The US and training Afghan police in Regional Command South

From Bouhammer's Afghan Blog--note the, er, outreach by the Pentagon:

Bloggers Roundtable with COL James Harris

The other day I was on the first Blogger’s Roundtable with Afghanistan in a long time. Actually the first time since before the 27th BCT left country in December, 2008. The 33rd BCT from IL [more here] has not done a good job in the Public Affairs and Media arena.

We talked with COL James Harris (Click here for BIO) who is the Regional Police Advisory Command-South Commander. We talked about mentoring and advising Afghan National Police in southern Afghanistan. Harris oversees nineteen police mentor teams in the southern region of Afghanistan [emphasis added] who mentors thousands of members of the Afghan National Police in the provinces of Helmand, Kandahar, Uruzgan and Zabul.

Harris said that they are working with nearly 12,000 police officers and the majority of them are loyal to their government and their leaders. "The police officers that I see and deal with on a daily basis are very dedicated to their cause and to their nation. And they’re challenged every day. They are confronted; they’re in contact with enemy forces on practically a daily basis," said Harris. Throughout his mentoring role, Harris said that the most rewarding element is watching the police officers’ progress through the training.

The ole’ Bouhammer asked Col Harris about the training of ANP and how far along they are coming with learning real police skills and tactics. I also asked about the continued lack of the unity of command within the Task Force and the elements it has control of.

Click here to listen to the audio of the Roundtable.

Click here for Transcript of Roundtable

Regional Police Advisory Command-South is part of Afghan Regional Security Integration Command - South. Not under ISAF but rather the American Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan (see Update here for a Canadian angle to CSCT-A).

An interesting exchange from the transcript regarding unity of command:

...With the pending deployment of the 4th Brigade of the 82nd, do you see that changing your -- changing your organization structure or changing the way you do business significantly there in the south region with police forces?

COL. HARRIS: Yeah, I'm looking at the concept with them. And I think they're going to provide more security, which will also provide more numbers, sheer numbers. And I think they'll cover more districts. Therefore, you know, I anticipate a success story there.

Q Are they going to report underneath you or are they going to have a complete, separate --

COL. HARRIS: No. No, they will not -- they won't report to me.

Q Okay. Thank you.

COL. HARRIS: They will be their own C2 cell. They work under RC South [emphasis added].

Q Okay. So they're not going to be PMT [Police Mentor Team] mentor, specifically.

COL. HARRIS: They will -- no, not specifically, but they will have that responsibility as well.

Q Okay. Is that going to be an issue with the -- we've been working some issues with unity of command in Afghanistan for the last several years.

So does this just continue that problem of different changes of command and different bosses?

COL. HARRIS: I don't think so. I think that's going to actually make it better...

Regarding the 4th Brigade:

The 4th Brigade Combat Team expects to work with Fort Bragg Special Forces and civilian law enforcement to prepare for its upcoming deployment to Afghanistan.

The Pentagon announced April 3 that 3,300 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division brigade will go to Afghanistan in late summer. The brigade will take part in the “training and mentoring” of Afghan National Security Forces, including army, national police and border police...

The 4th Brigade Combat Team, which is built around the 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment, will deploy for a year and will operate in NATO’s Regional Command West, based in Herat, and Regional Command South, based in Kandahar [emphasis added]...

So in RC South there will be the two sets of US trainers: the 4th Brigade Combat Team under ISAF and the 33rd Brigade Combat Team under Afghan Regional Security Integration Command [ARSIC] - South under CSTC-A. Hmmm.

A story last month about Canadians working with ARSIC. One wonders about how that is coordinated, what with our being under ISAF.

Update thought: Why have the Canadian media never (as far as I am aware) mentioned the Illinois National Guard unit at Kandahar?