Joint Intelligence Training Center Now Complete

By Chelsea IliffOctober 5, 2007

Joint Intelligence Training Center  Now Complete
(Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

FORT HUACHUCA, Ariz. (Army News Service, Oct. 5, 2007) - The Department of Defense Human Intelligence Training-Joint Center of Excellence celebrated the five courses that now fall under and complete the JCOE umbrella, and the joint effort that made this unification happen in a ceremony Monday.

"It's pretty amazing to think of all the things that have happened this past year to get us to this point and what's going to happen with the synergy now that we're complete," said Lt. Col. James Hamby, commander of HIT-JCOE.

Throughout the last fiscal year, there was a phased approach with the introduction of each of the five JCOE courses. The first four were: Advanced Source Operations Course, Defense Strategic Debriefer Course, Joint Interrogations Certification Course, and the Source Operations Course. Enhanced Analysis and Interrogation Training became the fifth course to join the center Sept. 30.

Lt. Col. Hamby recognized each of the five courses in the order in which they were received into the center and told the audience that JCOE, "is going to make a significant difference in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other places in the war on terror."

"This truly is a culmination of a long, difficult road," said Maj. Gen. John Custer, who was working at Central Command when this idea first crossed his desk 20 months ago. "It has been a road with detours, potholes, and wrecks along the way. But, this is where human intelligence training had to go for the future; it just couldn't survive any other way. Let the services have their initial entry training, and then everything else has got to be at one location."

Maj. Gen. Custer urged JCOE staff in the audience to continue to produce individuals and products that are "world class" and said human intelligence training is one of the major areas the military is moving toward.

"We have a whole new vision, a whole new understanding, a whole new desire for human intelligence. The world has changed. The tectonic plates are shifting. For the next 30 years, we're going to be in a human intelligence training environment," said Maj. Gen. Custer.

"We'll look back on this 15 to 20 years from now and this will blossom into a real center of excellence for the nation. We've proved that we could come together, could get to that vision. We changed the world of intelligence," said Maj. Gen. Custer.

In their speeches, both Maj. Gen. Custer and Lt. Col. Hamby spoke of unity and synergy. Thus, it was fitting when Lt. Col. Hamby revealed the new HT-JCOE crest and motto:

"Our Latin motto `Lunctis Viribus' stands for a unity of effort and I think that's what's happening throughout the services and within the intelligence community. We couldn't do it by ourselves. It's a unity of effort. For the crest, we gave the Institute of Heraldry general parameters for the design and they came up with the final product. I wanted it to be symbolic of the Department of Defense, training, intelligence operations and special operations," he said.

The ceremony also included a donation by JCOE to the food locker at the chapel. Senior Enlisted Advisor for JCOE Sgt. Maj. Scott Marshall said, "We want to take an active role on post, because Fort Huachuca is our sponsor, and we figured this was a good place to start."

(Chelsea Iliff writes for the Fort Huachuca "Scout.")