Congratulations on your assignment as Foreign Area Officer (FAO)! You are setting out upon not only the “path less traveled,” but an engaging professional field, highly respected by senior Army, Joint, and interagency leaders, as well as international partners. Your predecessors have experienced compelling and rewarding opportunities with unique experiences (often with their families) in exotic lands, resulting in fantastic stories and unprecedented occasions for professional and personal growth. Your hallmark will be Winston Churchill’s quote “There is only one thing worse than fighting with allies and that is fighting without them.” Your autonomy and oversized ability to make a significant difference are unequalled and a rewarding trade-off to time spent away from our homeland, friends, and peers. Your position will most often be laden with immeasurable responsibility but little structured authority. Unlike your previous military experience, you will often find yourself with no field manuals or detailed instructions and lacking informal peer lifelines. In light of the above, allow me to share solid practices gleaned from campfire discussions with accomplished seniors and peers, with more than a dollop of personal scar tissue.
Your Marching Orders
Above all, bring value to the organization -- never forget that your primary aim is to advance US interests. Much has been written about the strategic corporal; instead you are now paid to be the deliberate, strategic company- or field-grade officer and as such, much is expected of you. You have no doubt heard by now the “strategic scout” moniker implying the charge to seek opportunities and avoid pitfalls. This often involves not only thinking through the how, what, where, and why, but more importantly – whether to pursue an activity or policy. You must think at least two levels up and anticipate challenges, as well as their mitigation, far in advance. Your ability to reason, as well as secure and foster access, will be essential. Some access will be innate with your position, but never underestimate informal and occasionally unglamorous, though necessary, outlets. These can include, for example, when in an embassy assignment volunteering to serve on or chair embassy service committees, international school boards, or service/veteran organizations. Do not be surprised when you will have to employ your judgment to negotiate or prioritize conflicts among the multiple government, defense, and Army organizations and priorities you serve. To achieve our ends, access is sometimes automatic or earned, but impossible without a foundation of communication.
Nuanced Communications
A FAO is expected to be an adept cross-cultural communicator fluent in at least one foreign language, but that is the lowest expectation. A FAO often has massive responsibility but incommensurate authority. Contrary to your earlier company grade officer assignments that involved a “command” culture, you must operate in and frequently harbor a “consensus” environment. This will involve the ability to reason, persuade, negotiate, entertain, and occasionally cajole: in short --
communicate. Communication includes your ability to not only pass information, but also to persuade and listen to audiences both external and internal to our organizations. Communication also implies you have something to say – you will be assumed to know almost everything as it pertains to your foreign portfolio and, security issues, as well as DoD and Army or other service’s policy. Continually stay abreast of the most effective forms of communication and methods and put them into practice. As you will see, cross-cultural communications involve infinitely more than the assumed face-value expectation.
The Blue-on-Blue Challenge
Despite our shared citizenship, culture, and language, internal American audiences are frequently our most challenging. In addition to your foreign portfolio, your assignments will often straddle many American organizations, each one assuming your exclusive loyalty and understanding of its particular culture. You may have already observed cultural organizational differences unlike your earlier experience in dress, formality, information sharing, and confrontation, for example. You are often one of the few, if not the only nexus, and your ability to observe and employ your understanding will not only ensure your success but permit mutual harmony. This occasionally involves education. Unfortunately, after a generation of experience in combat theaters, many DoD audiences do not understand that outside these exceptions, the State Department has the lead on foreign policy everywhere else. The ambassador and embassy country team will have approval authority and veto of any DoD activity in country. Your responsibilities will include shepherding this process. On a country team, always inform at a minimum relevant peer stakeholders, the Senior Defense Official/Defense Attaché (SDO/DATT), deputy chief of mission (DCM), and ambassador. Another relevant feature of “friendly” communications involves communications not only horizontal, but vertical to seniors. Unfortunately, you may find yourself on the receiving end of hoisting well-intentioned but ill-suited “good ideas” upon our allies or partners. Your counsel and its delivery will be crucial to navigating this minefield. If unsuccessful, implement as directed but realize ultimate success lies with the partner.
Getting to “Yes” (or Si, Ja, Да…)
It may be counterintuitive, but external (foreign) audiences are most often easier to engage than our countrymen. This acceptance is often greased by American-provided support, but it is the forum closest to both responsible parties’ shared realization of success. This locus strips away excess and distraction and gets down to “brass tacks.” Although you must empathize with your interlocutor, don’t get blinded by the “romance” – you still represent our government, military, and society, and are obligated to politely yet firmly execute US policy worked out in the preceding, internal discussion. As a professional, never throw a countryman “under the bus” (even if deserved) That being said, as mentioned above the partner always retains the veto – any policy or program hoisted on a partner without the partner’s consent will fail. The partner may entertain it half-heartedly to achieve its own aims, but ultimately it will flounder and die.
Partner “buy in” cannot be stressed enough. The easiest way to gauge partner receptivity is by their participation, whether planning, resource contribution, or the gold standard -- financial. Most countries may not be able to fully underwrite the cost, but even the poorest can exhibit honest effort – providing our trainers or transporters no-cost translation, transportation, billeting, and/or meals, for example. At this point, it is worth mentioning the efficacy of the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program, in which participated foreign military students with whom you have undoubtedly studied in previous military professional fora. FAOs are largely responsible for candidate selection and care, and ensuring proper utilization by the partner nation. For example, your host country may often employ IMET graduates in foreign cooperation billets that will have interface with you. These individuals not only speak fluent English, but have attended courses in our military education system and, more importantly, understand our operating system and requirements (to include idiosyncrasies).
Senior FAOs can provide great general advice regarding all types and methods of communication. Hone your ability to speak publicly, converse, and write in both English and your target language. Bare simplicity of message is key, as nuance often gets lost or misunderstood in translation. An effective technique is to imagine how you convey the bare essentials of an issue to an uninformed layman or semi-interested relative. This may be necessary due to your (or the interpreter’s) lack of finesse in the target language, and it is also useful for economizing time and stripping away pretension. Always be approachable, (which may be a tall but necessary order for introverts to overcome). Look to your senior FAOs and peers for what works best.
Leaving the Nest
If you have read this far, you deserve to reap the following treasure trove of community advice distilled and garnered over the years. Although you are expected to acquire the new competencies mentioned above, you are still a military officer and will rely on your former training and experience. Your reputation is everything, and it starts now. As a high-visibility representative of our country and the armed forces, hold yourself to the highest ethical conduct and professional standards, including stewardship of resources and personal counseling. If your subordinates’ ethical conduct is in question, counsel quickly and fire quicker.
A first-term FAO attaché reflecting on the initial glam and attention remarked, “It can be really easy to think you are special.” Never confuse your position’s prestige with your person.
To maintain our corps’ professional reputation and your sanity, FAOs must strive to escape the occasionally necessary assignment morass of Washington, DC. Since you have extremely little or no opportunity to become a general officer, instead enjoy the foreign assignment opportunities in light of your and your family’s goals and needs. Making decisions without your spouse’s buy-in is a recipe for failure. Similarly, FAOs assigned to a country team must take every opportunity to get outside the capital and know the country.
Our community is small and tight and senior FAOs are invested in your success. In turn, take care of each other and “pay it forward.” You are always being watched – general officer visitors will notice your paunch and questionable haircut, unfortunately overriding your message’s reception and eroding its credibility. Similarly, your lapses will not escape foreigners’ or your peers’ attention. Do not put too much stock in mapping out your career – organizational priorities and fads will change and you must be ready for when the next world crisis will find you squarely in the spotlight.
You stand on the shoulders of countless FAOs who have gone before, and please accept our final welcome to this tight community. Many of us did not have even the above -- and trust us when we say much of this was learned the hard way. In closing, we wish we were back in your shoes at the start of what will be a fascinating pursuit. We salute you and your future and look forward to your stories of what works!
About the Author
Colonel Schmitt was formerly an infantry and special forces officer. He is a Eurasia FAO with more than 16 years' experience serving in countries of the former Soviet Union. He serves as Army Attaché, US Embassy Kyiv, Ukraine.