Conducting the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) and projecting United States (US) influence worldwide has meant an increasing number of US diplomats and military forces are assigned to locations around the world, some of which have not previously had a significant US presence. In the current security environment, understanding foreign cultures and societies has become a national priority. Cultural understanding is necessary both to defeat adversaries and to work successfully with allies. As indicated by recent experiences in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Somalia, understanding Islamic cultures is particularly important. This document defines a way US military leaders can prepare for and conduct military operations through the lens of cultural awareness. It provides a method for helping military commanders, staffs, and trainers engage successfully in any type of operation with an emphasis on postconflict stability operations. It also suggests modifications to the traditional intelligence preparation of the battlefield (IPB) and the military decisionmaking process (MDMP) to address the analytical difficulties posed by the conduct of military opera¬tions within and among different cultures. One of the distinguishing characteristics of the Long War, as the Global War on Terrorism is now known, is the cultural environment in which it is being fought. In truth, however, the US Army has routinely operated in unfamiliar cultural environments throughout its long history. The conditions in the Middle East today may be the most difficult in a very long time, and the Army is making tremendous efforts to become more effective. Among the key points the author makes in this study is the need for leaders to understand how culture affects military operations. LTC Wunderle briefly touches on some of the historical roots of Iraqi and Middle Eastern culture, but he focuses primarily on cultural conditions in Iraq today. He also presents ideas for modifying a number of the US Army's military decisionmaking processes and training programs.
About the Author: LTC William D. Wunderle is currently serving in the Joint Strategic Plans and Policy Directorate (J5) on the Joint Staff as a Political Military Planner with responsibility for Iran, Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinian Authority. Prior assignments include Senior Army Fellow at the RAND Corporation; principal US advisor to the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Defense and Aviation Joint Staff; Chief of Plans, Operations Officer, and infantry company commander with the 82d Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, North Carolina; and Chief of Strategic Plans for US Army South and J3, Joint Security Brigade, Operation Safe Haven. Wunderle served as a consultant for the University of Southern California's Institute for Creative Technologies Enhanced Learning Environments with the Creative Technologies (ELECT) project-a PC-based, bilateral contact-training module that allows US Army leaders to plan and conduct a series of bilateral meetings. Wunderle is a nonresident associate at Georgetown's Institute for the Study of Diplomacy and an adjunct instructor for the University of Maryland University College. Wunderle is a graduate of the Joint and Combined Warfighting Course at the Joint Forces Staff College in Norfolk, VA, and the Arabic Basic Course at the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center, Presidio of Monterey, California. He holds an MBA from Benedictine College, Atchison, Kansas; an MMAS from the School of Advanced Military Studies, US Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; and a BA from Cleveland State University, Cleveland, Ohio. Wunderle has published a number of books, monographs, and articles to include Forced In, Left Out: The Airborne Division in Future Forcible Entry Operations (Fort Leavenworth, KS: US Army Command and General Staff College, School of Advanced Military Studies, 1997) and "Through the Lens of Cultural Awareness: Planning Requirements in Wielding the Instruments of National Power" (RAND Technology and Applied Sciences Group Seminar, Warfighters: Operational Realities, 17 November 2004). His monograph Yin and Yang: The Relationship of Joint Vision 2010's Concepts of Dominant Maneuver and Precision Engagement (Fort Leavenworth, KS: US Army Command and General Staff College, School of Advanced Military Studies, 1998), was selected for further publication and distribution by the Association of the United States Army's Institute of Land Warfare as part of their Contemporary Professional Military Writing Series.