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Ramp up cultural training

In the coming weeks, Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command will deploy its first female engagement team to Afghanistan. There, alongside highly trained operators, they will venture into remote western and northern parts of the country and attempt to gain trust among Afghan women as part of an effort throughout Afghanistan to build broader support for the country’s fragile government. Officials say that if you win over the women, who have considerable influence at home, then you stand a better chance of winning over their husbands, brothers and sons.

The deploying engagement team — a captain, two corporals and a Navy corpsman — will be trained to the same standards the command prepares its radio operators, engineers and other “enablers” who work with MarSOC companies or adviser teams, officials say. they will be taught to master an M4 rifle and an M9 pistol and will receive instruction downrange on how to approach an Afghan village, and how to respond under fire. All good measures.

Cultural training, however, is lacking at the moment. MarSOC will provide this crew with fewer than 10 days worth before it deploys — a likely symptom of the rush to get a team in place. Such hurry-up measures may be necessary as U.S. forces adjust tactics and strategies in Afghanistan under the relatively new leadership of top commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal. But any prospect of success in Afghanistan critically depends on cultural expertise and language proficiency among all troops whose job is to go where Afghans live and build relationships of trust and respect.

Less than four years in the making, MarSOC is a work in progress. As the command continues to build out its structure, it should put a priority on developing language and cultural training programs that provide engagement teams and others, on such a critical mission, the ability to make a real, immediate difference in the war zone.

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