Q&A: Major General Jason K. Kamiya
Joint Warrior
Providing Joint Force Commanders With Joint Trained Forces
Major General Jason K. Kamiya
Commander, Joint Warfighting Center,
U.S. Joint Forces Command
Director, Joint Training (J7)
As the director of joint training and commander of the Joint Warfighting Center, Suffolk, Va., Major General Jason K. Kamiya ensures U.S.-based forces are prepared for multi-service/multinational operations. He assumed his current assignment on July 25, 2006. He and his staff, known as J-7, manage programs that train combat personnel and organizations from all services for joint operations. Additionally, the directorate assists with realworld contingency planning. The general was commissioned a second lieutenant in June 1976 upon graduation from Gonzaga University, Spokane, Wash., with a bachelor’s degree in political science. He has served in a variety of infantry and air assault units. Prior to coming to USJFCOM, he served as commander of Southern European Task Force (Airborne) in Vicenza, Italy. He has commanded at the company, battalion and brigade levels and has seen service in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operations Desert Shield/Storm in Saudi Arabia. His previous joint assignments include commanding Combined Joint Task Force-76, Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and serving as special assistant to the commander, U.S. Southern Command in Panama. The general also holds a master’s degree in national security affairs from the U.S. Navy Post Graduate School, Monterey, Calif. He attended the Armed Forces Staff College, Norfolk, Va., and the U.S. Army War College, Carlisle Barracks, Penn. His decorations include the Defense Superior Service Medal (with Oak Leaf Cluster), the Legion of Merit (with four Oak Leaf Clusters), the Bronze Star, the Defense Meritorious Service Medal, the Meritorious Service Medal (with three Oak Leaf Clusters) and the Army Commendation Medal. He is authorized to wear the Expert Infantryman Badge, the Pathfinder Badge, the Parachutist Badge, the Air Assault Badge and the Ranger Tab.
Q: What is the mission of the U.S. Joint Forces Command Joint Warfighting Center [JWFC] and what does this mission entail?
A: The fundamental mission of JWFC is to provide trained, capable and interoperable Joint Forces to the combatant commander. Consider us the “operational arm” for USJFCOM that is uniquely poised to provide joint force commanders with trained joint forces, capable of integrated operations with governmental agencies, multinational partners and non-governmental organizations, in support of national objectives. Having said this let me tell you that there are a lot of great people from a variety of organizations in addition to the team at JWFC from across the Department of Defense, Joint Staff, Joint Forces Command and other combatant commands, services, U.S. interagency and our multinational partners involved in joint training and in helping us accomplish our mission. Thus, I commonly refer to “us” as the joint training enterprise. It would probably take a few days to adequately describe to you in sufficient detail the full range of activities within this complex enterprise. So in the interest of simplicity and time, let me try to give you a brief description of what we do through the following three points. First, we prepare joint task force headquarters for deployment worldwide. For instance, we conduct three major exercises each year under Joint Forces Command’s UNIFIED ENDEAVOR Mission Rehearsal Exercise [UE MRX] program. This program is designed to prepare designated Service headquarters to assume the role of Multi-national Corps-Iraq [MNC-I], Combined Joint Task Force -76 [CJTF-76] in Afghanistan or CJTF-Horn of Africa [CJTF-HOA] in Djibouti. It includes robust academic training, command post exercises, and follow-on in-theater staff assistance visits. Since 2003, JWFC has conducted 14 Mission Rehearsal Exercises [MRX] and currently conducts three MRXs per year for forces destined for Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Horn of Africa [HOA]. Throughout the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, change is continuous. The JWFC MRX Program changes constantly to replicate the complex environment joint forces will experience overseas. As political conditions, force levels, missions, and insurgent operations change, the MRX program adapts to provide a realistic operational environment for deploying forces. Each MRX improves over the last. JFCOM integrates interagency, multinational, and joint operations into each exercise. Exercise designers capitalize on lessons learned across the joint force and increase the realism and fidelity of each exercise. Recent exercise enhancements include integration of cross-U.S. agency efforts aimed at defeating insurgent systems behind the use of improvised explosive devices [IEDs], employment of advanced information sharing capabilities for coalition partners, added modeling capabilities that can produce non-kinetic outcomes, and threat finance exploitation. JWFC is currently planning this year’s Mission Rehearsal Exercises for Iraq [August] and Afghanistan [October], and just completed a mission rehearsal exercise for JTF HOA in January. You may be interested to know that JWFC’s observer/trainer teams frequently partner with our counterparts from the Marine Corps’ Marine Air Ground Task Force Staff Training Program [MSTP] and the Army’s Battle Command Training Program [BCTP] in support of these exercises. In addition to the MRX exercise program, we also support combatant commanders in the execution of their top two priority joint training exercise each year. Second, we provide the required integrating environment for delivery of new and improved joint capabilities quickly to the field. While we recognize that some of what we do in capability development may not fully mature for a couple of years, we work hard with the test and experimentation communities to integrate capability development activities into training when it makes sense. Joint training can thus serve not only as a useful means to inform the development process, but also as a means to transition capabilities from the hands of developers into the hands of the warfighter. However, we are very careful about how we integrate new and emerging capabilities into joint training activities in that by doing so, we must also preserve the integrity of the commander’s established training priorities and objectives. Third, we collaborate heavily with the services, combatant commands, and Joint Staff over a variety of areas to include joint doctrine, common joint training tools and processes, development of joint standards and training objectives, joint training technologies for a persistent global training infrastructure, and a training environment that includes interagency, multinational and special operations forces that blends live-virtual-constructive elements designed to support the most realistic training experience possible outside real-world operations.
Q: What role is JFCOM and JWFC playing in the global war on terror?
A: As you can surmise from my earlier comments, our role is centered on preparing joint forces to operate in complex operational environments throughout the world. Beyond the MRX program that prepares joint force headquarters for Iraq, Afghanistan and the Horn of Africa, we also support numerous exercises of the combatant commander each year that prepare assigned forces to operate in their unique geographic of functional areas of responsibility. For example, we support U.S. Special Operations Command [USSOCOM] and the Joint Special Operations Task Force training to include the Able Warrior series exercises involving that command’s integration with other geographic combatant commanders and the U.S. Interagency. We also support the Department of Defense and Joint Staff national level exercise program involving senior leadership of our government and U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) exercises that address the command’s critical homeland defense and consequence management missions.
Q: What is training transformation and when did it all come about?
A: Well first of all, I wouldn’t characterize training transformation as something with a specific start and end date. Rather, it is a continual process of adaptation and innovation by all services with roots to their very beginnings. But Training Transformation [T2] as a formal program began in 2002 when the leadership of the Department of Defense and the Joint Staff outlined a vision as to how joint training would be conducted in the future. A vital part of that vision focused on the creation of a triad of joint training-related capabilities that would serve as engines of training transformation at the collective and individual levels. JWFC manages two of three core capabilities: the Joint National Training Capability [JNTC], which addresses joint training at the collective level; and the Joint Knowledge Development and Distribution Capability [JKDDC] that targets individual training through distributive learning. The third element of the triad, the Joint Assessment Enabling Capability [JAEC] assesses the effectiveness of joint training programs and activities across the enterprise. JAEC is managed by the Office of the Secretary of Defense. JWFC’s interdependent tri-lateral partnership with Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Staff in the management of the T2 strengthens the effectiveness of our joint training program. We collaborate heavily with the services, as well as the combatant commands are vital to the overall delivery and transformation of joint training. The T2 business model can be characterized as open, collaborative and incentivized. We’ve used this model to great success starting in FY 2004 as part of the implementation of the Joint National Training Capability, and now it is being extended across all joint training programs.
Q: You mentioned JNTC and JKKDC. Could you describe the value that JNTC and JKKDC provide to the joint force?
A: JNTC enables so much of what we do. If I may, I’d like to describe just one aspect of the kind of capabilities it delivers…the Joint Training and Experimentation Network [JTEN]. JTEN nodes spread across the continental United States, Hawaii and Germany and is currently comprised of approximately 33 permanent nodes and 7 deployable pods. The network will become even more expansive over time, increasingly global, as we work to connect it with other complementary networks in the United States and with those of our allies. For example, we will temporarily connect the JTEN with Australia’s training network in support of a PACOM exercise later this year. Last December, we supported a major combatant command joint exercise that was distributed over three countries, four connected networks spanning 51,000 miles [the equivalent of driving from Washington, D.C., to Los Angeles and back eight times], 13 states, 19 time zones, and 24 federated simulation systems. Growth of this training network allows increasingly distributed joint training exercises and brings joint training to the user at home stations instead of vice versa. The Joint Knowledge Development and Distribution Capability [JKDDC] will bring joint, distributive learning to individuals. There are approximately 85 joint courses on-line now of which about 54 are multinational. We expect the number of joint courses to increase to about 150 by April when we will also unveil a new and improved learning management system that will, over time, automatically send a report to service personnel management databases when a servicemember completes a course online. You may also be interested to note that 22 international organizations contribute to JKKDC courseware development and that the system will be accessible to the Regional Security Cooperation Network and Partnership for Peace [PfP] learning management system used by NATO and other European nations. Planned future capabilities include not only an increasing number of available courseware, but also user knowledge and experience profiles, collaborative tools, chat rooms and access to subject matter experts.
Q: Earlier you mentioned briefly the importance of lessons learned. Could you expound on this a little further?
A: Any high-performing organization like JWFC is constantly evolving and not settling on business as usual. Striving to incorporate lessons learned and best practices at every turn is a large part of this. The best example of the incorporation of lessons learned is our Mission Rehearsal Program [MRX] that I described earlier. The work that is done by our Observer Trainers and other subject matter experts during staff assistance visits to Iraq, Afghanistan and Horn of Africa captures many best practices and we strive to share them with other training audiences and inculcate them into our training program. Any changes in the operating environment in Iraq, Afghanistan or Horn of Africa will also be captured by our planning staff and ultimately replicated in the MRX. This repeatable cycle ensures that our MRX program remains relevant and accurately replicates the complexities of the operational environment. Since we support all the combatant commands and the services, we are in a unique position to promulgate lessons learned and best practices across the entire Department of Defense.
Q: What role does assessment play in the overall joint training enterprise?
A: Assessments are one of the most important functions we do as it is assessments that drive how we plan, how we direct and resource, and how we monitor. We strive to mature our assessment capability so we can not only answer the question, “Are we doing things right?” but also “Are we doing the right things?” We have to be smart so that assessments come at the right frequency and bear an appropriate balance between a quantitative and qualitative approach. A key part of this is reaching out to our stakeholders across the training enterprise to include the combatant commands, services, and increasingly from the multinational and interagency communities. Finally, we also try to periodically reevaluate and revalidate if what we are assessing— the measures of effectiveness and measures of performance—are relevant given the dynamic and evolving nature of the joint training environment and requirements of joint warfighters.
Q: Could you briefly describe JWFC’s activities in support of NATO?
A: Metaphorically speaking, we are striving to develop a transatlantic railroad of combined, joint training capabilities across the Atlantic that will connect JWFC with our NATO counterpart organization, the Joint Warfare Center in Stavanger, Norway. Simply put, the JWFC is to the U.S. Armed Forces as what the Joint Warfare Center is to the armed forces of NATO. Through key leader and staff engagements with Joint Warfare Center, we are developing a common understanding of NATO’s present and future training requirements and work hard, in concert with Allied Command Transformation [ACT], to support NATO’s own training transformation. We pursue increased partnership and integration whenever and wherever feasible. Subject matter expert exchanges between NATO and U.S. Provincial Reconstruction Team training programs, integrated International Security and Assistance Force [ISAF], Unified Endeavor [CJTF-76] and NATO Afghanistan Regional Command mission rehearsal exercises/training, combined JWFC–NATO Joint Warfare Center mobile training teams, and collaboration on development of distributive learning capabilities serve as a few examples of our cooperative work with NATO. We realize that policy limitations sometimes inhibit the nature of support we may provide NATO and the information and technologies we can share, but we are working these challenges hard with legal and other policy experts within JFCOM to stimulate requisite policy change. Finally, it is important to remember that JWFC is a supporting effort to NATO, not the other way around as people sometimes perceive. Learning is never a one-way street and we believe that through expanded training relationships with NATO we will increase our understanding of how U.S. joint forces may operate more effectively in the complex, joint, multinational environment.
Q: How does JWFC support Reserve Component Forces?
A: Working in concert with U.S. Northern Command [NORTHCOM], we continue to execute JFCOM’s Training and Readiness Oversight responsibilities of assigned Reserve Component Forces as a means of bringing present and emergent joint force training capabilities to the Total Force. This includes access to persistent networks in a Live-Virtual-Constructive training environment that enables multiscenario, controlled, interagency environments that will satisfy the often unique joint individual and collective training requirements of National Guard and Reserve Forces. Emergent joint training requirements relative to the National Guard’s Joint Operation Centers, Response Forces, and JFHQ-State and JTF-State initiatives serve as good examples. We are also learning more about the role of Reserve Component Forces in NORTHCOM’s, PACOM’s and SOUTHCOM’s homeland defense and civil support missions, and about some of the distinctive challenges and complexities associated with active component support to the Reserve and National Guard. It is our fundamental goal at JWFC to make every ounce of joint training capability, both present and future, seamlessly accessible to the total force within the resources provided to us.
Q: What are some of the challenges faced by JWFC, and how has the command tried to deal with them?
A: Great question. Of course there are numerous challenges related to any enterprise as large or as complex as ours, but let me briefly talk about two that immediately come to mind. First, essential to our mission is keeping joint training dynamic, relevant and responsive to the needs of the joint force. We touched upon this earlier and do this in a couple ways. First, we leverage the enormous capabilities and talents of other JFCOM subordinate commands and organizations such as the Joint Center for Operational Analysis (JCOA). JCOA is deployed full time in Afghanistan and Iraq. They also participated in crisis response operations such as recent tsunami relief [Indonesia], earthquake relief [Pakistan], and hurricane relief [United States Gulf coast]. They conduct operational analysis that helps ascertain what happened, why it happened, and most importantly, why answers to these two questions [are] important. JCOA thus is a primary partner for insights on operational issues and warfighter needs that in turn helps us identify potential gaps in joint training and/or capability development. JWFC also conducts staff assistance visits [SAVs] to joint force headquarters that we have trained—an extension of the MRX program. This takes place a couple of months after the headquarters has deployed into theater serving as yet another opportunity to build upon the pre-deployment joint training experience. The SAV also serves as an azimuth check for us along a path of continued learning and assessment. And finally, we keep joint training dynamic and responsive through constant dialogue with operational commanders and their staffs, and through less formal means such as news reporting of the global media, etc. Second, we recognized long ago that solutions for many of the operational challenges faced by the joint force today require unified action—that is the integration of all elements of national power—diplomatic, information, military, and economic. Thus, we work hard to integrate into our joint training exercises and events U.S. interagency partners from such organizations as the Department of State, United States Agency for International Development, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Central Intelligence Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, Department of Homeland Security and others. We believe that such integration and partnership produces not only richer training opportunity and experience for all involved, but can also lead to increased military-interagency training interdependencies over time. We clearly recognize the near-term challenges that participation in a plethora of yearly training exercises poses to the interagency at the present, and we are working very hard in support of the Office of Secretary of Defense, Joint Chiefs of Staff and interagency toward development of an holistic and integrated training strategy.
Q: How can industry best help JWFC and J7 accomplish its mission?
A: USJFCOM continues to work to bridge the gap between private industry, academia and Department of Defense through Cooperative Research and Development Agreements. With projects of mutual benefit to these organizations and the DoD, these agreements enable pooling of scarce research assets, and the sharing of information to facilitate fast, effective and efficient fielding of capabilities required by the joint warfighter today and in the future. We also engage through the National Training Systems Association by participating in key conferences such as the Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference. Finally, we continue to leverage our affiliation with the Congressional Modeling and Simulation [M&S] Caucus to showcase M&S training initiatives of the military in a joint task force environment, promote support from the M&S industry, and serve as a forum to understand the importance of M&S to our national security. ♦