Understanding Security Cooperation

Foreword

This handbook would be inaccurate or incomplete without the contributions from the U.S. Army Security Assistance Command (USASAC), the U.S. Army Security Assistance Training Management Organization (SATMO), and the final review by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA). It is one thing to describe security cooperation (SC) policy and doctrine from observations alone, it is another to have experienced practitioners translate policy and doctrine into a handbook designed to inform those who desire to learn more about the U.S. SC enterprise in general.

The U.S. Army Security Force Assistance Command deserves an accolade as well. Chapter 6 of this handbook is dedicated members of those advisor teams who want a voice in expressing their challenges and victories in the daily practice of security force assistance (SFA). The competition continuum can be difficult for those who lack an understanding of the importance of training with friendly foreign forces and the imperative of making adversaries aware of the full complement of warfighting functional capabilities the U.S. Army offers to its allies and partners.

Finally, the perspectives in Appendix B from Mr. Richard C. Merrin, the policy advisor (POLAD) to U.S. Army South (USARSOUTH); and Major Matthew A. Hughes, the SC liaison to the command group at USARSOUTH, are most welcome in this handbook. In their own words, POLADs often have foreign language skills and broad cultural expertise specific to the theater Army’s area of operations. This expertise can be used to mentor members of the staff, while providing context as planners consider courses of action and second- and third-order effects of SC activities. The utility of POLADs at the theater Army is an imperative in the information space, the up-to-date domain of SC, and irregular warfare messaging in competition, crisis, and armed conflict.

Endorsement

Deliberate security assistance planning, developed in close coordination with operational and contingency plans, can prioritize foreign military sales, training, and education to provide discrete capabilities that can be employed in combined operations. Employing security assistance in this way can reduce United States force requirements while relieving pressure on the services’ generating force and reducing strategic risk for concurrent contingencies. Planning and execution require a nuanced understanding of the authorities, regulations, laws, and tools that enable security cooperation activities.

The U.S. will not go into crisis or conflict without allies or partners. A granular understanding of these nations’ military capabilities can facilitate key leader and institutional conversations about strategic investments in military capabilities.

Since Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine in February 2021, one of the conflict’s defining aspects has been the United States’ provision of military material and training to Ukraine for resisting Russian aggression. Security assistance has likely not played such a public and visible role in a contemporary conflict since the 1973 Arab Israeli War. While the scale and speed of the ongoing assistance activities are uncommon, the fiscal and regulatory authorities underwriting the United States’ military support to Ukraine are longstanding. U.S. foreign policy has always incorporated security assistance as just one of numerous means for achieving national objectives or goals. Broad economic, political, and diplomatic ties between states are often accompanied by varying degrees of military relationships.

Increasingly, the role of security assistance for geographic combatant commands and theater armies expands not only strategic access but builds capacity or capabilities with allies and partners as part of setting the theater. This is particularly true during phase zero shaping and phase one deterrence operations. Campaign planning to set the theater must account for security assistance. This includes provision of defense articles, military education and training, and military-specific construction for partner and allied nations through foreign military sales and foreign military financing. Three important areas in which security assistance activities support setting the theater is filling capability gaps, improving interoperability, and sharing logistics. A holistic approach to security assistance can ensure that allies and partners are able to provide forces that contribute to filling capability or force gaps in U.S. operational and contingency plans.