Project White Horse Forum

Book Review

America’s Army: A Model for Interagency Effectiveness

By Brig. Gen. Zeb B. Bradford, USA (Ret) & Lt. Gen. Frederic J. Brown, USA (Ret)

Praeger Security International, 2008, XIV + 250pp, appendix, notes, bibliography, index, 3 figures, $ 49.95 (cloth), ISBN-10:  0313350248, ISBN-13: 978-0313350245

Review by Dag KJE von Lubitz, Ph.D., M.D.(Sc.), Adjunct Professor, College of Health Professions, Central Michigan University, Mt. Pleasant, Michigan 48858 and Consulting Scientist, MedSMART, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104 (www.med-smart.org)

 …the concept of “Teams of Leaders” represents what leadership in the modern world should be about, it’s implementation ought to be contemplated by leaders at all levels as the means to improve morale, performance, and efficiency of the organizations they lead.

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The Day Fire (started on Labor Day, September 4 – contained on October 13, 2006) is the sixth largest fire in California history. By, October 1st, it had burned over 162,700 acres , cost $70.3 million, and at one point, had 4,600 active firefighters.

During the Day Fire, only one website, a blog called the OjaiPost.com, (run by local technologist Tyler Suchman) digested all of the data that was out there and put it into a simple and useful format so that people in the Ojai Valley could quickly see where the fires were; where the evacuation centers were; what roads were closed, etc.  The site also allowed for public input and feedback.   The Ojai community (site of lengendary Shanri-La in the 1937 film, Lost Horizon)  contains 8,000 – 10,000 homes- population about about 32,000.  Once publicized, the site was getting 8,000 unique hits a day.  Do the math and you will see that most everyone in the valley, even people traveling out of the country and wondering about their homes, had a simple, single place to go to for the best collected information available.  Tyler drew his data from a variety of inci-web type sites and made it consumer friendly.
 
People got the news they needed.  There was no panic in the valley and the firefighters were able to get the job done. Contrast that with the floods of 2005 when a complete lack of knowledge about road closures – essentially one way in/out – and their duration each day caused a mini panic in the Ojai Valley that led to the shelves of most grocery stores being stripped bare.   

But to get people to go to his site, in essence, Tyler had to fight his way to the podium at a townhall meeting, and it took awhile to get normal media to “understand” and publicize.  Working together across organizational and functional boundaries comes hard – no matter how logical.

Sometimes the good guys get buried, but not always. Please see Tyler Suchman “leaning forward.”

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By Dr. Terry Paulson

Reprint of 7 January 2008 OPED in the Ventura County Star

Note: Dr. Paulson is a noted author and speaker.  His latest book is Leadership Truths: One Story at a Time.  He is a frequent collaborator on PWH issues and wrote this article while the RC Edition was under development. (http://www.terrypaulson.com/resources.html)

Happiness is the absence of a disaster and a short memory. Unfortunately, whether it’s the “devil wind,” fires or rain-driven mudslides, the disaster coverage cycle remains much the same. Most soon tire of the impressive visual disaster images and human-interest stories and return to life as usual — no better prepared for future disasters.

It’s important to prepare as a family, but as we start this year, we need the collective resolve to unleash our resourcefulness in creating plans, processes and preparedness that can truly make a difference when the major disasters strike. We need to become what experts call, “a resilient community.”

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10:08 PM EST, April 13, 1970 – With those words Jim Lovell initiated what may be as perfect a poster child for crisis response as can be found.  As the Apollo 13 spacecraft was on its way to the Moon, at a distance of 321,860 kilometers (199,990 mi) from Earth, the number two oxygen tank, one of two tanks contained in the Service Module (SM), had exploded.

Considerable ingenuity under extreme pressure was required from the crew, the flight controllers, engineers, the astronaut team, and all support personnel to work out how to jury rig the craft for the crew’s safe return, with much of the world watching the developing drama on television.

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Given the uncertainty, potential chaotic situations,  and severity of perceived threats and catastrophes possible in this century, the key skill (identified by multiple writers) that individuals, units and teams of commanders/decision makers (and indeed citizens) need to learn for perseverance in this new century is ADAPTABILITY.  I submit that acquiring and using that skill in creation of a resilient community is first dependent upon attitude- in this case incorporating the will to prepare- and second, equally important, the quest for knowledge in areas not common or necessary in the previous century.

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“How do we enjoy the benefits of globalization without being vulnerable to its excesses?”
The key to our collective future success (from maximal wealth creation to basic survival), will be in how we mitigate the impact of black swans generated by global instability. One of the best approaches I’ve encountered is to add resilience to the very fabric of our global system, the community.

Please see the 7 April post on Global Guerillas by John Robb:
http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/

(Note: Also well worth the efffort is his 03 April post “Open Decision Making” focused on the work of John Boyd.)

March 20, 2008, Boys & Girls Club of Camarillo
Ventura County California law enforcement and education officials said Thursday they will work more closely to implement new, practical strategies to prevent student violence.
Sheriff Bob Brooks (also PWH advisor), county Superintendent of Schools Charles Weis and other officials made the comments after attending a presentation in Camarillo…
Lt. Col (USA, Ret) Dave Grossman (http://killology.com/bio.htm) co-author of Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill: A Call to Action Against TV, Movie and Video Game Violence, outlined crime statistics, medical research data and other evidence to support his theory that by turning off the TV and limiting access to video games, parents and educators can make a real difference in the emotional, intellectual and physical well-being of children and as a result, reduce violent and aggressive behavior.
It was emotional for a lot of people in the audience, particularly the officers,” said Oxnard Assistant Police Chief Scott Whitney. “We know that this is a problem, our kids playing violent video games, being exposed to violence in movies and music. It’s just, what are we doing about it?    I think everybody thinks the problem is so big and their role in it may be so small that it’s easy to pass it off on to someone else, and what I got out of this is that somebody needs to step up.” ( emphasis added)
Problem:  The cavalry was there and listening…BUT the Sheriff can’t police your TV or your computer.
A resilient community has to be by definition THE community. You owe it to yourself, your kids, your schools, your community to follow the links posted here.
http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2008/mar/21/sheriff-schools-to-develop-youth-programs/
http://killology.com/new_media_vio.htm

Note from PWH Advisor, Dr. Chet Richards, author of the current Director’s Article on 4GW and of several books featured on PWH, including the recently published If We Can Keep It:

The ability to be an effective leader under stress is a valuable, crucial and indispensable skill for those in a position of command. Although most leaders can adjust immediately to situations that are predictable and stable, very few can adapt to unanticipated, rapidly changing, or chaotic high-stress conditions, without some degradation in their performance.
From natural disasters such as hurricanes and wildfires to man-made events such as the tragedies at Virginia Tech or 911, the key to success in times of crisis is Adaptive Leadership – the ability to deal rapidly with situations that are far outside your normal day-to-day experience.

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“The US national security budget is nearly $700 billion a year (much more if the total costs of Iraq/Afghanistan are thrown in), more than the rest of the world combined. Unfortunately, within that entire budget there isn’t a single research organization or think tank that is seriously studying, analyzing or synthesizing the future of warfare and terrorism…Given that relevancy in rapidly evolving future security challenges will become the key to future public funding of our national security system, will the critical changes be made to anticipate them? Likely not. The smart money is on a failure to change. “

Why we must create resilient community capability.  See John Robb/Global Guerillas, 7 March, 2008:

CAN THE US NATIONAL SECURITY BUREAUCRACY REMAIN RELEVANT?

http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2008/03/can-our-nationa.html?commenter=

The Resilient Community Initiative is being addressed initially as it relates to decision making in crisis.  As noted in the previous post link, process approach to crisis analysis can reveal weaknesses that lead to crisis-fostering environments.  Those weaknesses could be in any aspect of a community.

In his Blog Global Guerrillas, current PWH featured author, John Robb (http://www.projectwhitehorse.com/pdfs/3a.%20The%20Coming%20Urban%20Terror.pdf) notes: It should be clear, as we watch the gyrations and excesses of global markets, that no organization/state/group has any meaningful control over its direction. The same is true for almost every other aspect of globalization, from the environment to transnational crime to energy flows. In short, we’ve lost control and our collective future is in the hands of a morally neutral system that is operating in ways that we don’t fully understand (nor will we).Robb intends to research and write on the RC idea throughout the year.  PWH will provide links as his articles appear. In addition, his perspective on “open source warfare” provides critical background on the world environment in which the RC must thrive.