RELEASE NUMBER: 040330-01
DATE POSTED: MARCH 30, 2004
DoD official updates Congress on special ops transformation
By Sgt. 1st Class Doug Sample
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON (American Forces Press
Service, March 30, 2004) — With the help of special operations forces,
the United States has made significant progress in the war on terrorism,
a Defense Department official told the Senate Armed Services Committee March
25.
But sustaining that progress is not without its costs, he added.
Thomas W. O'Connell, assistant secretary of defense for special operations
and low-intensity conflict, said in his prepared statement that for the U.
S. Special Operations Command to continue to gain momentum in the war on
terrorism, it must modernize and transform. And he said USSOCOM will use
$6.546 billion -- its share of the President Bush's fiscal 2005 budget request
— to do so.
"I believe that the United States is at a critical moment in this war," O'Connell
told the committee. "We have realized initial successes and achieved a degree
of momentum that together support a general assessment that we are making
progress in winning this war. But sustaining that momentum and continuing
the successes against terrorists and their supporters now and into the future
is just as critical."
O'Connell said the president's budget submission for USSOCOM will continue
the modernization and transformation efforts started by the command in fiscal
2004.
Those efforts, he said, included:
-- Transforming special operations forces' capabilities to better locate
and track individual terrorists across the globe and conduct small, surgical
operations with minimal risk to the employed force;
-- Maintaining sustained operations in areas where terrorist networks are
operating;
-- Continuing to invest in critical "low-density/high-demand" aviation assets
that provide special operations forces with the mobility necessary to deploy
and to execute their missions quickly, and in key command, control and communications
to more effectively support the war on terrorism; and
-- Supporting personnel USSOCOM has added to better support worldwide deployments
and 24-hour-a-day operations.
"This funding is essential to sustaining the necessary operations in the
war on terrorism and to ensuring we can meet essential transformation requirements,"
he said.
In explaining USSOCOM's need for modernization and transformation, O'Connell
said the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, changed how DoD defines "defense" and
how, as a consequence, the war on terrorism fundamentally is a different
type of war from those the United States has fought before.
"Prior to then, we perceived and responded to the threat of global terrorism
in terms of transnational criminal activity, albeit politically or religiously
motivated," he explained. "Today's international terrorist is far different
than those of the past, as terrorists now have global reach, infrastructure
and significant resources."
He added that while special operations forces always were a part of the equation
in addressing terrorism, the "posture and role" of those forces today in
combating and defeating global terrorism has changed.
"Previously, we were postured to defend against a state projecting force
across great distances, and we built extensive capabilities to provide us
early warning and tools to deter aggression," he noted. "But the potential
destructiveness of an attack of the type we suffered on 9/11 means that we
are no longer afforded an opportunity to determine an 'appropriate response,'
nor make a clear determination of when decisive action is too little or too
late."
O'Connell pointed out that special operations forces originally were conceived
to be used for "supporting or leveraging" larger conventional forces in battle,
or for undertaking discrete and limited strategic missions. The new reality
of war, he said, has given them a more "prominent, front-line, essential
role."
That essential role forced USSOCOM to set several new priorities aimed at
transforming its capabilities in order to fight terrorist cells scattered
across the globe, O'Connell said. Besides low-density/high-demand aviation
assets, the priorities include sizing, training and equipping the command
to engage in "any threat environment against any adversary," he said. Special
operations forces should be culturally, linguistically, politically and regionally
focused, and more rapidly deployable, he added. They also must be capable
of conducting exceptionally precise strikes against specific targets and
able to achieve operational and tactical superiority, he said.
O'Connell told the committee the end priority is to develop operationally
and strategically agile joint forces that can develop and execute unconventional,
audacious and high pay-off courses of action.
"Transformation of SOF is a journey, not a destination, and there is no mark
on the wall that will indicate we are finished transforming," he said. "Transformation
is a continuing process that not only anticipates the future, but also seeks
to create that future."
O'Connell testified that he had recently visited both special operations
and conventional forces in Iraq. He told the committee that "these forces
make us proud – and should cause potential adversaries to pause before seeking
to harm the United States."
Special operations forces have gained much from their experience, he observed.
"The commitment of SOF to pursuing terrorists to all corners of the globe
is embedded in their mindset," he said. "The experience gained in defeating
the Taliban and disrupting al Qaeda in Afghanistan, destroying the brutal
regime in Iraq and aiding friends and partners in other corners of the globe,
such as Colombia and the Philippines, has matured our warfighters to a keen
edge. Our challenge is to maintain that edge."
- usasoc-