by Brian M. Ducote, Jim Gallagher, and Jason Elmore
The thought of U.S. Army advisors often conjures images of an American Soldier in a foreign land, standing side by side with an inexperienced recruit. The advisor demonstrates the finer points of handling a rifle to the trainee (who may or may not have military experience), or offers basic planning considerations to an inexperienced staff.
While this perception of security force assistance (SFA) is still accurate in some instances, the US military’s recent experience with foreign partner force advising has shifted to a much broader, more strategic purpose. Security Force Assistance Brigades (SFABs) no longer just “teach Afghans to shoot AKs.” The SFA role, including SFABs’ contributions within it, has become much more comprehensive and is entirely aligned to what the U.S. Army needs during each phase of the Strategic Contexts: competition, crisis, and conflict.
The History Behind SFABs
Throughout the height of the global war on terror, brigade combat teams (BCTs) were habitually tasked to provide advisors to Iraqi and Afghan security forces. Simultaneously, they also conducted stability and counter-insurgency operations. Typically, it was an immense challenge to perform both missions well concurrently.
As the US decreased its footprint in both theaters, the Army transitioned its BCT readiness focus to large-scale-combat operations (LSCO) in a new era of ‘great power competition.’ However, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan persisted, as did the necessity for advisors. This required the Army to repeatedly disassemble and reorganize BCTs to provide senior officers and non-commissioned officers to assist partners. Consequently, BCTs cut into their home station LSCO training and degraded their readiness.
To address this challenge, in February 2018 the Army transitioned from ad hoc advisor sourcing and formalized modern Security Force Assistance Brigades (SFAB). These units, composed of 800 Advisors, are specially recruited from within the Army and composed of officers and non-commissioned officers experienced in critical positions. SFABs are formally trained and equipped to perform their advising mission, and specifically deployed to meet advising requirements across all war fighting functions. 1st and 2nd SFABs subsequently deployed to Afghanistan in 2018 and 2019, providing professionals to accomplish the advising missions that BCTs had previously performed, and bolstering overall Army readiness.
With the U.S. national security focus shifting back to deterrence in a world of great power competition, so too has the purpose of SFABs shifted back to the original purposes of SFA. Advisors conduct assessments, support partners, liaise up, down and across the battlefield and chains of command, and advise partners to build their capacity and capability. Given the strategic requirement to prepare for large scale conflict, the SFABs provide the joint force with a critically important capability.
SFAB Core Functions
The SFABs have four core functions: assess, support, liaise, and advise. As strategic contexts shift between competition, crisis, and conflict, SFABs balance and flex their prioritization of the core functions to meet the needs of their host nation partners and fulfill U.S. interests.
Advisors assess partner capabilities across doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership and education, personnel, facilities, and policy. In Colombia, for example, advisors are fully integrated into the country’s military professional development institutions. Advisors routinely assess instructional material and offer ways and means to improve course lesson plans. When U.S. Army advisors conduct assessments and later advise improvements within a partner military’s professional institutions, it has a reverberating impact across the entirety of a partner force.
To support, advisors bring to bear the full might of U.S. joint fires and intelligence capabilities on behalf of the partner. Advisors assemble diverse teams to offer partners timely and accurate fires and intelligence by understanding the partner’s operation. Advisors also advocate for proper resources to higher U.S. or multinational headquarters. Additionally, partner commanders can leverage the experience of an advisor team to enhance or supplement gaps in their own staff, enabling operations and the military decision-making process. For example, SFAB advisors recently partnered with 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment “Blackhorse” during a National Training Center rotation at Fort Irwin, California, to validate advisors’ ability to operate during LSCO. In one instance, an SFAB team employed an organic sUAS asset at the request of the partner, identified an enemy battalion command post, and the partner employed mortars to destroy the target. The support of the embedded SFAB team enabled the partner to fight more effectively and win. This example served to prove the concept of SFAB support in future real world LSCO operations.
Advisors liaise with a wide spectrum of joint, interagency, intergovernmental, and multinational partners, and niche partner force command and control entities. In the liaise function, advisors provide an accurate order of battle, common operating picture, and understanding of battlefield effects to the joint force while embedded with partners.
Depending on the needs of partners and the operational environment across the strategic contexts, Advisors tailor their advising approach, as depicted above. Throughout all phases, Advisors must assess partner, enemy, and U.S. activities, adjusting their approach according to partner needs and operational environment conditions. An advisor’s ability to assess is perhaps the core function of most strategic value to the joint force. Timely and accurate assessments will drive subsequent responses, directly informing the commander as he or she visualizes, describes, directs, understands, and leads.
SFABs in Competition
In competition, advisors primarily advise to enable partners to overcome shortfalls, improve interoperability, and build strong partnerships that will endure during a transition to crisis.
In an environment of competition with Russia and China, SFABs are a critical tool for the United States to remain the “partner of choice” for host nations. SFABs create interoperability between the U.S. and its security partners while enabling multi-national cooperation across continents. Furthermore, SFABs are the GCC’s primary tool to posture for Conflict and Crisis while operating in Competition. Establishing meaningful and beneficial relationships with partners in the competition space, while maintaining a persistent presence, solidifies the U.S. as the partner of choice, and ensures that a U.S. presence is already in place to respond in a crisis or potential conflict.
Today, each of the five active duty SFABs–alongside elements of the National Guard’s 54th SFAB–are strategically aligned with a geographic combatant command’s (GCC) area of responsibility. As much as a third of any SFAB’s advisor teams are deployed within their GCC at any given time. In total, SFABs maintain a persistent or episodic presence in more than 70 nations. They are building host nation security force capacity and capability, which in turn strengthens U.S. security partnerships.
SFABs in Crisis
Should deterrence fail, however, SFABs will play a crucial role in the subsequent crisis. In crisis, advisors execute their advise, liaise, and support roles to posture for conflict or move the operational environment back towards competition. During an emerging crisis, our partners will turn to a capable and familiar face. If the necessity for large-scale conflict emerges, a U.S.-led multinational coalition must cooperate to win, and the success of any coalition depends on the strength of its relationships. Because Advisors are already in position, they can provide the joint force unprecedented access to partners and to host nation facilities while working to move a deteriorating situation back to competition.
In crisis, Advisors don’t just help the partner force with conflict de-escalation strategies. SFABs provide advice and support toward strategic, operational, and tactical planning to transition back to competition or into conflict. In support of the partner, advisors can fill information gaps using U.S. intelligence capabilities as situations rapidly develop. Advisors will also leverage their communication skills to liaise with and on behalf of their partner, providing reporting and assessments to U.S. strategic leadership who will closely monitor a developing crisis and make key decisions accordingly.
SFABs in Conflict
In conflict, advisors are heavily focused on the support and liaise functions to leverage multiple capabilities, including joint fires and intelligence. In modern conflict, the most capable, joint-integrated, and combined arms-skilled coalitions will have the initiative. SFABs, through their equipment and training, serve as the U.S. Army’s most capable conventional Army units for U.S. allies and partners to access American joint fires, real-time intelligence, and targeting capabilities.
For instance, if a Baltic state army at the forward edge of battle required access to NATO missiles, aircraft, or other joint and combined assets, a small SFAB team is already available to liaise and support. That SFAB team’s expertise enables it to provide interoperability between the U.S. and its coalition, assisting the partner army in accessing coalition assets. Moreover, Advisors will constantly provide updated common operating pictures to both partner forces and adjacent U.S. forces which will synchronize actions across a multinational coalition.
SFABs – A Force for the Future
Over the last five years, SFABs have gone from a concept on paper to fielded and well-trained units across every GCC. Their manning, training, equipment, and how they are integrated into U.S. operations continues to standardize, as does the capability of its partnered forces. As the modern security environment increasingly stresses the post-WW2 order, SFABs are a force now specially designed to provide trained conventional Army Soldiers to advise, support, liaise, and assess across the spectrum of conflict in support of vital American interests.
Advisors are in over 70 countries around the world making a difference in the competition space by building interoperability, capacity, and capability with partners. Volunteering for SFAB service is now a relevant and important opportunity to gain strategic experience at a tactical level.
If an American Soldier in the field finds himself wondering what the partner force to his left or right is doing, where it is positioned, or how it is synchronized, today he can pick up a phone and an advisor will have the answer. As the Army shifts its focus to large-scale combat operations, and as the world continues to be ripe with competition, the role of the SFAB and its advisors is more critical today than ever.
Col. Brian Ducote is the commander of 1st Security Force Assistance Brigade headquartered in Fort Moore, Ga. 1st SFAB persistently employs advisor teams across Central and South America to support United States Southern Command strategic objectives. Prior to commanding 1st SFAB, Ducote previously served as the inaugural commander of 1st Battalion, 1st SFAB, and later 1st SFAB’s deputy commander where he deployed advisor teams to Afghanistan in support of Afghan National Army partners. Prior to commanding 1st SFAB, Ducote commanded 1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division and 3rd Battalion, 7th Infantry Regiment.
Lt. Col. Jim Gallagher currently serves as the executive officer for 1st SFAB and previously served as the executive officer for 1st Battalion, 1st SFAB where he was employed to Colombia in support of security force partners there. He has experience at the battalion and company level with the 10th Mountain Division and previously served as a Legislative Liaison within the House of Representatives.
Maj. Jason Elmore is the public affairs officer for 1st SFAB and has served in staff positions at the Battalion, Brigade, and Division levels across 1st Armored Division, 3rd Infantry Division, and 4th Infantry Division. He previously served as a security force assistance team advisor to partners in the Afghan National Army.
