Managing the Interface: Providing a Trusted Bond Serving Military and Civilian Needs

Abstract

abstractCivil-military cooperation is a key foundation of any effort to progress reconstruction during conflict, but it is immensely complex. The two components – civil and military – contain many fractures, internal tensions, organisational variations and divergences in purpose. Building links between the two is a complex, confusing and time consuming task. Operational experience in Iraq shows that this is so, and shows that the failure to persevere and build these links, despite their complexity, can lead to operational inefficiency, compromise or even failure. In Iraq, issues like infrastructure security, oil and governance were all issues that required, and still require, close and considered cooperation between civil and military authorities, proving the necessity of close civil-military cooperation.