Building Healthcare for the Iraqi Military & Police

Presentation to the 2006 Tri-Service Symposium14 July 2006

Agenda

Operational Perspective Situation Staffing General Lessons Learned Pass to Captain Evors

Operational Perspective

J7 Engineer for Multi-National Security Transition Command – Iraq (MNSTC-I) Responsible for approximately $3B construction

program supporting Iraqi military and police Projects all over the country Work executed primarily by Air Force Center for

Environmental Excellence (AFCEE) and Gulf Region Division (GRD), US Army Corps of Engineers

Almost all work design-build Included work to develop Iraqi ministries capability to

do construction/facilities maintenance Period from May 2005 to December 2005

Situation

Starting to finish facilities originally planned for a much smaller force structure (11 Brigades vs. 10 Divisions)

Construction starting on work for larger force Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) continued to be

a problem, though some sites had regular indirect fire incidents

Planning for future expansion/growth in the Ministry of Interior program

Working closely with the Iraqi Security Ministries to assist them in acquiring resources and capability to build for themselves

Staffing

J7 a split of Individual Augmentees (IAs) and unit fills from the Army Reserve (Training Divisions)

IAs from the Air Force and Navy were degreed engineers, but Army Reserve were combat engineers (some had engineering degrees)

Contracting agencies (Air Force Center for Environmental Excellence (AFCEE) and Gulf Region Division, US Army Corps of Engineers (GRD)) had staff present in my office to support the MNSTC-I program

Healthcare expertise resident in the MNSTC-I Health Affairs Directorate

Lessons Learned

Infrastructure construction is a time-consuming process Force generation plans change faster than we as

engineers can react Best use of resources to go ahead and build, then adapt

to the new mission Local materials and construction technologies are best

U.S. agencies tried to introduce technologies we perceived to be faster and cheaper

Iraqi construction workforce had never dealt with them before

Cost actually higher and took longer than concrete and brick

We need to respect their way of construction and understand the limitations of the workforce

Lessons Learned (cont.)

Using local materials also creates employment outside of our jobsite

Using cost contracting vehicles provided the flexibility to deal with the changing security environment and keep the work moving

Larger projects with a defined security perimeter had fewer security issues than those in the middle of towns In town, it was critical to get coalition forces, local Iraqi

police and Iraqi military units involved to assist in ensuring the contractor can work

As I was leaving, we were starting to have more embedded coalition teams with the police and military units to facilitate this process

Lessons Learned (cont.)

Having QA eyes on the project was crucial to success Both AFCEE and GRD had local Iraqi engineers

working for them or their Title II contractor Have to work security issues closely to make sure that

local engineer can get onto the jobsite to do his work and avoid being targeted by insurgents

Organic movement/convoy team allowed us to visit the sites and obtain first hand knowledge of the work

A surprising number of adult Iraqis cannot read – impacts how we train operators of sewer/water plants and other complex systems on the bases we’re building

Construction Standards

They DO exist in Iraq!! Ministry of Construction and Housing is the repository MNSTC-I and our agencies used the International

Building Code where Iraqi standards were silent Must be enforced by a vigorous QA/QC program Sometimes difficult for US military and civilian

personnel to realize we’re operating to a different standard than what we see as “normal”