SCHOFIELD BARRACKS, Hawaii -- In times of conflict, socioeconomic vulnerabilities can be magnified.
For Operational Contract Support professionals, recognizing trends and understanding the economic climate, within a region of operation, is essential to ensure tactical-level OCS decisions have positive strategic-level effects.
Operational Contract Support is the process of planning for and obtaining supplies, services and construction through commercial sources for joint operations. OCS goes beyond supplies and services, it provides economic and battlefield effects for the commander. In other words, commanders need to plan for OCS in all phases of a campaign. Failure to do so may have significant unintended consequences and can adversely impact the mission.
During Operational Contract Support Joint Exercise 2015 here, members of the OCS community gathered to train, network and collaborate on all aspects of OCS, one of which is the study of the economic environment in which they may operate.
The exercise scenario for OCSJX-15 is set in the Asia-Pacific region, but each year the geographical Area of Responsibility changes, as does the mission. Framing the scenario inside a specific geographical area allows participants to train on real-world issues, circumstances and settings.
"I want to add an economic dimension to the exercise, for everyone to consider," said Dr. Miemie Winn Byrd, Associate Professor at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies. Dr. Byrd was asked to speak to OCSJX-15 participants on economic trends and factors that can impact the security environment in the Asia Pacific region.
Dr. Byrd explained that economic growth in the region over the last 30 years has led to income inequality, which can pose a security risk in the face of war or instability.
"Income inequality can create a vulnerable environment. As OCS professionals, you have to consider that and if you don't, we will be blindsided and there will be unintended consequences," Dr. Byrd said.
Although a society's vulnerabilities may not necessarily equal instability, the opposite is true -- every nation that has instability has socio-political or economic vulnerabilities, according to Dr. Byrd, and being aware of a nation's vulnerabilities is essential to OCS success.
"Imagine the rising income inequality as a pile of dry leaves. Something may come along to spark the pile and start a fire," she said. "The income inequality, like the dry leaves, makes the population very vulnerable, and your actions can be like a match, sparking the fire."
Operational Contract Support can be that spark, igniting fires in societies with positive or negative effects.
U.S. Air Force Maj. Chris Hearl, Air Force Installation Contracting Agency, spoke alongside Byrd, providing real-world examples of effects-based OCS. One example of a negative effect tied to OCS was from Djibouti, Africa.
According to Hearl, a contracting officer on the ground in Djibouti re-negotiated a contract for base operation support services. The re-negotiation effort saved hundreds of thousands of dollars and brought about efficiencies in the performance of the contract, but the result was a workforce reduction, causing close to 500 local Djiboutian to lose their jobs. The remaining workers, upset about the cuts, staged daily protests outside of the gate. Although the private contractor made the decision to cut their workforce, the perception was that the U.S. Government had treated the local population unfairly. Furthermore, senior Djiboutian government leadership reached out to the White House with their concerns; expressing outrage at the results the decision had on their economic stability.
Although the decision ultimately saved the government money in the short term, the result was significant tension to U.S. and Djiboutian relations. This strain on relations resulted in the government of Djibouti renegotiating other international agreements, essentially costing the U.S. government approximately $20 million annually for the U.S. military to access local sea ports.
"This represents a positive tactical decision, where the engineer and contracting officer got together and saved some money, as they were trained to do, unfortunately secondary and tertiary effects were counterproductive to our overall strategic intent," Hearl said. "Had the engineer and contracting professionals known that the commander's intent was to foster goodwill among the local population and bring stability to their economy, they may have deferred the chance to squeeze additional savings on the contract costs."
The goal behind sharing OCS examples such as this is to spur a transformational culture change within the Department of Defense, inspiring everyone to think outside the box and consider all effects of OCS. Hearl said effective OCS, to include the analysis of the operating environment and the understanding of economic implications of our actions within a given battlespace, does not fall to just one functional area or one military service.
"We want everyone to understand that their job, no matter what field or functional area they are in, can have an economic impact on the battlespace," Hearl said. "What we do every day reaches across not only military channels, but diplomatic, informational and economic channels as well."
During OCS planning, execution, and management, effective coordination and integration, across all stakeholders is critical to success, Hearl said.
"This isn't easy. In short, it gets everyone out of their comfort zones. This type of coordination brings challenges and concepts to people that they don't normally think about. They assume someone else is thinking about it," Hearl said. "With Congressional and GAO reports documenting an effective loss of between $30 and $60 billion during conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, we realize practically no one was thinking about it. It is critical for both acquisition and non-acquisition personnel to focus on OCS in our battlespace and doing so will return dividends to the Joint Force."
Hearl said through comprehensive training like OCSJX-15, the OCS community at large can turn lessons observed into lessons learned.
"We want to bring the right people to the table, to integrate all of the functional areas in the planning process," Hearl said. "Although we obviously can't think of everything, we can, and we should, think further through our actions than we have in the past."
OCSJX-15 participants will use what they learned from Byrd and Hearl's briefing during the scenario execution phase of the exercise, which started April 6.
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