A Framework for Security Cooperation Planning

"Building partner capacity has been a key component of U.S. defense strategy since the 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review was issued. However, but for a few exceptions, the Military Departments of the U.S. Armed Forces that have responsibility to organize, train, equip, and provide forces to U.S. Combatant Commands have not prepared their people to be good or even adequate at planning for steady-state, peacetime security cooperation activities, which is the principal way the Department of Defense (DOD) builds partner capacity. Rather, the focus of military education and training primarily remains on contingency and warfare planning. While useful in those contexts, it is not useful for steady-state, peacetime security cooperation planning. Not only are people poorly prepared, the DOD lacks a framework for security cooperation planning. This paper’s intent is to propose a framework for security cooperation planning that helps the DOD and its Military Departments understand how to adaptively influence, plan, and resource security cooperation activities carried out in various foreign nations and with members of foreign security forces."