Research Brief
Linking Language, Regional Expertise, and Culture Capabilities to Military Readiness
Oct 18, 2012
This report addresses questions concerning the U.S. Department of Defense's ability to measure and track the language, regional expertise, and culture (LREC) training and capabilities of general purpose forces. The authors used interviews with LREC practitioners and policymakers, a policy review, an academic literature review, and an analysis of survey data to address the research questions.
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The Defense Language Office tasked MITRE Corporation and the RAND National Defense Research Institute to jointly address questions concerning the U.S. Department of Defense's ability to measure and track the language, regional expertise, and culture (LREC) training and capabilities of general purpose forces (GPF). The authors used interviews with LREC practitioners and policymakers, a policy review, an academic literature review, and an analysis of survey data to address the research questions. Immediate recommendations include standardizing terms, developing measures of mission effectiveness, and collecting data to assess connections between LREC training and skills and mission success. Long-term planning should include efforts to develop a strong infrastructure across LREC stakeholders such that information can easily be shared, a theoretically sound causal model linking LREC skills to mission success, and tests of skills linked to mission readiness. The ultimate goal of these activities is to develop a set of readiness metrics, both at the general level for all GPF and at the mission-specific level, when specialized LREC skills may be required.
Chapter One
Introduction
Chapter Two
Methodology and Data
Chapter Three
Impact of LREC Training and Capabilities on Mission Readiness and Accomplishment
Chapter Four
The U.S. Department of Defense's Ability to Track LREC Training and Capabilities
Chapter Five
Conclusions and Recommendations
Appendix A
Policies and Directives Reviewed for This Analysis
Appendix B
Interview List
Appendix C
Interview Questions
Appendix D
Five-Percent Confidence Intervals for the Status-of-Forces Analysis
The research described in this report was prepared for the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). The research was conducted jointly by the MITRE Corporation's Department of Social, Behavioral, and Linguistic Sciences and the RAND National Defense Research Institute, a federally funded research and development center sponsored by OSD, the Joint Staff, the Unified Combatant Commands, the Navy, the Marine Corps, the defense agencies, and the defense Intelligence Community.
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