon guidance already issued in other forms.

2. Your mission: You are responsible for advice and assistance, as appropriate and within your means, to your counterpart and his command across 

the entire range of his responsibilities. Although you are to be concerned 

with the effectiveness of day to day operations, your basic objective is to 

bring about substantive and sustained improvement in the advised command and its subordinate elements so that it can perform its mission well 

with minimum US combat support and eventually none.

3. You are to keep always in mind that the key to mission accomplishment 

in the Delta is pacification. You will thus consider the basic function of your 

advised command to be support to pacification. This concept is described 

in the various RVNAF [Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces] and MR4 

campaign plans, with which I expect you to be fully familiar. Your advice 

on unit employment, on the disposition of artillery, engineers, and other 

combat support, on operational methods, on the use of firepower, and the 

like, must be offered in full appreciation of the ultimate objective—the 

successful pacification of MR4.

4. Although you have neither command nor other jurisdiction over 

province advisory teams in your TAOR [Tactical Area of Responsibility], 

I expect you to assist them in every possible way. You should provide a 

focal point for necessary coordination of military operations. You should 

find ways to support the efforts of these teams, and for your advised 
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MACDR-CG 13 December 1971

SUBJECT: Letter of Instructions

command to assist the province and district chiefs in its TAOR. You must 

lead and encourage your counterpart to visit district and province chiefs, to 

listen to what they have to say, to understand their problems, to contribute 

to the solution of these problem, and to counsel them as necessary. While 

your specific responsibilities in the field of pacification are limited, your 

understanding and support of the total pacification program must be 

thorough.

5. For certain military matters, your advised command, and your advisory team, are in the operational chain between MR4 headquarters and the 

sectors; these matters include allocation and control of US Army aviation 

assets, tactical air requests, and operational reporting among others. In 

such matters, I expect you to establish professional operating procedures 

and, working with the province senior advisors, to provide leadership and 

supervision so that these various systems operate smoothly and efficiently. 

In these fields, as well as others, the way to the desired results is good professional understanding of the problem, plus communication and a willingness to work out a solution.

6. US Army helicopter assets operating in the Delta are opcon [OPCON: 

Operational Control] to me as Senior Advisor, IV Corps/MR4, and I in 

turn make them opcon to you. They become opcon to you upon reporting 

for their mission. You are authorized to make them in turn opcon to 

regimental/group/brigade senior advisors or province senior advisors/

deputy senior advisors, or their duly authorized representatives. When 

these assets are under your opcon, I hold you responsible for what they 

do. Before making the assets opcon, you will insure that lower level senior 

advisors are properly trained and oriented to accept the responsibilities 

that go with this opcon. You and they will always have available the advice 

of the air mission commander, and/or the aviation task force (battalion/

squadron) commander. Listen carefully to this advice; disregard it at your 

great risk. In matters of safety of flight and weather limitations, the senior 

aviation commander present has the decisive word.

7. I hold you responsible for meticulous compliance with prescribed 

Rules of Engagement. You must take extraordinary measures to insure 

that personnel who have responsibilities in these matters are thoroughly 

briefed, periodically tested, and continuously supervised. Further, you 

are to convey to your counterpart this same concern for the protection of 

noncombatants.
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MACDR-CG 13 December 1971

SUBJECT: Letter of Instructions

8. We are engaged in a strong and systematic program for the improvement of the VNAF [Vietnamese Air Force], and of ARVN [Army of 

Vietnam]/VNAF working relationships. I expect you to take a personal 

interest in moving this program in your advised command. This is a multifaceted effort involving every type of VNAF support, and an intricate web 

of ARVN/VNAF operating procedures, command arrangements, and staff 

techniques. It involves the total US military advisory effort in the Delta. 

No aspect of your task is more important than this. The clearly foreseeable reduction of US aviation assets makes this effort essential to mission 

accomplishment in the Delta.

9. You are to consider yourself as a trainer much more than an operator. 

You should carefully observe the operations of your advised command, 

evaluate its basic deficiencies, establish systematic programs to assist your 

counterpart in the correction of these deficiencies, and then measure progress and report to him. Specifically, you will work toward improving command techniques, staff operations, coordination of combined arms and 

supporting operations, and the day-to-day training and command supervision of infantry platoons and companies and artillery batteries. Your counterpart should look on you as a consultant on these and other aspects of his 

responsibility, and not primarily as a channel through which he receives 

support of various kinds. This training emphasis and your function as consultant are a considerably greater challenge to your professional qualification and advisor abilities than is the more limited function of “operator.” 

You must consider that, through your years of professional preparation, 

and as a representative of the United States, you have important assistance 

to offer your counterpart and his command. At the same time you must 

approach the job with a certain humility, realizing that he knows a great 

deal more about Vietnam and his own situation than do you.

10. The Vietnamese are moving to an era of more austerity. We must teach 

them to economize, to do more with less, and to find substitutes. This is 

going to mean some tough decisions on tactics, methods, priorities, and 

allocations, and more primitive ways in many respects. Dedicated trained 

manpower, moving on the ground, will have to do the jobs of machines 

and technical gear. One of your main tasks is to develop a realistic acceptance by your counterpart of these realities, plus the toughness to meet the 

situation with less in the face of a determined enemy.

11. There is one coordinated effort in the Delta. There is not an “ARVN 
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SUBJECT: Letter of Instructions

War,” a “Sector War,” a “Navy War,” or “pacification” separate from other 

efforts. There is simply a single effort toward overall mission accomplishment. It falls to you, as the senior advisor to the major tactical command 

in your TAOR, to see to it that all aspects of this total effort are coordinated, especially as to military operations. You and your staff must provide a coordinating advisory focal point—reaching out to the advisors of 

VNN, VNAF, provinces, and others, and bringing about mutual exchange 

of views, discussion of problem areas, and solutions. You must impart 

the same spirit to your counterpart and his staff. The RVNAF command 

relationships are complex and often unclear. The secret to success in not 

to fall back on the written charters and to deal with problems in a bureaucratic way, but to concentrate on practicable workable solutions to concrete problems in a spirit of mutual cooperation. To achieve this will be a 

test of your professional ability, and to bring about this spirit in your counterpart and his staff will be a test of your sensitivity and advisory skills. It 

calls for an attitude of communication, appreciation of other’s viewpoints, 

accommodation, and at the same time a fully professional dedication to the 

mission, and decisiveness.

12. You must devote considerable effort to motivation of your own advisory team. The advisory function is, at best, difficult to understand and 

appreciate. At this stage, when advisory teams are decreasing in size and 

shifting in emphasis, and when the environment is one of withdrawal, it 

is of paramount importance that each advisor understand his mission, and 

the broader context of our effort. Your task is to insure that each advisor, 

in fact, has meaningful work to perform. You must take pains to do this. 

You should concentrate especially on the advisors at the lowest level, such 

as the Mobile Combat Training Team, where frustrations are greatest and 

where the Vietnamese emphasis essential to success is often lacking.

13. Your advisory team must in all things set the example to the Vietnamese. 

By our appearance, discipline, and adherence to established standards in 

everything we do, we must convey to our Vietnamese friends an example 

of rectitude and professionalism that they will emulate. This includes the 

simple soldierly matters of appearance, military courtesy and the like, but 

it extends across all activities—maintenance of our equipment, concern 

for our men, avoidance of black market and other unauthorized practices, 

attention to duty, dedication to mission, and all the rest. More than we realize, the Vietnamese look on us as examples of how they should proceed. 
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SUBJECT: Letter of Instructions

In our everyday conduct, we should go to great lengths to be sure that they 

have something worthy to copy.

14. I want your relationship with me and with this headquarters to be 

informal and direct. Be sure that you keep us informed of your situation, 

and let us know about problems you are unable to resolve on your own. Be 

especially careful to let me or the Deputy CG know of significant developments or initiatives of your counterpart, or matters of a sensitive nature 

that may have effect beyond your own scope of responsibilities. Do not 

hesitate to be in direct touch with members of the DRAC command group 

on any problem. If you cannot resolve a matter, do not take the weight of 

the world on your shoulders. Bring it to me. We are all in this together.

/S/ John H. Cushman

/T/ J.H. CUSHMAN

 Major General, USA

 Senior Advisor, IV Corps/MR4

65

Reprinted from Marine Corps Gazette, Vol 75, No 10, October 1991, The Marine 

Corps Association, 55–57. Reprint courtesy of the Marine Corps Gazette. 

Copyright retained by the Marine Corps Gazette.

Reading 8

Some Advice for the Prospective Advisor

Major David L. Shelton

Based on his 4-month experience with the El Salvadoran 6th 

Brigade, USMC Major David L. Shelton wrote the following 

article for “prospective” advisors. He considered advisory duty 

rewarding, but “a particularly tricky business.” 

In filling advisory billets, the Marine Corps continues to play its long 

established and traditional role of supporting allies in need of security 

assistance. As an inexpensive contribution, in both political and fiscal 

terms, it appears likely that the dispatch of security assistance and advisory personnel will continue to be a governmental weapon of choice when 

faced with the undesirable options of either committing US forces abroad 

or refusing to help allies in need face the threats of insurgency, drug trafficking, or other internal instability. All things considered, advisors can be 

a cheap and effective tool.

For the individuals concerned, however, advising remains a particularly tricky business. Every advisor is placed in the difficult position of 

trying to influence the behavior of others over whom he has no authority, 

causing them to do things that may be foreign to their nature and habit, 

while at the same time attempting to interpret, implement, and respond to 

criticisms of US political decisions over which he has no input or control. 

Furthermore, all of this occurs against the backdrop of severe social, institutional, and political stress that is inherent in societies in conflict.

Advisory duty thus presents some very special challenges, as well as 

some exceptional rewards, for those who are fortunate enough to receive 

an assignment like this. What follows, then, are some thoughts on the 

business of advising, with a particular emphasis on some suggestions that 

might make the life of the prospective advisor a bit easier.

Upon assignment to advisory duty, an individual’s first thoughts usually 

concern how to best prepare himself for the work that lies ahead. Formal 

activities prior to deployment can include language or language refresher 

training, security awareness instruction, counterterrorist driving, and 

combat shooting courses. The prospective advisor usually undertakes an 
66

extensive personal reading program to ensure he has a sound background 

on the country involved and the subjects that will be most important to the 

units he advises.

Eventually, though, time runs out, and the advisor finds himself on the 

ground close to a war attempting to help people who a few weeks before 

he didn’t even know.

It rapidly becomes apparent that success depends upon the degree to 

which the advisor can establish credibility with his counterparts in the 

host nation’s forces. The best advice in the world is ineffective if it is not 

accepted and acted upon. Personality plays a role here, as does experience, 

attitude, and all of the other variables that affect the process of establishing personal relationships. Furthermore, there are unquestionably some 

individuals who are more naturally suited to advisory duty than others. 

Nearly anyone, however, who makes a conscientious effort can improve 

his rapport with host-country nationals.

A good starting point is to approach the assignment with the idea that 

the advisor is a salesman with a worthwhile product that will help immeasurably if the consumer just learns a bit more about it. One of a salesman’s 

primary goals is learning his area and becoming known. Thus, an advisor needs to spend as much time as possible, in the beginning, just being 

around the unit and listening. This includes field time, social activities, 

training evolutions, and virtually any other event where the advisor can 

interact with his counterparts.

Having learned his way around and the personalities of his counterparts, the advisor then needs to start slowly with small recommendations 

or simple items that are very likely to succeed in order to build a successful pattern and establish some confidence with his host-nation counterparts. At the same time, he needs to be prepared for the inevitable setbacks 

that will occur when even some of his seemingly simple suggestions don’t 

work out.

An advisor needs to be aware of the differences between his own military system and that of his host’s and to explore all of the reasons that the 

host nation performs a task in a given manner before recommending a 

different way to do it. It is also a good idea to consider the reasons why 

the host nation might not be able to do a given task before it is recommended. Host nation capabilities and limitations must be considered prior 

to the submission of any advice or suggestions. At all costs, the advisor 

should avoid unfavorable comparisons of host-nation practices with US 

methods.
67

An advisor should strive to help his counterpart focus his efforts 

and limited resources in areas that have the most likelihood of achieving 

battlefield success. This may include major efforts, such as convincing the 

unit commander to establish some kind of an overall commander’s intent, 

or more basic items, such as determining what units to send on patrol and 

when. For a variety of reasons, counterparts may not be fully aware of 

how their resources are being expended and your attempt at focusing and, 

if necessary, redirecting efforts can be very useful.

The corollary to this is that the advisor needs to constantly encourage 

inventiveness, aggressiveness, supervision, and command involvement in 

the daily operations of the units he is advising. Many cultures look with 

aversion or disdain upon the practice of seniors inspecting juniors and will 

avoid it if at all possible. The advisor may need to focus his counterpart’s 

attention on the positive aspects of the personal involvement of a leader 

with his men and upon the increase in morale that results from it.

At the same time, the advisor must do what he can to reinforce the 

chain of command concept and, to the best of his ability, help his counterpart find host-nation solutions to host-nation problems. The advisor must 

never be seen as a shortcut or way around the system or allow himself to 

be put in the position where he must choose sides in a personality, factional, or other local dispute. His counterpart is ultimately responsible for 

what the unit accomplishes, and the advisor must be sure to stress that fact 

whenever there is any doubt.

In Third World military organizations it is particularly worthwhile for 

an advisor to constantly emphasize the basics. Unit esprit de corps, taking 

care of the troops, weapons and equipment maintenance, small unit tactics, 

law of land warfare, leadership and all of the subjects that Marines hear 

and practice on a daily basis may be foreign to armies whose traditions 

are markedly different. Yet, if he is successful in teaching these basics, the 

advisor will have made great strides towards professionalizing the host 

nation’s army and helping it to defeat its adversary.

One area of particular concern for the advisor may be civil-military 

relations. Many Third World nations involved in conflict have arrived at 

that point, at least partially, through a neglect of the needs and aspirations 

of the people of the country. As one of the governing institutions of the 

country, the army may very well be a part of the problem. An advisor can 

be in a unique position to offer an outsider’s advice and focus attention on 

the improvement of the relationship between the army and the population at 

the local level, where it really counts. Not only is this morally responsible, 
68

but it makes sense tactically as well. A population that supports the army 

is much less likely to aid the insurgency. Therefore, an advisor should 

be ever aware of the possible civil ramifications of everything that he 

recommends and does, and everything that the host army considers or 

attempts.

In the advisory effort, an advisor must have, above all, patience. The 

military that he is assisting is undoubtedly less skilled and capable than 

his own. It wouldn’t need US advisors if it weren’t. By the same token, the 

advisor must realize that US attitudes and practices often have very little 

validity for Third World armies. Thus, an advisor should not measure his 

progress by US standards but rather by standards that have relevance to 

the host nation.

An advisor must further accept the possibility that his successes may 

be few and that such progress that is made will likely be the result of the 

seeds that he plants and that his successors bring to fruition. Assisting 

armies may involve host-nation political, cultural, economic, or social 

changes that will take years to complete. Thus, an advisor should try to 

concentrate on bringing long-term, lasting improvements to the institution 

and should think in terms of years rather than months or days. Given the 

realities of most Third World armies, it is a virtual certainty that progress 

will be slow. The advisor should be prepared for this.

A further point to be made here concerns setting a positive example 

for counterparts. An advisor should attempt at every opportunity to participate in the host nation’s culture. He should further attempt to personify 

all of those traits and characteristics that mark a professional military man 

in both his personal conduct and in his relationships with his host-nation 

counterparts. It requires great effort to live within a culture that is foreign 

to one’s own. Yet in so doing the advisor can greatly enhance his stature in 

the host nation’s eyes.

An advisor can expect to be an object of curiosity to both the host 

nation’s army and its local population. Virtually all of his public (and a 

large part of his private life) will be studied with great intensity by interested locals. He may be the only North American that some of these people 

have ever seen, and they may form their entire opinion of the United States 

based upon their limited contact with this one individual.

The advisor can also expect to be a focus for the dissatisfaction that 

certain elements of the host nation may feel towards US policies and practices. These elements may even include, at times, the advisor’s own counterparts in the army; that is, those people whom he was specifically sent 

to help. At those times, an advisor needs to carefully consider US policy, 
69

accurately and tactfully express it when questioned about it, and do his 

absolute best to avoid the lasting damage that will occur if host country 

irritations and frustrations with US decisions break out into open hostility. 

Again, an advisor’s job is to cultivate friendships in order to influence the 

institution in positive directions. He can’t do that if host nationals are not 

talking to him.

An advisor must also be sensitive to the differences in cultural ethics 

that may exist between the two cultures and ensure that his conduct is 

above reproach in either of the societies, particularly with regard to cultures that may have distinctly different views and customs about what is 

financially, morally, or legally acceptable. At the beginning, during, and at 

the end of his tour, an advisor is a representative of the ideals and institutions of the Untied States, and no matter how close he grows to his counterparts he cannot escape that fact.

For his efforts an advisor can expect rewards and growth in both his 

personal and professional life. Professional growth may include the opportunity to observe or experience combat first-hand, while helping an ally 

develop the skills necessary to defend or maintain a nation and achieve US 

foreign policy goals. Other rewards can include the sense of satisfaction 

that is obtained when an advisor helps the host nation execute successful 

combat operations. Perhaps best of all is the feeling that an advisor gets 

when his assistance results in the preservation of friendly lives and limbs.

Other rewards of a more personal nature can include an area and cultural awareness that is virtually impossible to achieve while in the United 

States or at a large US base overseas. Language skills can likewise be 

enhanced while establishing friendships that cross social and cultural 

boundaries of all types. One of the most interesting features of advisory 

duty is the opportunity to see how much alike troops and officers of all 

nations are, while at the same time noting how cultural differences affect 

their actions and practices.

Advisory duty challenges an individual in many different ways but 

holds rewards that are not available in other types of work. Given the 

potential benefits of advisory missions when compared to the relatively 

low costs of the operations, it is a virtual certainty that security assistance 

programs will continue to be a highly useful political tool in the future. 

Just as certainly for the personnel involved, advisory duty will continue to 

be one of the most vexing, enriching, challenging, and memorable tours 

available.

For a more in-depth look at advisory duty, I recommend two excellent 

books written by former Vietnam advisors: Silence As a Weapon [available 
70

in paperback as Stalking the Vietcong: Inside Operation Phoenix: A 

Personal Account] by Stuart A. Herrington and Once a Warrior King

by David Donovan [available in paperback]. Both books are enjoyable 

reading and provide useful insights for the prospective advisor.
71

Reading 9

After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief

Major Gregory T. Banner

The following after action report was submitted by a Special 

Forces major serving as chief of an Operations, Plans and 

Training Team (OPATT) in 1992, toward the end of the US 

OPATT effort in El Salvador. His assessments and recommendations offered constructive criticisms to improve future advisory efforts.

2d BDE OPATT 18 April 1992

MEMORANDUM FOR Commander, USMILGP

SUBJECT: After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief, Apr 91–

Apr 92

1. PURPOSE. This document is the after action report of the Operations, 

Plans and Training Team (OPATT) Chief serving during the period April 

1991-April 1992, with the 2d Military Zone, El Salvador.

2. GENERAL SITUATION. The Second MILZONE [Military Zone] 

OPATT consists of one Major and one SFC. These personnel live at the 

2d Brigade in Santa Ana. The MILZONE also includes DM-6 and DM-7 

[Military District] however US advisors were withdrawn from these units 

in February 1991. During the course of the tour covered by this report, 

several important changes occurred, these were the official cease fire 

which began on 1 February 1992 and a change in Brigade commanders in 

January 1992. Since the majority of the tour was prior to these changes, 

many comments reflect conditions prior to Jan/Feb 1992 but are included 

for historical reasons.

3. MISSION ASSESSMENT. At the completion of this tour, there are 

still a number of things I don’t understand about the war, the MILGROUP 

[US Military Group] effort, and my part in the greater scheme of things. 

None of it falls into easily definable categories of success, failure, or progress such as with any other job I have had in the military. The best I can 

do for an after action report is to therefore list some basic thoughts I have 

regarding my tour. As with all such reports, the purpose is to stimulate 

professional thought and hopefully improvement in such operations in the 

future.
72

2d BDE OPATT 18 April 1992

SUBJECT: After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief, Apr 91– 

Apr 92

a. I have learned an incredible amount during this year. For that reason, this has been a good tour, and time and money well spent by our Army. 

Unfortunately, I was assigned here to be an advisor to the Salvadoran 

Army, not to be just an observer. In that, I would consider my mission to 

be a failure. I would be hard pressed to list any successes I have had or 

anything their Army is doing better because of my presence. On the other 

hand, I know of soldiers who have literally died because the ESAF [El 

Salvador Armed Forces] would not adopt simple suggestions I made, and 

I can list hundreds of improvements which still need to be made in their 

training and operations. “Observer” would be a far more accurate term 

than “advisor” or “trainer.” These latter two terms require either a willingness of the host nation to accept advice/help, or lacking that, some sort of 

power base from which to implement change in spite of local resistance. 

Neither of these conditions existed for me and so during almost my entire 

tour, I was strictly an observer.

b. From having a certain amount of experience working with foreign 

soldiers, I expected a lot of institutional and personal inertia within the 

ESAF, and a variety of internal problems. Dealing with these things is the 

challenge of such work and it is an accepted part of “the deal.” The only 

way to overcome such problems though is to have the US effort and our 

systems so organized that we can overcome such things. The real disappointment of this tour is not the ESAF problems, but the things the US 

could and should be doing better. Arriving as I did after the MILGROUP 

had been in existence for many years, it was extremely disappointing and 

frustrating to find few working procedures or a comprehensive organization or support system to try and overcome ESAF problems at my level. 

Although my mission statement was never verbalized as such, I believe it 

was to go out to the unit and do “the best I could.” I was however completely on my own and absolutely at the mercy of the ESAF. They could 

have locked me in a box for a year and nobody in either the ESAF or 

US systems would have cared. I have experienced personal and professional insults and have felt that at best my presence was tolerated but not 

desired or welcomed. This situation existed because of some particularly 

bad ESAF personalities I had to deal with, but the problem was encouraged by the fact that no one really cared how or if my talents were usefully 

employed, and they were not.

c. The advisory business and the mission of the MILGROUP are the 
73

2d BDE OPATT 18 April 1992

SUBJECT: After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief, Apr 91–

Apr 92

most difficult jobs I have thus far seen in my career. That difficulty though 

covers and obscures the fact that we can do it a lot better. I feel that we 

have suffered from the luxury of having nobody capable or competent to 

judge our work outside of this country’s borders. That fact has allowed the 

MILGROUP to accept a bad situation and has stunted the development 

and growth of the MILGROUP effort. As long as we kept out of the public 

spot-light, we could pretty much do as we pleased and measure progress 

with whatever yardstick (or micrometer) we chose. I accept the statements 

of personnel with far more experience, that over the course of the war, the 

ESAF has made enormous progress and that much of that is due to the 

MILGROUP effort. All I know about first hand though, is my little part, 

and my question is one of efficiency. I think we could have done much 

better, brought the ESAF along faster, and possibly ended the war sooner.

d. Various published sources have criticized the quality of our military personnel in El Salvador. From my tour I reject the idea that we have 

“second rate” personnel here. I have met very few people here whom I 

would not again serve with, or under. The problems I have seen are not 

personal, they are systemic, and are therefore much harder to grapple with. 

After Vietnam and now El Salvador, we still don’t have a handle on fighting UW [Unconventional Warfare] in other countries, and how we use the 

inherent strengths of our country versus being hampered by the inherent 

limitations. The whole subject could easily take up a doctoral thesis but 

suffice it to say that good soldiers are the starting point, but by themselves 

are not enough. I believe though that with a good system as a starting 

point, good people will produce results. Without any system, it will be hit 

or miss whether even the best soldiers we have to send, can produce any 

effect at all.

e. As my frustrations grew, I began to look harder and harder for 

answers. Implementation was unfortunately above my level, but at least 

I began to record various ideas I had and the thoughts of others. My list 

of specific recommendations are at enclosure 1. These comments and the 

thought processes behind them are for me, probably the most valuable 

thing to come out of my tour. If I was not able to solve any problems, 

I believe that I am at least at the starting point of having identified a lot 

of them with at least a few clues to some of the solutions. If for no other 

reason, this process for me and the education I received here, made the 

tour worthwhile. My comments at enclosure 1, I feel, can be used now to 
74

2d BDE OPATT 18 April 1992

SUBJECT: After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief, Apr 91– 

Apr 92

improve MILGROUP – El Salvador operations and I believe they could be 

valuable for any future similar effort in a different country. Even though 

the war has now ended in El Salvador, the challenge to the unit advisor 

remains, and most if not all of the problems still exist. As long as we retain 

field advisors similar to our current effort, an attempt should be made to 

improve the situation and create an effective presence at that level. This 

enclosure was a running list which I started and have added to as I learned 

something or formed a new opinion on matters. It is unfortunate but I do 

not believe that institutionally we have any similar document or process to 

try and capture the nuts and bolts of putting together an effective advisory 

effort. Such a product should be created.

f. I believe we were lucky that the war in El Salvador ended as it 

did. Various parts of the advisory effort effected this outcome, some in a 

major way. For the local advisors out with the units though, I believe the 

war ended in spite of our efforts, not because of them. Those who did have 

successes, did so because they happened to have particularly enlightened 

counterparts who took advantage of what their US advisors could do. I 

was not so lucky and do not believe that our doctrinal approach to the 

advisory business should be based on luck. If the job is worth doing, it is 

worth doing right and requires planning, organization, and systemic solutions, not trusting to the good will of the host nation and hoping they will 

do what we want. In Vietnam, we tried initially to run the war for the Host 

Nation. In El Salvador we were at the other extreme and pretty much gave 

them the option of ignoring our presence. I think that at least we have the 

problem bracketed and should search for the middle ground which will 

make us effective without being overly domineering.

g. It appears that armed conflict in El Salvador has ended. For their 

sake and ours, I hope this is so. What troubles me at this point though is 

the belief that because of the successful political conclusion of the hostilities, the US Army now believes it knows how to handle insurgencies and 

establish effective MILGROUPs. It does not. The subject still needs serious study and the development of an effective approach. I do not believe 

that we have doctrinally learned much from either our “loss” in Vietnam 

or our “victory” in El Salvador. Even in the areas where we have had successes, we have not taken enough notes to know what was right or wrong 

in our efforts. I think that any future effort will essentially be starting from 

scratch without the benefit of learning from our mistakes or successes in 
75

2d BDE OPATT 18 April 1992

SUBJECT: After Action Report, 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief, Apr 91–

Apr 92

El Salvador. It appears to me that our effort in El Salvador was likewise 

conducted without a serious study of Vietnam or an effort to learn what we 

could from that or other conflicts.

4. These comments have unfortunately been overwhelmingly negative 

and reflect my frustration at having done very little during my year. The 

mission of the MILGROUP in El Salvador (and in Vietnam) presented a 

far more difficult job and a greater challenge than anything else our Army 

has done in many years. For all the difficulty of conventional operations, 

they are not even in the same ball-park as far as the need to be innovative, creative, and juggle a host of political, military, social and economic 

requirements. The fact is that nobody is adequately trained for the work 

and that makes a complex job extremely difficult. Nevertheless, I feel that 

the difficulty of the challenge does not excuse poor performance. We get 

paid to tackle such problems, analyze what is going on and find solutions. 

I am embarrassed at how little I have accomplished here and only through 

hearing similar feelings from other advisors have I been able to keep some 

measure of professional self-respect. I have no doubt that the job could be 

done better. My one great hope is that we can do it better and take the time 

to really study the problem and develop workable solutions. We are not 

there yet and we owe it to our country and those we want to help, to get 

our act together and figure out how to do this type of mission.

/S/ Gregory T Banner

Encl /T/ GREGORY T BANNER

 MAJ, SF

 2d MILZONE OPATT Chief
76

18 April 1992

AUTHOR’S NOTE: The following was compiled while assigned as an 

advisor in El Salvador during 1991 and 1992. The material contained here 

is based on personal experience and on study from other advisory efforts. 

Items mentioned may or may not be based directly on observations from 

El Salvador. The comments are also meant to be lessons learned, both 

from things we have done right, and things we have done wrong.

1. The basis for having effective advisors are systems which create an 

environment in which he can work. A national level agreement needs 

to spell out, in writing, what are the specific functions of the advisors, 

what they will do and how they will do them. It is not an option for the 

unit to stick their advisors in a hole and ignore them. The function of the 

MILGROUP is to ask the HN [host nation] forces if the advisors are doing 

what the HN wants, and ask the advisors if they are being listened to and 

productively employed. MILGROUP’s function should then be to try to 

fix any problems which arise from these questions. If the advisors are not 

being used, they should be removed and put someplace else. If they are 

not doing their jobs for the HN, they should be fired. This national level 

agreement needs to be put in a document which lists what the HN will/will 

not do, what the advisor will/will not do, and what are some of the variables which are allowed. It is the function of the national level liaison (the 

MILGROUP) to establish and run a system at national level. Within this 

system, the local advisors can then do their jobs of being advisors.

2. The MILGROUP should have a wire/POC [point of contact] into 

every TRADOC [Training and Doctrine Command] HQ [headquarters] in 

order to test equipment, comment on doctrine, get advice about problems, 

etc. . . . Every advantage should be taken of the opportunity to use a combat 

zone to improve our Army and we should use all of our resources to help 

the HN. (The MILGROUP should do a monthly report and list problem 

areas; this report should go to all the TRADOC/FORSCOM [Forces 

Command] headquarters which may be of help or may have bright ideas 

in their particular areas of expertise.)

3. MILGROUP needs the basic military necessities: A good and complete library of all applicable manuals, access to a TASC [Training and 

Audiovisual Support Center] system, good supply system. The MILGP

[MILGROUP] should also be a good central location to have the master 

set of such things as lesson plans and various training aids.

4. Advisors should not be restricted to certain sites or activities, they 

should have free access to go anywhere and do anything. (No US or host 
77

nation restrictions.) HN should not be able to dismiss advisors from meetings, not invite them to meetings, or deny them information on the basis 

of security classification. Advisors should be able to accompany units on 

operations. Advisors should have full access to all HN activities and materials. (National level guidance needs to make this perfectly clear so that 

local units do not try and cannot “jerk” their advisors around. (Are we on 

the same side???)) The effect of US restrictions is to destroy the credibility 

of the advisor in addition to seriously degrade his ability to know what is 

really happening and what the problems are. (El Salvadoran joke—The 

Spanish word “Asesor” which means “Advisor,” really means, “one who 

tries to tell us how to run a war without ever having been there.”)

5. Advisory effort needs to be coordinated; all US agencies need to be 

combined (see CORDS [Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development 

Support] program in Vietnam), and encourage host nation to do the same. 

For example, the senior US advisor in a zone needs to know everything 

the US is doing in that zone. UW is too complicated to just have a military, CIA [Central Intelligence Agency], or AID [Agency for International 

Development] advisor in a zone or to have them working separately. They 

need to know each other’s business, work together, and one boss should 

coordinate all of these efforts in the zone. Unity of Command, a basic for 

success!!! (The principles of war apply to UW too!!!)

6. Check language problems, translators, etc. . . . Lack of language skills 

can be a major issue. It should be a goal to have at least one native speaker 

with each advisory team.

7. Maximize passing of information among MILGROUP. Systematize 

with reading files, info [information] papers, etc. . . . Monthly info paper 

should be done by each advisor at a major staff section or agency at national 

level. If such papers are done by the civilian agencies they should be passed 

and made available to the MILGROUP. Field advisor’s monthly report 

should be broken down to specifically address issues to each national level 

advisor (so they can find quickly what pertains to them). A monthly military report should just be a part of zone and country reports which address 

what EVERYBODY is doing (other US agencies). If we truly combine all 

operations, separate US reports should not even exist. We should be working so closely with the HN that only one report, including everybody, is 

required!

8. Advisors should not be in the logistical system. Make the HN system 

work!!!!! At the same time though, logistical muscle is often what gives 

the advisor the power he needs to get things accomplished. It is a subtle 

difference which needs careful consideration.
78

9. Need an info paper explaining all of the special rules which apply 

during the tour (tax deduction $500/month in combat zone?, priority on 

Space-A travel, promotion/selection boards, policies regarding families 

left behind, paid leave between overseas assignments, finance matters, 

etc. . . ) 

10. For any short tour, need to maximize information system for personnel. Need good reference system: how to find stuff, how to get stuff done, 

who to ask for help in different areas (US military and civilian assets, HN 

assets for advisors and HN forces, other assets). Personnel should not have 

to hunt for information or accidentally bump into things. Explaining such 

things should be part of an extremely well organized in-processing system. 

Each team should have a “smart book.”

11. The MILGROUP needs from the start to have a program for recording 

historical information. Someday, someone will probably want to study the 

evolution and functioning of the MILGROUP and such information will 

be useful. Include: All positions held by MILGROUP personnel—names 

and dates of personnel & changes/evolution of MILGROUP structure; 

evolution and changes to host nation structure (especially as it applies to 

the MILGROUP); critical documents such as mission statements, guidance from higher, etc; all after action reports. All personnel should be 

encouraged to keep a diary of events and submit this to the historical files. 

(Where does all of this stuff go when the MILGROUP is closed down? 

National Archives?) How does the MILGROUP as a body and our Army 

in employing MILGROUPs, systemically improve our efforts? What are 

we doing to learn from our mistakes and evolve so that we can do better?

12. Working of national level advisors with “field” advisors—The national 

level personnel should develop national plans with their counterparts. Such 

plans may be simple ways of doing business such as a new form or new 

system. This plan should then be written up, published, and publicized 

through the HN and the advisory system. The field advisor’s function is 

then to monitor at their level and ensure the new program is understood, 

implemented and functioning.

13. Any document from national level (HN) which applies to the advisors or would be of interest, should be sent “back channel” through the 

advisor’s chain down to the field advisors. Don’t depend on the HN telling 

the advisors about anything.

14. Advisors should know specialties/areas of expertise of fellow advisors. They should use each other as needed.

15. “US” and “Advisor” bashing is a favorite sport. Accepting support 
79

is not the same as liking the US, or wanting the advisors camped out in a 

unit’s backyard. Often third world personnel just have an inferiority complex to start with, and if they can get away with it, will pick on, and abuse 

their advisors, and bad-mouth the US in general. This should be countered 

quickly and aggressively. The advisors should not have to take this type 

of abuse but they rarely have the power to do anything at their level other 

than talk. This is especially a problem if there is a rank difference between 

the advisor and his counterpart. The MILGROUP should receive reports 

of such activity and counter it quickly and aggressively. A commander 

with such an attitude probably should forfeit his right to an advisor (and 

everything the advisor brings with him).

16. Advisors who work a particular zone, need to have ongoing projects to 

compile an area study of the zone and specific target analyses of all critical 

points within the zone (Both types of projects and formats for them are 

known by SF [Special Forces] personnel. Doing such studies are routine in 

SF and should be routine for advisors). This should be started by the first 

person in the job and continually upgraded as new information is obtained. 

One of the first things a new person should read are these files because 

they should contain information on the most critical things to be known 

about the zone. When the site/MILGROUP is closed out, it is CRITICAL 

that this information be organized and retained for our own intelligence 

purposes. Probably the best place to send it is to the S-2 of the SF Group 

with responsibility for the area.

17. Some specific techniques to get the advisors actually doing something 

useful (as opposed to B.S. touchy/fealy/advising business with no rules or 

requirements):

a. Every month have the advisors do a formal target analysis of one 

target/fixed site in their zone. Have this include a list of specific recommendations. Do this report in the host language. Require the local unit to 

respond formally in writing to the recommendations and have the entire 

packet go to higher (national?) level for review and to resolve conflicts.

b. Every month have the advisors write a list of recommendations 

for the unit. Make the unit respond in writing to each recommendation.

c. Have the advisors review and approve every OPORD [operations 

order], directive, or all of the other important documents. (Don’t let this get 

out of hand, but the idea is that the advisors should be formally consulted 

on these major documents which govern how the unit does its business.)

d. Give the advisor(s) formal authority over a specific project or site. 

Have him take charge for a month or so, fix all the problems (as many as 
80

possible) and train the HN people to run it after he is gone. He can then 

monitor and make corrections during the remainder of his tour.

e. Give the advisor a formal job in the chain of command. Make 

him/them the S-3/training, S-2, XO, or even the commander of a subordinate unit. (With “equal” countries such as England and Germany, we 

exchange officers who work as the XO, Cdr, S-3 in the unit. With poor 

countries who desperately need the help, all we do is advise??? Why not 

give us real jobs???)

f. Have the HN commander write a report every month on how he is 

using his advisor(s)/what the advisor(s) did that month. It can be billed as 

“report on your advisor” but what it really is, is “what are you having your 

advisor do for you.”

18. Advisors usually have a difficult enough time with a unit where they 

live. It is impossible and unrealistic to expect someone to commute and 

have a meaningful relationship with a unit. If some place is important 

enough and needs an advisor, they should have their own; “token” advisors 

who only visit a few times a month are generally a waste of time. Liaison 

visits are alright but a true advisory relationship with all that entails should 

not be expected.

19. Advisors who routinely get US training teams in their area, should 

have current info books on all assets available to the teams. Include 

diagrams/pictures of all training facilities, info on billets, eating, 

transportation, etc. . . .

20. Is gross fraud, waste, and abuse by the HN personnel acceptable??? It 

should be clearly stated and constantly emphasized that thievery is not a 

privilege of rank. Getting the HN logistical system/budget strait should be 

a priority because this system often drives all of the others; a poor logistical system (poorly managed) will screw up everything else. Looking the 

other way or pretending it’s not happening is not the solution. Part of the 

professional development of higher ranking officers is that such behavior 

is not acceptable. Since most of the logistical system is US funded, what 

will the Congress et. al. have to say about “our” money being siphoned off 

into retirement funds???? Such a problem could really explode and cause 

massive embarrassment/problems for the advisory effort. The professional 

standards of our Army are generally pretty good and it is definitely a function of the advisory effort to transmit such things as honesty, integrity, and 

fiscal responsibility, even if the HN doesn’t want it. Accepting problems 

as “part of the culture” is a cop-out.

21. What kind of specific training, classes, in-processing do advisors 

need?
81

a. Read:

 Country Area Study

 Silence Was a Weapon Harrington [Stuart A. Herrington]

 The Advisor Cook [John Cook]

 Rand Corporation Study, The American Military Advisor and His 

Foreign Counterpart: The Case of Vietnam, G.C. Hickey, March 1965.

 After Action Reports of predecessors.

b. Talk to all US sections in country team/embassy—Political, 

Economic, & other State Dept Sections, CIA, AID, USIS [US Information 

Service], etc . . . , other agencies (UN [United Nations], ICRC [International 

Committee of the Red Cross], DSF [unknown],Reporters (???)) Regardless 

of political leanings, it is useful to get other people’s views and see “the 

other side.”

c. Personal security training—Lots of pistol shooting, enough 

ammunition to stay current (50 rds [rounds]/month?), training program/

standards for bodyguards.

d. Special schools or one already in existence: PSYOPS [Psychological Operations] or Civil Affairs Course (6 wks [weeks] each) (probably 

of use to all advisors even if they are not specifically 39s [PSYOPS/Civil 

Affairs military occupational specialty] or PSYOPS/CA advisors), State 

Department Area Studies Courses.

e. Language Training, Language Training, Language Training! What 

is the minimum acceptable level (1-1, 2-2, 2+-2+)??? (Non-native speakers should also be funded to continue formal language training while in 

country. One hour a day is not unreasonable.)

22. Have advisors work on simple things, small victories. Usually it is 

a total waste of time to try and impart US grand doctrine or strategy. It 

is much more important to find ways/specific techniques for better leadership, training, and general operations. Philosophy does not count for 

much, look for practical improvements.

23. Advisors need to regress in their thinking to understand where problems may be. Think very, very, basic. For example—For marksmanship 

training, can everyone see the target???? Most countries can’t afford 

glasses for their troops and don’t bother with vision tests. Should someone 

who is functionally blind be an infantryman? Do the troops have vitamin 

deficiencies that lead to problems with night vision? Can the troops read?

Take things like this into account.
82

24. Each advisory team should have an automatic subscription to all 

documents/magazines which apply to their mission:

US military professional journals (“Infantry,” “Special Warfare,” 

etc . . .)

Any military journal which is produced by the US in the host nation 

language

Other US government journals/documents which apply to the 

country/mission

US civilian publications

Host Nation publications

Local Newspaper

25. Advisors need to be watched by the MILGROUP for abuse of their 

positions. If the advisor is indeed in a position of power, he can’t be abusing his counterparts. This is unprofessional and reflects poorly on our 

Army and the advisory effort. Also the advisors can’t use their “get out of 

jail free” cards to disregard HN civilian laws. Some types of personalities 

are just unacceptable for this type of work and they cannot be trusted with 

power. (An SF person with this type of problem should be thrown out of 

the branch!!) 

26. Games played by the HN:

a. “But the other advisor did this/could get this for us.” (Obviously 

since you won’t/can’t you either don’t like us or are not very good at your 

job.)

b. “You/someone else promised to do something.” They will swear 

that a promise was made to do/get something and give you those big disappointed puppy-dog eyes that you apparently are not going to keep your 

word or the word of a co-worker (who is usually not around to be asked 

about this).

27. Basic problems. There are some fundamental problems in the advisory business. The only way to overcome these problems is by having 

A SYSTEM and SYSTEMIC SOLUTIONS/PROGRAMS to combat the 

things which are wrong in the HN forces. Without systems (national level 

guidance/programs/instructions) to support the advisor, he will be spinning his wheels and accomplishing very little or nothing. The problems 

are:

a. The advisors were brought into country by the national level HN 

people (for their own reasons). This does not mean that the local people 

and lower levels want advisors or advice.
83

b. The HN forces are very often corrupt to one degree or another. 

For this reason they don’t want anybody looking at their operation, finding out about these types of activities, reporting, or fixing budget/money 

problems.

c. Very often, the advisor (regardless of rank) could do anybody’s 

job in the HN unit, better than the person holding the job. The advisor 

will have all kinds of ideas to improve things throughout the unit. This 

is a threat. The HN personnel will generally be hesitant to invite scrutiny because, however nicely it may come out, there will almost always 

be some form of criticism. If someone can prevent an inspection of their 

operation, they will.

d. Basic misunderstandings between what the advisor thinks he 

should be doing/what he is capable of doing, and what the HN thinks 

he should be doing/wants him to do. Getting this straight is part of “The 

System” and written guidance is needed to make sure this is all perfectly 

clear to all parties. If left to the HN, they will so design the advisor’s job 

that he is no threat, provides only resources (without specifically controlling them), and does not see anything which reflects badly on the HN unit 

or personnel.

28. The MILGROUP is usually at the end of a long and poor line of 

communications/logistical support. It is probably most cost effective and 

efficient for the MILGROUP to have one person, specifically designated, 

assigned at the support base for the MILGROUP (In the case of El Salvador, 

in Panama). Such a person should be the POC for all needs, paperwork and 

actions. This is much better than constantly sending people TDY in order 

to accomplish what would otherwise be routine actions for someone who 

is permanently stationed at the support site.

29. A line of communications needs to exist between MILGROUPs in the 

same region or doing a similar job. MILGROUPs should pass good ideas 

and solicit help from wherever they may find it.

30. Need to develop for/with the HN a list of long term projects/goals to 

organize systems in their country:

Training Aids System—One site which can fabricate aids, copy aids 

from the US system, catalog films, slides, etc . . ., print Graphic Training 

Aids and Charts, etc. . . .

A process for writing doctrine and regulations. Come up with the best 

way to do something, then print it and publicize it. These are really national 

level SOPs which are a necessity for any system to work. Concentrate first 

on admin/log.
84

A list of individual SQT [Soldier Qualification Tasks] tasks (for all 

MOSs [military occupational specialties] and Grades) and a list of METL 

tasks for all types and levels of units. These things drive the train for all 

individual and unit training.

31. What is the relationship between the Defense Attache Office and 

the MILGROUP? We are on the same side and need to work together. 

Passing of info and meetings to discuss mutual needs and projects should 

be routine.

32. Somebody should have biographies of all the key host nation personnel (Somebody probably already does). When unit personnel changes are 

made, the field advisors should update these bios and be able to consult 

them to read up on new people.

33. What is the fundamental method of operation for the MILGROUP 

in regards to the host nation? Bottom line is that the MILGROUP exists 

to implement improvements and physical changes within the HN military. MILGROUP needs to watch itself that it does not spend too much 

time simply recording information and reporting on events. The job is to 

get something accomplished, not to chronicle what is happening. Do not 

get too caught up in reports and briefings unless they lead to evaluations 

and solutions. It could be a full time job to list problems but this is a 

waste unless it leads somewhere. It is also a subtle form of camouflage for 

the MILGROUP to constantly pursue/generate information in the pretext 

that this automatically leads to something useful and therefore gives the 

appearance that the MILGROUP is earning its money. The DAO [Defense 

Attaché Officer] exists to generate information, the MILGROUP exists to 

get things accomplished.

34. The advisory business is extremely frustrating. The source of much 

of that frustration is the advisor not being told what is expected of him 

or what his specific goals are. At the beginning of the tour, he should be 

told, in writing preferably, exactly what is expected of him and what the 

system is so that he can accomplish these goals. Of course what goes on an 

OER [Officer Evaluation Report] or NCOER [Noncommissioned Officer 

Evaluation Report] support form can never be brutally honest. But for the 

advisor’s own peace of mind, if very little is expected of him because of 

severe limitations in what he does or how he can do it, this needs to be 

explained. If someone is really an observer, with minimal or no power to 

really effect change, his job description should be so stated. This process of 

clearly stating job limitations and expectations, is healthy for the advisor’s 

chain of command too. They should not have unreal expectations and they 

should support the system to enable the advisor to accomplish his stated 
85

mission(s). As with much in the military, what goes on efficiency reports 

and what is briefed, is often pure B.S. The above listed problem/process 

should be aimed at the realities of the situation. Every month, this written 

guidance should undergo a reality test/check to make sure that everyone 

is on the same frequency and knows what is really happening out in the 

field.

35. HN personnel will always want personal favors. High on the list are 

buying things through catalogs or through the US PX system, getting US 

visas for people, and using the US post system to mail things. It is best 

if the MILGROUP/embassy write a clear policy letter prohibiting such 

activities. This should be translated into the native language and the advisors can then hand it to people who ask for such favors. Otherwise, the 

advisor will have problems and people will think he is just choosing not to 

be helpful. (“But the other advisor did it!”)

36. The limit on US advisors in El Salvador severely limited our effectiveness in a number of ways. One critical way was that it was just physically 

impossible for the small advisory teams to look at and help all of the staff 

sections within a major unit.

How to tackle problems with limited US resources (personnel)? Would 

it be useful to pick a “staff section of the year” and try to concentrate US 

and host nation resources for a set time period to evaluate and fix all of the 

problems in that area, then move on to something else? The advisory effort 

should have a long term focus (10 years does not seem unreasonable) and 

with planning could pick one area to concentrate on per year. If US personnel and resources are limited, take the advisors and have them work 

principally in one area at a time instead of spreading them over all staff 

sections and functions. This comment applies when we have, for example, 

only a small team at large headquarters, which is a fundamental mistake 

to start with. A proper advisory team needs an “expert” to work with and 

help each major staff section. All staff functions are critically important 

and deserving of full time attention.

/S/ Gregory T Banner

/T/ GREGORY T BANNER

 MAJ, SF

87

Reprinted, by permission, from Armor, July–August 2005, Armor Association, 

44–47.

Reading 10

From the Ashes: Rebuilding the Iraqi Army

Major Mike Sullivan

Major Mike Sullivan, an armor officer assigned as a battalion operations observer controller, Combat Maneuver Training 

Center (CMTC), Hohenfels, Germany, suddenly found himself a member of a training team sent to Iraq to build and 

train the 6th Iraqi Infantry Battalion. His 2005 Armor article describes the experiences of that team. Major Sullivan 

has an oral history collected by the Operational Leadership 

Experiences project that can be accessed digitally at http://

cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/ 

p4013coll13&CISOPTR=207&REC=4.

When you hear the term “observer controller (OC),” it brings to 

mind images of non-MILES wearing, doctrine-spouting, mistake-hunting 

experts who are the bane of units going through Combat Training Centers. 

They are also considered to be safe from deployments, other than the 

occasional temporary duty trip. However, on 16 March 2004, members 

of the Timberwolf OC team from the Combat Maneuver Training Center 

(CMTC), Hohenfels, Germany, arrived in Baghdad, Iraq, with a new mission: to train a battalion of the new Iraqi army. Suddenly, those doctrinal 

experts would have to practice what they preach.

The CMTC sent two ten-man teams to support the Coalition Military 

Assistance Training Team (CMATT). A mix of armor and infantry backgrounds, each team was made up of several OCs, which included one 

field grade officer, two captains, and seven senior noncommissioned officers (NCOs). The Timberwolf team was the first to hit the ground, with 

the mission of training the Iraqi 6th Infantry Battalion. Two weeks later, 

another team from the CMTC, the Grizzlies, arrived to train the Iraqi 7th 

Battalion.

As with so many units entering Iraq, there was the initial confusion, 

apprehension, and frustrations normally involved with a deployment. It 

took approximately two weeks travel time to arrive at our training base in 

Kirkush, Iraq. Located in the US Army’s 1st Infantry Division’s (1ID’s) 

sector, Kirkush lies between the towns of Balad Ruz and Mandalay. The 
88

Iranian mountains are clearly visible to the east. Kirkush Military Training 

Base (KMTB) was residence to the 30th Enhanced Separate Brigade 

(Forward Operating Base Caldwell), a North Carolina Army National 

Guard unit assigned to 1ID, and the Iraqi army training area. All CMATT 

activities, courses, and infantry battalions are located on the Iraqi portion 

of KMTB. All courses for the Iraqi army, ranging from primary leadership 

development courses to senior NCO courses, are conducted at KMTB. 

Currently, control of the courses is gradually being handed over from a 

joint team of US military instructors to Iraqi instructors, a sure sign of the 

Iraqi army starting to train their own.

Three Iraqi battalions, 5th, 6th, and 7th, were stood up at KMTB. 

Challenges began immediately for the Timberwolf Advisor Support Team 

(AST). Our ten-man team had the responsibility to train approximately 

1,000 Iraqi army soldiers and stand up the life-support facilities for the 

entire battalion. Weapons, vehicles, bunks, mattresses, bedding, mess 

hall equipment, uniforms, administrative equipment, and anything else 

a battalion needs to operate, had to be found, requisitioned, and set up. 

Vehicle support and CMATT support convoys were very limited due to 

intense insurgent activities during the month of April. Using borrowed 

two-and-a-half-ton trucks from the 30th Brigade, we pulled together basic 

life-support resources for the battalion.

Iraqi officers had undergone a one-month training period in Jordan. 

The senior NCOs (SFC and above) were graduates of the senior NCO 

course, which was managed by a civilian contractor company. All the battalion officers and senior NCOs arrived in Kirkush to conduct leader’s integration training. Once integration training was complete, battalion leaders 

would conduct their own basic training for approximately 600 privates.

The AST’s mission was to prepare, coach, teach, and mentor battalion 

leaders to successfully train their soldiers. CMATT based its training principles on the US Army of World War II—if you have the necessary cadre 

to train an army, you can build quality, professional forces in a short time. 

Our grandfathers had years to get ready for war; we had months.

Leader integration exposed us to the material, cultural, and leadership 

challenges we would experience over the course of training. Classroom 

aides, such as laptops, light projectors, and PowerPoint slides, were nonexistent. It was not until two Timberwolf AST members risked life and limb 

to go to another forward operating base (FOB) and bring back supplies 

that we had the materials to train teachers. Even simple overhead projectors were difficult to find. The first week of class consisted of whiteboards 

and strictly hands-on training. For classes, such as first aid and weapons, 
89

this proved to be the most effective teaching method. For more difficult 

concepts, such as land navigation (intersection and resection proved to be 

extremely difficult), visual class materials were invaluable.

Cultural differences also proved difficult. Formations, timelines, 

and uniform standards were slow to be accepted. Part of the uniformity 

problem stemmed from a lack of supplies. Kirkush was the central 

distribution point for all Iraqi Civil Defense Corps (ICDC) and Iraqi army 

uniforms. Therefore, as soon as a new supply of uniforms arrived, they 

were rapidly distributed across all Iraqi law enforcement units. Sporadic 

supply deliveries limited the AST’s ability to provide uniforms for even 

battalion leaders.

Finally, overcoming the ghost of the old Iraqi army proved to be a 

leadership challenge. Many of the officers and senior NCOs had prior military experience, either with the Iraqi army or in the Kurdish Peshmerga 

[militia]. However, in the old Iraqi army, the roles of the officer and NCO 

differed greatly from officer and NCO roles in the US Army. We led by 

example, making us the first to teach Iraqi leaders to lead by example. 

Eventually, most Iraqi leaders understood what their roles and relationships were.

Arrival of the Iraqi soldiers also jolted leaders into leadership roles. 

We were pleasantly surprised when most of the NCOs stepped up and 

took charge when soldiers arrived. The officers and NCOs did not want to 

appear incompetent to the soldiers. The table of organization and equipment 

(TOE) strength for soldiers was 591, but 750 new recruits were brought 

in to account for eventual attrition. Over the course of five days, soldiers 

would show up at the front gate of Kirkush where Iraqi NCOs waited with 

busses to take them on post. This process went from 0900 hours until the 

front gate closed at 2000 hours. After undergoing various searches, soldiers 

were bussed to the battalion area for initial in-processing. Normal inprocessing procedures included briefings, amnesty box, haircuts, medical 

exams, and equipment issue. Once our battalion reached 750 soldiers, our 

rosters were closed and basic training commenced.

Basic training was broken down into two distinct phases: phase I 

dealt with individual soldier skills; and phase II taught squad and platoon 

maneuvers. Individual skills involved first aid, land navigation, general 

knowledge classes, and marksmanship training. Our battalion’s weapons 

arrived about four days prior to the start of range week. Over 750 brandnew weapons from Bulgaria arrived; due to construction constraints, all 

were placed in one arms room. Needless to say, weapons draw was a 

long and time-consuming process. Without enough AK47s to equip every 
90

soldier (since we were overstrength), zeroing and qualification had to 

be redone at the completion of basic. The officers and NCOs ran both 

the zero and qualification range, with the assistance of some Jordanian 

soldiers assigned to CMATT. The classes paid off; nearly all the soldiers 

qualified.

Pay became another source of frustration for both the AST and the 

Iraqis. Without any sort of central banking system in place, all payments 

had to be made in cash. A roster was sent from Kirkush to Baghdad. 

The cash then had to make its way back to Kirkush and be distributed to 

Iraqi soldiers. To complicate matters, the rosters sent down to the AST 

teams were in English. Company officers would pay their soldiers and the 

English/Arabic problem was resolved with the help of dedicated translators. Once the soldiers had money, they needed time off to get the money 

to their families. Again, with no banking system in place, the only way for 

the soldiers to get money to their families was to hand-carry the cash.

An often overlooked challenge faced by all soldiers in Iraq is the language barrier. The Iraqi army is set up to mimic the societal breakdown 

of ethnic backgrounds. Our battalion strength would consist of 20 percent Kurdish and a split between Shiite and Sunni Muslims, which was a 

challenge for translators, many of whom spoke Arabic. For example, in a 

class given in Arabic, a Kurdish soldier with a question would use another 

Kurd who understood both Kurdish and Arabic to translate. The soldier 

would then ask the translator in Arabic, who would in turn translate it into 

English for the AST instructor. An answer given in English would make 

its way back through two people in Arabic and then in to Kurdish—a long 

process, but vital to ensuring the new Iraqi army is fully integrated to 

match the cultural diversities of Iraq.

Phase-two training focused on getting the battalion ready to conduct 

operations in support of coalition forces. This meant training Iraqis on 

three key tasks: checkpoint operations; combat patrols through towns; 

and cordon and search operations. Checkpoint/traffic control operations 

encompassed a variety of tasks, all of which we had trained as OCs at the 

CMTC, which included vehicle search, personnel search, and checkpoint 

set up. Using the same standards that 1ID used during their Operation 

Iraqi Freedom training, the Iraqis became proficient at running effective 

checkpoints. Due to a lack of tactical vehicles, we focused on dismounted 

patrols. Some after-action reports (AARs) coming out of Iraq argue that 

coalition forces needed to leave their vehicles and put more “boots on 

the ground” to interact with the Iraqi people, following the “beat cop on 

patrol” that the New York City Police Department used so successfully 
91

to cut crime. This fit our training perfectly for two reasons: we were 

limited on transportation options both for training and for operations, so 

dismounted infantry tactics were perfect for the 6th Battalion; and the 

Iraqi population felt more comfortable seeing Iraqi soldiers patrol through 

their towns, stopping vehicles or even searching homes. Understandably 

so—Americans would feel more comfortable seeing US troops conduct 

military operations within the United States.

Phase two also involved more advanced weapons training. Machine 

gun training using RPK and PKM machine guns added a potent punch 

to the light infantry battalion. Weapons were assigned to an individual 

and more time was committed to zeroing and qualifying. Reflexive fire 

training also helped Iraqi soldiers develop trust in their abilities, weapons, 

and teammates. The AK47 proved to be the more difficult to use in closequarter battle (CQB) training because of its safety switch location. Whereas 

the M16/M4 had an easy-to-reach safety switch (left side and easily moved 

with the thumb), the AK47 safety is on the right and harder to reach. 

Also, moving the AK47’s selector switch from ‘safe’ sets the gun on ‘full 

automatic.’ “Rock and roll” is not the preferred method for controlled pairs 

in a CQB situation. However, through extensive training and coaching 

from the AST, Iraqi soldiers developed enough skill and confidence in 

their weapons to conduct both safe and effective operations.

Concurrently, members of the 6th AST conducted right seat ride 

patrols with members of the 30th Enhanced Separate Brigade. Getting out 

and into the sector allowed advisors to see first-hand the problems, challenges, and different personalities that the Iraqis will soon face. Patrolling 

with the 30th Brigade also validated many of the training scenarios units 

were put through at the CMTC. During situation training exercise (STX) 

lanes at Hohenfels, units often complained they were not given enough 

information, such as where to locate the town mayor, to conduct effective 

patrols. For example, on our first patrol, one of the tasks was to gather 

information on a small town outside of Balad Ruz. The town was designated by number, not name, on the American map. The patrol went from 

building to building, and eventually found the town mayor two hours later. 

The 30th Brigade again provided great support by answering all of our 

questions and providing great advice for their soon-to-be partners.

Members of the Timberwolf team served as subject-matter experts 

and go-to guys for every type of problem, which included establishing 

necessary systems from S1 to S4 to the arms room, dealing with pay 

problems (in Iraqi Dinar), or teaching Iraqi medics how to administer an 

IV to one of the many soldiers who went down due to the extreme heat. 
92

Once operational, we served as the communications link between the Iraqi 

unit and the US unit we were supporting.

During the first Gulf War, the issue of properly using advisors with 

coalition units was addressed. It was determined that the role of advisors 

would include providing a communications link to the higher US 

headquarters; providing accurate reports to the US commander on the 

successes or failures of the advisor’s unit; providing an accurate assessment 

on the unit’s capabilities to accomplish a mission; and coaching, teaching, 

and mentoring units—we were more than advisors.

Tankers and infantrymen all shared the same goal: to ensure Iraqi army 

soldiers were successful. Watching Iraqi army soldiers go from a nonexistent battalion to a fully functional operational unit, provided us all with 

a great sense of satisfaction, greater than any end of a rotation at CMTC. 

With a lot of patience, experience, and hard work, OCs from the CMTC 

successfully completed their mission and helped the Iraqi military take a 

step closer to providing for their country’s security and its future.
93

Reprinted, by permission, from Armor, November–December 2005, Armor 

Association, 18–22.

Reading 11

The Role of the American Advisor

Major O. Kent Strader

A student at the School of Advanced Military Studies at Fort 

Leavenworth, Major O. Kent Strader wrote this article for 

Armor magazine. An infantry officer, Major Strader offered 20 

principles for advising based on his experiences with the Saudi 

National Guard.

Advisors will play a key role in the future of a free Iraq. As such, the 

advisor must keep the mission firmly planted in his or her mind. Many 

years of advising and assisting the Iraqi National Guard remain ahead. The 

attitude of the advisor will live long after he or she departs the country.

The US Army benefited greatly from foreign advisors who came to 

America during the Revolution to serve in the Continental Army. However, 

none contributed quite as significantly as Major General Baron Fredrick 

von Stuben. In actuality, von Stuben was a captain in the Prussian army, 

not a major general. Nonetheless, his contributions as General George 

Washington’s Inspector General of the Army instilled discipline and professionalism into an army that previously lacked formalized training. 

His drill manual, taken from the Prussian army, was the backbone of the 

Continental Army throughout the Revolutionary War. As a benefactor of 

advisors, such as von Stuben, the US Army has since undertaken the role 

of the advisor on numerous occasions throughout its long and illustrious 

history. State militias trained during the Civil War were benefactors of 

Regular Army noncommissioned and commissioned officer training prior 

to service in combat. In our own backyard, South America stands as a 

classic example of the US Army’s role in advising and training. The emergence of Special Forces placed the onus of advising and training foreign 

troops on a specific branch. Vietnam stands as the most comprehensive 

example of Special Forces and conventional Army advisory capacity to 

train an indigenous force. Throughout the remainder of the 21st century, 

advisors will continue to train and assist armies throughout South America, 

Southeast Asia, and the Middle East.
94

This article addresses the importance of advisors in the post 9/11 era. 

For democracy to come to the Middle East, the United States must remain 

engaged through military-to-military contact. This contact will come in the 

form of theater security cooperation programs, namely US Army soldiers. 

Advising another country’s Army is a difficult task, fraught with potential 

pitfalls and cultural faux pas. However, if properly trained, prepared, and 

indoctrinated, the advisor can literally be a force multiplier for the country 

team, the program manager, the combatant commander, the Department of 

Defense, and the United States. It is the ambassadorial attitude that is most 

important to inculcate into would-be advisors. Every action, every work, 

every attitude, must be subjected to close scrutiny in light of US foreign 

policy.

In the Army’s recent history, the combat training centers have been a 

repository of available advisors to the Afghan National Army. Members 

of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment, the operations group, the US 

Army infantry centers, one-station unit training (OSUT) brigades, and 

many others have been sent to Afghanistan to create an Afghan National 

Army. Most recently, drill instructors have been sent to Iraq to train the 

fledgling Iraqi National Guard, as well as soldiers from divisions assigned 

to Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The future appears to predict an increased role for the advisor as 

divisions conduct stability and reconstruction operations (SRO) and 

soldier are assigned to the Iraq or Afghanistan country team. A senior 

coalition advisor in Iraq notes: “It is unrealistic to assume that progress 

will be smooth and continuous. There will be many more problems and 

reversals. There are forces that are corrupt and disloyal. At the same time, 

there is progress and that progress is gathering momentum.”1

The honest 

and transparent frustration of this advisor is not unlike advisors who 40 

years ago sought to assist the South Vietnamese army in eradicating the 

threat of the Viet Cong and establishing a free, democratic society.

There are some striking parallels to the situation in Iraq that mirrors 

the situation on the ground in Vietnam in 1964. General William C. 

Westmoreland relates in his memoirs, A Soldier Reports, “For all the 

domestic foment, the US Military Assistance Command during the 

latter months of 1964 made at least a measure of progress in the basis 

assignment of providing security for the people and helping defeat the Viet 

Cong. Progress centered in a program I code-named HOP TAC, which 

in Vietnamese means co-operation. It was designed to gradually expand 

security and government control and services—pacification—outward 

from Saigon and into six provinces that form a kind of horse collar about 

the city.”2
95

The goal of the “pacification” program was to defeat a local counterinsurgency, create an independent military and police force, and assist the 

government of South Vietnam in creating a politically, economically, and 

socially stable environment for a democracy to flourish. However diluted 

these objectives may have become or however frequently their emphasis changed, the mission was invariably the same. The same is true of 

Iraq. Create a free, self-determined government, capable of combating the 

internal threat of terrorism and participate as a functioning member of the 

world community.

Advisors will play a key role in the future of a free Iraq. As such, the 

advisor must keep the mission firmly planted in his or her mind. Many 

years of advising and assisting the Iraqi National Guard remain ahead. The 

attitude of the advisor will live long after he or she departs the country. I 

remember my counterparts reciting for me the lineage of advisors they had 

worked with throughout their careers. Invariably, one here and one there 

would have a less-than-stellar reputation.

As an advisor, it is important to build and keep a good reputation. 

Imagine five or ten years from now, US forces have left Afghanistan and 

Iraq, but a large advisory presence remains. Your assignments officer 

calls and informs you that you are going to Afghanistan to be an advisor 

for a year, unaccompanied. You immediately think back to your time in 

Afghanistan as a company commander and remember the frustrations of 

dealing with tribal rivalries and cross-border incursions by Taliban. How 

are you going to survive the year and learn as much as possible? You may 

have to overcome your attitude or prejudices first. To be a successful advisor, follow the twenty principles of advising:

The relationship with counterparts is sacred. The first rule is: never 

lose trust and confidence in counterparts. Above all, never relinquish your 

integrity. These two things, in rare circumstances, may come into conflict. 

If that were to happen, your conscience will most assuredly be your guide. 

Never promise anything you cannot deliver. Clarify, in detail, your responsibilities and those of your unit, if you are providing training on bringing in 

a mobile training team. For example, if the classroom does not have desks 

and chairs and you only agreed to teach the block of instruction, ensure the 

commander knows it is his responsibility to supply tables and chairs.

Cultural awareness and sensitivity. As an advisor, assimilating and 

synthesizing the relevance of a particular culture quickly and correctly is 

vitally important. Invest in books on the subject of Islam and use internet 

sources and research the culture and customs of your host. One source 

that provides an excellent overview of Islam is Karen Armstrong’s book, 
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Islam, A Short History. Fortunately, the Office of the Program Manager 

(OPM) has a valuable link, which addresses the position of the new advisor and what to anticipate. Additionally, OPM requires all new advisors to 

attend a new advisor’s orientation course that provides some invaluable 

information and sources, but the preponderance is a learning environment. 

There are also US Army resources on the role of an advisor that could help 

future advisors, such as Ronald H. Spector, Advise and Support: the Early 

Years, 1941-1960, published by the Combat Studies Institute, Command 

and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. [The US Army 

Center of Military History published Dr. Spector’s work and Dr. Jeffrey J. 

Clarke’s Advice and Support: The Final Years, 1965-1973, not the Combat 

Studies Institute.] The important thing to remember is go into your experience without prejudice and with a willingness to understand the culture. 

Every culture appreciates a guest who tries to observe their customs and 

courtesies.

Dealing with state department representatives. Upon my arrival in 

Saudi Arabia, I discovered that there was little to no existing relationship 

with the Consulate. Nonetheless, we were dependent on the Consulate 

for warden information, “Tea” rations, entertainment, mail, and other 

American citizen services.3

 Mutual support is vital in remote foreign 

assignments. Building relationships with the Consular section, local representatives, and political and economic officers all provide further insight 

into the country and the scope of the mission.

Local nationals. Local nationals are an invaluable asset with whom 

you must develop a rapport and perhaps a personal bond. If you are 

required to travel extensively, as was my case, the hotel manager was an 

invaluable ally. His relationship with the local governor’s office more than 

once allowed me to avoid a terrorist incident. His relationship with the 

community provided an opportunity to experience local cultural events. It 

is also essential to develop a rapport with the soldier or officers you advise. 

They are your customers, and although you may be tempted to keep a professional distance, don’t! In a preponderance of the world, relationships 

are the key to successful business.

Religion/history. Muslims are proud of their religion and history—

respect this! In the Arab world, most Muslims will attempt to convert you 

to Islam, because their faith demands it. Entertain the religious differences between your faith and theirs, always remaining respectful. If you 

are uncomfortable talking about your religious beliefs, you should not be 

afraid to make that known. However, expect to be bombarded with leaflets, copies of the Koran, and perhaps even taken to a Mosque to speak 
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with a Shi’ite Imam or Mullah or Sunni cleric. Take time to learn about 

heritages and the culture significance of certain regions and clans.

Mission focus. Just as it is important to understand the commander’s 

intent two levels higher, it is imperative that the advisor understand the 

program manager’s intent and guidance. US advisors are viewed as having 

lots of money to throw at their counterparts’ “worthy” projects; therefore, 

you may be expected to provide everything, which may have happened with 

past advisors. However, at some point, it will become incumbent on the 

local national government to develop a defense budget, allocate resources, 

and hold local commanders fiscally accountable for expenditures. You 

may be faced with budgeting priorities directed from the local government. For example, the Central Region Brigades in and around Riyadh 

received new light armored vehicles, were supplied one advisor per battalion, and allocated intensive training and resources. Meanwhile, the light 

brigades in the east and west received next to nothing. Capably advising 

and assisting the light brigade, despite the lack of resources was a challenge. Nevertheless, it was imperative to help my counterpart understand 

that he was not the main effort, which was very challenging. Regardless 

of the realities, as his advisor, it was incumbent on me to encourage him 

to find imaginative ways to train. Remember, work with your counterpart 

honestly and frankly; but, be cognizant, you cannot expect to run into his 

office and tell him how dysfunctional his organization may be—let it be 

self-discovery, never force fed.

Influencing is the key. Influencing your counterpart can be extremely 

difficult—he will have several reasons why something could not be done 

or why he failed to make a decision that was in the best interest of his 

unit. The unknowns are the power players, the power brokers, the real 

decisionmakers on tribal issues and much more. In his book, The Arab Mind, 

Raphael Patai states, “In the men’s [Arab men] world, age differences are 

of the utmost importance. He learns who his other superiors are, in addition 

to his father: all older men than he, including even a brother or a cousin 

who is his senior by only a year or so.”4

 Doctor Patai’s analysis synthesizes 

Arab male culture so we can understand how basic power is derived and 

understand the leadership framework of the Middle East. For example, 

I served as an advisor to one senior Saudi officer who was incapable of 

making a decision. Later, I realized he was not empowered to make any 

key decisions. In our understanding, rank relates to decisionmaking, but 

not in the Arab world. If took me months to figure out why he would not 

make what seemed to be a simple, yet vital, decision. Finally, I went to his 

boss and got a decision. Influencing in this case required figuring out who 
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was the real power broker and dealing with him, not my counterpart.

Influencing revolves as much around who to influence as it does influencing. In foreign armies, rank can be meaningless. It can be a symbol 

of longevity, it can be a reward for faithful service, it can mean a lot of 

things, but never assume that it means someone has power to make decisions. Invariably, you will spend the first six months of your tour figuring 

out who are the real power brokers and the last six trying to influence 

things that you identified within the first 30 days of your arrival. Do not 

get frustrated—in some cultures, such as the Middle East, anger is a sign 

of weakness and will close down a negotiation or discussion quickly. All 

true power brokers, and your counterpart considers you a power broker, 

remain calm and are well spoken. Influencing is an art.

Developing leaders. You will have ample opportunity to interact with 

junior leaders, some of them may be officers and others sergeants. Take 

every opportunity to build a rapport and solicit information from the junior 

officers. You will find they share your frustrations and this can be an opportunity to impart invaluable wisdom. Think of advising as a mutual fund; it 

simply needs maturing to grow. Sometimes advisors get frustrated because 

they do not see themselves getting enough accomplished. The process may 

take years, patience, and repetitive training to see the fruits of your labor. 

Showcase freedom and democracy. Many of the nations in which US 

Army advisors serve are fledging democracies or places we want to stimulate democracy. Take every opportunity to emphasize our democratic values. It may seem obvious, but arrogantly telling another foreign national 

about the virtues of democracy will not endear him to the idea. Seek out 

individuals who are interested in the democratic process and discuss it 

with them. One local national was such a man and we had numerous discussions on the subject. He once shared with me how his friends in the 

capital city had defined democracy. To them, drunkenness and philandering was their vision of democracy in a repressed country. My friend firmly 

reminded them that an American democracy is not doing what you please, 

but respecting the law and rights of others. Furthermore, he admonished, 

“Until Saudis learn to respect one another, democracy will never come to 

their country.” I found his recounting refreshing, and I had coincidentally 

made my point. Take every opportunity to discuss our way of life. You 

never know what benefit it will have.

Avoid being the “big-nosed” American. Some advisors find it very 

difficult to be humble. As a guest in another country, displaying arrogance 

is a sure way to fail your mission. There are those who arrive in country 
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ready to train their hosts; however, they will quickly lose interest and be 

frustrated, irritable, and disinterested in their mission when their methods 

are not well received. Frustration is to be expected; nevertheless, you must 

find a way to present an affable and pleasant attitude. Otherwise, your tour 

will be miserable as will everyone around you. Being demanding and discourteous is not ambassadorial, it is simply rude.

Negotiation skills. Experience in Iraq and Afghanistan has taught us 

a lot about the importance of negotiation. Arabs respect negotiation, haggling is expected, but demanding a fair bargain is also expected. Reading 

books on business negotiating before you arrive in country will help you 

understand the concept. More importantly, review the Center for Army 

Lessons Learned (CALL) website for lessons learned from Iraq on negotiations or go to the Combined Arms Center website for resources. Do not 

answer your port of call without some sort of reference in your kit bag, 

because negotiating is inseparable from advising.

Avoid instructing; focus on advising. There will be time when you 

will be required to instruct or demonstrate a particular skill or expertise 

in a given task. Do not do your counterpart’s job for him. I was amazed 

to observe the creative mental energy some of my counterparts placed 

into trying to coop the advisor into doing their work. Encourage your 

counterparts to read doctrinal manuals or seek information from available 

research sources.

There will be times when your counterpart may avoid failure and 

embarrassment by simply not complying with his training schedule, 

as opposed to trying and failing. In these circumstances, the advisor is 

required to demonstrate exceptional wisdom to identify and address his 

counterpart’s intransigence. If this is the case, remember the rule: make 

it his idea. Always give your counterpart credit when it is deserved. Tell 

his boss how great he is while he is present, which will garner you a lot 

of wasta (power/influence). You will have to figure these things out by 

doing. Nevertheless, it is all about influencing your counterpart to become 

self-sufficient. We should be working ourselves out of a job, if we are 

effective.

Know the enemy. Nearly every country in the world has an antiAmerican element. Those individuals will demonstrate hostility toward 

you by their expressions or perhaps actions. Be prepared for both. Those 

individuals who would oppose you are not worth your time or energy. 

Avoid them and move to the next willing advisee. Secondly, you will have 

enemies in your area of operations who want to damage the American 
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image for their own benefit. Do not fall victim to their designs. Know who 

your enemies are and their mode of operation. Never allow yourself to be 

caught in a vulnerable situation without an escape plan. Avoid dead ends, 

neighborhoods located off main roads, and identify the “rough” part of 

town. Know the patterns of your enemies and work opposite: avoid setting 

patterns.

Instill the warrior ethos. Many armies do not have a warrior spirit; 

mainly because they lack history. Second, they do not grow up in physical environments playing contact sports. Third, some find manual labor 

culturally reprehensible. You will have to instill this spirit. The US Army 

physical fitness program is a great place to start: let them see you exercising, influence your counterpart to establish a graduated physical fitness 

program, and help him visualize his command goals.

Instilling the warrior ethos by tying them to combat tasks is another 

effective method. My counterparts did not understand this component of 

soldiering. When I asked them how they expected to repel an attempted 

takeover of the government, they replied, “You Americans will come and 

help us.” Certainly, our presence in their country might lead them to believe 

their stability is in our national interest, so I reminded them that it was in 

their best interest to prepare mentally and physically for the challenge.

Identify detractors and develop a plan of action. There will be times 

when your counterpart will send you chasing ghosts; those ghosts may 

detract from the significant issues. For instance, your counterpart may 

know that his riflemen have never qualified to standard, but he will make 

excuses why his soldiers are unable to qualify correctly. Back up, regroup, 

and take another tack. If he thwarts you three times, consider it a dead 

issue and move on. If it is important enough to the mission, look for delicate ways to work around him without destroying your relationship.

Force protection. Since your mission will no doubt be in an emerging 

nation, protecting yourself, your fellow advisors, and support staff will 

always be a consideration. Take physical security and force protection 

seriously. Ensure you have a clear understanding of the operating environment from your security manager and/or the regional security officer at 

the Consulate or Embassy. Maintain a strong relationship with the local 

police, your unit S2/G2, and the expatriate community. Common practices, such as bomb sweeps, checking your rear view mirror frequently, 

driving in the far right or left lane, maintaining proper spacing for a quick 

exit when stopping at traffic lights, and never taking the same way to work 

or home, should become routine habits. If you are authorized to carry a 
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weapon, become familiar with the weapon and review the rules of engagement regularly. Ensure you have a workspace and home barricade or “bug 

out” plan. Never take anything for granted and remain vigilant.

Expatriate relationships. Americans and other English-speaking foreign nationals may be your sole source of socialization. Small expatriate 

communities can be very cliquish. Nevertheless, it is important to maximize your social opportunities, so do not be afraid to venture outside your 

comfort zone. If you are non-social, you will probably not enjoy being an 

advisor. The more social you are, the more you will flourish. Never get 

involved in the expatriate community gossip or personal squabbles. You 

are expected to remain professional; you will be held accountable. There 

are advisors who destroy the reputation of a country team with alcoholism, 

indiscretions, and other means.

Enjoy yourself. Many advisors are required to travel to and from their 

compounds daily and rarely venture out to see the country. For example, 

if you advise the Iraqi army, make sure you go to Babylon and Ur. If you 

advise the Saudi army, trek up the Hejaz Railway and visit Petra. If a particular sport is available, take advantage of it. Most of the expatriate communities have hash runs, orienteering clubs, desert trekking clubs, cycling 

clubs, rugby leagues, and much more.

Other foreign military advisors and contractors. The US military 

advisory team will probably not be the only team in the country. If you 

happen to share the same turf with another advisory team, work together. 

Failing to work together develops a negative adversarial attitude. Perhaps 

our government and the other advisory team’s government are competing for foreign military sales contracts; nevertheless, it is vital to work 

together because in most cases, they are our allies. Cooperating with advisory teams from other nations has several advantages: you will learn a 

tremendous amount by sharing ideas and experiences; you are both aliens 

in a foreign country and need each other for survival; and it is good to perpetuate the spirit of cooperation among our allies. Many of them perceive 

Americans as arrogant and pushy. Getting to know them can dispel that 

notion. Contractors can be a difficult group to address; in one situation, 

you might find a conscientious and hardworking contractor; in others, you 

might find lazy, shiftless, and basically, noncontributing individuals. You 

must be prepared to deal with both; however, if they do the mission a disservice, get rid of them.

Interpreter/translators. If you are serving as an advisor, you will not 

just need a translator; you will need someone to interpret and translate 
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documents and letters. All written documentation that you provide your 

counterpart will have to be translated. For instance, all the advice you 

provide your counterpart should be written, which will be better received 

and suffice as formal documented advice. This will also provide your 

future replacement a paper trail for reference. Your interpreter/translator 

will have to get to know you and your phraseology, and you will have 

to develop confidence in his skill as an interpreter. If you have a senior 

translator, make sure he does quality control on every document your 

interpreter/translator prepares. You may also request the senior translator 

to occasionally observe your translator to determine the quality of his work. 

If interpreter/translator schools are available, recommend your translator 

attend as often as possible. There are training courses in the Untied States 

and England for translators who are more advanced; sending them is a 

benefit to the organization and your mission.

Advising is a tremendous experience. Invest the time to understand 

diverse cultures and the advisory mission, and learn how to influence foreign militaries and assist their nation’s ability to determine its own destiny. 

In light of the current National Military Strategy, it is logical to assume 

that advisory demands will increase as our troop strength decreases in Iraq 

and Afghanistan. The advisor represents our great nation as a diplomat 

and a soldier to train a foreign military and demonstrate the virtues of the 

American way of life.
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Notes

1. Anthony H. Cordesman, The Critical Role of Iraqi Military, Security 

and Police Forces, Center for International and Strategic Studies, Washington, 

D.C., 2004, p. 3.

2. General William C. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, De Capo Press, 

New York, 1976, p. 82.

3. The United States Consulates and Embassies throughout the world 

maintain contact with American citizens through appointed information conduits 

called “wardens.” These individuals attend a regularly scheduled meeting at 

the Consulate or Embassy to acquire relevant information for dissemination. 

“Tea rations” are alcohol rations purchased from the Consulate for authorized 

diplomatic passport holders in remote locations.

4. Raphael Patai, The Arab Mind, Charles Schribner & Sons, New York, 

1973, p. 35.

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Reprinted from Marine Corps Gazette, April 2006, www.mca-marines.org/

gazette, The Marine Corps Association, 58–60. Reprint courtesy of the Marine 

Corps Gazette. Copyright retained by the Marine Corps Gazette.

Reading 12

Training Iraqi Forces

Major David H. Marshall

Major David H. Marshall, a USMC Reserve Officer, served in 

Iraq as the operations officer for the 3d Force Reconnaissance 

Company in 2004. Attached to the 1st Force Reconnaissance 

Company, his April 2006 Marine Corps Gazette article 

addressed an episode from his advisory service with the Iraqi 

National Guard (ING).

On 1 June 2004, a detachment from 1st Force Reconnaissance Company 

was assigned the task of standing up a specialized tactical unit within the 

504th Iraqi National Guard (504th ING) Battalion while supporting Task 

Force 3d Battalion, 7th Marines’ (3/7’s) mission of security and stability in 

the western area of Al-Qa’im, Iraq. This article is a case study and details 

the process 1st Force Reconnaissance Company used, along with the associated lessons learned, while underscoring the complexity of establishing 

credible and reliable Iraqi Security Forces (ISF).

Training ISF

The Commanding Officer (CO), 3/7’s guidance was to develop a unit—

selected from the existing soldiers of the 504th ING—that would “stand 

and fight.” At the time there was growing frustration with the ISF, not 

only in the Al-Qa’im region but across the entire I Marine Expeditionary 

Force area of operations. The consistency and commitment of the ING 

was increasingly being questioned. Many units within the 504th ING were 

even refusing to conduct patrols with 3/7 Marines. The capabilities that the 

CO wanted the unit to be able to accomplish were as follows:

•	 Act as a quick reaction force for the 504th ING.

•	 Execute cordon and knock operations independently and in combined operations.

•	 Be prepared to support conventional operations with specialized 

skill sets.
106

1st Marine Division’s ING ‘Enhanced Platoon’ Training

The 1st Marine Division (1st MarDiv) ING enhanced platoon training 

program in Ramadi served as the initial right of passage for the follow-on 

specialized training to be provided by 1st Force Reconnaissance Company. 

Regimental Combat Team 7 issued a fragmentary order requiring each 

battalion to recruit and vet 20 qualified personnel utilizing background 

checks, literacy tests, vision tests, security screening, and a physical test. 

There was also a requirement to send one Marine staff noncommissioned 

officer (SNCO) and three NCOs to the enhanced platoon course to serve 

as instructors. 1st Force Reconnaissance Company assisted 3/7 in the personnel selection process. Twenty ING soldiers from the 504th ING were 

identified including 2 officers and 18 enlisted soldiers.

Establishing an Operations and Training Center: Integrating 

Civil Affairs

During 1st Force Reconnaissance Company’s mission analysis, the 

requirement for an operations and training center was identified. The plan 

was to eventually grow the unit to company size, requiring a facility for 

use as a command post. For security and simplicity, a location adjacent to 

an established ING company headquarters was selected.

Civil affairs (CA) then became involved. The building refurbishing 

was initiated with the initial purchase of supplies to renovate the building. 

A project assessment was completed and submitted to the CA officer and 

a local Iraqi contractor, who used local sources and purchased most of the 

supplies. This system of acquisition was anything but easy to manage; 

however, the supplies did roll in, and the refurbishing got underway.

There was a vehicle shortage throughout the entire ING, and it was 

expected that the enhanced platoon would need vehicles in order to conduct operations. A project assessment was submitted in order to purchase 

two vehicles locally. The same Iraqi contractor was used, and he “openpurchased” two used trucks from Baghdad. We had them painted green 

and added bench seats in the back in order to transport troops.

Building refurbishment became a time-consuming and difficult aspect 

to manage. There was trouble getting the Iraqi contractors to the facility 

because they were threatened when they went to work for the Marines. 

Added to the difficulties was the lack of attention to detail on the part of the 

Iraqis we were using to open-purchase some of the supplies. Negotiating 

prices and monitoring the flow of supplies as they trickled in was a 

painstaking process. Our vigilance was rewarded, however, and a habitable 

building was completed with air-conditioned office spaces, classrooms, a 

mosque, and an armory. Desks, chairs, conference tables, supplies, and 
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all of the administrative and logistical requirements to operate a military 

organization were provided.

‘Commando’ Sustainment Training: Developing Self-Sufficiency

The order that 1st MarDiv published announcing the enhanced platoon training stated that the emphasis of the course would be “on the 

spiritual aspect of warfighting—the e’sprit d’corps and sense of duty that 

motivates men to ‘stand and fight.’” Based on the battalion CO’s intent, it 

was assessed that a follow-on training package would be required in order 

for the enhanced platoon to be able to conduct these types of operations 

in a safe and effective manner. Merely having a sense of duty and the 

motivation to stand and fight does not mean a unit will be proficient in an 

operational sense, particularly with the high-risk type of missions we were 

expecting them to execute.

In order to develop the sustainment training, a visit to the enhanced platoon course was conducted during its second week. One of the first things 

learned was that the enhanced platoon course was actually “Commando 

School.” The Army originally organized the course, and they had entitled 

it Commando School. The title of commando had become very deeply 

ingrained in the ING culture as an elite status, and upon graduation from 

the school, graduates were given red berets to wear as a sign of their status 

as commandos.

After the visit to Camp Ramadi a follow-on 2-week training package 

was developed that consisted of the following:

•	 Hand-to-hand combat (1 day).

•	 Cordon and knock (4 days).

•	 Combat trauma (1 day).

•	 Live fire (3 days).

•	 Mounted patrolling (2 days).

•	 Final exercise (1 day).

Thirteen of the original 20 soldiers graduated Commando School and 

returned to the Al-Qa’im region. It was assessed that although the numbers 

were small, only squad-sized, there were enough to conduct the training 

and for them to ultimately be able to conduct some operations. Another 

20 soldiers were selected and sent to the course, so there was an expectation that more were on the way. Additionally, a focus of the training was 

to prepare the leadership in a fashion that would ultimately sustain the 

unit. With two officers in the unit, it was hoped that they could develop an 

understanding of the planning and preparation processes for operations as 
108

well as the administrative and logistical requirements for the day-to-day 

functioning of a tactical unit.

The way ahead for the commandos was clear. We were going to conduct 2 more weeks of follow-on sustainment training, after which the battalion would provide us an actual target in order to conduct a cordon and 

knock operation. Also, this group of 13 would serve as the training cadre 

for the future graduates of Commando School. As stated, over time it was 

expected that there would be a company-sized commando unit operating 

within the 504th ING.

The commandos graduated from school, returned to Al-Qa’im, and 

were proudly wearing their berets. They had brand new AK-47s and Glock 

19 pistols that we had issued to them. Within the ING, and throughout 

all of Iraq, owning a pistol is a status symbol. Of the approximately 30 

officers within all of the 504th ING, only about 10 had pistols. Now we 

had commandos, often very young soldiers, with pistols, new AK-47s, and 

brand new red berets. They were getting a lot of attention—as we would 

find out later, probably too much attention.

Challenges to Developing an ISF

The sustainment training went well. The commandos showed up on 

time and with the proper gear almost all of the time. They appeared motivated, and the instruction the Marines were providing them seemed to be 

sinking in slowly. Although they were a long way from tactical proficiency 

by our standards, they were progressing. Expectations for the unit were 

high, and there was optimism in the air. With the end of the sustainment 

training we began to focus on conducting actual missions. We requested 

that the battalion operations and intelligence sections generate a target 

package for the commandos to execute. The following parameters were 

asked for with regard to the type of target to be identified:

•	 The battalion had a few targets that they executed on a somewhat 

regular basis that were perpetually dry holes. These were “lowrisk” targets, if there is such a thing. They were targets where the 

likelihood of the individuals(s) being present at the time of the 

raid was low but possible.

•	 We asked that the initial target be in one of the outlying towns 

and not in Husaybah. Husaybah is an urban town with the homes 

built very close to one another and on extremely narrow side 

streets. The towns to the east of Husaybah were more rural and 

less densely populated.

•	 We requested to execute the raid during the early morning hours 
109

because we wanted it to be conducted in daylight. Most of the 

raids being conducted by 3/7 were being executed under the cover 

of darkness, but in the name of keeping it simple and without any 

unnecessary confusion, we asked to conduct the raid during the 

daylight.

A target was identified and a concept of operations developed. We 

would bring the commandos onto Camp Al-Qa’im and isolate them the 

night prior to execution. 8th Platoon, 1st Force Reconnaissance Company 

would move to a position about 1 kilometer from the target and stage as a 

quick reaction force. The commandos would depart the base and move to 

the location on their own, in their own vehicles, and execute a raid on the 

target location. Our translator would be collocated with the 8th Platoon 

commander, and he would have one of the commando’s hand-held radios. 

This plan would enable the commandos to execute the mission without 

ever being seen with coalition forces while still having the ability to call 

for help should the situation dictate.

The commandos arrived to Camp Al-Qa’im, and we immediately 

sensed that something was wrong. We were advised that two of them had 

quit. We began planning for the mission, but it was obvious that there was 

an air of uncertainty with many of the commandos regarding executing 

this mission. Eventually one of the two officers told us that some of the 

soldiers were refusing to execute the mission. They described an environment where corruption and fear had polluted the commandos. One of the 

soldiers had been shot at inside his home the night before in essentially a 

“drive-by” shooting. Other ING soldiers had begun talking to the commandos and warning them that if they executed the mission their lives and 

the lives of their families would be at risk.

Push came to shove and we forced the officers to identify who would 

execute and who would not. At this point only five soldiers were willing 

to execute the mission. The 3/7 battalion CO spoke to the two commando 

officers and gave his intent that is best described as “one brave soldier,” 

meaning that the commando program would continue, even if we had only 

one brave soldier. The battalion commander directed us to move our force 

recon platoon from a quick reaction force to a cordon element and let the 

five soldiers conduct the raid. 

We returned to the isolation area, and the officers returned to their 

soldiers to inform them that they were going to execute with only the five 

willing soldiers. The soldiers had reached the point of no return. They had 

no more room to back up. It was only then that one of the officers indicated 

that he, too, would quit. When all was said and done we had one officer 
110

and three soldiers who were willing to stand and fight. The mission was 

cancelled.

The battalion commander’s intent was to continue with the program, 

even if it was with only four soldiers, but obviously this was a setback. 

Within a week 20 commandos were due to graduate Commando School. 

The intent was to add the new commandos and attempt another mission. 

Most likely more would refuse to execute, and we might get another four 

or five that were willing to fight. Over time, there might eventually be 

enough commandos to execute missions. At the time of this writing 1st 

Force Reconnaissance Company was near the end of its deployment and 

had turned the commando program over to 3/7.

Lessons Learned

There is an inherent problem in establishing a credible and reliable 

ING supported by a citizenry where tribal influence and affiliations are so 

deeply rooted. Additionally, there is an extremely high level of corruption 

within the ING. Employing these soldiers within the same areas that they 

live is also difficult because of the influence insurgents and criminals can 

have on their families. A preferred option, based on the established security conditions, is to employ these soldiers for missions in other areas of 

Iraq. At a minimum our experience identifies that the nature of employing 

Iraqi soldiers in areas where they live must be considered during concept 

development.

The commando employment could have been initiated through the 

execution of snap vehicle checkpoints or selected patrols. This plan would 

have enabled the unit to gain the confidence it needed through small 

successes.

Conclusion

The establishment of credible and reliable ISF is a slow and methodical process. Our experience was that it is a frustrating endeavor and one 

where stalwart leadership is essential. Marine forces are not alone in this 

endeavor. Throughout all of Iraq, coalition forces are facing the challenges of training and preparing ISF. The influence and corruption that 

has existed in their culture for hundreds of years is extremely difficult to 

overcome. There is a continued need to establish an environment of security that enables the training and deployment of ISF. As we learned, simply 

training, equipping, and organizing is not enough. We cannot undo the 

influence and corruption that has existed for hundreds of years by sending soldiers to a school, calling them commandos, and expecting them to 

execute. It just isn’t that easy, not yet anyway.
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Reprinted from Marine Corps Gazette, April 2006, www.mca-marines.org/

gazette, The Marine Corps Association, 62–65. Reprint courtesy of the Marine 

Corps Gazette. Copyright retained by the Marine Corps Gazette.

Reading 13

Marine Foreign Military Advisors: The Road Ahead

Lieutenant Colonel Andrew R. Milburn and

Major Mark C. Lombard

Lieutenant Colonel Andrew R. Milburn and Major Mark C. 

Lombard are USMC infantry officers who were assigned to the 

USMC Security Cooperation Education and Training Center 

(SCETC). Both served as advisors to the Iraqi army. Their 2006 

Marine Corps Gazette article described the USMC advisory 

program. 

During the past year the Marine Corps has provided hundreds of 

Marines as advisors and trainers to foreign militaries in support of the global 

war on terrorism (GWOT). Marine foreign military advisors are operating, 

or have operated, in such diverse countries as Iraq, Afghanistan, Chad, 

Niger, the Republic of Georgia, the Ukraine, Columbia, and Argentina, 

to name just a few.1

 Over the course of the last 2 years the Department of 

Defense has increased its focus on these types of missions. In the National 

Security Strategy 2004, the Secretary of Defense made numerous comments about the importance of security cooperation engagements. This 

emphasis is probably attributable to the realization that they are an effective and efficient means of leveraging the support of foreign governments 

in the GWOT. A small team of well-trained advisors can do much to bolster the capabilities of a friendly foreign military at relatively low cost in 

terms of personnel.

Already stretched thin by the demands of sustaining a rotation of 

forces in Iraq while continuing to meet our commitments elsewhere, the 

Corps has responded to the requirement of sourcing advisor billets by 

forming advisor teams from a variety of sources, including the Reserve 

Component. It has become apparent, however, that the growing number 

of these missions calls for a longer term solution, hence the decision to 

1. For calendar year 2004, the Marine Corps’s SCETC prepared and 

deployed hundreds of Marines and sailors to the following nations in support of 

the GWOT: Iraq, Afghanistan, Columbia, Jamaica, Argentina, Norway, Georgia, 

Chad, Niger, and the Ukraine.
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establish the Foreign Military Training Unit (FMTU). During the last year 

the Security Cooperation Education and Training Center (SCETC) has 

played a pivotal role in the planning and execution of Marine Corps security 

cooperation missions around the globe, from small, short-duration mobile 

training teams to the larger and longer term commitments in Afghanistan 

and Iraq. As we turn to a discussion of how best to prepare the new FMTU 

we will draw from the experiences of SCETC as well as from those of 

Marine advisors in Iraq and Afghanistan. These experiences lead to the 

conclusion that the FMTU’s success in preparing advisors will hinge upon 

two key components—selection and training.

Selection of Marine Advisors

The foundation for building a successful FMTU is to establish a process to select individuals with the requisite character and experience. The 

importance of the advisor mission, linked as it is to the strategic focus 

of building host-nation militaries in order to allow us to scale down US 

involvement, demands that we send our best. A 10- to 17-man advisor 

team is too small to carry a substandard performer. It will be no easy task 

to select those Marines best qualified for duty as foreign military trainers 

and advisors. However, the experiences of those who have already served 

in this role, summarized below, offer some useful guidance:

•	 An effective advisor is not, as the term might suggest, merely a 

giver of advice; he is a leader. Anyone who argues otherwise has 

never tried to calm a panicky commanding officer into leaving his 

office to visit a combat outpost or had to persuade and cajole a 

reluctant company into crossing the line of departure.

•	 Those Marines with instructor experience generally are better 

suited to the mission.

•	 Enlisted Marines below the rank of staff sergeant generally do not 

possess the maturity and experience required to be effective advisors. Of course, there have been some notable exceptions, and this 

is a rule that can be waived in exceptional cases. The minimum 

rank requirement for officers should be captain, with at least one 

tour in the Operating Forces and exceptional recommendations.

•	 Good Marines do not invariably make good advisors. The role 

requires an unusual blend of persistence, forcefulness, and 

patience, as well as the judgment to know which quality is going 

to be most effective in a particular situation. Several Marines with 

solid reputations have proven to be ineffective advisors because 

they lacked the patience to work within a culture that places little 
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emphasis on qualities that we regard as being indispensable to 

military life.

Every effort should be made to select Marines who have demonstrated 

exceptional maturity, patience, and instructional aptitude. The “drill 

instructor” style of instruction is not generally effective in training 

indigenous soldiers.

These experiences underscore the requirement to establish a rigorous selection process for the FMTU. Failure to do so is likely to have 

damaging consequences. For the same reason, the Corps already goes to 

great lengths to select the right Marines for such special duties as recruiting or security guard. The role of advisor demands the same attention to 

the selection process. The following steps offer a reasonable method for 

screening potential advisors:

•	 Screening by the monitor for suitability. Preference should be given 

to those Marines, officer and enlisted, who have been instructors 

or who have already served advisor tours.

•	 Command endorsement, completed and signed by the Marine’s 

commanding officer.

•	 Individual or group interview by key FMTU personnel, to include 

former advisors.

•	 Probationary status until completion of the basic advisor course. 

This can be accomplished by issuing the Marine temporary additional duty orders for the course.

Training Marine Advisors

As stated previously, the selection and training of the FMTU Marine 

should be linked. The training phase should prepare the Marine for the 

unique demands of being an advisor to a foreign military, a mission that 

will be unlike any other he has had to face during his career.

SCETC’s Advisor Course, which is currently the only course of its 

type offered by any Service, has, over the course of the last 20 months, 

grown from 3 days of largely briefing-based training to a 21-day course 

that includes:

•	 Language and cultural training.

•	 Foreign weapons training.

•	 Peacetime detention and hostage survival training.

•	 Evasive driver training.
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•	 Certified combat lifesaver and medevac training.

•	 Supporting arms training.

•	 Counterinsurgency overview classes.

•	 Crew-served weapons review.

•	 Marksmanship.

The course is constantly being modified to reflect the nature of advisor 

operations, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan. The input from advisors 

in both countries is summarized below and, again, offers some useful 

guidance for the FMTU.

Medical training. All advisors should go through a 3-day combat lifesaver course of the type taught to designated Marines of deploying units. 

This class should be taught by a senior medical corpsman, preferably one 

who has served in Afghanistan or Iraq. Where possible, one advisor per 

team should go through a more extensive medical training course, either 

through the military or one of the civilian corporations that specializes 

in teaching emergency medicine courses. Even in the few cases where 

an advisor team includes corpsmen, the nature of the missions—which 

usually consist of one or two advisors operating away from battalion 

headquarters with a company of host-nation soldiers—and the absence of 

indigenous medical personnel mean that the advisor is almost invariably 

the first responder in the event of casualties. This situation has occurred 

on several occasions. The most recent example occurred in mid-May 2005 

when an Iraqi Intervention Forces patrol in Mosul was hit by a vehicleborne improvised explosive devise (VBIED), seriously wounding five 

soldiers. The advisor acted quickly and competently, undoubtedly saving 

lives.

Vehicle training. Currently, SCETC sends advisors through the driving school at the Virginia International Raceway (VIR). This course, 

which teaches high-speed evasive and offensive driving skills using sport 

utility vehicles (SUVs) on hard surfaced roads, was relevant when the 

Iraqi Army advisors had only SUVs. Since then, however, advisors in 

Iraq have been equipped with HMMWVs, which handle differently. In 

Afghanistan, the advisors use both HMMWVs and pickup trucks, but 

almost all of their operational driving is conducted on dirt roads. VIR has 

received high praise from all of those who have attended, and the basic 

techniques that are taught are still relevant. However, what is needed is 

a course that focuses on those specific skills required in-country. In the 

case of those advisors bound for Iraq, specific skills will mean driving 

and maneuvering HMMWVs at speeds of approximately 50 to 60 miles 
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per hour in heavy traffic, as well as practicing the reaction by both gunners and drivers to various threats, such as IEDs, VBIEDs, and small arms 

ambushes. For those destined for Afghanistan, the course should focus on 

off-road driving skills, from dirt road to rough terrain. Finally, all advisors 

should receive driver training. The size of the teams does not permit the 

luxury of having designated drivers.

Communications training. It would be hard to overstate the importance 

of training advisors in how to use and troubleshoot the communications 

equipment that will be their link to both reinforcement and casualty evacuation (CasEvac) assets. Advisors in Afghanistan all carry AN/PRC-148 

multiband inter-/intrateam radios (MBITRs), and each team also has two 

AN/PSC-5 satellite radios. In Iraq, advisors are primarily using vehiclemounted and man-packed SINGCARS, but as of May 2005, the new teams 

are also deploying with the MBITR. The advisor course should include 

extensive practical application in the use of the AN/PRC-119 man-pack 

radio, the AN/VRC vehicle-mounted radio, and the AN/PRC-148 MBITR. 

The Afghanistan National Army (ANA) advisors should also receive training in the use of the AN/PSC-5.

Crew-served weapons training. All advisors should receive refresher 

training on the M2 .50 caliber heavy barrel machinegun, the M249G squad 

automatic weapon, and the Mk19 40mm grenade machineguns, one of 

which is mounted on most hardback HMMWVs loaned by the major 

subordinate command. Advisors are now deploying from the continental 

Untied States directly to operational units with little time for in-country 

training. All members of a team will regularly have to man a vehiclemounted crew-served weapon. They will have to be ready to employ the 

weapon quickly and accurately—no easy task from a moving platform.

CasEvac training. The procedures for CasEvac vary considerably 

between Iraq and Afghanistan. Most CasEvacs in urban areas of Iraq are 

conducted by ground, while in Afghanistan they are almost all conducted 

by helicopter. Any advisor training course should involve extensive practical application in procedures to be used in the destination country.

Close air support (CAS). The use of CAS varies significantly between 

countries. In Afghanistan it is used far more often, but the techniques 

employed bear little relation to the schoolhouse methods taught at The 

Basic School. While CAS has played an important combined arms role 

in urban operations in Iraq, there has been little opportunity for the 

employment of CAS by advisor teams—in fact, to date no Iraqi Army 

advisor team has controlled CAS. That having been said, advisors to the 

Iraqi Army should at least receive a class and practical application on the 
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six-line brief. Advisors to the Afghan Army should get more extensive 

practical application in various methods of employing both fixed-wing 

and rotary-wing CAS.

Language training. The usefulness of language skills is obvious. The 

intent should not be to bring the advisor up to the standards of a foreign 

area officer. However, sending Marines through a course that involves a 

month of immersion in language training, such as is currently offered by 

the Department of State’s Foreign Service Institute, will pay great dividends. At least one member of each advisor team should receive this training. Although interpreters are currently assigned to the Afghan and Iraqi 

Armies, anyone who has had to deal with foreign militaries knows the cliché “lost in translation” is very apropos. Furthermore, the advisor’s status 

and credibility is enhanced immeasurably if he has a working knowledge 

of the language.

Intelligence training. It is axiomatic that intelligence should drive 

operations; this is especially true in a counterinsurgency where intelligence and information operations are key components. Advisors in Iraq 

have realized the requirement to establish an intelligence cell within their 

teams in order to handle the flood of information that invariably gets 

passed by the local inhabitants to the Iraqi soldiers. Sifting through this 

information and being able to separate actionable intelligence from the 

fluff is a demanding and time-consuming task that requires the attention of 

trained personnel. Each team needs to include one or two individuals who 

have expertise in intelligence collection methods from target surveillance 

to tactical questioning. Without this expertise, indigent units are unable to 

take advantage of their unique positions vis-à-vis the local population. The 

result of the lack of training in intelligence collection methods is that Iraqi 

units find themselves conducting numerous time-consuming cordon and 

capture raids based on single source information that more often than not 

result in the arrest of individuals who subsequently have to be released. In 

Afghanistan the flow of quality intelligence is not so much an issue since 

the embedded training teams are given missions by their parent Special 

Forces Operational Detachment Alpha. However, there is a requirement to 

train the ANA embedded training teams (ETTs) in the techniques of tactical interrogation since their missions involve the detention of suspected 

insurgents.

Interrogation and detainee handling. The teams in both countries 

supervise the detention and interrogation of individuals on a regular basis. 

Neither Afghan nor Iraqi soldiers receive formal training in these areas—

and mistakes are commonly made.
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Civil affairs (CA) training. The distribution of money for projects 

that help the local populace is a powerful tool in counterinsurgency. It is 

even more powerful when employed by indigenous troops as a means of 

befriending the locals. Small unit operations in Afghanistan and Iraq often 

involve the conduct of CA-type projects. Advisors would benefit greatly 

from having been given a CA overview and project assessment class as 

part of their predeployment training.

Cultural training. The importance of cultural education cannot be 

overstated. The advisor is often faced with the dilemma of how to reconcile the hard and fast dictates of military operations with a culture that 

does not view timelines and tactical continuing actions with the same 

degree of urgency. This places a considerable burden on the advisor who 

must learn methods of eliciting performance from his unit without losing 

patience. Conversely, the advisor who allows himself to be persuaded by 

the smiling assurance of his protégés, and who thinks that he is allowing 

himself to become culturally assimilated, is also in danger of becoming 

ineffective. He will be well liked by his counterparts but will have unwittingly relinquished his ability to accomplish his mission. Selected former 

advisors should be included in the predeployment training to discuss the 

cultural issue from a military perspective. It is important that new advisors 

understand the degree of frustration they will experience in trying to have 

their units accomplish relatively simple tasks. Practical exercises involving role-playing should be introduced to reinforce these classes.

Country-specific training. While much of the advisor training course 

covers topics that are relevant regardless of theater, differences in the 

environment and the nature of tactical-level operations warrant separate 

attention during the predeployment course. For instance, the Afghan ETTs 

generally conduct their missions in the mountainous regions along the 

Pakistan border, whereas their counterparts in Iraq are primarily focused 

in urban areas. The course must be flexible enough to involve separate 

track training tailored for the specific requirements of each country. For 

example, in the Fallujah after-action report submitted in November 2004 

by this author, then-Maj Andrew R. Milburn, the following was recommended with reference to advisors desired for Iraq:

He should also receive training in a combination of MOUT [military operations on urbanized terrain] and SASO [stability and 

support operations] techniques that focus on house searches and 

clearing from the level of cordon and knock to dynamic entry and 

clearing. The Iraqi soldiers in his charge will rely on him to direct 

them in this area where tactical errors are potentially fatal.
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More Thoughts on the Future of Advisor Training

At the time of this writing it had not been decided whether the FMTU 

would have responsibility for selecting, training, and deploying advisors 

in support of the Iraq and Afghan missions. It is the opinion of the authors 

that since these are currently the largest—and projected to be the longest 

in duration—of the Marine Corps’ current advisor commitments, it makes 

sense for them to fall within the purview of the FMTU. If not, then SCETC 

will presumably continue to run its current course for advisors while the 

FMTU runs a parallel and similar course for those Marines who are deploying elsewhere. Regardless of the FMTU’s relationship with SCETC, it will 

have the responsibility for two tiers of training. The first will consist of the 

basic advisor course, while the second will involve follow-on specialized 

training. There are numerous topics that could populate this second tier, 

but based on the experiences of advisors in Iraq and Afghanistan, three 

areas should receive priority—languages, advanced medical skills, and 

intelligence collection—the value of which have been previously cited.

Conclusion and the Road Ahead

Marine Corps advisors will continue to play a significant role in the 

prosecution of the GWOT in both Iraq and Afghanistan and in other less 

heralded areas of operations. The decision to establish the FMTU is an 

important step in ensuring that our Corps is well prepared for this commitment. At the time of this writing, decisions are pending as to many of the 

details of this new unit, including the nature of its interaction with SCETC. 

Regardless of the outcome of these decisions, the experiences of SCETC 

and the advisors whom it has deployed over the course of the last year 

provide a valuable guide for those charged with selecting, training, and 

equipping Marines to be advisors in the years ahead.
119

Reprinted, by permission, Memorandum RM-4482-ARPA, March 1965, G.C. 

Hickey with the assistance of W.P. Davison, for Advanced Research Projects 

Agency, The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, CA.

Reading 14

The American Military Advisor and His Foreign Counterpart: 

The Case of Vietnam

Gerald C. Hickey

Dr. Gerald C. Hickey first went to Vietnam as a University of 

Chicago anthropology graduate student in 1956. In 1962 he 

became a researcher with the RAND Corporation and completed numerous studies prior to his departure from Vietnam 

in 1973. While researching this study on advisors and their 

counterparts, his notes were destroyed during a Viet Cong 

assault on the Special Forces camp at Nam Dong, an action 

in which Captain Roger Donlon earned the first Congressional 

Medal of Honor in Vietnam. Dr. Hickey was later awarded the 

Distinguished Public Service medal by the Secretary of Defense 

for his ethnographic studies, his contributions to the enhancement of US advisor and Vietnamese counterpart relationships, 

and his presence and counsel during periods of attack by Viet 

Cong forces and during Montagnard uprisings. Although the 

literature cited in Appendix B is dated, it shows a variety of 

sources available for those interested in the topic and some of 

the ideas current at that time.

PREFACE

This Memorandum presents the results of a RAND study conducted 

in South Vietnam during 1964 under the auspices of the Research and 

Development Field Unit, Advanced Research Projects Agency, Department 

of Defense. Dr. Gerald C. Hickey spent ten months in the field. Upon his 

return, he wrote this report with the assistance of Dr. W. Phillips Davison, 

a RAND consultant.

The study in a sense was a victim of the war in Vietnam: while Dr. 

Hickey was gathering data in the field, he became an inadvertent participant in repelling the attack by the Viet Cong against Nam Dong on July 6, 

1964. During the course of that bloody battle, many of Dr. Hickey’s field 

notes were destroyed.
120

He interviewed several hundred American advisors of all categories 

during the year, both individually and in small groups. His conclusions on 

the problems and needs of advisors in their relation to Vietnamese counterparts are based on these interviews, on earlier visits to predeployment 

training sites in the United States and from his direct observations in the 

field and at various training centers.

This report is not intended to serve as a blueprint for reorganizing the 

selection and training of advisors. It is hoped that the findings will contribute constructively to ongoing efforts for increasing the effectiveness of 

the advisory program.

SUMMARY OF FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS

American advisors in Vietnam include the roughly 30 per cent of 

the US military stationed there who are assigned to advising designated 

Vietnamese counterparts in the performance of the latter’s tasks. Their 

function, and hence the quality of their preparation for the role, are of 

vital importance to our interests in South Vietnam. The greater the advisor’s professional competence and his ability to establish rapport with the 

man he is advising, the more likely is it that the counterpart will accept 

and act on his advice. One quality without the other will greatly diminish 

the effectiveness of the American. Professional expertise is a requirement 

both obvious and easily measurable, and it has not been the crucial problem in the advisor-counterpart relationship. A faculty for effective interaction with a foreign national, and the skills necessary to developing and 

expressing that faculty, are much more intangible. They play no part in 

traditional military pedagogy, and their great importance is perhaps not 

yet fully understood in all quarters that must concern themselves with the 

novel requirements of counterinsurgency.

The author’s ten-month inquiry into the working relations between 

advisors and counterparts confirmed for him the growing evidence 

that, with many notable exceptions, these relations are not as close and 

productive as they need to be. After initial visits to predeployment training 

sites in the Untied States, he spent most of that time interviewing advisors 

of all categories both individually and in groups, in virtually every part of 

South Vietnam. From these interviews, as well as from direct observation 

and his knowledge of the curricula of the various training centers, he 

reached the following conclusions as to the major principles governing the 

advisory role in a country such as Vietnam, and the chief barriers to better 

understanding and cooperation at present. Included among the barriers are 

both the immutable problems, intrinsic to the role of the foreign advisor 

overseas, which one must recognize as such in order to learn to cope with 
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them, and a number of present realities that may be within the American 

establishment’s power to change. The author’s findings are listed here 

without distinctions between these categories and not in the order of their 

importance.

•	 The amount of time that advisor and counterpart spend together has 

a direct and important bearing on their relationship and in many 

cases determines the advisor’s success in winning the respect and 

cooperation of the Vietnamese.

•	 Nearest the operational level—in the Special Forces A Teams, at 

battalion, in the River Force and Junk Fleet—advisors not only 

spend all their time with counterparts but share their food and 

bivouac and even the dangers of battle. They show the highest 

incidence of good rapport and successful collaboration. They also 

have an obvious need, in their training, for the social and linguistic skills that facilitate direct communication.

•	 By contrast with the American in the field, the advisor at headquarters has other, nonadvisory responsibilities and rarely, if ever, sees 

his counterpart outside formal occasions. His linguistic requirements are correspondingly less urgent. Personal rapport, though 

always desirable, is less crucial to the execution of his tasks.

•	 Advisors at all levels are overburdened with paper work, including demands for data that could as easily, sometimes even more 

efficiently, be compiled elsewhere.

•	 The great influx of personnel in recent times has added to the 

bureaucratic chores of advisors in Vietnam, detracting seriously 

from the time they have available for their major task of working 

with counterparts.

•	 The enlarged military structure has the added effect of removing 

the field advisor even farther from his superior officers in the military. Without easy access to them, he tends to feel that headquarters does not understand the nature of his role and its problems. A 

major complaint is that the advisor, though constantly reminded 

of the limits of his function, is held accountable for mistakes as 

though he were in command.

•	 Much of the advisory activity goes on at the local level, in conjunction with small military and paramilitary units, and centers in 

large measure on civic action, which concerns the welfare of the 

native population. Beyond a natural inclination and aptitude for 

this kind of work, the advisor, to be effective in this role, will need 
122

some familiarity with the social and cultural environment as well 

as with the rationale and specific techniques of civic action. Yet a 

great many advisors are assigned to this task without prior training 

beyond their military and technical equipment.

•	 Many Americans, measuring the Vietnamese by their own cultural 

standards, are highly critical of their value system and some of 

their attitudes and behavior patterns. They are apt to accuse their 

counterparts and other associates of being lazy, unenthusiastic, 

without a sense of urgency about their jobs and the pursuit of the 

war in general, lacking in frankness to the point of deviousness, 

intent on ritual but uncharitable toward their fellowmen, lax about 

health and hygiene, wasteful with materiel. Often, they vaguely 

ascribe these characteristics to what they call the inscrutable “oriental mentality”; nothing in their training seems to have prepared 

such critics to look on these aspects of Vietnamese behavior as 

appropriate and legitimate manifestations of a foreign culture and 

tradition.

•	 The fact that not enough advisors speak Vietnamese remains the 

major barrier to communication. Especially important at the lower 

military levels, even a little knowledge of the language impresses 

and pleases the Vietnamese and enables the American to use his 

interpreter to better advantage.

•	 The demand for skilled interpreters has long since outstripped 

the supply. Many Americans, untrained in the use of interpreters, 

cannot spot the unqualified, or speak too fast and colloquially to 

be understood. Misunderstandings between advisor and counterpart arise easily when interpreters, whether from ignorance or by 

intent, introduce inaccuracies that the American cannot catch and 

correct.

•	 The unique way and view of life of the Vietnamese results in needs 

and desires different from those of Americans. The failure of advisors to take this into account, their tendency to assume an identity 

of habits and physical requirements, has led to costly and wasteful 

errors in civic action programs.

•	 Lack of information on the society of Vietnam leaves many advisors unprepared for the ethnic complexity of Vietnam and for such 

cultural conflict situations as the enmity between the Vietnamese 

and the mountain people. By and large, Americans are indignant 

at the treatment the montagnards are receiving at the hands of the 

Vietnamese. When called on to arbitrate internal disputes, as they 
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often are, they benefit greatly by some insight into these two major 

ethnic groups and their ancient conflict.

•	 Although mutual professional respect is a prerequisite for good 

collaboration, advisor and counterpart are not always well 

matched in competence or in the prestige of the military branch 

they represent. This is most strikingly true in the Special Forces: 

an elite group in the American establishment, the Special Forces 

of Vietnam are notorious for being poorly selected and trained and 

correspondingly lacking in motivation and morale.

•	 Americans are insufficiently prepared for the fact that the military 

concepts and practices of the Vietnamese diverge from their own 

in a number of ways. (a) French influence is still strong among 

officers, and it tends to govern their tactical thinking, making 

some of them unreceptive to American approaches. (b) Individual 

military ranks may carry prerogatives and powers of decision different from their US equivalents. In their highly structure establishment, members of the Vietnamese military must seek approval 

from their superiors before they can act, with inevitable and sometimes costly delays. (c) The principle of reward and punishment 

pervades military life and governs promotions. Field service often 

denotes a lack of recognition, as compared to headquarters service 

for those in favor who tend to advance more rapidly in rank, and 

this lessens the field officer’s incentive to risk his life in battle. 

Also, fearing the punishment that attends losses of men or automatic weapons, he may be timid in operations, unwilling to engage 

either in hazardous missions. (d) The military’s involvement in 

politics leads to frequent changes in the various commands in 

response to upheavals in Saigon. Political instability of the kind 

recently witnessed means uncertainty for present jobholders, who 

may become overcautious about showing initiative in the desire 

not to expose themselves. It also means that advisors often are 

compelled to deal with incompetent counterparts who owe their 

assignments only to political favor.

•	 Present tours of duty for advisors are too short, when one considers the time of learning and adjustment before an advisor begins 

to work effectively with his counterpart—under present selection 

and training procedures. 

•	 Within the American establishment, advisors lack opportunity and 

the vertical channels that would permit them to inform their superiors of their experience and to consult them on problems. Similarly, 
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more and better lateral communication among advisors at the same 

level would add to their knowledge and resourcefulness.

•	 Successive advisors to a single counterpart, having no record of 

past experience, face a long exploratory period in the advisory 

role. They are apt to repeat their predecessors’ mistakes both in 

the psychological approach to the counterpart and in specific suggestions that may already have proved impracticable.

•	 New advisors departing from the United States, even after they 

know their assignments, often are not taught the requirements of 

their jobs. Particularly are they unprepared for the all-important 

function of planning for and participating in civic action 

programs.

Solutions to the problems here outlined could be approached, broadly 

speaking, through a more careful selection of personnel; improvements 

in their training; and a variety of administrative changes. Following are 

the author’s main recommendations under these three categories. They are 

based on a combination of personal observation (both during his recent 

inquiry and in the course of earlier stays in Vietnam) and the suggestions 

most frequently advanced by the advisors themselves.

Selection Criteria

•	 To ensure strong motivation for the task, it would be well to place 

advisory service on a voluntary basis if at all possible.

•	 Whether service is compulsory or voluntary, a careful screening 

process should be devised to test a candidate’s suitability from 

the point of view of (a) professional equipment; (b) adaptability 

to foreign cultures; (c) a temperamental disposition, especially in 

the case of prospective field advisors, to share dangers, hardships, 

exotic food, and primitive shelter with members of an oriental 

civilization; (d) existing linguistic skills or the ability to acquire 

languages easily; (e) the possibility of “culture fatigue” in a man 

who, though otherwise qualified, has had too many overseas 

assignments and is not keen on another.

Desirable Emphases in the Training of Advisors

•	 Language being the single most important factor in breaking 

down cultural barriers, language training far more intensive 

than at present should be given to all field advisors. Those in the 

higher echelons, with less need for direct daily contact with their 

counterparts, would be adequately served by a briefer course of 
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instruction in the general structure and conceptualization of the 

Vietnamese language and in the proper use of interpreters. Those 

in whom screening tests reveal unusual linguistic ability should 

also be given all the language training available, whether or not 

their daily task makes it imperative.

•	 In preparing personnel for cultural hurdles they will have either to 

remove or to bypass, training programs must insist on the importance of respecting the Vietnamese cultural identity wherever it 

does not go against the interest of the counterinsurgent effort, and 

must stress the patterns that are most strikingly different from 

ours: the preference for indirectness that is evident in the language 

itself and in the general style of discourse; the more relaxed and 

fatalistic attitude toward time; the importance of tradition and 

ritual, including the cult of the ancestors; a relative indifference 

to human beings not part of one’s kinfolk and intimate environment; the importance of taboos; native attitudes toward health and 

hygiene, with special attention to folk-medical beliefs; and the 

most common criteria of the good life.

•	 To accomplish this kind of indoctrination, students in 

predeployment courses ought to have some instruction in the 

history, economics, government, sociology, ethnic composition, 

major religious sects, and general customs of the country as well 

as on the special characteristics of the region to which they are 

being assigned.

•	 American distrust of Vietnamese food being very common, and at 

times a barrier to good feeling and camaraderie between advisor 

and counterpart, training programs should attempt to break down 

the prejudice rather than reinforce it, and stress the excellence of 

the native food as well as the many examples of Americans who 

have learned to eat it without ill effects.

•	 In addition to acquainting students with the official structure of 

the Vietnamese military, predeployment instruction should contain important information on the informal, unwritten aspects of 

the system, its “real workings,” as advisors call it. These would 

include, for example, the strong heritage of French military thinking among officers and their preference for French tactics and 

techniques; the decision-making mechanisms within the army; the 

status and prerogative of the different military ranks; the principle 

of reward and punishment that governs promotions and hence 

conduct in the military; and a definition of a given counterpart’s 
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precise role within the hierarchy, with emphasis on the limits it 

imposes on his autonomy.

•	 Far greater attention than heretofore needs to be given to all facets 

of civic action. Prospective advisors must be impressed with the 

importance of civic action in the counterinsurgent effort; they must 

understand the principles governing it in order to develop specific 

plans and approaches for collaborating with local populations.

Among the prerequisites for informed civic action planning are, above 

all, an awareness of specific local needs and wishes (which may be quite 

different from what American standards would dictate and can be acquired 

only through familiarity with the region and consultation with the people 

and its leaders), and a number of local or economic variables that might 

make an otherwise attractive innovation undesirable (e.g., if it were to 

replace manpower with machines and thus create a form of technological 

unemployment; if materials used created a problem for indigenous industry; or if its use ran afoul of religious taboos or folk superstition).

•	 In making their recommendations, advisors must learn to weigh 

the merits of an immediate objective against any undesirable 

side effects it might have. By successfully exploiting a temporary advantage, for instance, an advisor could permanently alienate a counterpart and thus lose his cooperation in more important 

ventures.

•	 Instead of the current practice of having recent advisors who 

have returned to the United States address prospective advisors 

at predeployment sites in this country (after their experience has 

lost some of its immediacy and before the outgoing advisors know 

their specific assignments), it is recommended that this kind of 

briefing take place in small three-day “exit-entrance seminars” 

in South Vietnam, and that the outgoing speaker address himself 

chiefly to new recruits who will work at his own advisory level—

battalion, Special Forces, sector, etc.—and in a comparable 

capacity. Not only will his memory be fresh and accurate, but the 

particular information he has to impart will have more relevance 

and practical value to an audience so selected.

•	 Language and cultural training centers, similar to those that some 

missionary societies have found useful, might be set up as a pilot 

project within South Vietnam. In them, carefully selected personnel would live and study for several months in a community 

away from Saigon and without contact with other Americans, the 
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instruction to be supplemented by frequent field trips to different 

regions of Vietnam.

Administrative Considerations

The following suggestions are designed to maximize the effectiveness 

of the advisor and create the best possible conditions in which to use his 

special skills to full advantage:

•	 Every effort should be made to reduce bureaucratic demands on 

the advisor, especially paper work, to the minimum necessary.

•	 Because it takes several months for an advisor to work effectively 

with his counterpart, the possibility of extending the length of 

tours should be studied; the present six months for battalion and 

Special Forces advisors might well be stretched to nine months.

•	 Professional equality and other bases for mutual respect being of 

great importance in advisor/counterpart relations, both rank and 

military occupational specialty ought to be matched wherever 

possible.

•	 The team concept as reflected heretofore in the organization 

of the Special Forces A Teams must not be abandoned, as has 

been proposed, in favor of rotation of team members. Its proven 

advantages—strong esprit de corps, mutual dependability among 

team members, and the high performance that comes of long 

group drill and firm morale—far outweigh such dangers as the 

development of an inbred mentality or collective demoralization 

through one or two disaffected members. These dangers, moreover, 

can be controlled by a capable team leader.

•	 Vertical communication within the American echelons should be 

encouraged with the aid of better opportunities through which 

advisors can maintain rapport with their superiors by reporting to 

them and airing their problems as needed.

•	 Lateral communication would be greatly enhanced by the organization of periodic group sessions of advisors at the same level, 

preferably attended also by several representatives from higher 

echelons, in which experiences could be exchanged and common 

difficulties discussed and solved. The “group-process” technique 

employed experimentally and successfully by the Walter Reed 

Army Institute of Research in several series of meetings (designed 

primarily for sector advisors but attended also by a number of battalion and Special Forces advisors) may be a useful model here. 
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Taping the sessions has the advantage of providing a permanent 

record and giving the participants great freedom of expression, as 

their voices will not be identifiable.

•	 Every outgoing advisor should be asked to draft, for the use of his 

successor, a brief, informal profile of his counterpart and a record 

of advice already given and either accepted or rejected. A new 

advisor who is prepared for the personality of his counterpart, his 

idiosyncrasies and his receptivity to advice, and who knows what 

advice has already been tried, will be spared much of the timewasting trial-and-error phase of the uninitiated.

•	 On the basis of a careful survey, based at least in part on opinions of individual advisors, it may be useful to explore the wisdom of terminating some advisory functions and reducing others. 

Counterparts who have long benefited from the help of American 

advisors may turn out to have mastered their tasks or to need only 

sporadic assistance on some aspects of it, which conceivably could 

be supplied from an advisory pool upon request.

•	 In contemplating an administrative change such as the termination 

of the advisory function wherever a counterpart has been saturated 

with advice, US planners must keep in mind that the field advisor 

also fulfills the invaluable function of an American observer on 

the scene who reports to headquarters on the progress of the war.
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CONTENTS

PREFACE ........................................................................................... 119

SUMMARY ........................................................................................ 120

Section

 I. AIMS AND SOURCES ............................................................... 131

 II. THE VARIETY OF ADVISORY ROLES .................................. 132

 III. BARRIERS TO COOPERATION .............................................. 134

1. Different Styles of Communication ....................................... 135

2. The Vietnamese “Timetable” ................................................. 136

3. Attitudes Toward Preventive Measures ................................. 136

4. Hygiene .................................................................................. 136

5. Social Responsibility ............................................................. 137

6. Differing Military Practices ................................................... 138

7. Local Prejudices ..................................................................... 139

8. Ascertaining Local Needs ...................................................... 140

9. Language Problems ................................................................ 141

10. Mutual Estimates of Professional Competence ..................... 141

 IV. BRIDGING THE CULTURAL GAP ......................................... 142

 V. SELECTING ADVISORY PERSONNEL ................................. 146

 VI.TRAINING PROGRAMS ........................................................... 147

1. Civic Action Training ............................................................. 149

2. In-Country Training ............................................................... 150

3. Exit-Entrance Seminars ......................................................... 151

4. Language Training ................................................................. 152

 VII. IMPROVING THE ADMINISTRATIVE SETTING ................ 153

1. Paper Work ............................................................................. 153

2. Duration of Assignment ......................................................... 153

3. Advantages and Disadvantages of the Team Concept ........... 154

4. Matching Rank and MOS ...................................................... 155

5. Improving Communication, Both Vertical and Lateral .......... 155

6. Building on Past Experience .................................................. 157
130

7. Establishing Continuity with the Counterpart’s Previous 

Advisors.................................................................................. 157

8. Terminating Some Advisory Functions ................................. 158

Appendix

A. DEVELOPMENT OF THE ADVISORY ROLE IN 

COUNTERINSURGENCY...................................................... 161 

B. A SURVEY OF LITERATURE RELATING TO THE 

ADVISORY FUNCTION ........................................................ 169
131

I. AIMS AND SOURCES

Since the United States is engaged in South Vietnam in an advisory 

capacity, the term “advisor” has tended to be applied loosely to almost anyone among the American personnel stationed in that country. In the present 

study, however, we are concerned only with members of the American 

military for whom an opposite number has been designated (or is supposed 

to be designated) by the Vietnamese authorities, and whose chief task it 

is to advise the Vietnamese “counterpart” in the execution of his function. 

Our discussion thus includes the not infrequent cases in which for one 

reason or another the Vietnamese have failed to assign a counterpart to 

an American advisor, as well as instances where advisor and counterpart 

never see each other and a professional or personal relationship therefore 

cannot be said to exist. The number of advisors as here defined is about 30 

per cent of the approximately 22,000 American military personnel now in 

Vietnam.

For reasons that the author will attempt to explore, there are great variations in the extent to which advisors and counterparts understand each 

other’s personalities, motives, and problems, and therefore in the degree 

to which the Americans are successful in exercising their advisory function. The purpose of this study is to suggest ways in which the relationship could be improved, so that Vietnamese military authorities would be 

more likely than they are at present to understand, accept, and act upon 

American advice.

The author’s analysis of advisor-counterpart relations and his suggestions for possible improvements are based largely on interviews he conducted with about 320 US advisors in Vietnam over a ten-month period 

in 1964. His talks were spread over some seventy locations, ranging from 

Saigon headquarters to small team sites in the countryside, and from the 

17th Parallel in the north to Panjang Island in the south. About two-thirds 

of the interviews were on an informal individual basis; the rest took place 

in group discussions.1

 In a few cases the writer had occasion to make his 

observations under battle conditions. (A large proportion of his detailed 

notes were burned during the Viet Cong attack on Nam Dong in July 1964 

and had to be reconstructed from memory.) Most of the work took place in 

a more peaceful environment.

Under the terms of reference of this inquiry, the writer was not authorized to question Vietnamese personnel directly about their views and experiences of advisor-counterpart relations. However, his fluent knowledge of 

the Vietnamese language enabled him to obtain a considerable amount of 

relevant information indirectly, through informal conversations on other 
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subjects with Vietnamese and montagnard officers, men, and civilians. He 

has also drawn on his previous work on Vietnam, which extends over a 

period of ten years, four of these spent in the country itself.

As background for the inquiry, the writer visited several of the military 

schools that are training advisory personnel in the United States, examined 

those parts of the curricula that have a bearing on advisor-counterpart relations, and talked with a number of instructors, both military and civilian. In 

addition, W.P. Davison prepared a brief survey of the published literature 

bearing on the advisory function and of the experiences of civilian agencies in selecting and training personnel for overseas duty. (This survey is 

included here as Appendix B.)

Throughout his investigations, the author received generous assistance and hospitality from US personnel in Washington, Saigon, and the 

Vietnamese countryside. He was impressed by the ability of some of the 

Americans to understand the Vietnamese and establish a good working 

relationship with them, especially when one considers how short the training period and the tour of duty itself tend to be for most US personnel in 

Vietnam. The suggestions made in this report draw heavily on the experience of those Americans who have been successful in communicating with 

the Vietnamese and motivating them to adopt improved techniques in both 

military situations and civic action.

II. THE VARIETY OF ADVISORY ROLES

It is impossible to give a single definition for the advisory role of 

Americans in Vietnam. Many types of advisors are required, and new 

advisory positions are constantly being added, each of which involves new 

and different problems. A brief survey of the principal categories of advisors and their assigned duties is given in Appendix A. Though the conditions under which they work may differ, American personnel in all these 

categories are faced with the basic task of developing a good relationship 

with their counterparts.

In most instances the amount of time that an advisor and his counterpart spend together is an important factor in determining whether they can 

reach a satisfactory working relationship and establish a personal rapport. 

The advisor’s level in the hierarchy and his specific assignment determine 

to a large extent the kind and the extent of his contact with the counterpart. 

Generally speaking, the advisory roles of those low in the chain of command and those directly involved in counterinsurgent operations demand 

that advisors spend a great deal of time, and work very closely, with counterparts, for their task is primarily to “advise.” By contrast, those higher 
133

in the chain of command have additional responsibilities to the American 

side of the counterinsurgency effort and can devote only part of their time 

to being advisors. Their contact with counterparts, therefore, is less frequent and intimate, and they usually find it more difficult to develop close 

rapport with the Vietnamese. 

One example of the first category is the battalion advisor, who is 

bound to have a great deal of contact with his counterpart, the battalion 

commander. Not only do they plan operations together, but they jointly 

accompany the unit in the field for long periods at a time, sharing bivouac and food as well as rigors and dangers. It is a situation conducive to 

developing good rapport. As one battalion advisor put it, “Getting shot at 

together is the best way to develop close feelings.”

River Force advisors also accompany their counterparts on operations, 

and Sea Force advisors share quarters and food with their counterparts 

when on sea duty. Similarly, the Junk Fleet advisors spend considerable 

time with the Vietnamese personnel, living near the bases or on the junks 

themselves. Like the battalion advisors, these Navy advisors sometimes 

share combat experience with their counterparts.2

Advisors at the sector [province] level likewise have to spend much 

time working closely with counterparts. The senior sector advisor, for 

example, shares a variety of responsibilities with the province chief, who 

nowadays is invariably a military official. Both must respond to constant demands concerning the Regional as well as the Popular Forces. 

Moreover, together with the USOM province representative they form the 

Joint Province Committee, which is responsible for all civic action within 

its area, and this common membership requires cooperation and daily 

communication. (The role of the subsector [district] advisor, only recently 

created, is likely to involve a similar working relationship with the district 

chief.) A common complaint of sector advisors is that their ever-increasing 

administrative responsibilities, as well as growing demands from Saigon 

for reports and data of various kinds, prevent them from seeing as much of 

their counterparts as they should.

The A Teams of the American and Vietnamese Special Forces, which 

operate at the village level and in areas remote from the capital,3

 must 

collaborate in organizing the locally recruited Strike Force, establishing 

new posts, maintaining existing ones, and planning and conducting military operations. A close working relationship between the teams therefore 

is essential; the American A Team leader, in particular, must have daily 

contact with the Vietnamese camp commander, and good rapport between 

them is a prerequisite for the successful operation of a camp.
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Regimental advisors and division advisors, though higher in the chain 

of command, continue to be relatively near the operational end of the spectrum. Hence they have frequent contact with counterparts in the planning 

of operations, and often accompany them on visits to the field. Corps level 

advisors, on the other hand, are further removed from operations and, in 

addition, have numerous responsibilities associated with American personnel in the corps. Their dual functions put them in the category of part-time 

advisors. This is true also of Navy, Marine, and Air Force personnel at this 

level, and applies equally to advisors of the Special Forces B Teams.

At the MAC-V (Military Assistance Command, Vietnam) headquarters, the advisors’ is likewise a part-time function, with only periodic 

and sometimes infrequent contact with the Vietnamese opposites. Many 

Americans at this level report seeing their counterparts only at conferences, by special appointment, or at official gatherings. This results in formal, highly structured relationships, with little possibility of real rapport 

between Americans and Vietnamese.

The influx of US military personnel has greatly added to the administrative responsibilities of advisors at nearly all levels, affecting the amount 

of time they can spend with their counterparts, sometimes to the point of 

absorbing it entirely. One US general complained that he had not seen 

his opposite number in several months as a result of the added demands 

caused by the American buildup. At battalion level, the increase in the 

advisory personnel creates new tasks for the senior battalion advisor; at 

sector level, the addition of subsector advisors means that the sector advisor must concern himself with problems of communications, logistics, and 

security. And a 50 per cent increase in personnel has forced the US Special 

Forces to create new headquarters, with a C Team and several B Teams, in 

each corps area.

III. BARRIERS TO COOPERATION

In order to establish satisfactory working relationships with their counterparts, American advisors at all levels need more than time and opportunity; they have to overcome a number of cultural barriers that initially 

make it difficult for them and the Vietnamese to understand each other. 

The first step toward overcoming these barriers is for American personnel 

to recognize that they exist, and that characteristics that may seem alien 

and irritating to Americans are a normal aspect of the Vietnamese personality. In general, the advisors who are outstandingly successful in working with their counterparts are those who learn to live with Vietnamese 

cultural and behavioral patterns and make no effort to change them unless 

they interfere directly with military operations.
135

In the following we shall try to analyze the cultural differences that are 

mentioned most frequently by advisors as causing difficulties in cooperation. In the author’s view these also are the most important.

1. Different Styles of Communication

In spite of the fact that the Vietnamese have long had experience in 

dealing with foreigners, and even though most of the US military advisors 

in Vietnam have previously served overseas, many of them in non-Western 

countries, inadequate communication continues to be the great cause of 

difficulties in their relations. Cultural differences are reflected in behavior, values, and attitudes, and are manifested in a wide variety of ways. 

A very general complaint of advisors concerns the frustration brought on 

by their having to deal with what they call the “oriental mentality” of 

their counterparts. This term encompasses a range of Vietnamese ways 

that they do not understand. Some of those whom the author interviewed, 

including four advisors of Japanese ancestry, expressed the opinion that it 

was something unfathomable for the Westerner, and that it would always 

be a barrier to communication. When they elaborate on this problem and 

on their own experiences, advisors commonly cite examples of what they 

interpret as deviousness or lacking of honesty in their counterparts. Some 

used the expression “sneaky Petes,” and one intelligence advisor at corps 

level described his counterpart as “putting on the inscrutable mask” every 

time he was asked a direct question.

Most of these are cases where the Americans, who tend to put a high 

value on frankness, fail to understand the Vietnamese preference for 

indirectness. The latter tendency is reflected very strongly in the language 

and verbal style of the Vietnamese, who prefer veiled implication to direct 

statement, inference to direct question. In some instances, the seeming 

lack of candor will be merely reluctance on the part of a Vietnamese to 

admit that he does not understand a particular statement or idea or that 

he has made a mistake. In many of the specific situations that advisors 

cited, for example, the counterpart was being called upon to respond 

immediately concerning a course of action recommended by his advisor, 

and his response was vague and equivocal, suggesting that he may not 

have considered the advice suitable to the occasion and was too polite or 

embarrassed to say so, or, simply that he had not understood it. A number 

of the sector advisors who had received such unsatisfactory responses 

from their counterparts in connection with the pacification plans that were 

being implemented in their provinces suspected at first that this hesitation 

was due to objections to the plans which the Vietnamese were reluctant 

to voice. On discussing the problem among themselves, however, they 
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concluded that, more likely, their counterparts had not understood the 

plans and were unwilling to admit it.

2. The Vietnamese “Timetable”

Another common cause of frustration for the Americans is that the 

Vietnamese seem to lack a sense of urgency, and do not display any enthusiasm for their tasks or even a desire to “get things done.” Thus, they continue to take siestas (sometimes even during operations), insist on taking 

Sundays off, and observe their holidays. (At least one new national holiday was proclaimed in 1964.) The American personnel interviewed who 

expressed their irritation at this lethargy had various theories to explain it. 

Many attributed it to fatalism, an aspect of the “oriental mentality” that 

produces apathy. Others thought it was due to the fact that the Vietnamese 

have been at war so long. (As one battalion advisor put it, “Hell, we come 

out here fresh, all gung ho to fight the war, and then we find they aren’t 

that eager. They have been at it long before we came, and they’ll be fighting long after we leave.”) A small group of advisors at corps level suspected that some of the Vietnamese officers were in no hurry to end the 

war because “they never had it so good.” And a few equated their counterparts’ lack of motivation with laziness, which in turn they blamed on an 

inadequate diet.

3. Attitudes Toward Preventive Measures

The wisdom and economy of prevention, as manifested in preventive 

medicine and preventive maintenance, is an unfamiliar concept in Vietnam. 

The ordinary Vietnamese believes that so long as a thing works it is in good 

condition, that there is nothing anyone can do to ensure its continuing 

to work, and that when it stops it must be replaced. This attitude causes 

problems for advisors at all levels, from those in the field to personnel 

at corps level who are concerned with logistics. Those interviewed 

complained that the Vietnamese were constantly requesting replacements 

for equipment that had deteriorated solely through lack of maintenance, 

and that attempts to persuade a counterpart to educate and discipline his 

men in this regard usually resulted only in strained relations. Most of them 

interpreted this indifference to prevention as wanton wastefulness; several 

advisors thought it grew out of the conviction that the rich Americans 

would always replace equipment as requested.

4. Hygiene

Social practices diverge sharply in matters of hygiene, to the distaste 

of many Americans. Toilet training among the Vietnamese is very casual; 

in city or country, children may relieve themselves almost anywhere but 
137

in the house, and most adults therefore are similarly relaxed in their habits. 

For Americans, the use of the latrine is one of the basic tenets of personal 

and group hygiene. In Special Forces A Teams and in training camps for 

other paramilitary groups, the US advisors always recommend the construction of latrines as necessary to camp sanitation, but they encounter 

problems in getting the Vietnamese troops to use them, as well as in persuading the camp commanders to resort to disciplinary measures when 

they don’t. One American A Team leader in I Corps, for example, recalled 

his sense of frustration as he quoted his Vietnamese counterpart who, in 

answer to repeated complaints that the troops were using the available 

latrines only part of the time, had said with some annoyance: “What difference does it make? They have the whole jungle to use.”

The American concern over hygiene extends to food preparation, and 

wariness about native food creates another barrier in the relations of advisor and counterpart. Warnings concerning diseases that may be contracted 

through the consumption of local food and water are included in the orientation given to all advisors shortly after they arrive in Vietnam, and one 

widely-used manual about the country makes only scant mention of the 

good quality of its cuisine. Most advisors are reluctant, and many are actually afraid, to eat Vietnamese food, particularly nuoc mam, the fish sauce 

served as a condiment with all Vietnamese meals.4

 Knowing this, many 

Vietnamese counterparts are hesitant about inviting their advisors to dinner 

lest both sides be embarrassed by the American’s distrust of Vietnamese 

food, and thus forego a good opportunity for improving personal relations. This was confirmed to the writer by a number of sector, battalion, 

regimental, Sea Force, and Junk Fleet advisors who had learned to eat with 

their counterparts and had found that it helped create a closer relationship. 

It should be noted that advisors who frequently ate Vietnamese food (some 

of them had done so exclusively for periods of weeks and even months) 

recalled very few occasions when this had made them ill.

5. Social Responsibility

The cultural distance between the two nations is evident in differing attitudes toward members of the larger society. Whereas the Western concept 

of charity is based on the assumption of one’s responsibility to other human 

beings in general, the Vietnamese tend to feel responsible only toward those 

with whom they have close personal relations, such as kinfolk and intimate 

friends, and do not identify themselves with the problems of people whom 

they do not know. As a result, they can remain quite indifferent to the needs 

of their wounded and at the same time be almost obsessed with their obligations to provide properly for the dead, as tradition demands.
138

6. Differing Military Practices

The gap between the two cultures is reflected also in the differences, 

both social and spiritual, between the Vietnamese armed forces and the US 

advisory organization. Not only are the two systems differently structured, 

but roles and relationships within the structures vary considerably, as does 

also, for example, the attitude toward reward and punishment.

In the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), French influence 

continues to be strong. All members of the high command at the Joint 

General Staff (JGS) are French-trained. Some of them are graduates of 

St. Cyr, and most of the officers served in the French army during the 

Indochina War. They tend to cling to the French concepts, techniques, 

and tactics, and advisors at all levels, when trying to introduce changes, 

face the problem of their counterparts’ deeply-rooted military ideas and 

habits.

Moreover, the advisor must learn to recognize and evaluate the relative role of his counterpart in the Vietnamese military’s social structure, 

his freedom of action and of expression, before he can develop a useful 

working relationship with him. Relations between subordinates and superordinates are quite different in the two military establishments. Generally 

speaking, the US advisor is much freer to approach his immediate superior 

with suggestions than is the counterpart, and he is able to make decisions 

not only in field tactics and the like but also in the planning of such things 

as civic action programs. The Vietnamese, having to seek approval from 

above on important moves, therefore are often reluctant or slow to respond 

to situations demanding quick action. Battalion advisors and Special Forces 

advisors told the author of occasions during operations when they had had 

an opportunity to contact the Viet Cong but the counterparts refused to 

move until they had the permission of their superior officers. In one such 

instance, the regimental commander was taking his siesta and could not be 

disturbed. By the time his approval had been secured, the Viet Cong had 

evacuated their position and vanished. Senior advisors encounter a similar situation in the Joint Province Committee, where the province chief’s 

inability to approve new projects or the allocation of funds without authorization of his superiors delays many of the programs.

Another aspect of the Vietnamese military system that has considerable bearing on the response of counterparts is the principle of rewards and 

punishments. Under the Diem regime there were strong sanctions against 

the commander who suffered casualties, and the effects of this policy continue to make themselves felt. Battalion and regimental advisors told the 

author that their counterparts still feared punishment in jail if they lost any 
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troops; moreover, because the number of weapons lost had become an 

indicator of the war’s progress, the Vietnamese tended to be overcautious 

in the use of automatic weapons and sometimes left them behind at the 

post to avoid risking their loss. Sector advisors encounter the same reason for timidity among the province chiefs, particularly in financial matters. The Vietnamese counterpart, in weighing an advisor’s suggestion, 

assumes that the risks are greater for him than for the American, and the 

consequences of a mistake more painful. One of them was quoted as saying, “If we do anything wrong, you’ll be reprimanded, but I’ll go to jail.”

Field advisors who have sufficient rapport with their counterparts to 

be in their confidence report that lack of rewards is another factor in the 

reluctance to go out on operations. Many of the Vietnamese field officers 

have become demoralized by the fact that they have held the same rank for 

eight to twelve years while most of their colleagues in Saigon or at Corps 

are being promoted rapidly. They invariably attribute the promotions to 

favoritism rather than merit, and assume that their own actions, however 

meritorious, will not be similarly recognized. As the advisors point out, 

this leaves the counterpart in the field with little incentive to risk his life 

in combat.

The involvement of their military in political affairs inhibits the 

Vietnamese counterparts in a similar way. Upsets in the central government invariably result in changes in the military commands, and these set 

off a chain reaction that reaches down to all levels of the armed forces. 

(Although all the corps are affected, the most drastic changes seem to 

occur in III Corps, undoubtedly because of its proximity to Saigon.) 

Advisors report that, whenever a political upheaval begins, their counterparts become completely inactive and adopt a “wait and see” attitude. In a 

period of frequent political change at the top, as in the past year, there will 

be a succession of personnel changes within the military, often the expression of political favoritism. Advisors then not only have to adjust themselves to a series of new counterparts, but, they point out, those appointed 

through political favor frequently are not qualified for their positions.

7. Local Prejudices

In addition to the cultural gap between the Vietnamese counterpart and 

his Western advisor, there are conflict situations among the various groups 

within Vietnam that can affect their relationship. The most general and 

serious is the hostility between the Vietnamese, who inhabit the low-lands, 

and the montagnards, or upland people, which puts a strain on relations 

between the US and Vietnamese Special Forces. After a long history of 

discord between the two groups, the struggle has become acute in the past 
140

decade, with uprising by the montagnards in 1958 and again in September 

1964. In the A Team sites in the highlands, montagnards constitute most 

of the Strike Force, while the Special Forces that recruit and control them 

are, with rare exceptions, Vietnamese.

Most of the American Special Forces advisors resent the attitude of 

the Vietnamese toward the montagnards and what they consider their mistreatment of the Strike Force. The author was told of numerous examples: 

The few Vietnamese in the Strike Force were served before the montagnards. Some Vietnamese medics refused to touch any montagnards, and 

the latter complained to the advisors that, when they were hospitalized, 

the Vietnamese staff neglected them and even charged them for drinking 

water. In one camp the Vietnamese commander insisted that a montagnard 

always be point man on patrols; he claimed that the bullets bounced off 

the mountain people, whereas they penetrated such more highly developed 

species as the Vietnamese and Americans. In another camp, where the 

camp commander, a captain, was a montagnard, the Vietnamese Special 

Forces enlisted men ordered him about and openly belittled him.

By and large, the montagnards have good relations with the advisors, and, when difficulties arise with the Vietnamese, they look to the 

Americans for support and arbitration (as they did during the 1964 uprising). In such a situation the advisor has to know the situation and both 

parties well enough to be able to effect a solution without offending either 

side.

8. Ascertaining Local Needs

Sector advisors all agree that a major difficulty in civic action programs, which are conducted so as to improve the welfare of the local population and gain their support for the government’s cause, is to determine 

the needs and desires of the people. The mistaken assumption that the 

Vietnamese or the montagnards want the same things as Americans has 

led to some useless projects, and has caused advisors much frustration 

as well as friction with counterparts and local leaders. Thus, the pigsties 

constructed for a montagnard group as part of a Special Forces civic action 

program went unused; when asked why, the villagers explained that there 

was no reason to pen the pigs since “they had always run around loose.” 

In a similar case, Vietnamese peasants received wheat under an agricultural aid program; they fed it to their pigs, because wheat was not one of 

their staples. Medical programs often encounter difficulties because many 

Western medical concepts are incompatible with folk medical beliefs. 

Taboos must also be considered. One sector advisor, for example, was 

puzzled when members of a montagnard group did not use tin roofing for 
141

its intended purpose; their reason was that “you can’t make babies under 

tin roofs.”

9. Language Problems

Although it is possible to gain rapport with a counterpart without 

speaking his language, advisors have found even a little knowledge of 

Vietnamese an immeasurable aid in understanding the counterpart and his 

cultural milieu. It is difficult to appreciate the local value system without 

some acquaintance with the local language.

An ever-growing number of Vietnamese, particularly among officers, 

have been learning English, and those who have spent time in the United 

States speak English well. Also, more and more advisors are receiving 

instruction in Vietnamese prior to their assignment, but this does not enable 

them to perform the advisory role without the assistance of an interpreter. 

With the exception of those who studied Vietnamese at Monterey, advisors 

whom the author talked to complained that their instruction had been too 

brief and cursory, and usually had formed only one part of a demanding 

training schedule. They generally agreed, however, that even a little language study had given them added insights into the host society, and that 

they learned something about the Vietnamese people through their association with the language instructor.

The language problem is aggravated by the difficulty of finding competent interpreters, as the demand for them has long since outstripped the 

supply. Having to settle for whatever interpreters they can get, many advisors have trouble in communicating through them. They complain that 

often the interpreter does not understand what is being said in English or 

does not know how to translate from the Vietnamese. Some Americans 

suspect that interpreters express their own opinions instead of translating 

those of the counterpart.

10. Mutual Estimates of Professional Competence

Respect for each other’s professional military competence is essential 

to a good working relationship and rapport between advisor and counterpart. Many advisors report that the first thing a counterpart wants to 

know is the extent of their training and experience, particularly combat 

experience; he wants to be sure that his advisor is likely to understand the 

kind of war that is being fought in Vietnam. (This is becoming more of a 

problem, as there are now relatively few World War II and Korean War 

combat personnel who are still available to act as advisors to ARVN or 

paramilitary field units.)

By the same token, the Vietnamese counterpart’s performance as a 
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soldier affects his relationship with the advisor. Frequently, the training 

he has received determines how much respect he can command from 

Americans. ARVN paratroop units, for example, are among the elite of 

the armed forces. Their officers are well trained, and they have a good 

deal of esprit de corps. Airborne advisors tend to speak highly of their 

counterparts, of whose competence in combat they will cite numerous 

examples. They take pride in the paratroopers and are happy to be associated 

with them. Much the same is true of the ARVN Ranger units and their 

advisors. Americans also have high regard for the “junkies,” or Junk Fleet 

personnel, even though the Junk Fleet does not enjoy the reputation of 

being an elite body. Here it is a matter of an underdog organization which 

presents a challenge to advisors and counterparts alike, all of whom work 

for the goal of attaining the status and recognition that they believe the 

Junk Fleet deserves.

In the Special Forces, on the other hand, lack of respect hampers 

relations between advisors and counterparts. The US Special Forces are 

an elite group of highly trained personnel with a strong pride and sense 

of identity. The Vietnamese Special Forces have never been anything like 

this. As some advisors put it, recalling their use during the Ngo Dinh Diem 

period, “they were organized as a palace guard.” They are not specially 

selected or trained, and their teams are organized haphazardly. Advisors 

complain that Special Forces officers in the A Team posts view their 

assignment as a form of banishment and consequently lack interest in their 

work, and that the Vietnamese teams are full of enlisted men who are not 

really qualified in their specializations; they are said to include poorly 

trained medics and weapons sergeants who are unable to strip weapons. 

Inevitably the disparity between the Vietnamese and the American Special 

Forces tends to impair both personal and working relations.

IV. BRIDGING THE CULTURAL GAP

Most advisors experience difficulties that are due to these barriers to 

cooperation, but only a minority among them recognize the cause of these 

problems and attempt to resolve them by cutting across the cultural gap. 

Advisors who typically are successful in establishing good working relationships with their counterparts are those who have made the effort to 

learn something about the Vietnamese, their way of life, and at least a little 

of their language. Once they begin to understand the social environment 

and come to feel at ease in it, they are prepared to respect, even if they 

cannot share, the value system of their counterparts and the behavior that 

follows from it, and they are thus able to achieve the needed rapport. As 

a result, the working relationship improves, and the advisor finds himself 
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learning how to motivate his counterpart to accept and act on advice.

The experience of one Junk Fleet advisor whom the author interviewed is illustrative of the enormous difficulties that attend some of the 

advisory jobs as well as of the extent to which dedication and initiative on 

the part of the Americans can transcend these problems. The advisor, on 

arriving with his assistant at an isolated Junk Base, faced a situation that 

many would have found hopeless. He spoke no Vietnamese, and Saigon 

had misinformed him about the situation. To begin with, there were far 

fewer junks and personnel than he had been told there would be. To 

make matters worse, the sailors had no barracks, uniforms, or blankets. 

Most of them slept on the beach; those with dependents were crammed 

into thatched huts. Their pay was chronically late, and they were totally 

without medical attention. Many already had deserted. The counterpart, 

who was the base commander, was demoralized. He was convinced that 

the paramilitary Junk Fleet, which then was newly organized, was being 

neglected because the Vietnamese Navy considered it a mistake and had 

decided to ignore it.

The advisor, together with his assistant, settled in a small thatched 

house, ate Vietnamese food exclusively, and began to learn the language 

and to familiarize himself with the surroundings. In a variety of ways, he 

set about obtaining the needed materials. US Navy channels in Saigon sent 

him black cotton material for uniforms, and Navy doctors brought medicine to the base and spent their free time treating the ill. The advisor also 

appealed to several private sources in the United States and in response 

received funds from church groups, blankets from weaving mills, and 

candy and movie films for the dependents. The dai uy (captain) and his 

assistant were soon welcomed in every household, and they shared many 

meals with the base commander. 

Having won the confidence of the commander, the advisor then 

was able to convince him that the best way to gain the attention of the 

Vietnamese Navy headquarters was to demonstrate the potential of the 

Junk Fleet by conducting a series of operations along the coast. Together 

they planned the operations and accompanied the junks. The success of the 

mission drew praise from the US and Vietnamese high commands, and it 

marked the turning point for the Junk Fleet, which now is being integrated 

into the regular Navy.

In discussing this experience, the American advisor attributed his 

success to the good rapport he had achieved with his counterpart. As he 

put it, “If he [the counterpart] had not appreciated my genuine interest 

in them and their difficulties as shown in my sharing their life and its 

problems, he wouldn’t have listened to me.”
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There are many advisors, however, who are not prepared to try to 

understand this or any other foreign society. For them, Vietnam is just 

another country in which they are compelled to spend an overseas tour. 

They do not expect to learn anything useful from the experience, and with 

time tend to become more alienated from their surroundings rather than 

less so. It is easy enough for them to withdraw into an American environment and seek only the company of compatriots. They count the days 

remaining in the tour, scrupulously marking them off on the calendar. 

Throughout, they and their counterparts remain strangers.

An advisor at one of the corps headquarters was typical of this group, 

with its intransigent, unsympathetic attitude toward the Vietnamese mentality and customs. He advocated “using the stick” with the Vietnamese 

in order to get them to do things “our way.” (He recalled with disgust 

that, when he arrived in Saigon the first things he noticed were “the traffic 

mess” and some young men urinating against the wall of a building on a 

main street.) Except for official dealings with his counterpart, his contacts 

with Vietnamese society were few. His quarters, a private room with a 

refrigerator, were in the advisor’s compound, he had his meals in the mess, 

and a vehicle was provided to take him to corps headquarters, where the 

US advisors occupied offices close to their counterparts.

Though at first impressed by his counterpart’s experience, he soon 

found him to be “lazy, sour, and dirty”; his uniform usually rumpled, he 

slouched and showed little interest in his job. The advisor regarded him 

as no different from other Vietnamese, whose persistence in observing 

the lunar New Year and other holidays and taking time for a daily siesta 

annoyed him. He also thought the government at fault for not mobilizing 

everyone, “including those crooked taxi drivers and cyclo drivers.”

In the end, he concluded that the Vietnamese simply lacked discipline, 

and that he might as well give up trying to do anything with them: “I said 

to hell with them. I put in my time, then went back to the room to play my 

tape recorder and write letters.” Several weeks before his departure, however, the advisor’s opinions were shaken when, after a political reshuffle in 

Saigon, he noted a change in his counterpart, who suddenly “began to look 

alive and act like a soldier.” The Vietnamese then confided to him that he 

had previously been in political disfavor and afraid of being jailed, but that 

with the new regime he was now hoping for a promotion.

As these examples suggest, overcoming barriers to cooperation is a 

highly individual matter, and the successful advisor is one who is able to 

analyze a situation correctly and adjust his behavior accordingly. It would 

obviously be impossible to anticipate all possible situations and responses 
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to them. Yet past experience has shown certain techniques to be widely 

applicable. For example, advisors who had come to appreciate Vietnamese 

indirectness resorted to indirect approaches as the best way to get their 

counterparts to accept advice. Once advisor said: “I found it was better 

to use the expression, ‘Wouldn’t it be a good idea if someone did . . .?’ 

rather than, ‘You should . . . .’” Others found demonstration an effective indirect means of getting across their ideas. This was borne out at 

several Special Forces A Team sites, where the Vietnamese watched the 

Americans construct their GI shower and followed their example. Health 

measures, including the use of window screening, improved kitchen facilities, and proper waste disposal, were introduced by the same means. And 

several Special Forces medics reported that their Vietnamese counterparts, 

though they did not come to ask advice, would visit the dispensary on 

some pretext and linger there, all the while observing techniques or physical arrangements which they would then imitate.

In seeking to induce their counterparts to accept their recommendations, advisors must be able to see beyond the immediate and narrow 

objective, to make sure that its realization will not entail undesirable developments or endanger future efforts. Sometimes, a temporary situation will 

offer tempting leverage for motivating a counterpart, but, if exploited, 

could prejudice the long-term relationship. One such case was reported 

by a Navy advisor. He had had two counterparts, who were in competition 

and disliked each other, and had been able to get things done by playing 

one off against the other, rather than winning the friendship and trust of 

one or both. He lost his leverage, however, when one of the counterparts 

was transferred and his relationship with the other remained poor. The 

“goodies” approach, with which some advisors ingratiate themselves by 

making purchases at the US PX or obtaining helicopters or vehicles and 

other amenities for their counterparts’ personal comfort, has its own dangers. Though it may give the advisor useful leverage on occasion, it also 

may cause the counterpart to develop what is best described as a “mendicant” mentality. Once this attitude has become entrenched, the advisor is 

dependent on bribes if he is to retain any influence.

No specific set of rules can be written for bridging the cultural gap 

and overcoming the barriers to cooperation that arise in the highly diverse 

relationships between US advisors and their Vietnamese counterparts. 

The effectiveness of the advisory group as a whole could be substantially 

increased, however, through three basic endeavors: improving the selection 

∗

The author hopes to prepare a paper which deals in greater detail with problems and experiences in bridging the cultural gap.
146

of US advisors; devising training programs that will make advisors sensitive 

to a variety of possible situations; and providing an administrative setting 

that will allow individual advisors to use their skills to best advantage. The 

remainder of this paper will deal in turn with the problems of selection, 

training, and administration.

V. SELECTING ADVISORY PERSONNEL

Professional competence in his specialty is the most important qualification for an advisor. By itself, however, it is not enough. Even an expert 

advisor cannot motivate his counterpart to act on his advice unless he is 

highly motivated himself. Furthermore, the skills necessary for working 

with foreign nationals can be taught only partially. Training can heighten 

motivation and sharpen skills, but only if the motivation and skills are there 

to begin with. And the most successful advisors tend to be those whom 

life experience and personality have qualified for the role. Throughout 

Vietnam, the men who have established outstandingly good working relationships with their counterparts and have overcome the cultural barriers 

to cooperation have been what could be called “natural” advisors. This 

means that they like their work and have the right personality for it.

To ensure a high degree of motivation on the part of American personnel it would be well if, insofar as possible, duty in Vietnam were placed 

on a voluntary basis. Moreover, within the ranks of such volunteers, those 

who showed the greatest potential for the advisory role should be selected 

for assignments that involved close working relationships with counterparts, while those with high motivation but lower crosscultural skill or 

background should be assigned to jobs involving fewer contacts with the 

Vietnamese.

A careful screening process would eliminate those, even among volunteers, whose motivation was low or who were basically incapable of 

adapting themselves to another culture. It would also permit spotting some 

(and they are numerous among advisors today) who, though well qualified 

by personality and experience to do the job successfully, never adjust to 

the environment or to their counterparts because they have become tired of 

foreign places. They include many World War II and Korean War veterans, 

now nearing retirement, who talk nostalgically about Japan or Germany, 

but now want only to reach the end of their somewhat precarious tour and 

return to the United States. “To settle in some place where I can hunt and 

fish” is the aspiration many of them express.

A number of US agencies have developed techniques for selecting 

personnel who show outstanding qualifications for working with foreign 
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nationals overseas. The literature describing these techniques, some of 

which might be adapted to the selection of advisory personnel for assignments in Vietnam, is summarized in Appendix B. Without doubt, finding 

the officers and men capable of becoming outstanding advisors is the single most important step in improving advisor-counterpart relationships.

VI. TRAINING PROGRAMS

In addition to the MATA (Military Assistance Training Advisor) course 

at Fort Bragg and the Monterey language school, the US Army has several 

orientation courses for personnel assigned to duty in Vietnam, and the Air 

Force has a special course in language and area study administered by the 

Foreign Service Institute. But there are a great many advisors who receive 

no training for their prospective role. The Navy, for example, provides no 

orientation for its advisors; the Survival Course at Coronado that most of 

them attend has nothing to do with preparation for the advisory task.

Most existing orientation courses are not designed to take into 

account the specific prospective function of the individual advisor; indeed, 

the student usually does not know at that stage—though he sometimes 

surmises—to what role in the large and diversified advisory system he will 

be assigned. Any training course so conceived is apt to be too general and 

superficial, or to include irrelevant and unnecessary information, for the 

man who, upon arrival in Vietnam, will be sent to a specialized job in a 

small, remote area. A common complaint among US personnel nowadays 

is that the orientation they have been given does not apply to the part 

of Vietnam in which they are stationed. (Some materials widely used in 

training courses, for instance, actually refer to customs in North Vietnam 

instead of those in the south.)

Not only should training programs be examined with a view to their 

modernization, intensification, and extension to larger numbers of prospective advisors, but it would be desirable to have the individual advisor’s 

functions known and defined beforehand, so that orientation and training 

could be more nearly tailored to his needs than is possible at present.

Among advisors interviewed who had received predeployment training, the majority thought that their courses ought to have given them better preparation for the advisory role and more information on Vietnamese 

customs, religion, political institutions, and current history. They also 

expressed the need for a more intimate knowledge of what they called the 

“real workings” of the Vietnamese military.

The training institution that is to help equip a student to work in a foreign culture has two broad tasks. One is to provide him with a background 
148

of knowledge and techniques that will be useful in the country to which he 

is assigned; the other, to reinforce skills and attitudes that will enable him 

to continue his education while on the job.

The most obvious category of useful knowledge that can be taught is 

that of information about the geography, history, economics, government, 

and customs of the country of assignment.5

 For Vietnam, for example, this 

would include instruction on the importance of the family in social relations, on the cult of the ancestors (and the related concept of death) and 

their place in Vietnamese life, and on aspects of Buddhism, with particular 

attention to two “reformed” Buddhist sects, the Cao Dai and the Hao Hao. 

(Sector advisors in areas where these sects predominate all expressed to 

the author their need for more information on them.)

The advisors interviewed believed that they would have understood 

their counterparts better if their predeployment training had acquainted 

them with the informal aspects of the Vietnamese military structure. This 

kind of instruction would seem to be highly desirable. It ought to include 

such important factors as the responsibilities and prerogatives associated 

with individual military ranks, which in the formal structure appear to 

be equivalents of US ranks but do not necessarily correspond to them in 

powers and status; and introduction to the Vietnamese system of promotion and punishments; and also perhaps a discussion of the part of the 

Vietnamese military establishment in the political life of the country.

Training programs cannot, of course, prepare an advisor for every 

specific situation that he may face in relation to his counterpart. They 

can, however, make him aware of the barriers to communication he is 

likely to encounter, and point out possible solutions by describing ways 

in which other advisors have either overcome these barriers or learned to 

work effectively within or in spite of them. All training programs should 

emphasize, in particular, the importance of continuing language study for 

those who work in close association with their counterparts.

Again, as with selection methods and criteria, a number of the nonmilitary US agencies have had extensive experience in training personnel 

to work with counterparts overseas. The literature on their training programs is summarized in Appendix B. It might be profitable to review their 

experience from the point of view of its applicability to training courses 

for advisory personnel assigned to Vietnam.

Whatever added insights such a review might yield, however, it is 

evident from the present author’s observations that the advisory program 

would benefit by the intensification or introduction of the particular kinds 

of preparation that will be discussed in the remainder of this chapter.
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1. Civic Action Training

Civic action is a form of community development that introduces 

socioeconomic changes with a view to meeting the people’s needs and 

winning their support. In Vietnam, it is carried out, on the military side, 

by the Special Forces and the sector and subsector advisors. Most of these 

men either have no preparation whatever for civic action or have received 

instruction only in engineering and other physical techniques, not in how 

best to work with the civilian population. Yet it is with this last aspect that 

an effective civic action program must primarily concern itself.

Training for civic action should aim at acquainting the student with 

some of the variables that can have an important bearing on whether a 

projected change or innovation will benefit the people without disrupting 

the society they live in, or whether it is likely to cause more difficulties 

than it is designed to solve. A well-meaning American, for example, 

might favor introducing the labor-saving, cheaply-constructed windmill 

for irrigation. But a little insight into the economic structure of the 

Vietnamese village would reveal to him that such a devise would result in 

increased unemployment—a major problem in Vietnam—by diminishing 

the demand for teams of four laborers to operate the present, foot-powered 

water wheels. Similarly, it is easy to imagine the damaging effect on the 

thatch market that would be caused by the distribution of free tin-roofing.

Determining the real needs of the populace is the first step in a successful civic action program, and it requires some familiarity with the local 

society. If the advisor simply assumes that the Vietnamese farmer wants 

the same things as the American farmer, he may end up, as pointed out 

earlier, with empty pigsties, unused latrines, and wasted wheat. Moreover, 

within Vietnam, regional variations are considerable and must be taken 

into account in the over-all planning of civic action programs. For example, the Vietnamese are mainly wet-rice cultivators, but their techniques 

vary: chemical fertilizer is used in some areas and not in others, and water 

control is a problem only here and there. Also, in a transition zone such as 

the area above the Mekong River Delta, rice is only a consumption crop, 

while the cash crops are tobacco and peanuts. Economic variations are 

compounded by ethnic differences in the determination of popular needs. 

Thus, the montagnards practice swidden, or “slash-and-burn,” agriculture 

without fertilizer and with little or no water control, and have only begun 

to develop the commerce that is widespread among the Vietnamese of the 

lowlands.

Projects designed to meet collective needs at the communal level, 

whether the community be the hamlet, the village, or a group of villages, 
150

might be anything from dispensaries, schools, maternity centers, or market 

places, to a new canal or a new bridge. Whether any of these are actually 

needed, and in what order of urgency, is best determined through study of 

the local situation and contact with local leaders and knowledgeable villagers. An example of a very successful community project that the author 

encountered was a market place organized by a montagnard group and 

financed through the Special Forces. The A Team leader had consulted 

with some of the montagnard leaders, who, after conferring with the villagers in the area, recommended building a market place with small shops. 

It was constructed with the approval of local officials, and loans were 

made to montagnards to enable them to open small businesses. The project 

has proved a financial success, and has been the more welcome as it has 

marked the first instance of montagnard-operated commerce in the area.

Some individual needs are common to more than one group, with due 

allowance for slight regional variations. For example, refugees and resettled 

villagers alike require shelter (which must be constructed on piling for 

montagnard groups), food (rice for all, with salt for the montagnards and 

fish sauce for the Vietnamese), clothing, blankets, and so forth. Beyond 

these basic requirements, however, individual need can be determined only 

through inquiry, which may yield unexpected responses. One sector advisor 

who had inquired into the needs of a group of montagnards and expected 

requests relating to agricultural activities was surprised when one villager 

expressed a wish for simple barbering equipment and another wanted a 

foot-powered sewing machine. Both men wanted to set up shops.

Civic action training thus should be designed to equip advisors not 

only to teach the construction of simple equipment and facilities but also 

to make informed appraisals of specific local needs. A substantial body of 

literature is available that would be useful in such training courses.6

2. In-Country Training

At present, area and language training is given in the United States, 

usually as part of a larger training program, and weeks or even months 

may elapse between the end of the program and the advisor’s arrival overseas, during which time the student is bound to lose some of his scant 

and hastily acquired knowledge of the language. Moreover, his receiving 

the training while still in the United States has all the disadvantages of 

its being removed from the environment in which it is to be applied. He 

does not actually use the language as he learns it, nor is he able to relate 

the information on Vietnamese culture to surroundings that would make 

it meaningful and real. The material he is asked to absorb may strike him 

merely as exotic, and this will affect his motivation to learn.
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A possible solution may lie in the institution of in-country language 

and cultural training, which many missionary groups have found useful 

for their new members. The technique could be tried experimentally in a 

pilot course with selected advisors who already have had their technical 

training. In addition to offering intensive training in the Vietnamese language and instruction in aspects of Vietnamese culture, the course could 

include field trips throughout the country to familiarize the students with 

its geography, ethnic composition, and administrative and military organization, as well as with the functions of the US military and civilian agencies active in counterinsurgency. It should last a minimum of three months, 

and, if possible, should be conducted outside Saigon. Students assigned to 

the school should have no responsibilities outside the course and should 

live apart from other Americans.

3. Exit-Entrance Seminars

It is customary now to use advisors who have recently returned to the 

United States and have them address, instruct, or meet informally with 

members of predeployment orientation courses. One of the problems that 

this entails is that, by the time it happens, the advisors have been away from 

the scene for a while and the sharpness of many meaningful experiences 

has diminished in their memory. For some of them, selective remembering includes a tendency to dramatize past experience and indulge in “war 

stories,” in which a sniper may become an ambush and a few Viet Cong 

be transformed into a company or a battalion. Another problem lies in the 

fact that, as already pointed out, the present courses are large and include 

candidates for a wide variety of advisory roles, and only part of every 

audience will ultimately have practical use for the particular lessons to be 

learned from the experience of the returning advisor. Thus it may happen, 

for instance, that a former battalion advisor addresses a group of listeners 

most of whom will be going to the MAC-V or corps staff.

Both these problems could be overcome with relative ease if orientation of this kind took place in seminars in the field, in which advisors about 

to depart were brought together with those newly arrived who were slated 

to play the same role (though not necessarily to fill the same positions). In 

such seminars, of two or three days each, which could be held in Saigon, 

outgoing battalion advisors, for example, would meet with men about to 

become battalion advisors and, in an atmosphere of informal discussion, 

would analyze the advisory role and the particular problems likely to await 

them. The new arrivals would benefit from the very fresh experience of 

the veterans. They would gain some understanding of what their new roles 

involved and of the difficulties they might encounter in relations with 
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counterparts, and they would at the same time learn of some of the successful solutions that their predecessors had found.

4. Language Training

Vietnamese is a difficult language for the Westerner to learn, and it is 

estimated that the average person requires 800 to 1000 hours of intensive 

study to attain some fluency in it. Even for those nearest the operational 

level, it may not be practicable or necessary to invest quite that much time 

in language study, but it is essential that they be given enough—and that 

means more than present training courses provide—to enable them to communicate directly with their counterparts. All field advisors interviewed 

who had some mastery of Vietnamese had found it an invaluable asset. It 

is recommended, therefore, that regimental, battalion, sector, subsector, 

and Junk Fleet advisors, at least two members of every A Team, as well 

as other advisors who have regular close contact with their Vietnamese 

counterparts be given sufficient training in the language to permit them 

to speak it with reasonable ease, and that they be urged, as part of their 

indoctrination, to continue studying Vietnamese once they are in the country and on the job. Language training should be extended, furthermore, 

to those advisors in other roles, regardless of the closeness of their daily 

contact with Vietnamese, who manifest an unusual facility for the study 

of foreign languages. (Recently-developed language ability tests might be 

used to determine such special aptitude.)

For advisors working in the highlands in close touch with the 

montagnards—this would include some Special Forces A Team members 

and subsector advisors—it would be desirable to organize courses in the 

montagnard languages. These are less complex than Vietnamese and 

easier to learn. Also, basic information on their structure and sounds is 

readily available, having been collected by the Wycliffe Group from the 

University of North Dakota Summer Institute of Linguistics.7

Above the regimental level, there is less need for advisors to use 

the Vietnamese language. They tend to spend less of their time in the 

advisory function, and an increasing number of Vietnamese officers 

speak English. Moreover, some of the advisory roles involve little contact 

with the counterpart. In these cases, it would be sufficient for advisors 

to have a basic vocabulary, of perhaps two hundred words, along with 

some awareness of the general character of the Vietnamese language, 

its structure and its conceptualization. Even such limited instruction in 

the form and composition of the language will afford the advisor added 

insight into the country’s culture, and the Vietnamese as a result will 

feel that he is interested in them. Advisors with little linguistic training, 
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however, should be carefully instructed, as part of their orientation, in the 

selection, training, and use of interpreters, in methods of detecting and 

removing misunderstandings, and in the significance of nonverbal signs 

and expressions.

 French continues to be useful, both for advisors higher in the chain 

of command and for those working with some of the highland groups (the 

Rhadé, Jarai, Bahnar, and Sedang, in particular), and its study therefore 

should be encouraged. Also some advisors who are not greatly interested 

in acquiring Vietnamese are more motivated to learn French because of 

its universality and the possibility that they may be assigned to a Frenchspeaking country in the future.

VII. IMPROVING THE ADMINISTRATIVE SETTING

Nearly all advisors interviewed reported that their working relations 

with counterparts were made more difficult than necessary by certain factors relating to the administration and personnel policies and practices. 

They offered a variety of ideas for removing some of the hurdles. The following recommendations reflect both the complaints and the suggestions 

that were made most frequently.

1. Paper Work

All the sector advisors, among others, comment on the growing 

demands for reports and other kinds of paper, which cut heavily into the 

time they can spend working with counterparts. As one example of unnecessary paper work they cite requests for information on such things as Viet 

Cong-initiated incidents, weapons losses, and number of strategic hamlets 

in the province. The typical sector advisor, who does not have the time or 

staff to conduct research or collect basic data, simply obtains this type of 

information from the Vietnamese. It would be much simpler, therefore, if 

those who desired such data would obtain them directly from Vietnamese 

sources in Saigon. This would reduce the burden of the sector advisor and 

give him more badly-needed time to spend working on common problems 

with his counterpart.

2. Duration of Assignment

“We know we may be cutting our own throats, but the tour in Vietnam 

should be longer if we are going to win.” This was the comment of a 

spokesman for a group of sector advisors, and it was echoed by very many 

advisors at all levels. In their estimate, it takes an advisor from six to eight 

months to know his role and the situation well enough to begin working 

effectively with his counterpart. Most of them also described what they called 
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the “end-of-the-tour slump,” which results in a relatively unproductive final 

month.

The duration of the relationship between advisor and counterpart is 

an important factor in whether or not they develop rapport. It takes several months before the average advisor is able to work effectively with a 

counterpart, and too-frequent rotation of American personnel puts an undue 

burden of adjustment on both sides. If the advisor’s tour could be lengthened, the productive period of advising would be correspondingly longer, 

and administrative pressures at all levels related to the replacement process 

would be reduced. The current six-month assignment of battalion advisors, 

for example, might well be extended to about nine months. (A full year 

with a battalion would perhaps be too long, given problems of health and 

other hazards, including that of isolation in a small group.) The same goes 

for duty with Special Forces A Teams, where the advisor’s tour likewise 

could be stretched to nine months, though probably not more than that.

3. Advantages and Disadvantages of the Team Concept

The new plan to rotate members of the Special Forces A Teams so as 

to make it possible to extend tours from six months to one year will have 

the effect of destroying the team concept as it now exists. The advantage 

of the team is that it contains the elements of the primary group, as defined 

by the sociologist Cooley.8

 Since the members of a group train together 

and each has his role defined for him already at that stage, necessary 

adjustments are worked out before the team begins to function in the field. 

Above all, the members develop a sense of group solidarity as they come 

to rely on one another. In the successful defense of a post, such as that at 

Nam Dong on July 6, 1964, the importance of team training, coordination, 

and interreliance was amply demonstrated; in spite of the overwhelming 

odds, the team members responded as they had been trained, and contained the enemy attack by a coordinated effort. In a team whose membership is constantly changing, group spirit and a sense of mutual dependence 

and cooperation are more difficult to develop than in a team with stable 

membership. Not only, therefore, would it be desirable to preserve the 

team concept in the Special Forces, but it might be well to extend it also to 

the newly enlarged battalion advisory group and the recently implemented 

subsector advisory body (see Appendix A).

Admittedly, the primary group in the A Team, battalion, or subsector 

setting has certain potential disadvantages against which one must be on 

guard. Thus, the individual member’s identification with his group may 

be so strong and satisfying as to interfere with his ability or willingness to 

develop a relationship with his counterpart. By the same token, the group 
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can provide an easy refuge for those who are temperamentally disinclined 

to establish rapport with the Vietnamese. It is, of course, up to the leader 

of the team to see that this does not happen.

Still another danger of such strong group feeling is that the disaffection 

of one or a few members can demoralize the entire team. This occurred, 

not long ago, when members of a Special Forces A Team thought that several of them had been treated unjustly by higher echelons after an incident 

involving some of the Vietnamese Special Forces. As a result, they lost 

interest in their responsibilities and started taking long sun baths, their 

attitude summed up by one man, who said: “We might as well get a tan; 

it’s the only thing we’ll get out of this tour.” Yet when a new B Team commander reviewed the case and acted in favor of the team, their attitude 

changed once more. They undertook new projects and enthusiastically 

trained a new Strike Force company, which carried out a very successful 

operation during its first week of activity.

4. Matching Rank and MOS

Vietnamese society is very conscious of status, and military rank is 

assumed to reflect, among other things, the holder’s professional competence. Great importance, therefore, attaches to whether the advisor’s rank 

matches that of his counterpart. Inequality in rank is easily interpreted by 

the Vietnamese as an indication of unequal professional competence; if the 

advisor’s rank is lower, it may be thought to reflect badly on the counterpart 

or to reveal the Americans’ low estimate of his qualifications. It is desirable, 

therefore, that the advisor be of the same rank as his counterpart, for it will 

enhance the chances of their establishing a good professional relationship.

Almost as important as the matter of rank is the advisability of matching, wherever possible, the military occupational specialty of advisor and 

counterpart. Not only does having the same MOS involve a community of 

interest that creates rapport, but it also makes it possible for the American 

to demonstrate his professional knowledge as a colleague and equal, which 

is likely to increase his effectiveness as an advisor.

5. Improving Communication, Both Vertical and Lateral

Many field advisors have expressed the opinion that those higher in 

the chain of command, particularly staff officers at MAC-V headquarters 

do not understand the nature of the advisory role, let alone the specific 

problems involved in relationships with Vietnamese counterparts. On the 

one hand, they point out, the field advisor is constantly reminded that he 

is indeed only an advisor; on the other, he is held responsible as though 

he were in command. And they cite numerous examples to show that, 
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whenever anything goes wrong with the program—be it at battalion, 

regiment, province, or A Team site—the advisor is held accountable. If, 

as is often the case, the particular failure is due to the counterpart’s not 

having taken his advice, he is adjudged a poor advisor and is presently 

transferred to another post, with great damage to his career.

A marked lack of provisions for vertical communication within the 

American establishment limits the advisor’s performance and thus affects 

his relations with his counterpart. For there are few, if any, advisors who do 

not experience some problems in dealing with their Vietnamese opposites. 

In the case of field advisors, many such problems concern operations, and 

their solutions may be of the greatest urgency. There are instances of unit 

commanders reluctant to make contact with the Viet Cong or bent on using 

tactics that their advisors consider disastrous; and there are commanders 

who will not discipline their troops for failing to do their duty or for such 

infractions of the rules as being noisy on patrols and thereby betraying 

their presence to the Viet Cong. Some Special Forces A Team leaders have 

had problems with camp commanders who refuse to improve poor sanitation or inadequate camp defenses. The advisor lacks any convenient 

means or established practice for bringing these problems to the attention 

of the higher echelons. If he could freely admit and discuss matters with 

them, his superiors might be able either to provide him guidelines or, in 

some cases, to try solving the difficulties through consultation with their 

own counterparts. Such a free exchange would have the added benefit of 

providing those high in the chain of command with realistic insights into 

the situation in the field, for the frank opinion of the field advisor is one of 

the best indicators of the progress of the war.

Lateral as well as vertical communication needs to be improved. Field 

advisors encounter many identical or similar problems, but most of them 

have few opportunities for discussing their common difficulties and working out common solutions to them. Sector advisors now are fortunate in 

being able to meet periodically in Saigon. These meetings, although convened for other purposes, offer them an opportunity for such discussions, 

which they have described as very useful. But for most field advisors the 

occasion arises only through chance encounters, when several of them 

happen to be at headquarters at the same time.

Consideration might be given to a system of incentives and methods 

for on-the-job improvement. Advisors might be encouraged to seek 

assistance in overcoming difficult and recurring problems in their relations 

with counterparts. A small team of consultants or “trouble-shooters” might 

be constituted for giving such assistance on an “on-call” basis.
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6. Building on Past Experience

When we take the long-range view of the conflict in Vietnam, it 

becomes particularly important that there be provisions for continuing 

evaluation and for feeding the lessons of past experience into future 

planning, selection, and training processes. New and better ways must be 

devised, therefore, in which advisors can pass on the experience they have 

gained in the field both to their successors and to higher headquarters.

A precedent for an effective method of recording the experiences of 

advisors and improving communication among them may be found in the 

“group-process” technique that has been successfully employed by the 

Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) group in Vietnam. It 

is designed to bring about a rapid sharing of pertinent information and 

opinions when the group addresses itself to a problem, or a set of problems, 

common to all participants. One or two moderators trained in group 

behavior have the specific task of reducing extraneous details (“noise”) to 

a minimum and keeping both form and content of the information elicited 

in focus. The method permits group members to participate fully in the 

highly efficient production of information and the delineation, sharing, 

and solving of problems, and it renders them sensitive to specific social, 

cultural, and behavioral concepts of the foreign nation. It has been the 

experience of WRAIR that in the course of this process participants 

become less and less aware of the differences in rank and status among 

them and therefore tend to express themselves quite freely.

Group sessions such as these would improve lateral communication 

among advisors. Furthermore, if representatives of the higher levels of 

command were to participate in the meetings, they might gain an insight, not 

available to them at present, into advisory activities at lower echelons, the 

problems they entail, and in general, the realities of the counterinsurgency 

situation. The sessions should be recorded on tape. This would have the 

advantage not only of placing the valuable experience of the field advisors 

on record but also of ensuring a certain degree of anonymity for the 

advisors, who could speak their minds more frankly in the knowledge that 

their voices would be impossible to identify as the data accumulated.

7. Establishing Continuity with the Counterpart’s Previous 

Advisors

Nearly all advisors in Vietnam are working with counterparts who 

have already had one or more advisors. This fact has considerable bearing 

on their relationship, for the good will, or bad feeling, that existed between 

the new advisor’s predecessor and his counterpart does much to determine 
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the climate in which he embarks on his functions. An awareness of the 

predecessor’s experience would therefore be a most useful part of every 

newcomer’s orientation. There is as yet no institutional way of providing 

such information. The overlapping of advisory tours would offer an 

opportunity for the incoming advisor to learn about the outgoing one’s 

relationship with the counterpart, but it is standard procedure only in 

the Special Forces. Theoretically, also, a new advisor might obtain this 

knowledge from colleagues who knew his predecessor and had a chance 

to observe him in his work with the counterpart. In practice, however, rank 

differences among colleagues could easily inhibit free discussion. And, if 

the relationship had been poor, the other advisors might be reluctant to 

comment on it.

Not only would the new advisor benefit from knowing how well his 

predecessor had got along with the counterpart, but he might also gain in 

effectiveness if he knew what specific advice the counterpart had already 

received. At present, for example, advisors often unwittingly duplicate 

suggestions that have already proved unworkable. When this happens, the 

Vietnamese usually is unwilling to say so, lest this be construed as criticism of the advice or as a reflection on relations with the previous advisor. 

Rather than make explanations, the counterpart in such a case will merely 

fail to act, the advisor in turn will feel frustrated in his attempt to motivate 

him, and the effect of this will be to put an unnecessary strain on their 

relationship.

Every outgoing advisor could be asked to write, for the use of his 

successor, a brief profile of his recent counterpart. It should include his 

appraisal of the counterpart’s performance and receptivity to advice, as 

well as a general outline of the kinds of advice already given him. If kept 

short and informal, it need not add appreciably to the advisor’s paper 

chores. Such a profile would be a useful addition to the new advisor’s 

preparation for assuming his role.

8. Terminating Some Advisory Functions

There are counterparts in Vietnam today who might be described as 

“overadvised.” Some have had advisors for eight to ten years and by now 

know enough to carry on without their help. In extreme cases, they are 

resentful of the advisor and unwilling to listen to what he has to say, so that 

the advisor begins to feel useless. In other instances, as advisors pointed 

out to the author, counterparts need advice only from time to time. Thus, 

several advisors dealing with supplies felt that their counterparts knew the 

job well enough to do it without assistance, while a number of battalion 
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advisors reported that their counterparts had mastered the techniques but 

still needed advice on when to use them.

Perhaps the time has come for the US advisory mission in Vietnam to 

undertake an investigation that would reveal which Vietnamese military 

personnel no longer needed advice, with a view to the possibility of suspending it in those cases. The opinions of advisors who have worked with 

their counterparts long enough to determine their proficiency would be 

very valuable here, and a survey of this kind might be conducted with the 

use of questionnaires. It could also be a first step toward deciding in which 

areas of specialization—supplies, for example—advisory roles could be 

abolished entirely.

It might be possible to test the feasibility of such a plan by removing 

advisors from certain field units experimentally to see how they performed 

subsequently without assistance. Also, a pool of advisors could be established to provide specialists who would serve temporarily as needed.

In considering the termination of a given advisory function, however, 

one would have to bear in mind that some advisors do more than advise. 

Battalion advisors, for instance, also are reporters who keep headquarters 

informed on the progress of operations as well as on local situations. And 

only recently, it will be remembered, Special Forces A Team advisors were 

the first to report unrest among the montagnards and to give warning of the 

impeding revolt.

The ideal end situation is for the advisor to work himself out of a 

job; that is, to work toward a situation in which he is no longer needed. It 

should be to the credit of the counterpart, and recognized as such, that the 

relationship is terminated. Likewise, recognition of a job well done should 

be extended to the advisor by appropriate measures.
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Notes

1. The group discussions were organized by staff members of the Walter 

Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR). Typically, about twenty-five US 

military advisors would meet in an initial three-day session, followed by three 

one-day sessions, for an exchange of views and experiences and a discussion of 

common problems. Participants in the series of meetings so conducted included 

every sector advisor in every corps area, three senior advisors to the commanding 

officers in I, II, and IV Corps, a number of senior division advisors, and some battalion advisors.

2. For details on various branches of the Vietnamese military and their 

subdivisions (including River Force, Sea Force, Junk Fleet, Special Forces, and 

Strike Force), and on the position of the advisor in each, see Appendix A, . . . .

3. See Appendix A for the organization of the Special Forces and the functions of the A, B, and C Teams.

4. In one orientation program, American personnel were given a hypothetical situation and asked to act out the role of an advisor who gets ill during a 

Vietnamese dinner given by his counterpart. It is questionable whether training 

programs should be used to reinforce a stereotype such as this, which has at most 

only a slight basis in fact.

5. For detailed information on Vietnamese beliefs, social practices, and motivation, see: G.C. Hickey, Village in Vietnam, Yale University Press, New Haven, 

Connecticut, 1964; James Hendry, The Small World of Khanh Hau, Aldine Publishing Co., Chicago, 1964; Special Operations Research Office, Area Handbook 

on Vietnam, American University, Washington, D.C., in revision; Bernard B. Fall, 

The Two Vietnams, Frederick A. Praeger, Inc., New York, 1963.

6. C. Arensberg and A. Niehoff, Introducing Social Change, Aldine Publishing Co., Chicago, 1964; Ch. Erasmus, Man Takes Control, University of Minnesota Press, 1961; G. Foster, Traditional Culture: Impact of Cultural Change, 

Harper & Row Publisher, Inc., New York, 1962; W. Goodenough, Cooperation in 

Change, Russell Sage Foundation, New York, 1963.

7. Affiliated with the Christian Mission Alliance, the Wycliffe Group is 

composed of trained linguists, who usually go to remote areas of the Vietnamese 

highlands, where they learn the local languages, collect word lists, and analyze 

the structure and sound patterns of the languages.

8. “By primary group I mean those characterized by intimate face-to-face 

associations and cooperation. They are primary in several senses, but chiefly in 

that they are fundamental in forming the social nature and ideals of the individual. 

The result of intimate association, psychologically, is a certain fusion of individualities in a common whole, so that one’s very self, for many purposes at least, is 

the common life and purpose of the group. Perhaps the simplest way of describing 

this wholeness is by saying that it is a ‘we’: it involves the sort of sympathy and 

mutual identification for which ‘we’ is the natural expression. One lives in the 

feeling of the whole and finds the chief aims of his will in that feeling.” (Charles 

H. Cooley, Social Organization, The Free Press, Glencoe, Ill., p. 23.)
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Appendix A

Development of the Advisory Role in Counterinsurgency

“Advisor” has become the generic term for all US military personnel 

serving in the Republic of Vietnam. As used in this report, however, it is 

restricted to those who have, or are supposed to have, an opposite number 

on the Vietnamese side—a “counterpart”—whom they are to advise on 

matters connected with the counterinsurgency effort.

In the past ten years the over-all advisory function of the US military 

in Vietnam has undergone considerable changes. Following the partition 

of the country in 1954, the primary responsibility of the United States 

Military Assistance Group (MAAG) was to aid the South Vietnamese 

government in the formation and development of the newly established 

Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). As the Vietnamese armed 

forces expanded, members of the US Air Force, Navy, and Marines joined 

this advisory staff. With the growth of the Viet Cong insurgency, the 

Vietnamese armed forces became operational and thus required new kinds 

of advice, and additional advisory assistance was needed for the paramilitary units formed to rally local populations to their own defense. Finally, 

the military also assumed responsibility for social and economic programs 

designed to win the support of the rural population. The result of these 

developments has been an increase in the size and complexity of the military advisory program, as well as the redefinition of existing advisory roles 

and the creation of new ones. The program in Vietnam is unique, for it is 

the only instance in which the American advisory role is being performed 

in a counterinsurgency situation.

Early in 1962 the American effort increased considerably, and the 

Military Assistance Command in Vietnam (MAC-V) was formed to consolidate the various advisory and support groups. At present the roles of 

the advisors vary greatly, the major variables being an advisor’s level in the 

chain of command, his military occupational specialty (MOS), branch of 

service, geographical location, and the circumstances of the war. Generally 

speaking, the advisory roles of the MAC-V staff in Saigon and of the four 

corps area headquarters have evolved from the earlier MAAG structure, 

undergoing whatever changes the situation demanded. The commanding 

officers have their counterparts in the Vietnamese Joint General Staff (JGS). 

∗

In practice, some of those who have counterparts never actually have contact 

with them, while in other cases the counterpart position remains vacant for lack 

of qualified personnel.
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Below them are the “J” staffs (concerned with personnel, intelligence, 

operations, logistics, planning, and communication), some of whose members serve as advisors to the comparable staffs in the JGS headquarters. 

In addition, a US Air Force Advisory Group and a Navy Advisory Group 

both had advisors in their respective Vietnamese headquarters. Others may 

be found in various offices of the MAC-V; for example, some members of 

the Joint Research and Testing Activities Branch have Vietnamese counterparts with whom they cooperate on research projects.

The four corps headquarters have similar staff positions (G-1, G-2, 

G-3, G-4, G-5), but some of the commissioned and noncommissioned 

advisors at this level have more specialized roles and are dealing with 

particular aspects of logistics or intelligence. Within each corps area, field 

advisors are attached to ARVN units. At division headquarters there are 

staff advisors as well as advisors assigned to the individual regiments and 

battalions. All field advisors are involved in operations along with their 

counterparts, and their work includes more tactical responsibilities than do 

the functions of other corps advisors.

At the regimental level, a senior advisor with a staff of several assistants helps the regimental commander in planning and conducting operations, and he is available for advice on tactics when operations are under 

way. He and his counterpart visit field units and observe operations, reporting back to their respective superiors at division headquarters. They also 

serve as liaison between division and battalions. Often, a counterpart will 

call on the regimental advisor for logistical support (usually helicopter or 

air transport).

The battalion advisor performs functions similar to those of the regimental advisor, but on a lower echelon. He works closely with the battalion 

commander in planning operations, and he accompanies the unit into the 

field, often for periods of six to eight weeks. In addition to being available 

to assist with the many problems a battalion faces while on operations, the 

battalion advisor serves the useful function of being a reporter on the scene 

for the US chain of command. He may be called upon to request helicopter 

support or a medical evacuation. When he goes into combat with the unit, 

he may find himself playing the additional role of cocombatant.

In the past, battalion advisors numbered either two or three: usually a 

captain, a noncommissioned officer, and, in three-man teams, a lieutenant. 

Recently, however, the number of battalion advisors has been raised to 

five: the senior advisor (a captain); the assistant advisor (a lieutenant); and 

three noncommissioned officers, two of whom deal with light weapons 

and one, with communications.
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The Vietnamese Sea Force maintains coastal surveillance as one of its 

major responsibilities, and US advisors divide their time between working 

with their counterparts at naval headquarters on the various problems of 

ship maintenance and ship deployment, and accompanying the Sea Force 

on sea duty, where they live on Vietnamese naval vessels and furnish 

advice on ship operation or patrolling techniques.

The Vietnamese Navy’s River Force has several functions. Its primary 

task is to support the ARVN in operations by transporting troops, weapons, and supplies. Occasionally, it takes an active part in operations by 

lending artillery support. Patrolling and surveillance of the major rivers 

crossing the Cambodian border are secondary functions. US Navy personnel act as advisors in all these activities. During operations, they also play 

an important part in coordinating the actions of the River Force with those 

of the ARVN and related US advisory units. In addition to being equipped 

to advise on administrative, logistical, and operational matters of a naval 

character, they must be well versed in the US Army and ARVN chain of 

command, as well as in the structure and functions of the Vietnamese Navy, 

so as to be able to coordinate successfully the activities of these agencies.

In 1962, as part of the intensified counterinsurgent effort, three new 

categories of advisors were created: (1) Sector advisors were appointed 

to assist the province chiefs, all of whom at the present time are military men; (2) US Special Forces advisors helped the Vietnamese Special 

Forces organize the Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) program; 

and (3) US Navy advisors were assigned to the newly-formed paramilitary 

Junk Fleet of the Vietnamese Navy.

(1) According to the Table of Distribution, the sector advisor is 

either a lieutenant colonel or a major, and his staff consists of the assistant sector advisor (major), an intelligence officer (captain), an operations 

and training advisor (captain), a psywar/civil affairs advisor (captain), a 

Regional Forces–Popular Forces advisor (captain), an intelligence sergeant, light weapons advisor (E-6), an administrative specialist (E-5), and 

a communications specialist (E-4). The TD also provided for augmentation of the staff by the following: an air liaison officer (USAF captain), 

an assistant Regional Forces–Popular Forces advisor (lieutenant), a senior 

infantry sergeant, typist (E-3), an Air Force communications specialist (E4), and a medical specialist (E-5).

In many respects the sector advisors have a broader range of responsibilities than do other advisors in Vietnam, and they play an important 

part in the implementation of pacification plans, which aim at rallying 

the civilian population to the government side. In addition to advising the 
164

province chief on things military—use of Popular and Regional Forces, 

security, psychological warfare, cooperation with ARVN operations—the 

sector advisor with the province chief and USOM province representative form the Joint Province Committee responsible for all civic action 

programs. The committee decides on projects aimed at meeting the needs 

of the local population, and all three members must agree on and sign the 

financial arrangement for implementing each project. They then oversee 

its progress and approve its completion.

Involvement of sector advisors in socioeconomic civic action programs is something new in Vietnam. For the first time, an American military advisor has to be aware of the needs of the local civilian population. 

To perform effectively as a member of the Joint Province Committee, the 

sector advisor not only is called upon to judge the efficacy of a proposed 

project, but he also must be prepared to suggest useful projects himself. In 

addition, he assumes the role of comanager in arranging for the financial 

support of projects, seeing that funds are expended efficiently, making sure 

that those involved in the project are dealt with equitably, and, with other 

members of the committee, guaranteeing the successful completion of the 

project. Finally, the sector advisor differs from other advisory personnel 

in having not only a Vietnamese but also an American counterpart—the 

USOM province representative.

Very recently, subsector advisors have been added, who are to serve 

at the district level. The subsector advisor (a major or captain) has a fourman staff consisting of an assistant subsector advisor (captain or lieutenant), an intelligence sergeant, a communications specialist (E-4), and a 

medical specialist (E-6). Subsector advisors are under the administrative control of the sector advisor and the operational control of the Joint 

Province Committee, and their function was created to relieve the sector 

advisors of ever-growing responsibilities in the implementation of various 

pacification programs. According to the official Terms of Reference, the 

subsector advisor will:

A. Monitor all US/GVN programs with the subsector; 

report program status, evaluate program effectiveness, 

identify problem areas; recommend program improvement to the Joint Province Committee or other US/GVN 

personnel directly concerned. Specific responsibility 

for US/GVN programs will be determined by the Joint 

Province Committee and may include but not be limited 

to:

(1) Expediting the flow of US/GVN resources to subsector, village, and hamlet level.
165

(2) Serving as an official member of the district reception 

committee to pass on the acceptability of completed 

projects which were built with funds and materials 

provided by the Joint Province Committee.

(3) Following the activities of joint US/GVN-financed 

cadre teams working in the subsector to give advice 

and make recommendations regarding their support, deployment, utilization and conduct.

B. Advise and assist the subsector commander (district 

chief) and his staff on all matters dealing with the conduct of the counterinsurgency campaign in such a manner as to improve all phases of activity in the subsector 

and hasten the successful conclusion of the conflict.

C. Make recommendations to the sector advisor on the 

employments of US military resources in response to 

requests from the subsector commander or designated 

responsible subordinates.

D. Accompany Regional and Popular Force units engaged 

in operations in order to give advice, evaluate their 

effectiveness, and make recommendations leading to 

improved capabilities.

E. Prepare and maintain basic data on the subsector, to 

include information on population, ethnic groups, religious groups, friendly and enemy military situations, 

crops, handicrafts, education and health facilities, etc.

F. Keep informed of the total situation in the subsector in 

order to bring advice and action to bear on those critical 

problems that may be slowing or preventing successful 

prosecution of the counterinsurgency effort.

G. Report through US channels on prescribed matters or 

other matters vital to the US interests.

H. When visiting or stationed in a subsector, maintain communications on a schedule to be established by the sector advisor.

I. When designated as team leader and stationed in 

a subsector, act as area coordinator and assume 
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responsibility for the safety of all US military 

personnel in the subsector, unless there is a higher-level 

headquarters in the same subsector.

(2) The CIDG program is administered by the Vietnamese 

Special Forces with the advisory assistance and financial support of the 

US Special Forces. As it was organized in 1962, the Special Forces chain 

of command was as follows: A US C Team, or headquarters staff, included 

some who served as advisors to the Vietnamese Special Forces C Team. 

Each of the four corps areas had a B Team for both the US and Vietnamese 

Special Forces, and under their command were the A Teams, who worked 

at the local level, usually in remote areas. Duty for the US Special Forces 

in Vietnam was voluntary, and tours of duty were one year for C Team 

members, six months for B and A Team personnel. All of them were on 

temporary duty, received a per diem, and had to provide for their own food 

and quarters.

Recent regulations have altered this arrangement. Service continues 

to be voluntary, but all US Special Forces personnel in Vietnam will now 

serve one year on regular, not temporary, duty. Whereas, in the past, A 

Teams remained together as a group during predeployment training and 

duty in Vietnam, the present arrangement calls for the periodic rotation of 

team members.

The primary function of the A Teams (both US and Vietnamese) is to 

establish camps in remote areas and recruit units of the Strike Force from 

the local population. In the highland camps, most Strike Force members 

are drawn from the montagnard groups; in camps in or near the lowlands, 

the Vietnamese predominate. The Special Forces teams train the Strike 

Force members and then lead them on operations in their area. Strike 

Force personnel are paid a monthly wage from funds provided by the US 

Special Forces. The US A Team advises the Vietnamese Special Forces 

on the construction and maintenance of the camp and its defenses, on the 

training of the Strike Force, and on operational tactics.

The advisor’s role in the US Special Forces is unique in that it takes 

place entirely within a team context; the advisor is recruited, trained, and 

expected to perform as a member of a team. Each A Team is composed of 

the team leader (captain), an executive officer (lieutenant), a team sergeant 

(master sergeant), two medics (who have received extensive training, 

including limited surgery at the Dog Surgery School at Ft. Bragg, NC), 

and specialists in intelligence, communications, demolition, and heavy and 

light weapons. All the men are trained in at least one specialization other 

than their own. One team member assumes responsibility for supplies, and 
167

one medic is placed in charge of the mess. The camp commander, who 

is head of the Vietnamese Special Forces team, is the counterpart of the 

American team leader, and, at least in principle, each member of the US 

team has an opposite number in the Vietnamese Special Forces.

In addition to carrying out military operations, the A Teams conduct 

programs intended to aid the local populations. Some of these, like the 

projects of the Joint Province Committee, are of a socioeconomic nature. 

They may include the feeding and housing of refugees or resettled populations, school construction, and efforts to improve water control, crop production, and livestock care. Team medics conduct sick call for the military 

and their dependents, make house calls to civilians in the surrounding villages, help organize dispensaries, and train local nurses.

(3) The plan for a paramilitary Junk Fleet was first proposed in 

1959. It called for construction of motorized wooden junks in indigenous 

styles, recruitment of local fishermen to be trained by Vietnamese Navy 

personnel, and establishment of junk bases along the coast. The aim of the 

project was to give the Navy a greater role in counterinsurgency by introducing locally-based units that could operate continually within a given 

radius, patrolling the coastal waters and river mouths. Smaller than regular 

Navy craft, the junks could reach places theretofore inaccessible, and their 

appearance made them less easily identifiable as military.

By early 1963 a number of the junks had been constructed. Bases were 

established in each of the four Navy coastal districts, and US Navy advisors were assigned to the district headquarters in Danang, Nhatrang, Vung 

Tau, and An Thoi on Phu Quoc island. Since the very concept of the Junk 

Fleet was new to both the Vietnamese and the Americans, the role of the 

Junk Fleet advisor was not well defined. Construction, maintenance, and 

defense of the junk base demanded his attention and that of his counterpart, as did the training of the sailors, most of whom were not local fishermen but rural or urban Vietnamese unaccustomed to the sea. Once the base 

and the fleet had become operational, the advisor’s responsibilities would 

include the planning and carrying out of patrolling operations.

To this day, the role of the Junk Fleet advisor has remained more fluid 

than that of other advisors in Vietnam. Given the wide range of responsibilities, the typical US Navy man, with skills and experience in weapons, base defense, ship maintenance, and even clerical tasks, has been of 

great value, and, since such a variety of skills in a single man is not easily 

matched on the Vietnamese side, many Junk Fleet advisors have more than 

one counterpart. Because of insufficient logistical support, both the advisor and his counterparts have had to be skillful at devising ways of coping 
168

with the myriad problems that faced the Junk Fleet in its formative period. 

(One advisor arrived at his base to find the personnel without blankets, 

uniforms, or barracks, and without facilities for routine medical and dental 

care. He successfully appealed to private sources in the United States for 

some of the needed commodities, and he soon found himself practicing 

limited medicine and dentistry.)
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Appendix B

A Survey of Literature Relating to the Advisory Function

Following is a brief overview of social science research bearing on 

relations between advisors and their counterparts, with particular emphasis on the selection and training of advisors and the evaluation of past 

experience. 

Nearly all social research bears in one way or another on the problems 

faced by American military advisors. Ideally, existing knowledge in such 

fields as small-group behavior, mass phenomena, attitude formation, cognition, social change, and a multitude of others should be made available 

to them in a form that will assist them in their relationships not only with 

their counterparts but also with indigenous populations and others with 

whom they work or come into contact. Some materials are, of course, 

more relevant than others. Most directly related to the advisors’ tasks are 

studies concerned with communication and cross-cultural communication, 

social analysis of foreign societies, related cross-cultural programs, and 

counterinsurgency and internal war. Even if attention is limited to these 

four categories, however, the number of potentially useful works is enormous. Those on communication and foreign areas are numbered in the 

thousands; those on related programs and counterinsurgency in the hundreds. A few examples will illustrate the nature of the material in each 

category.

There is no adequate summary treatment of what is known either 

about communication in general or about intercultural communication in 

particular. One valuable reference is The Process of Communication, by 

David K. Barlo (Holt, 1960). An older book that gives a popular version 

of experience in the commercial world, much of which is transferable to 

other situations, is Is Anybody Listening? by William H. Whyte, Jr. (Simon 

& Schuster, 1952). A well-known volume on communicating with people 

of other cultures, which is currently used in most courses for orienting 

overseas personnel, is The Silent Language by Edward T. Hall (Doubleday, 

1959). A bibliography of published works could run to any length, depending on the patience of the compiler and the reader. In addition, a substantial 

amount of research on communication is being conducted by organizations 

under contract to various government agencies. Much of this is designed 

to apply to foreign areas. For example, the Special Operations Research 

Office of American University has current projects on influence processes 

in crosscultural interactions and on informal communication systems in 

selected countries.
170

Area studies are even more extensive. The most comprehensive source 

of information on foreign societies is the collection maintained at Yale 

and associated universities known as the Human Relations Area Files, 

which has served as the basis for area handbooks compile by the Special 

Operations Office. Data on current attitudes and opinions in foreign areas 

are collected by the US Information Agency, and are included in several 

series of reports issued by the Agency. Among the many published monographs, perhaps the most widely-known on Vietnam is that of Bernard 

B. Fall, Street Without Joy: Indochina at War (The Stackpole Company, 

Harrisburg, 1961).

The experience of public and private bodies engaged in programs of 

international aid, international education, or international communication offers a rich store of information that still remains to be collated. The 

American Council of Voluntary Agencies for Foreign Service, Inc., under 

a contract with the Agency for International Development, is currently collecting and classifying information about the technical assistance programs 

of voluntary agencies, missions, and foundations. The Peace Corps and the 

National Institutes of Mental Health, in March 1963, jointly sponsored 

a symposium entitled “The Peace Corps and the Behavioral Sciences,” 

which summarized much of the experience of the Peace Corps in using 

social research up to that time. The operations of the US Information 

Agency in various parts of the world are described in scattered reports 

and occasional documents, while the exchanges conducted by the State 

Department under the Smith-Mundt and Fulbright programs have given 

rise to a substantial number of books, articles, and reports. One of the most 

comprehensive of these is the volume by Clarie Selltiz and others, Attitudes 

and Social Relations of Foreign Students in the United States (University 

of Minnesota Press, 1963). The Agency for International Development has 

contracted with the National Planning Association for an extensive study 

of techniques for dealing with social and economic development problems 

in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and Syracuse University is conducting another massive project on administrative methods and techniques of 

technical assistance, also under an AID contract. A very large number of 

books, articles, and reports on the US economic aid program have been 

written in recent years.

Studies of experience in counterinsurgency and internal war are somewhat fewer in number, and the better ones are well known to personnel 

concerned with military assistance. One of the earliest systematic analyses, 

and still one of the best, is Lucian W. Pye’s Guerrilla Communist in Malaya

(Princeton University Press, 1956); another excellent study of insurgency 

in Southeast Asia is George K. Tanham’s Communist Revolutionary 
171

Warfare: The Vietminh in Indochina (Praeger, 1961). Extensive bibliographies on this subject have been compiled by the Special Operations 

Research Office and a number of other organizations, and a substantial 

amount of research in the area is under way. Some of these studies, such as 

the Internal War Project of Princeton University’s Center of International 

Studies, are under private auspices. Most, however, are being done under 

contract with government agencies.

An effort to summarize for the use of prospective advisors the volume 

of research that bears in some way on the advisor counterpart relationship would result in a compendium that was either quite incomplete or 

unwieldy. Existing and ongoing research will be most useful when it is 

examined with very specific questions in mind, and especially so when the 

examiner already has a comprehensive knowledge of the problems faced 

by military advisors in a particular area.

Selection of Advisory Personnel

If the principal categories of jobs to which advisors are assigned are 

clearly defined, the extensive literature on selection, training, and administration of personnel for overseas service can probably provide at least 

some assistance in improving current procedures. This literature covers 

the experience of private institutions, government agencies (including the 

armed services), and international bodies. Among several bibliographies 

of relevant studies these are the most extensive:

Center for Cultural and Technical Interchange Between 

East and West, University of Hawaii, “Symposium 

on Development of Research on Effectiveness in 

Working Abroad,” January 5-7, 1963. The Center has 

collected what is probably the most comprehensive 

bibliography, consisting of over 600 references, on 

the selection of personnel for crosscultural service. 

A selected list of 340 titles from the periodical literature has been compiled by Allan A. Spitz and 

Edward W. Weidour, in Development Administration: 

An Annotated Bibliography, East West Center Press, 

Honolulu, 1963.

Elliott McGinnies, “A Review of Selection Methods for 

Overseas Assignment,” prepared for the US Peace 

Corps, June 1961 (unpublished).

Society for Personnel Administration, Selecting Employees 

for Overseas Assignment, Washington, 1961.
172

Clarence E. Thurber, “Literature in the Field of Personnel 

for International Development,” Pennsylvania State 

University, July 1962 (unpublished).

Mottram Torre, The Selection of Personnel for 

International Service, World Federation for Mental 

Health, Geneva and New York, 1963.

Some of the available literature deals with the question of selection from the point of view of specific types of organizations, and some 

approach it without reference to particular agencies. Among the most useful general treatments are Working Abroad: A Discussion of Psychological 

Attitudes and Adaptation in New Situations (Group for the Advancement 

of Psychiatry, New York 1958), and Harlan Cleveland et al., The Overseas 

Americans (McGraw Hill, 1960). The experience of United Nations agencies is discussed in the proceedings of the Conference on Recruitment, 

Selection and Training of Technical Assistance Personnel (Carnegie 

Endowment for International Peace, Rome, February, 1962). This conference was of particular interest in that it brought together specialists 

from various underdeveloped countries as well as from Europe and North 

America. An Agency for International Development study, entitled “Report 

and Recommendations of the Task Force on Recruitment, Screening and 

Selections for A.I.D.” (Washington, March 1962), contains both recommendations for personnel policies and identification of research needs. 

Several industrial enterprises have undertaken studies on selection of personnel for overseas service. One report of the Standard Oil Company of 

New Jersey claims a 20 per cent increase in selection efficiency, measured in terms of satisfactory completion of assignment, as a result of 

using six standardized psychological tests during the selection process. 

(Standard Oil Company of NJ, Social Science Research Reports, Volume 

II, “Selection and Placement,” 1962.)

The qualities that the various organizations are seeking to discover 

through the selection process naturally differ with the particular needs of 

the agencies. All agree, however, that the first qualification for anyone 

serving in an intercultural context is professional competence; linguistic 

and social skills do not make up for a lack of professional and technical 

know-how. The pool of those from whom selections is made should 

therefore be limited to individuals who have the necessary professional 

competence or who can be taught it in a short time. The quality that is 

usually judge the next most important is “cultural empathy” or “crosscultural sensitivity”—the ability to understand and adjust to a very different 

social situation. This ability is usually found among people of particular 

social backgrounds, such as those who come from minority groups or from 
173

groups with a strong tradition of involvement overseas, or whose families 

have intermarried with foreigners. Other qualities that are nearly always 

mentioned as desirable are high motivation and intelligence, social ease, 

communication skills, adaptability to different food and customs, and 

organizing and leadership ability.

A large number of selection techniques have been devised in efforts to 

discover and measure desirable and undesirable qualities. Most common 

are interviews, self-report inventories, psychiatric screening, and batteries 

of psychological tests. In addition, various experiments have been conducted with group-interaction situations, in which a person’s behavior is 

observed while he is in an environment that closely resembles the one he 

will encounter on the job. Some group-interaction situations are known 

as “house party” tests, in which the subject lives and works with a small 

group for several days in an isolated location. The Peace Corps and several 

other agencies have experimented with using nationals of the country to 

which a person is to be assigned to help determine whether he is qualified 

for the job.

In spite of experimentation with a large number of selection techniques, there is still relatively little solid information on how well they 

work. This situation is improving rapidly, however, as evaluation studies 

are being completed that will make it possible to compare predicted performance with actual performance.

The work done on selection thus far suggests a number of general 

observations that would apply to most organizations working overseas. 

One is that skill cannot be separated from motivation. Most people, unless 

they have severe personality disorders, can learn at least some crosscultural skills if they want to—and if time is available. The rate of learning 

and the ability to benefit from training vary widely, however, especially in 

the case of linguistic skills. Older people sometimes find it almost impossible to unlearn speech habits that interfere with acquiring a new language. 

Another general observation is that many individuals, especially if they 

are of senior rank or are volunteers, object to being subjected to selection 

∗

An informal survey of foreign officers with whom the US military advisors 

have been working revealed the following as the qualities most often mentioned 

by counterparts as being desirable in US advisory personnel: (1) Professional 

competence; (2) language ability—ability to get ideas across; (3) respect for the 

local culture, as shown in efforts to use the language, interest in local history and 

geography, and the quality of being a good guest; (4) empathy; (5) enthusiasm; (6) 

adaptability; (7) patience; and (8) humor. (Memorandum by Maj. Gen. Edward 

Lansdale, “Through Foreign Eyes,” October 7, 1963.)
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procedures and therefore cooperate poorly. This difficulty can be partially 

overcome, however, if emphasis is given to “placement” rather than to 

“selection.” Few people object to tests that are likely to result in their 

being assigned to the jobs that they can do best. A third observation is 

that, whenever possible, the selection (or placement) process should be 

continued at least through the first stages of training. A person’s performance in training may indicate his suitability for a given job more clearly 

than any number of preliminary tests. In the Peace Corps and a number of 

other agencies, some individuals are “selected out” after several months 

of training, when there are indications that they will not perform satisfactorily overseas.

The degree to which the military establishment can benefit from experience with selection techniques in other agencies is limited by several 

factors. One limitation is its sheer size and complexity, combined with the 

necessity for rapid action and the primacy of military skills. Another is the 

fact that most members of the services have already survived extensive 

selection procedures, and it is not necessary to start from the beginning 

as is the case with an agency recruiting new personnel. Nevertheless, a 

hard look at the possibility of introducing additional selection procedures 

for overseas military advisors is desirable. The present military screening process is rigorous when it comes to physical toughness and technical 

competence, but it provides few indications with regard to cultural empathy and aptitude for crosscultural communication. Observers overseas 

have frequently been impressed by the tremendous range of differences 

among American military personnel in their ability to adapt to a foreign 

environment. Some show an almost incredible facility for learning other 

languages and understanding other peoples, while others are highly ethnocentric and find it difficult to deal successfully with any foreign nationals. If it were possible to screen out the personnel with the least cultural 

empathy without lowering professional standards, the efficiency of military activities that require association with foreign nationals would be substantially increased.

The Training Process

Training for officers who engage in advisory functions abroad is given 

at a number of schools, at other military installations, and by organizations under contract. Most advisors who are assigned to Vietnam attend 

the MATA course at Ft. Bragg, but some receive orientation at the Military 

Assistance Institute of the Foreign Service Institute in Washington, and 

some receive predeployment training at bases prior to assignment. The 

standards of the major training institutions are high, and instructors are 
175

usually in touch with a large part of the research that bears on the advisory 

function. In most cases, civilian specialists are also invited to lecture or 

take part in seminars. Nevertheless, the various training centers do not 

appear to share a common approach to their task, and the interchange of 

experience among them seems to be limited. 

The literature on training, most of which deals with the experience 

of civilian agencies, suggests that the most obvious category of useful 

knowledge that can be taught is that dealing with the geography, history, 

economics, and government of the country of assignment. More subtle, 

but essential, categories include social organization and customs, and the 

prevailing psychological patterns and attitudes among members of the 

host population. When a specific assignment has been given a student, it 

is sometimes possible to provide him with orientation about the group in 

which he will be working, about the resistances he is likely to encounter, 

and even about the individuals with whom he will be associated.

Among the most important techniques that can be taught are communication skills: an ability to use the language, and a capacity to communicate in the face of the language barrier. Learning a difficult language such 

as Vietnamese is a time-consuming task, however, and only a beginning 

can be made in brief training courses. It is therefore of particular importance that students be given as much orientation as possible in the selection, training, and use of interpreters, in methods of detecting and dealing 

with misunderstandings, and in the significance of nonverbal cues.

There is a need for more research on how to make the most of the limited time that can be devoted to language instruction in training courses. 

The process of learning a language seems to parallel closely the process 

of learning to understand another culture, and it is possible that the two 

subjects could most profitably be taught together. The example of one 

experiment may be useful here in which Tagalog was taught together with 

instruction in the way that Filipinos behave toward each other (F.X. Lynch, 

Understanding the Philippines, Ateneo de Manila, 1961).

More research on the side effects of language teaching would also be 

desirable. There are indications that some knowledge of a language is of 

great help to an advisor in determining when a counterpart is confident or 

not confident, when he understands or does not, and when he is telling the 

truth. It has also been suggested that even a relatively slight familiarity 

with the language of a country on the part of a foreigner greatly improves 

the attitudes of the indigenous population toward him. But just how much 

language teaching it takes, and under what conditions, to produce given 

results must be determined by further investigation.
176

To operate successfully in another society, a person must have a good 

understanding of his own culture and nation. This will enable him not only 

to answer many inevitable questions, but also to view with some objectivity the differences between his own “natural” way of doing things and the 

ways of the people with whom he will be working. If differences among 

cultures are recognized, they can be made conscious and objective, and 

hence manageable. Without such an awareness, a person is in danger of 

attributing his own expectations to people who do not share them. Training 

courses therefore usually include material on American society as well as 

on the nation of assignment.

As important as teaching knowledge and skills is to develop attitudes 

and aptitudes during the orientation process that will help a person to continue his education and to function more efficiently in the country of his 

assignment. Among these it is essential to cultivate the ability to discriminate among people of another culture as individuals, so as not to run the 

danger of treating them as undifferentiated members of a foreign society. 

“The ability to like or dislike the individual member of another culture 

with the same discrimination that would be displayed in one’s own culture 

is one of the surest signs that . . . no irrational, stereotyped prejudices, 

either positive or negative, are interfering with a free flow of cross-cultural 

communication.” (Margaret Mead, “The Factor of Culture,” in Mottram 

Torre, The Selection of Personnel for International Service, pp. 18ff.)

Equally important is a sensitivity to the responses given by people of 

other cultures—the ability to prevent chain reactions of misunderstanding. 

A training course cannot describe all the possible bases for misunderstanding in advance; the individual must be prepared to observe both himself 

and others when exchanging ideas in a foreign culture, and should be ready 

to introduce self-corrective measures when necessary. He must behave a 

little like a psychiatrist in a psychiatric interview. (Bryant Wedge, M.D., 

“Toward a Science of Transnational Communication,” in Application of 

Psychiatric Insights to Cross-Cultural Communication, Group for the 

Advancement of Psychiatry, New York, 1961, pp. 387ff.) Closely related 

is the desirability of being able to realize that a person must be a learner 

before he can be an advisor and hence cultivate a habit of inquiry and 

interest with respect to another society. (George M. Guthrie, “Preparing 

Americans for Participation in Another Culture,” in Peace Corps and 

Behavioral Sciences, p. 398.) Accompanying the spirit of inquiry should 

be a willingness to experiment, be it with new food or with techniques. 

In short, training courses should endeavor to develop what social scientists sometimes refer to as the multicultural personality: a personality that 

enables a person to operate comfortably in two different cultures.
177

Finally, it is important that training courses enable an individual to 

understand his own reactions better. Many officers, in describing one-year 

tours abroad, have noted that after eight or nine months one tends to slow 

down on the job and to think about reassignment. This experience seems 

to parallel that of foreign students in the United States, who often become 

disillusioned toward the end of their first year of study here and lose some 

of their motivation. If they stay for another year, however, their motivation tends to rise again. (Margaret L. Cormack, “Three Steps to Better 

Orientation,” Overseas, September 1963.) Perhaps the “slowing down” 

sensation that advisors have noted toward the end of their tour is not so 

much related to the length of their assignment as they think, and, instead, 

is a reaction that almost everyone experiences after several months in 

another culture. Further research into the extent to which this is true would 

be desirable. Meanwhile, orientation courses might warn advisors to be 

alert to the danger of diminished motivation toward the end of one-year 

tours, so that the individual will be prepared to deal with it.

In general, military schools have had more experience and are better 

organized than the schools run by civilian agencies. Nevertheless, the volume of experience in nonmilitary contexts is now such that it merits close 

attention by those conducting military orientation courses. Also, research 

sponsored by civilian agencies and private bodies will frequently be helpful. 

For example, the State Department research study on overseas adjustment 

problems, presented at a conference in Washington on May 10, 1963, summarizes much of the experience in this field of the State Department, the 

US Information Agency, and the Agency for International Development.

The Peace Corps, private universities, and individual researchers have 

experimented with a number of training techniques, some of which have 

been tried out in military schools as well: role playing, group dynamics, 

simulated field environments, establishment of bicultural situations in the 

training program, the use of native instructors, and so on. In one case, it was 

found that native instructors were defensive about their own society and its 

inadequacies, and tended to make the area study unduly difficult. (Herbert 

B. Fowler et al., “The Iran Project—Peace Corps Training in an Unusual 

Environment,” The Peace Corps and the Behavioral Sciences, p. 564.) In 

other cases, using native instructors yielded very good results. A mechanism 

for a continuing exchange of experience among major institutions training 

personnel for overseas service would be beneficial to all concerned.

Military and civilian agencies might collaborate in developing certain 

basic training aids for schools preparing for overseas service, the existing 

training aids being, in the opinion of many scholars, far less good than 

they ought to be. In some cases, material prepared for one agency might 
178

be adapted for use by another. For instance, a pamphlet prepared for the 

International Cooperation Administration (Arthur Raper, Some Points for 

Consideration of Technicians Working with Villagers, Washington, 1960), 

which has been called one of the briefest and best training aids available, 

probably would have applications for military advisors. The same is true 

of the Peace Corps handbook (Working Effectively Overseas, Washington, 

1961).

The effectiveness of training courses for military advisors could be 

increased by additional research among graduates of these courses. In this 

way, for example, one might learn to what extent training can develop the 

multicultural personality, reinforce cultural empathy, and provide a basis 

for accelerated learning in the field. Why do some advisors continue language study after reaching their post while others do not? Why do some 

attempt to shut themselves up in a simulated American environment while 

others learn to operate effectively in the local society? Since most of the 

necessary learning must take place on the job, the extent to which training is able to provide the needed motivation and facilitate this learning 

process will make a significant difference in the effectiveness of the entire 

advisory operation.

Research to strengthen the political component of training programs 

would also be desirable. Military advisors are one of the most important 

channels for the communication of political information between the 

United States and the host county, and they are in touch with segments of 

the indigenous population that are not reached by any other US personnel. 

How can they help the personnel with whom they are working develop a 

sense of national purpose? What training would assist them in doing this? 

The existing literature on psychological operations scarcely touches such 

questions as these at all. Furthermore, such questions must be answered 

largely from the field rather than from headquarters. The experience of 

military advisors is one of the major resources of nation policy, and ways 

should be found to make the most of it.

No matter how much thought is given to the selection and training 

of military advisors, however, the brevity of orientation courses that can 

be given them and the short tours of duty of the advisors will limit their 

effectiveness. Several things might be done about this. In The Overseas 

Americans, Harlan Cleveland and his collaborators point out that special 

courses given by the agencies involved in overseas operations should 

not be expected to do the whole training job. Even before the personnel 

concerned reach these specialized courses, colleges should have laid 

the groundwork for overseas service by emphasis on subjects relating 
179

to international affairs. A corollary for the military establishment is that 

greater emphasis on training for overseas duty might be given by the whole 

system of military schools. It is probable that an increasing proportion 

of military personnel will serve in capacities that bring them into close 

contact with foreign armed forces and civilian populations. A broad base 

of international service training would benefit not only military advisors 

but a wide range of other specialists as well. 

Evaluation and the Cumulation of Experience

Officials concerned with foreign aid programs have sometimes 

observed with some annoyance that each project seems to start at almost 

the same level of ignorance as those that went before. Administrators have 

not learned how to cumulate the lessons of past failures and successes, and 

little time or money has been budgeted for this purpose.

Nevertheless, the problems of collating experience and assessing the 

success of both individuals and programs overseas have been given extensive attention by civilian agencies and individual researchers. Some of 

this work is transferable to the military context. For example, a specialist 

on intercultural communication has suggested a number of specific questions for use in evaluating the social and psychological component of a 

person’s field experience: Describe the persons you got to know best. Why 

was this? Were they compatriots or foreigners? How free were you to discuss personal problems with these friends? How was a friendship formed? 

What were the strengths or limitations of the person involved? On what 

matters did you agree or disagree? What persons did you find most difficult to deal with? What must a consultant do to get along with people in 

_____? (Mottram Torre, Selection of Personnel for International Service, 

pp. 102-103.) A large proportion of the currently available evaluation studies are summarized in the following sources:

Albert E. Gollin, “Evaluating Programs and Personnel Overseas: 

A Review of Methods and Practices,” Bureau of Applied 

Social Research, Columbia University, February 1963 

(unpublished).

Gordon MacGregor, “The Experiences of American Scholars 

in Countries of the Near East and South Asia,” Conference 

Board of Associated Research Councils, Washington, 1957 

(unpublished).

Hollis W. Peter and Edwin R. Henry, “Measuring Successful 

Performance Overseas,” International Development Review, 

Vol. 3, No. 3, October 1961.
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UNESCO, “Evaluation Techniques,” International Social Science 

Bulletin, Vol. 7, No. 3, 1955.

In addition, evaluation studies of the A.I.D. participant training program are currently being conducted by the Bureau of Social Science 

Research in Washington, and a number of research projects to evaluate 

Peace Corps performance are in progress. To the degree that techniques 

for evaluating and cumulating experience in military assistance programs 

can be developed, a spiral of improved performance and effectiveness can 

be expected.
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About the Author

Robert D. Ramsey III retired from the US Army in 1993 after 24 years 

of service as an Infantry officer that included tours in Vietnam, Korea, and 

the Sinai. He earned an M.A. in history from Rice University. Mr. Ramsey 

taught military history for 3 years at the United States Military Academy 

and 6 years at the US Army Command and General Staff College. Mr. 

Ramsey is the author of Global War on Terrorism Occasional Paper 18, 

Advising Indigenous Forces: American Advisors in Korea, Vietnam, and 

El Salvador.