USMC FAO Notes

MAJ Pat Caroll, International Affairs Officer Program Coordinator

As announced in the FAO Journal's June issue, the USMC International Affairs Officer Program website has been moved to its permanent location at www.hqmc.usmc.mil/faowebsite.nsf. We will continue to update and improve the site as a tool for both USMC and other services FAOs, and we welcome any of your comments. Future planned additions will include USMC Defense Attaché System billet availability, FAO In-Country Training Trip Reports, potential thesis topics (specifically for RAOs), and Mentoring Program information/points of contact. Additionally, please feel free to update PLU regarding political-military billets you may have filled in the past for which we do not currently have you recorded. It will assist in monitoring how effective the overall program has proven to be.

The Unified Commands and International Issues Branch (PLU), PP&O is currently sponsoring the following officers on in-country training (ICT). Maj Collins will be finishing his ICT this December after stints at the Marshall Center in Garmisch and an internship in Moldova. He is heading off to participate in the Defense Attaché System upon his return to CONUS. Maj Barnes is currently at the Marshall Center and will be conducting an internship at the Diplomatic Academy in Moscow. Maj Moseley and Capt Oppenheim are improving their Chinese at the Capitol Normal University in Beijing and traveling throughout NE Asia. Majs Cunningham and Palmer are based in Oman and Egypt, respectively, and are continuing their Middle Eastern and North African excursions. LtCol Mauro and Maj Dyson are at Sogang University in Seoul, Korea; and our first East Asian FAOs conducting ICT in Vietnam (Maj Nelson) and Japan (Capt Perry) have recently arrived at their current duty stations and are forging ahead. We have also received a "green light" in response to our NSDD-38 request to place two officers in Croatia in late 2001 for the second phase of the FAO program.

On the experience-track side, a board held by PLU, PP&O in late July added another 17 FAOs and 4 RAOs as experience-track International Affairs Officers. This brings the total number of officers in the USMC IAOP to 248 FAOs and 41 RAOs officers on active-duty. Our annual study-track board was also held during the first week in August during which 10 new FAOs and 8 new RAOs-in-training were selected from among 53 superior application packages. Congratulations to all those who were selected. The RAOs and the Japanese and Chinese FAOs will start their training at NPS, Monterey in Jan 2001 with the remaining FAOs commencing in July 2001.

LtGen E. R. Bedard, the new Deputy Commandant for Plans, Policies and Operations (PP&O) signed the revision to the FAO/RAO Marine Corps Order. The update, MCO 1520.11E (International Affairs Officer Program), should be released shortly. General Bedard also signed the Memorandum of Agreement between HQMC and the Defense Intelligence Agency which will formalize the support structure for our FAOs conducting ICT while attached to various DAOs around the globe. The third main issue from the Program Coordinator's perspective involves a billet redesignation initiative. In late July 2000, representatives from PP&O, Director Intelligence, Total Force Structure Division, and Manpower all met in Quantico and agreed to redesignate 65 billets and "tie" them to FAO/RAO study-track program graduates. While this change will not be formally entered into the Total Force System until Feb 2001 (and will not impact assignments until the summer of 2002), this is a big step towards improving utilization tours for Marine Corps-funded FAOs and RAOs. Adding these 65 billets to the 45 FAO/RAO billets that already exist (31 of which are within the Defense Attaché System) will improve the stature of the program and, more importantly, place the most qualified officers in areas that will best benefit the Corps' worldwide mission.

The FAO/RAO Program, and the Marine Corps in general, received a tremendous boost in its Foreign Area Studies arena after former Marine and Wall Street entrepreneur, Mr. Guy Wyser-Pratte the President of Wyser-Pratte Co., Inc., offered to make a sizeable donation to the Marine Corps University Foundation that will be used to purchase Foreign Area Studies material for the MCU Research Center in Quantico and/or newly selected FAOs and RAOs. Our most sincere thanks go out to one of our own Once a Marine Always a Marine, Semper Fidelis.

The Navy and Marine Corps FAO Program Coordinators have also been working together to implement SECNAV's FAO Mentoring Program initiative. This is an attempt to solicit the international expertise of business leaders, former military officers, and university professors to assist our FAOs/RAOs through an informal type of teacher-pupil relationship. Letters are now being mailed out to over 100 individuals asking for their participation. Finally, on 13 September, the Navy and Marine Corps Program Coordinators had the opportunity to jointly brief Secretary Danzig on the status of their respective programs. The Secretary of the Navy was particularly pleased with how the Marine Corps is running their ICT portion of the program and raised several issues about Marine Corps participation within the Defense Attaché System that will be examined in the coming months.

2000, Foreign Area Officer Association
Springfield, Virginia
Maintained by LTC Steve Gotowicki.
http://www.faoa.org