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Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign 
Affairs, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, House of 
Representatives: 

United States Government Accountability Office: 
GAO: 

July 2010: 

Defense Management: 

U.S. Southern Command Demonstrates Interagency Collaboration, but Its 
Haiti Disaster Response Revealed Challenges Conducting a Large 
Military Operation: 

GAO-10-801: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-10-801, a report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on 
National Security and Foreign Affairs, Committee on Oversight and 
Government Reform, House of Representatives. 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) has been cited as having mature 
interagency processes and coordinating mechanisms. As evidenced by the 
earthquakes that shook Haiti in January 2010, the challenges that 
SOUTHCOM faces require coordinated efforts from U.S. government 
agencies, international partners, and nongovernmental and private 
organizations. This report (1) assesses the extent that SOUTHCOM 
exhibits key attributes that enhance and sustain collaboration with 
interagency and other stakeholders and (2) evaluates SOUTHCOM’s 
approach for developing an organizational structure that facilitates 
interagency collaboration and positions the command to conduct a full 
range of missions. To conduct this review, GAO analyzed SOUTHCOM 
documents, conducted interviews with the command and a number of its 
partners, and visited three U.S. embassies in the Caribbean and 
Central and South America. 

What GAO Found: 

SOUTHCOM demonstrates a number of key practices that enhance and 
sustain collaboration with interagency and other stakeholders toward 
achieving security and stability in the region. SOUTHCOM coordinated 
with interagency partners to develop mutually reinforcing strategies, 
including its 2009 Theater Campaign Plan and its 2020 Command 
Strategy. In addition, SOUTHCOM focuses on leveraging the capabilities 
of various partners, including interagency and international partners, 
and nongovernmental and private organizations. For example, at SOUTHCOM’
s Joint Interagency Task Force South, resources are leveraged from the 
Department of Defense, U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies, 
and partner nations to disrupt illicit trafficking activities. During 
humanitarian assistance activities, SOUTHCOM has leveraged regional 
knowledge and activity expertise with nongovernmental and private 
organizations. Further, SOUTHCOM has established several means to 
enhance and sustain collaboration between the command and its 
partners. For example, SOUTHCOM has established a Partnering 
Directorate that provides full-time outreach, coordination, and 
support to interagency and other stakeholders. Moreover, information 
is frequently shared with partners through databases, conferences, and 
the sharing of lessons learned. Underlying these key practices is 
sustained leadership, which has been a key enabler for enhancing and 
sustaining collaboration with partners. 

While SOUTHCOM developed an organizational structure designed to 
facilitate interagency collaboration, the scale of the Haiti 
earthquake disaster challenged the command’s ability to support the 
relief effort. In 2008, SOUTHCOM developed an organizational structure 
to facilitate collaboration with interagency and other stakeholders, 
which included a civilian deputy to the commander, interagency 
representatives embedded in key leadership positions, and a 
directorate focused on sustaining partnerships. However, SOUTHCOM’s 
support to the disaster relief efforts in Haiti revealed weaknesses in 
this structure that initially hindered its efforts to conduct a large 
scale military operation. Specifically, the structure lacked a 
division to address planning for operations occurring over 30 days to 
1 year in duration. In addition, the command’s logistics function was 
suboptimized and had difficulty providing supply and engineering 
support to the relief effort. Moreover, SOUTHCOM had not identified 
the personnel augmentation required for a large contingency nor had it 
developed a plan to integrate personnel into its existing structure. 
To address these weaknesses, the commander returned SOUTHCOM to a 
traditional joint staff structure, while retaining elements from the 
2008 reorganization. Combatant commands need to be organized and 
manned to meet their daily mission requirements and be prepared to 
respond to a wide range of contingencies, including large scale 
disaster relief operations. Ensuring better alignment of its 
organizational structure and manpower to its identified mission 
requirements, and the development of personnel augmentation plans may 
enhance SOUTHCOM’s ability to conduct the full range of missions that 
may be required in the region. 

What GAO Recommends: 

GAO recommends that SOUTHCOM (1) revise its Organization and Functions 
Manual to align structure and manpower to meet approved missions; and 
(2) identify personnel augmentation requirements for a range of 
contingency operations, develop plans to obtain personnel, and 
exercise and assess these plans. DOD concurred with our 
recommendations and stated it is addressing these issues as quickly as 
possible. 

View [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-801] or key 
components. For more information, contact John Pendleton at (202) 512-
3489 or pendletonj@gao.gov. 

[End of section] 

Contents: 

Letter: 

Background: 

SOUTHCOM Demonstrates Practices That Enhance and Sustain Collaboration: 

SOUTHCOM Developed a Command Organizational Structure Designed to 
Facilitate Interagency Collaboration, but the Haiti Relief Effort 
Challenged the Command: 

Conclusions: 

Recommendations: 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

Appendix I: Joint Interagency Task Force South: 

Appendix II: Continuing Promise: 

Appendix III: Scope and Methodology: 

Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Defense: 

Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

Tables: 

Table 1: Reported Number of Full-Time Interagency Partner 
Representatives Embedded at SOUTHCOM as of July 2010: 

Table 2: Continuing Promise Mission Deployment Dates, Countries 
Visited and Reported Patients Treated: 

Table 3: Nongovernmental Organizations Involved in the 2009 Continuing 
Promise Mission: 

Table 4: Agencies Interviewed During our Review: 

Figures: 

Figure 1: Locations of SOUTHCOM and Its Command Components: 

Figure 2: SOUTHCOM Received Inputs from Several Partners during 
Development of the 2009 Theater Campaign Plan: 

Figure 3: JIATF South and Interagency Participation during the 
Disruption of Illicit Trafficking Activities: 

Figure 4: USNS Comfort during the Continuing Promise Mission. 

Figure 5: SOUTHCOM's Organizational Structure after 2008 
Transformation: 

Figure 6: Reported Buildup of Military Forces Supporting Relief 
Efforts in Haiti as Part of Operation Unified Response: 

Figure 7: SOUTHCOM's Organizational Structure Adopted during Operation 
Unified Response: 

Figure 8: JIATF South Interdiction Targets: 

Figure 9: Locations Visited by USNS Comfort during Continuing Promise 
2009: 

Figure 10: USNS Comfort Activities during Continuing Promise 2009: 

Abbreviations: 

DOD: Department of Defense: 

SOUTHCOM: U.S. Southern Command: 

JIATF South: Joint Interagency Task Force South: 

[End of section] 

United States Government Accountability Office: 
Washington, DC 20548: 

July 28, 2010: 

The Honorable John F. Tierney: 
Chairman: 
Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs: 
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform: 
House of Representatives: 

Dear Mr. Chairman: 

The U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) operates in the Americas and the 
Caribbean, areas primarily affected by challenges such as corruption, 
crime, transnational terrorism, natural disasters, and poverty that 
impact the security and stability of the region.[Footnote 1] As 
evidenced by the devastating earthquakes that shook Haiti in January 
2010, these threats require coordinated efforts from U.S. government 
agencies, international partners, and nongovernmental and private 
organizations, often with the U.S. military in a supporting role. In 
recent years, in an effort to better support security and stability in 
the region, SOUTHCOM has sought to evolve to become a more interagency-
oriented command, recognizing that many of the challenges it faces 
cross role and mission lines of various U.S. government agencies. In 
2008, SOUTHCOM was reorganized in part to focus on collaboration with 
interagency and other stakeholders and, by 2009, observers were citing 
the command as having mature interagency planning processes and 
coordinating mechanisms.[Footnote 2] 

SOUTHCOM's evolution reflects a growing recognition of the limits of 
traditional military power and the need to adjust the military's 
approach. Challenges to national security have expanded significantly 
from the state-based threats of the Cold War era to include 
unconventional, diffuse, and ambiguous threats from nonstate actors 
that arise from multiple sources. The interrelated nature of these 
threats makes it difficult, if not impossible, for any one agency to 
effectively address them alone.[Footnote 3] As the Department of 
Defense (DOD) further develops the military capability and capacity to 
address these challenges, it must develop the institutional capability 
and flexibility to respond alongside interdepartmental, 
nongovernmental and international partners, effectively leveraging 
existing resources in a resource constrained environment. DOD's 
geographic combatant commands, like SOUTHCOM, will need to play 
pivotal roles in this effort since they engage in the day-to-day 
missions of building partner nation military capabilities as well as 
conducting humanitarian assistance projects in various countries, and 
are responsible for conducting large military operations, such as 
peacekeeping efforts, noncombatant evacuation operations, and support 
to international disaster relief efforts. 

To assist in Congress's continuing oversight of interagency 
collaboration issues, this report assesses SOUTHCOM's efforts to 
enhance and sustain collaboration with interagency and other 
stakeholders and evaluates its approach for developing an 
organizational structure that facilitates interagency collaboration 
and positions the command to conduct a full range of missions. 

To conduct our work, we obtained and reviewed a wide range of DOD, 
SOUTHCOM, and interagency partner documents to include strategies, 
plans, policies, directives, after-action assessments, and other 
documentation detailing interagency collaboration at the geographic 
combatant command level. In addition, we interviewed officials at many 
agencies including DOD, the Department of State, the U.S. Agency for 
International Development, the Department of Homeland Security, and 
the Department of Justice to gain their perspectives on SOUTHCOM's 
collaborative efforts. To assess SOUTHCOM's efforts to collaborate 
with interagency and other stakeholders, we identified best practices 
to enhance and sustain collaboration with interagency and other 
stakeholders in prior GAO reports;[Footnote 4] and to determine the 
extent that SOUTHCOM demonstrated these practices, we interviewed DOD 
officials; interviewed SOUTHCOM and embedded interagency partner 
officials at SOUTHCOM's headquarters in Miami, Florida in June 2009; 
and interviewed officials from a number of SOUTHCOM's interagency 
partners in Washington, D.C. to gain their perspectives on SOUTHCOM's 
efforts. We also interviewed officials at SOUTHCOM's Joint Interagency 
Task Force South (JIATF South) in Key West, Florida in August 2009; 
observed a humanitarian and civic assistance mission--the 2009 
Continuing Promise--in Nicaragua in July 2009; and attended mission 
planning sessions in Jacksonville, Florida, in October 2009 and Panama 
City, Panama, in December 2009, during which we interviewed U.S. 
government, international partner, and nongovernmental organization 
officials.[Footnote 5] We also visited U.S. embassies in Panama, 
Colombia, and the Dominican Republic in December of 2009, interviewing 
U.S. government and international partner nation officials to obtain 
their views on SOUTHCOM's collaborative efforts. To evaluate 
SOUTHCOM's efforts to develop an organizational structure that 
facilitates interagency collaboration and positions the command to 
conduct a full range of missions, we identified DOD's guidance for the 
organization of a combatant command as outlined in DOD joint 
publications, instructions and other documents, and analyzed 
SOUTHCOM's strategic documents, policies, guidance, and directives 
outlining the command's mission, organizational structure, and staff 
functions. We interviewed SOUTHCOM and interagency partner officials 
from the command's existing organizational structure in Miami, 
Florida, in June 2009 and reviewed and analyzed documentation 
regarding SOUTHCOM's 2008 organizational structure changes. We also 
conducted follow-up meetings with SOUTHCOM officials in Miami, Florida 
in April 2010 to obtain information on the effectiveness of the 
command's organizational structure in supporting international 
disaster relief efforts following the January 2010 earthquake in 
Haiti. More details about our scope and methodology are included in 
appendix III. 

We conducted this performance audit from April 2009 through July 2010 
in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe 
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

Background: 

To perform its military missions around the world, DOD operates 
geographic combatant commands that conduct activities within assigned 
areas of responsibility.[Footnote 6] SOUTHCOM, based in Miami, 
Florida, has an area of responsibility encompassing the land mass of 
Latin America south of Mexico, including 31 countries and 10 
territories, and the waters adjacent to Central and South America, the 
Caribbean Sea, and portions of both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. 
[Footnote 7] SOUTHCOM headquarters is comprised of about 800 military 
and civilian personnel representing the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine 
Corps, Coast Guard, and several DOD agencies. The military services 
provide SOUTHCOM with component commands which, along with its special 
operations component, three joint task forces,[Footnote 8] three 
forward operating locations,[Footnote 9] and 24 security cooperation 
offices[Footnote 10] perform SOUTHCOM missions and security 
cooperation activities throughout its area of responsibility. Figure 1 
shows the locations of SOUTHCOM and its command components. 

Figure 1: Locations of SOUTHCOM and Its Command Components: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map of SOUTHCOM] 

The following locations are depicted on the map: 

U.S. Southern Command: Miami, Florid: 
800 DOD personnel. 

U.S. Air Forces Southern: Tuscon, Arizona: 
384 DOD personnel. 

U.S. Army South: San Antonio, Texas: 
795 DOD personnel. 

U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command: Mayport, Florida: 
152 DOD personnel. 

U.S. Marine Corps Forces, South: Miami, Florida: 
67 DOD personnel. 

U.S. Special Operations Command South: Homestead, Florida: 
152 DOD personnel. 

Joint Interagency Task Force South: Key West, Florida: 
512 DOD personnel. 

Joint Task Force Bravo: Soto Cano Air Base, Honduras: 
628 DOD personnel. 

Joint Task Force Guantanamo: U.S. Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba: 
1,726 DOD personnel. 

SOUTHCOM Forward Operating Location: Comalapa, El Salvador. 

SOUTHCOM Forward Operating Locations: Aruba; Curacao, Netherlands
Antilles. 

Source: SOUTHCOM, Map Resources (map). 

[End of figure] 

Primarily as a result of the commander's assessment of the regional 
security environment--which indicated growing challenges such as narco-
trafficking and other illicit trafficking activities, organized crime, 
and gangs, exacerbated by conditions of poverty, income inequality, 
and social exclusion--in October 2006, at the direction of SOUTHCOM's 
combatant commander, plans were drafted for reorganization of the 
command into a more interagency-oriented organization. These 
challenges were viewed by SOUTHCOM as transnational and crossing roles 
and mission lines of various U.S. government departments and agencies. 
A new organizational structure was designed that, according to 
SOUTHCOM, would allow the command to collaborate proactively with U.S. 
government agencies and partner nations in the region, and improve 
collective responses to regional and transnational security 
challenges. In September 2007, the Secretary of Defense authorized 
[Footnote 11] SOUTHCOM's reorganization to a more interagency-oriented 
organization and in October 2007, the reorganization was added to the 
list of DOD's top 25 transformation priorities.[Footnote 12] 
SOUTHCOM's new organizational structure was provisionally adopted in 
May 2008 and fully implemented in October 2008. U.S. Africa Command, 
which became fully operational in 2008, is another geographical 
combatant command that is working toward a more interagency-oriented 
focus.[Footnote 13] 

SOUTHCOM Demonstrates Practices That Enhance and Sustain Collaboration: 

SOUTHCOM demonstrates a number of key practices that enhance and 
sustain collaboration with interagency and other stakeholders toward 
achieving security and stability in the region. These practices 
include: establishing mutually reinforcing strategies with partners, 
leveraging capabilities, and establishing means to operate across 
multiple agencies and organizations. For example, the command has 
defined and established a directorate to develop compatible policies 
and procedures that facilitate collaboration across agencies and 
organizations, and put in place mechanisms to share information with 
interagency and other stakeholders regularly and frequently. 
Underlying these practices has been leadership, which has been a key 
enabler for enhancing and sustaining collaboration with partners. 

SOUTHCOM Has Worked with Interagency Partners to Develop Mutually 
Reinforcing Strategies: 

SOUTHCOM coordinated with interagency partners to develop mutually 
reinforcing strategies including its 2009 Theater Campaign Plan and 
its 2020 Command Strategy, and provided inputs to State Department's 
regional strategic plans. Based on our prior work, developing mutually 
reinforcing strategies helps align activities, core processes, and 
resources to achieve common outcomes. SOUTHCOM's efforts to develop 
mutually reinforcing strategies have helped to align resources and 
activities of SOUTHCOM and federal agencies to achieve broad U.S. 
objectives and helped to ensure there was no duplication of efforts. 

SOUTHCOM coordinated the development of its 2009 Theater Campaign 
Plan, which lays out the command's theater priorities and guides its 
resource allocations, with over 10 U.S. government departments, 
agencies, and offices, to include the Departments of State, Homeland 
Security, Justice, the Treasury, Commerce, and Transportation, and the 
Office of Director of National Intelligence. Figure 2 provides the 
complete list of departments, agencies, and offices involved in 
developing the 2009 Theater Campaign Plan. DOD's 2008 Guidance for 
Employment of the Force required both SOUTHCOM and U.S. Africa 
Command, as prototype test cases, to seek broader involvement from 
other departments in drafting their theater campaign and contingency 
plans. To meet this requirement, SOUTHCOM held a series of meetings 
with interagency officials that focused on involving and gathering 
inputs from interagency partners for its Theater Campaign Plan. 
According to both SOUTHCOM and interagency partners, this coordination 
has helped SOUTHCOM understand the diverse missions of its interagency 
partners and better align activities and resources in the region. 
During these meetings, SOUTHCOM was able to identify resources to 
leverage by identifying which partners were best positioned to have 
the greatest effect on a specific objective and by identifying 
specific programs, activities, and operations that other interagency 
partners engage in that include similar objectives. As a result of 
this effort, SOUTHCOM's 2009 Theater Campaign Plan includes 30 theater 
objectives, of which 22 are led by interagency partners with SOUTHCOM 
in a support role. 

Figure 2: SOUTHCOM Received Inputs from Several Partners during 
Development of the 2009 Theater Campaign Plan: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustration] 

2009 Theater Campaign Plan: Input received from: 
* Department of Commerce; 
* Department of Energy; 
* Department of Homeland Security; 
* Department of Justice; 
* Department of State; 
* Department of Transportation; 
* Department of the Treasury; 
* Environmental Protection Agency; 
* Office of Director of National Intelligence; 
* U.S. Agency for International Development. 

Source: Joint Operational War Plans Division, Joint Staff. 

[End of figure] 

In addition to the Theater Campaign Plan, SOUTHCOM is coordinating 
with interagency partners on its command strategy and provides inputs 
to Department of State's strategic plans. For SOUTHCOM's 2020 Command 
Strategy, which is currently in development, the command conducted a 3-
day conference to gather inputs from interagency partners. During this 
conference, SOUTHCOM provided an overview of the strategy, and 
gathered perspectives on SOUTHCOM's assessment of challenges in the 
region and the command's strategic objectives. SOUTHCOM also provides 
inputs to Department of State's Mission Strategic and Resource Plans 
through its security cooperation offices located in U.S. embassies 
within its area of responsibility.[Footnote 14] For example, the 
security cooperation office in Colombia represents SOUTHCOM's 
interests during the drafting of the Department of State's Mission 
Strategic and Resource Plan for Colombia. According to both SOUTHCOM 
and interagency partners we spoke with, this coordination has helped 
ensure that SOUTHCOM and interagency partner strategic goals were 
mutually reinforcing and has helped align activities and resources in 
achieving broad U.S. objectives. Specifically, SOUTHCOM's goals to 
provide tactical, operational, and strategic support to Colombia's 
counter-narcotics efforts align with the Department of State's goals 
to provide counter narcotics training and technical assistance, 
ensuring unity of effort. 

SOUTHCOM Leverages the Capabilities of Various Partners to Address 
Needs: 

SOUTHCOM focuses on leveraging the capabilities of various partners, 
including interagency partners, international partners, and 
nongovernmental and private organizations to address challenges in the 
region. Our prior work has shown that organizations can obtain 
additional benefits by identifying and addressing needs by leveraging 
the resources and capacities of collaborating organizations that would 
not be available if the organizations were working separately. 
Specifically for SOUTHCOM, the command engages with partners to 
leverage capabilities such as personnel and assets, differing legal 
authorities, differing jurisdictions, and regional and activity 
expertise from partners to achieve missions. 

SOUTHCOM's JIATF South Leverages Personnel, Assets, Intelligence, and 
Authorities to Support the Disruption of Illicit Trafficking: 

JIATF South, a national task force under the command and control of 
SOUTHCOM, has the primary mission of detection, monitoring, and 
interdiction support to disrupt illicit trafficking[Footnote 15] and 
narco-terrorist activities that threaten the United States and 
international partner nations within its operating area. To achieve 
its goals, JIATF South leverages the resources and capabilities of 
U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and international 
partner nations, to include personnel, assets, authorities, and 
intelligence. JIATF South recognizes that the disruption of illicit 
trafficking activities could not be successful without the involvement 
of interagency and other stakeholders, and every target that the 
national task force pursues requires a high level of interagency 
collaboration. According to JIATF South officials, it has taken the 
national task force over 20 years to achieve the level of interagency 
integration and synchronization that now exists to conduct 
international drug disruption operations.[Footnote 16] The disruption 
of illicit trafficking activities (shown in figure 3) requires 
different capabilities possessed by individual partners to accomplish 
the mission. These include: (1) sharing of intelligence information 
among U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and 
international partner nations to cue illicit trafficking events; (2) 
detection and sorting of the traffickers using DOD, U.S. Coast Guard, 
U.S. Customs and Border Protection and international partner nation 
assets; (3) monitoring of the event and achieving localized domain 
awareness through a combination of intelligence and maritime and 
aerial assets; (4) assignment of operational capabilities from DOD, 
U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Drug Enforcement 
Administration, and international partner nations to intercept the 
traffickers; and (5) support to interdiction and jurisdiction by 
leveraging law enforcement authorities, capabilities, and 
international agreements. While DOD has the responsibility for 
detection and monitoring of air and sea illegal drug activity into the 
United States, it must rely on interagency and international partners 
to provide the authority and jurisdiction to interdict illicit 
trafficking activities, unless otherwise authorized or permitted by 
law. See appendix I for a further description of JIATF South. 

Figure 3: JIATF South and Interagency Participation during the 
Disruption of Illicit Trafficking Activities: 

[Refer to PDF for image: 5 photographs with descriptive text] 

Intelligence: 
Information is received at JIATF South about an illicit trafficking 
event. 

Detection: 
At JIATF South the information is verified and the target is 
prioritized based on the accuracy of information received, the level 
of confidence of the location of the target, and the proximity of 
assets to intercept the target. 

Monitoring: 
JIATF South continues to monitor the target through intelligence, and 
maritime and aerial assets. 

Interception: 
Maritime and aerial assets from agencies such as U.S. Customs and 
Border Protection, U.S. Coast Guard, and DOD vessels with U.S. Coast 
Guard Law Enforcement Detachments on board or international partner 
nation assets are assigned to intercept the target. 

Interdiction: 
The interdictions–boarding, search and seizures, and arrests–are led 
and conducted by U.S. law enforcement agencies, U.S. Coast Guard, or 
U.S. Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachments onboard DOD vessels, or 
international partner nation assets, with the appropriate authority 
and jurisdiction. 

Source: GAO analysis of JIATF South information. 

[End of figure] 

The collaboration at JIATF South between DOD, interagency partners, 
and international partners provides benefits that complement each 
other. JIATF South identifies needs for capabilities, authorities, and 
jurisdiction, and which agencies with complementary missions can 
provide the necessary assistance. For example, while JIATF South's 
mission is to detect and monitor illicit trafficking, the U.S. Coast 
Guard's mission includes conducting maritime law enforcement, and each 
agency's unique authority, jurisdiction, and expertise can compliment 
each other in achieving a shared mission, such as countering illicit 
trafficking. However, JIATF South still faces challenges to leveraging 
resources because JIATF South, interagency partners, and international 
partners have differing missions, priorities, and cultures. For 
example, while one of the primary objectives of the Drug Enforcement 
Administration is the disruption and dismantling of drug trafficking 
organizations, it may have cases where the agency would prefer to 
allow a target suspected of carrying illegal drugs to be unhindered 
but monitored in transit, in order to gain more information about a 
drug organization as a whole, while JIATF South would have a higher 
priority in removing the flow of drugs toward the United States. 

JIATF South has been able to overcome collaboration challenges because 
it emphasizes mutual benefits by leveraging of resources--every 
participating organization gains in the process. Moreover, the 
national task force has a focused mission that requires interagency 
collaboration to be successful. According to a Drug Enforcement 
Administration official, JIATF South provides significant support to 
its organization in conducting its mission and it is valuable to have 
an agent at the task force to coordinate efforts. JIATF South 
officials, including interagency partners, told us that being part of 
JIATF South provides mutual benefits. For example, the Federal Bureau 
of Investigation provides JIATF South with information from its 
sources and in return, the bureau receives information to support its 
cases and access to tracking capabilities. In addition, according to 
embedded interagency officials at JIATF South, the use of formal 
memoranda of understanding at the national task force is unnecessary 
because the benefits derived from the collaboration provides a strong 
incentive to maintain continued participation and the lack of 
memoranda of understanding provides flexibility within operations, 
which is preferred by most embedded interagency officials. 

SOUTHCOM Leverages Regional Knowledge and Activity Expertise with 
Interagency and Other Stakeholders during Humanitarian Assistance 
Activities: 

By working side-by-side with interagency partners, nongovernmental 
organizations, private organizations, and international partners 
during humanitarian assistance activities, SOUTHCOM is able to learn 
from these partners given their knowledge of the regions and expertise 
on activities that may be beneficial to address challenges in the 
region. These organizations share common interests with SOUTHCOM in 
humanitarian assistance and can expand the command's capacity to 
enhance security and stability in the region. For example, interagency 
partners and nongovernmental organizations can provide resources to 
sustain projects that SOUTHCOM initiates or provide follow-up care 
after health-related humanitarian assistance missions. In one case, 
SOUTHCOM built a school in Nicaragua, thus accomplishing its training 
mission, and an international nongovernmental organization provided 
books and desks in order to make the school sustainable, furthering 
the overall mission. In addition, the nongovernmental and private 
organizations' missions and goals can be furthered by coordination 
with the command, making the interactions mutually beneficial. For 
example, Project Hope, an international nongovernmental organization, 
furthers its goal to provide humanitarian assistance and health-
related education by having a role in SOUTHCOM's humanitarian and 
civic assistance missions. 

SOUTHCOM integrates interagency and other stakeholders with compatible 
goals and complementary capabilities into its humanitarian assistance 
activities, allowing all participants to achieve their goals. A 
primary example of this integration is the Continuing Promise mission, 
a humanitarian and civic assistance operation to train U.S. military 
and international partner forces' medical personnel and civil 
construction engineers, while providing services to communities in the 
region. Figure 4 displays the USNS Comfort during the 2009 Continuing 
Promise mission. 

* During the 2009 mission, interagency partners, nongovernmental 
organizations, and international partners provided donations of goods 
for the mission, volunteered during the mission deployment, and filled 
vital medical capacities for the mission. U.S. Public Health Service 
officers filled 49 critical medical, engineering and environmental 
health positions, while nongovernmental organizations filled 97 vital 
medical positions that could not be filled by the military for the 
2009 mission. According to SOUTHCOM, with the addition of 
nongovernmental medical personnel, the command increased its ability 
to provide medical services by a reported 25 percent more primary care 
patient treatments, 50 percent more surgical procedures, 33 percent 
more optometry and eyeglasses services, and 25 percent more outpatient 
care. 

* For the 2010 Continuing Promise mission, interagency and other 
stakeholders provided expertise during planning conferences on various 
aspects of the mission. For example, during the first planning 
conference for the 2010 Continuing Promise mission, when DOD officials 
expressed difficulties in finding adequate translators during 
deployment site visits, one nongovernmental organization offered to 
organize translators with local language capabilities at each site, 
filling an essential gap. In addition, SOUTHCOM and its components met 
with international partner nations to coordinate access to potential 
sites for on-ground clinics and gather their feedback on the public 
health needs of the potential site areas. See appendix II for more 
details on the Continuing Promise mission. 

Figure 4: USNS Comfort during the Continuing Promise Mission. 

[Refer to PDF for image: photograph] 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of figure] 

SOUTHCOM Has Established Several Means to Collaborate with Diverse 
Agencies and Organizations: 

SOUTHCOM has established several means--including developing a 
directorate to facilitate collaboration with partners and sharing 
information frequently with partners through databases, conferences, 
and sharing lessons learned--to enhance collaboration between the 
command and its partners. Our prior work has shown that the means to 
operate across multiple agencies and organizations--such as compatible 
policies and procedures that facilitate collaboration across agencies 
and mechanisms to share information frequently--enhances and sustains 
collaboration among federal agencies.[Footnote 17] 

Partnering Directorate Provides Outreach, Coordination, and Support to 
Interagency and Other Stakeholders: 

SOUTHCOM has established a Partnering Directorate within the command, 
with 16 authorized staff, that provides full-time outreach, 
coordination, and support to its interagency partners, international 
partners, nongovernmental organizations, and private organizations. 
This directorate provides the means for partners to interface with the 
command and its components, and is responsible for integrating 
partners into exercises and operations. For example, an agency or 
nongovernmental organization interacts with the Partnering Directorate 
to become a part of the Continuing Promise mission. According to 
SOUTHCOM officials, the Partnering Directorate focuses on developing 
relationships that are mutually beneficial to the command and the 
interagency and other stakeholders, determines the extent of existing 
coordination, and possible areas of enhanced collaboration. 

The Partnering Directorate provides the means to work between SOUTHCOM 
and interagency partners through its Integration Division and between 
SOUTHCOM and nongovernmental and private organizations through its 
Private-Public Cooperation Division. The Integration Division 
incorporates interagency partners into SOUTHCOM's planning, 
operations, and exercises, and has the role of embedding interagency 
representatives into the command. SOUTHCOM officials and interagency 
officials told us that there are several benefits to embedding 
interagency representatives such as increased communication and a 
better understanding of each agency's missions, roles, and 
responsibilities. As of July 2010, SOUTHCOM reported having 20 
embedded interagency officials as shown in table 1. Decisions to embed 
interagency representatives are done on a case-by-case basis, with 
most agencies sending a short term representative to SOUTHCOM to 
discuss needs, roles, and responsibilities and to assess whether a 
full-time detail would be mutually beneficial. Agencies that we spoke 
with, including U.S. Agency for International Development and the 
Department of State, told us that having embedded representatives at 
SOUTHCOM increases the communication between the agencies and helps 
inform the agencies of each others' plans and activities. For some 
interagency partners, embedding a representative at SOUTHCOM may not 
always be the best option for facilitating collaboration since many 
agencies have limited personnel and resources. SOUTHCOM and 
interagency partners may create other means to collaborate effectively 
based on these agencies' individual requirements and resources. For 
example, while a Department of the Treasury official decided not to 
embed a full-time official at the command after a short term detail, 
the agency and SOUTHCOM decided that providing a local representative 
with access to the command and establishing a memorandum of 
understanding would improve communication and coordination. 

Table 1: Reported Number of Full-Time Interagency Partner 
Representatives Embedded at SOUTHCOM Headquarters as of July 2010: 

Interagency partners with SOUTHCOM-embedded representatives: 

Department of State: 
Number representatives embedded: 5; 

U.S. Agency for International Development: 
Number representatives embedded: 3; 

Department of Homeland Security: 
Number representatives embedded: 5; 

Department of Justice: 
Number representatives embedded: 4; 

Office of the Director of National Intelligence: 
Number representatives embedded: 3; 

Total: 
Number representatives embedded: 20. 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of table] 

The Partnering Directorate's Public-Private Cooperation Division 
provides a way for SOUTHCOM to engage with the public and private 
sectors. For example, according to SOUTHCOM, Food for the Poor, the 
largest nongovernmental organization working in Latin America, reached 
out to SOUTHCOM to collaborate on humanitarian assistance activities. 
The Public-Private Cooperation Division serves as a coordinating unit 
between nongovernmental and private organizations, with the Division 
providing information to organizations on activities and conferences, 
and connecting the organizations with SOUTHCOM's components for 
activities. Since the establishment of the Public-Private Cooperation 
Division in the Partnering Directorate, nongovernmental and private 
organization participation has increased in some activities. For 
example, in the 2007 Continuing Promise mission there were three 
nongovernmental organizations participating, but the 2009 mission had 
over twenty nongovernmental organizations participating. Private 
organizations also share their expertise and perspectives through the 
Public-Private Cooperation Division. For example, the Business 
Executives for National Security, a nonpartisan organization through 
which senior business executives aim to enhance the region's security, 
shared their perspectives in March 2009 on how SOUTHCOM could better 
plan for activities that address security challenges in the region. 

While SOUTHCOM has created the means to interact with nongovernmental 
and private organizations and these interactions have increased, the 
command also recognizes that barriers exist to working with these 
organizations. These barriers can be at the strategic level, where 
nongovernmental and private organizations may have differing 
perspectives on why and how assistance should be provided in the 
region. These differences can range from the varying terminology used 
to describe missions to the concern that nongovernmental and private 
organizations are not understood or fully appreciated. In addition, 
DOD's lack of fully developed policy and procedure for partnering with 
these organizations can increase these differences. For example, 
unclear understandings of nongovernmental and private organization 
roles when working with DOD may exist during the execution of the 
different types of missions. Having identified this as a potential 
issue, SOUTHCOM is in the process of developing two handbooks that 
will guide these interactions and provide guidance on how SOUTHCOM can 
better interact with nongovernmental and private organizations. One 
handbook, which is currently in draft and expected to be completed by 
September 2010, will be provided to SOUTHCOM's components and the 
other handbook, which is also in draft and expected to be completed by 
September 2010, will be provided to nongovernmental and private 
organizations that participate in SOUTHCOM activities. 

Information Is Frequently Shared with Partners through Databases, 
Conferences, and Sharing Lessons Learned: 

SOUTHCOM also provides mechanisms for stakeholders to access and share 
information. Based on our prior work, the frequent sharing of 
information among partners enhances and sustains collaborative 
efforts, and is a crucial tool for maintaining national security. 
Specifically, the use of compatible databases to provide information 
among partners is a means that facilitates working across agency 
boundaries. SOUTHCOM utilizes the Theater Security Cooperation 
Management Information System, which is an internet-based program that 
provides an integrated map of activities that are occurring across the 
region, providing a mechanism to coordinate activities. SOUTHCOM has 
given access to the system to interagency partners, including 
Department of State, U.S. Agency for International Development, and 
Department of Justice, to encourage them to input their own activities 
and to increase their awareness of SOUTHCOM activities. For example, 
during our review of the system, we observed that the Federal Bureau 
of Investigation had entered its own activities into the system. In 
addition, SOUTHCOM created an automated tool in 2008 to use during 
exercises and operations, such as humanitarian assistance and civic 
assistance missions, to vet classified and unclassified information 
within short periods of time to be able to share the information with 
nongovernmental organizations and international partners.[Footnote 18] 
This tool increases the command's ability to share intelligence 
information properly and quickly with partners, improving the 
collaboration to achieve shared goals. 

By sharing information routinely with its interagency partners, 
international partners, and nongovernmental organizations, SOUTHCOM is 
building and maintaining relationships that are important in 
accomplishing shared missions. According to interagency officials 
embedded in SOUTHCOM, SOUTHCOM's constant sharing of information 
builds a culture of trust and transparency and helps the command and 
partners understand and overcome cultural differences in their 
agencies. For example, SOUTHCOM incorporates embedded interagency 
partner representatives into regular meetings at the command, and 
provides the agency representatives an opportunity to discuss what 
their agencies are doing in the region. More specifically, during 
weekly senior management meetings, intelligence agency and law 
enforcement representatives may share information on cases that are 
being conducted in the region and discuss potential areas for 
collaboration. 

While interagency partner representatives embedded in the command and 
those on temporary assignment to the command maintain routine 
communication with SOUTHCOM, the command also maintains communication 
with other federal government agencies in close proximity to SOUTHCOM 
by granting them access to its facilities, allowing other government 
officials to gain some of the benefits of having a presence at the 
command without committing staff on a full-time basis. For example, 
the local Miami Border Patrol is provided identification badges which 
allow access into SOUTHCOM's headquarters building, although these 
personnel are located at another site. The command also embeds 
international liaisons from eight countries within the command, which 
facilitates the sharing of information to integrate planning efforts 
and coordinate exercises in the region.[Footnote 19] 

Another mechanism SOUTHCOM uses to share information with interagency 
partners, international partners, and nongovernmental organizations, 
is hosting conferences with partners in which perspectives from many 
agencies, international partners, and nongovernmental organizations 
are discussed and incorporated appropriately. For example, in 2009 
SOUTHCOM coordinated with the Department of State to host a conference 
on migrant camps, and invited relevant nongovernmental organizations 
to the conference. SOUTHCOM's components also host conferences to 
share information. For example, SOUTHCOM's JIATF South sponsors a 
semiannual counter narcoterrorism conference and invites interagency 
partners, such as the Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Customs 
and Border Protection, and U.S. embassy officials from the Americas 
and Caribbean. 

Finally, SOUTHCOM shares information by consistently collecting and 
sharing lessons learned at the command level and for the activities 
conducted. SOUTHCOM solicits and collects lessons learned from DOD and 
from interagency partners, international partners, and nongovernmental 
and private organizations involved in activities. For example, during 
the Continuing Promise mission, lessons learned were collected from 
DOD participants, interagency and international partners, and 
nongovernmental organization participants. The lessons learned that 
are collected are shared at SOUTHCOM, including its components, and 
with its partners and then used to implement changes in future 
missions. For example, lessons learned from the prior Continuing 
Promise missions were shared with participants and appropriate changes 
were considered during the planning phase for the 2010 mission. 
Specifically, participants in the 2009 Continuing Promise mission 
identified, as a lesson learned, that early host nation participation 
was critical in the initial planning of the deployment. This lesson 
learned was incorporated into the 2010 planning of the Continuing 
Promise mission when U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command decided to 
hold planning meetings with countries involved in the 2010 mission 
prior to site selection. 

Leadership and Strategic Communication Essential in Furthering Key 
Practices: 

Underlying these key practices is sustained leadership, which has been 
a key enabler for enhancing and sustaining collaboration with 
partners. Our prior work has shown that committed and sustained 
leadership by those involved in collaborative efforts from all levels 
of the organization is needed to overcome the many barriers to working 
across agency boundaries.[Footnote 20] SOUTHCOM's leadership has 
focused on building relationships of trust, open dialogue, and 
transparency with partners. According to interagency partners we spoke 
with, leadership at SOUTHCOM has been important in building 
relationships among agencies. While SOUTHCOM has encountered some 
resistance to its collaboration efforts, it has overcome much of this 
resistance by building relationships, providing information on the 
command's activities, and discussing the overall benefits of the 
interactions for the region. 

SOUTHCOM's leadership also focuses on strategic communication to 
emphasize its role in supporting interagency, international, and 
nongovernmental and private organization partners in the region. 
Leadership at SOUTHCOM has set the tone for a culture that is more 
collaborative in nature, and has communicated this throughout the 
command and to key interagency and other stakeholders. This strategic 
communication includes a mission and vision that incorporate 
interagency collaboration, and strategic goals that emphasize unity of 
mission with other partners. Furthermore, SOUTHCOM has focused on 
strategic communication to emphasize that its main role is defense and 
that it has a supporting role in diplomacy and development in the 
region. The command has also utilized various social media to 
communicate its actions including a Facebook page, YouTube page, and 
Twitter feed. Moreover, SOUTHCOM often communicates that relationships 
must be mutually beneficial and interagency participation in SOUTHCOM- 
led activities must be relevant for other stakeholders involved. 
Underscoring all of this is the command's continued focus on 
maintaining relationships with partners to address challenges in the 
region. 

SOUTHCOM Developed a Command Organizational Structure Designed to 
Facilitate Interagency Collaboration, but the Haiti Relief Effort 
Challenged the Command: 

While SOUTHCOM developed a command organizational structure designed 
to facilitate interagency collaboration, the scale of the Haiti 
earthquake disaster challenged the command's ability to support the 
relief effort. Combatant commands need to be organized and manned to 
meet their daily mission requirements[Footnote 21] and be prepared to 
respond to a wide range of contingencies, including large-scale 
disaster relief operations. However, SOUTHCOM's nontraditional 
combatant command structure created difficulties in responding to the 
crisis and in augmenting military personnel during its initial 
response. 

SOUTHCOM's Command Structure Reorganized in 2008 to Facilitate 
Collaboration: 

As part of the 2008 reorganization, SOUTHCOM developed a directorate 
organizational structure to facilitate collaboration with interagency 
and other stakeholders, which included a civilian deputy to the 
commander, interagency representatives embedded directly into key 
senior leadership positions, and a directorate, the Partnering 
Directorate, focused on improving and sustaining partnerships. 
According to a DOD directive and Joint Staff publications, combatant 
commanders are given the authority and latitude to establish the staff 
organization they deem necessary to carry out assigned missions, 
duties and responsibilities.[Footnote 22] Once the command has defined 
its missions, tasks and functions, as assigned by higher authority, it 
then develops an Organization and Functions Manual, which documents 
the organizational structure and serves as the basis for determining 
the manpower requirements necessary to carry out these missions. 
According to a Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff instruction, the 
requirements are to be stated in terms of the minimum manning required 
to accomplish approved missions, and should be based on the average 
workload of the command expected for at least the next 3 years. 
Temporary changes in workload and short duration missions should be 
supported through solutions such as personnel augmentation.[Footnote 
23] According to DOD's Unified Command Plan, SOUTHCOM is responsible 
for planning and conducting a wide range of missions and contingency 
operations, such as disaster relief operations as directed.[Footnote 
24] 

SOUTHCOM's reorganization was focused on addressing its daily mission 
requirements, which included addressing challenges that impacted the 
security and stability in the region and required interagency 
solutions. In order to support interagency solutions, SOUTHCOM 
developed an organizational structure that transitioned the command 
out of the traditional joint staff organizational structure[Footnote 
25] to a staff structure with three mission directorates and three 
functional directorates. The three mission directorates--Security and 
Intelligence, Stability, and Partnering--each focused on achieving one 
of the hemispheric goals included within SOUTHCOM's Command Strategy 
2016.[Footnote 26] Three enabling or functional directorates were also 
created: Policy and Strategy, Resources and Assessments, and 
Enterprise Support (see figure 5). Under this organizational 
structure, SOUTHCOM split and merged various aspects of the 
traditional joint staff organizational structure to fit into the six 
directorates. For example, intelligence and operations, traditionally 
separate directorates, were combined and incorporated under the new 
Security and Intelligence Directorate. Moreover, the new Stability 
Directorate combined several aspects from the traditional joint staff 
organizational structure to be under one directorate, to include parts 
of intelligence, operations, planning, as well as training and 
readiness. According to SOUTHCOM, the creation of this directorate 
organization structure improved their ability to work with interagency 
and other stakeholders to address challenges in the region. 

Figure 5: SOUTHCOM's Organizational Structure after 2008 
Transformation: 

[Refer to PDF for image: Organizational chart] 

Top level: 
Commander; 
- Command action Group. 

Second level, reporting to Commander: 
Military Deputy Commander; 
Civilian Deputy to the Commander. 

Third level, reporting to Commander: 
Chief of Staff; 
- Standing Joint Force Headquarters. 

Fourth level, reporting to Chief of Staff: 
Policy and Strategy Directorate; 
Resources and Assessment; 
Security and Intelligence Directorate; 
Stability Directorate; 
Enterprise Directorate; 
Partnering Directorate. 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of figure] 

In addition, SOUTHCOM added elements to its organizational structure 
that furthered the command's ability to collaborate with interagency 
and other stakeholders. The organizational structure SOUTHCOM 
developed included two deputies to the commander--a military deputy 
commander as well as a civilian deputy to the commander. The military 
deputy commander is able to exercise military command authorities when 
required, with duties to include serving as acting commander whenever 
necessary, overseeing the development of contingency plans, and 
engaging the Joint Staff, the Departments of the Army, Navy, Air 
Force, and the U.S. Coast Guard, as required. The civilian deputy to 
the commander--a senior foreign service officer with the rank of 
Minister Counselor from Department of State--advises the Commander on 
a range of foreign policy issues and also serves as primary liaison 
with the Department of State and all U.S. Chiefs of Mission and 
embassy personnel in the region.[Footnote 27] The civilian deputy to 
the commander's duties include overseeing the development of the 
command's regional strategy and furthering interagency and public-
private sector engagement. Several interagency partner representatives 
were also embedded directly into key senior leadership positions 
within the organizational structure, serving dual roles--one for 
SOUTHCOM and one for their parent agency. For example, the Partnering 
Directorate included two senior interagency partner representatives--a 
Department of State Senior Foreign Service Officer and a U.S. Agency 
for International Development Senior Development Advisor--serving in 
command leadership positions. The Department of State Senior Foreign 
Service Officer serves as a midlevel foreign policy advisor, while 
filling the dual role as deputy of the Partnering Directorate. 
[Footnote 28] The U.S. Agency for International Development Senior 
Development Advisor, who advises the command during interactions with 
the U.S. Agency for International Development and ensures SOUTHCOM's 
activities are consistent with the U.S. Agency for International 
Development's developmental goals, also serves as Director of Regional 
Issues division in the Partnering Directorate.[Footnote 29] In this 
role, he examines the regional issues that may undermine stability and 
security, such as rule of law, environment and energy, finance and 
trade, infrastructure and social issues. He manages a staff of both 
civilian and military personnel. 

Further, as described earlier, SOUTHCOM also created a Partnering 
Directorate focused on improving partnership opportunities with other 
U.S. government agencies, non-governmental and private organizations, 
and international partners in an effort to foster "whole of 
government" solutions to challenges in the region. According to 
SOUTHCOM officials, the concept for the Partnering Directorate was 
modeled on the Joint Interagency Coordination Group, first formed in 
2002 to enhance interagency coordination and unity of effort in the 
war on terrorism.[Footnote 30] In 2006, the existing combatant 
commander expanded on the Joint Interagency Coordination Group, 
creating specific divisions for interagency coordination and public-
private partnership. These two divisions were combined, along with the 
command elements handling development, into the Partnering Directorate 
as part of the 2008 reorganization of SOUTHCOM. 

Several other combatant commands have also developed organizational 
models designed to improve interagency collaboration. For example, 
U.S. Northern Command uses a traditional joint staff organizational 
structure on a day-to-day basis that includes an interagency 
coordination directorate the command established to facilitate and 
focus on building effective, durable, and lasting relationships 
between the command and federal (DOD and non-DOD), state, local, 
tribal, nongovernmental, commercial and private sector, and 
international governments, departments, organizations, and agencies. 
U.S. Africa Command, DOD's newest geographic combatant command, is 
organized in a directorate structure similar to SOUTHCOM, with seven 
directorates that combine complementary functions of a traditional 
staff organization, with structural modifications to accommodate 
interagency partners. U.S. Africa Command's seven directorates 
include: Resources; Operations and Logistics; Joint Force Development 
and Readiness; Strategy, Plans and Programs; Intelligence and 
Knowledge Development; Outreach; and Command, Control, Communications, 
and Computer Systems. 

SOUTHCOM's Disaster Relief Efforts in Haiti Revealed Weaknesses in Its 
Organizational Structure and the Lack of Augmentation Planning: 

While SOUTHCOM and its interagency partners told us that this 
organizational structure improved the command's ability to work with 
partners in the region, SOUTHCOM's support to the disaster relief 
efforts in the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti, named Operation 
Unified Response, revealed weaknesses in the command's organizational 
structure and a lack of augmentation planning that initially hindered 
its efforts.[Footnote 31] Operation Unified Response, according to 
SOUTHCOM officials, was the largest disaster relief effort DOD has 
ever conducted, far larger than was anticipated or planned for by 
SOUTHCOM, requiring 24-hour, 7-days-per-week operations. Figure 6 
shows the buildup of military forces supporting international disaster 
relief efforts in Haiti as part of Operation Unified Response, which 
SOUTHCOM reported peaked at more than 20,000 personnel. 

Figure 6: Reported Buildup of Military Forces Supporting Relief 
Efforts in Haiti as Part of Operation Unified Response: 

[Refer to PDF for image: line graph] 

Date: January 16; 
Number of personnel: 5,040. 

Date: January 17; 
Number of personnel: 6,038. 

Date: January 18; 
Number of personnel: 11,706. 

Date: January 19; 
Number of personnel: 11,524. 

Date: January 20; 
Number of personnel: 12,963. 

Date: January 21; 
Number of personnel: 13,101. 

Date: January 22; 
Number of personnel: 13,656. 

Date: January 23; 
Number of personnel: 18,163. 

Date: January 24; 
Number of personnel: 17,850. 

Date: January 25; 
Number of personnel: 18,346. 

Date: January 26; 
Number of personnel: 18,325. 

Date: January 27; 
Number of personnel: 19,732. 

Date: January 28; 
Number of personnel: 20,934. 

Date: January 29; 
Number of personnel: 20,413. 

Date: January 30; 
Number of personnel: 20,320. 

Date: January 31; 
Number of personnel: 20,448. 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of figure] 

When the earthquake struck Haiti, SOUTHCOM's directorate 
organizational structure had been untested in a major crisis and the 
command was not fully prepared to carry out a large scale military 
operation, such as Operation Unified Response. SOUTHCOM was organized 
and manned to meet its day-to-day missions, such as building partner 
nation military capabilities and conducting humanitarian assistance 
projects to address challenges in the region. While a combatant 
command should be organized and manned to meet its daily mission 
requirements, it must also be prepared to respond to a wide range of 
contingencies identified in DOD's Unified Command Plan, including 
disaster relief operations, when directed by higher authority. 
However, SOUTHCOM's directorate organizational structure had 
weaknesses that hindered its initial response to the Haiti earthquake. 
Specifically, the command structure lacked a division to address 
planning for future operations, which, according to SOUTHCOM 
officials, is necessary to establish proper planning cycles and 
divisions of labor, and to develop the necessary guiding documents for 
operations occurring over 30 days to one year in duration.[Footnote 
32] Moreover, SOUTHCOM had suboptimized some core functions that were 
necessary to respond to large scale contingencies. For example, 
SOUTHCOM's logistics function was suboptimized because it was placed 
under Enterprise Support in the organizational structure rather than 
being its own core function. As a result, the command had difficulty 
planning for the magnitude of logistics support required during the 
Haiti relief effort including supply, maintenance, deployment 
distribution, health support, engineering, logistics services, and 
contract support. Further, the command had difficulty communicating 
with its components, joint task forces, and security cooperation 
offices in theater because the command's organizational structure was 
organized into mission and functional directorates, while its 
components, such as Joint Task Force Haiti, were organized in 
traditional joint staff directorate structures.[Footnote 33] 

In addition, SOUTHCOM had not developed an augmentation plan for 
military personnel for a large contingency such as Operation Unified 
Response. To support short duration missions and contingencies, a 
combatant command is responsible for identifying and validating the 
personnel augmentation required and submitting these requirements to 
its military service component commands to fill.[Footnote 34] Further, 
we believe the command should exercise and assess these types of 
augmentation plans in order to be fully prepared to meet their 
assigned missions. Given the extent of the earthquake disaster, the 
command did not have the military personnel to support the relief 
effort. According to SOUTHCOM officials, the command was staffed at 
about 85 percent of its authorized staffing level of 960 military and 
civilian personnel, and did not have the necessary personnel depth to 
support a large scale military operation. While augmentation was 
required, the command had not identified the military personnel 
augmentation requirements necessary for a large contingency and had 
not developed a plan to integrate military augmentee personnel into 
the existing directorate structure. In addition, the augmenting 
military personnel were not familiar with SOUTHCOM's directorate 
structure and did not initially understand where they could best be 
utilized because many of the traditional joint staff functions were 
divided among SOUTHCOM's directorates. Ultimately, SOUTHCOM received 
over 500 augmentees to provide additional capability to its existing 
command staff of approximately 800 personnel, including an entire 
staff office from U.S. Northern Command, filling vital gaps in 
SOUTHCOM's ability to support operations in Haiti. However, according 
to SOUTHCOM officials, the command was able to integrate interagency 
and international partners into the relief efforts without difficulty 
because the Partnering Directorate had already established 
relationships with the partners. Specifically, 40 augmentees from 
seven agencies and four international organizations were integrated 
into the planning and operations of the command. 

As a result of these challenges, SOUTHCOM's combatant commander made a 
decision within the first week of the Haiti disaster to return the 
command to a traditional joint staff organizational structure to 
address the weaknesses. SOUTHCOM's revised organizational structure is 
shown in figure 7. This organizational structure provided the command 
with the capabilities to better conduct Operation Unified Response by 
establishing the future operations division, elevating various 
functions such as logistics, and improving communications between the 
command and its DOD stakeholders. However, the command has retained 
some elements from the 2008 reorganization that enhance interagency 
collaboration. For example, the Partnering Directorate, the position 
of civilian deputy to the commander, and the interagency partner 
representatives serving dual roles have been retained. According to 
SOUTHCOM officials, the command plans to remain in this traditional 
joint staff structure for the foreseeable future and has received 
approval from the Secretary of Defense. However, some SOUTHCOM 
officials expressed concerns the command was directing its manpower 
resources toward a contingency-based organizational structure, the 
skill sets of which would only be utilized every 4 to 5 years when 
responding to a major crisis such as Operation Unified Response. 
Officials further stated that large disaster relief efforts requiring 
DOD support, such as those required during the Haiti response, rarely 
occur and are not the focus of the work in SOUTHCOM's area of 
responsibility the majority of the time. 

Figure 7: SOUTHCOM's Organizational Structure Adopted during Operation 
Unified Response: 

[Refer to PDF for image: Organizational chart] 

Top level: 
Commander; 
- Command Select Special Staff. 

Second level, reporting to Commander: 
Military Deputy Commander; 
Civilian Deputy to the Commander and Foreign Policy Advisor. 

Third level, reporting to Commander: 
Chief of Staff; 
- Standing Joint Force Headquarters. 

Fourth level, reporting to Chief of Staff: 
J1: Manpower and Personnel; J2: Intelligence; 
J3: Operations; 
J4: Logistics; 
J5: Plans, Policy and Strategy; 
J6: Communications; 
J7: Training, Exercises and Engagement; 
J8: Resources and Assessments; 
J9: Partnering. 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of figure] 

Moreover, according to SOUTHCOM officials, the command is working to 
revise its Organization and Functions Manual to align manpower 
resources to its identified mission requirements and is creating 
personnel augmentation plans to respond to small, medium, and large 
contingencies. The last time SOUTHCOM updated its Organization and 
Functions Manual was January 2009, and it has not been updated to 
reflect SOUTHCOM's current joint staff organizational structure, as 
well as its revised mission and strategic objectives. The manual 
serves as the basis for determining manpower requirements necessary to 
perform assigned missions and is to be updated and submitted annually 
to the Joint Staff. Ensuring better alignment of SOUTHCOM's 
organizational structure and manpower to its identified mission 
requirements; and the development of augmentation plans for a range of 
contingencies, such as those as large as Operation Unified Response, 
may enhance the command's ability to conduct the full range of 
missions that may be required in the region. 

Conclusions: 

Modern national security challenges require collaborative efforts 
among U.S. government agencies, international partners, and 
nongovernmental and private organizations. The Americas and the 
Caribbean are areas that face these types of challenges and ultimately 
require partnerships with various interagency and other stakeholders 
to ensure security and stability throughout the region. SOUTHCOM has 
taken significant steps in building these partnerships through its key 
practices that enhance and sustain collaboration. However, the command 
faces challenges preparing for divergent needs of its potential 
missions, which range from conducting military-focused operations to 
supporting efforts to enhance regional security and cooperation. The 
command must have an organizational structure that is not only 
prepared for military contingencies, but can also be effective in 
supporting interagency and other stakeholders in meeting challenges 
such as corruption, crime, and poverty. While the command has made 
recent changes to its organizational structure to better enable it to 
conduct military contingency operations, it will be unable to 
determine the most effective organizational structure until it aligns 
its structure and manpower resources in its Organization and Functions 
Manual to its identified mission requirements, and develops personnel 
augmentation plans necessary to respond to a wide range of contingency 
operations, including disaster relief operations, when directed by 
higher authority. As SOUTHCOM continues to further its interagency 
missions and partnership capacities, it is vital that as a geographic 
combatant command, it continues to maintain its capability to meet its 
military operational demands as they arise. 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

To improve SOUTHCOM's ability to conduct the full range of military 
missions that may be required in the region, while balancing its 
efforts to support interagency and other stakeholders in enhancing 
regional security and cooperation, we recommend that the Secretary of 
Defense direct the Commander, U.S. Southern Command to take the 
following two actions: 

1. Revise SOUTHCOM's Organization and Functions Manual to align 
organizational structure and manpower resources to meet approved 
missions, to include both daily mission and contingency operation 
requirements; and: 

2. Identify personnel augmentation requirements for a range of 
contingency operations, develop plans to obtain these personnel when 
needed, and exercise and assess these augmentation plans. 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

In its written comments on a draft of this report, DOD concurred with 
our recommendations that DOD direct SOUTHCOM to revise its 
Organization and Functions Manual to meet approved missions and 
identify personnel augmentation requirements for a range of 
contingency operations. In its response, DOD also stated it is 
addressing these issues as quickly as possible to ensure readiness for 
future contingencies. DOD's written comments are reprinted in appendix 
IV. Technical comments were provided separately and incorporated as 
appropriate. The Department of State, U.S. Agency for International 
Development, Department of Justice, and Department of Homeland 
Security did not provide written comments on our draft report. 

In its response, DOD stated that SOUTHCOM has sought to become a 
center of excellence in interagency partnering and has actively shared 
its experience and contacts with other geographic combatant commands. 
In our report, we acknowledge that SOUTHCOM has taken significant 
steps in building partnerships with interagency and other stakeholders 
and agree that the command demonstrates a number of key practices that 
enhance and sustain collaboration with these partners. Given the 
challenges of corruption, crime, illicit trafficking, and poverty 
facing the Americas and Caribbean, we believe collaboration will 
continue to be critical to ensuring security and stability throughout 
the region. As SOUTHCOM continues its efforts, we encourage the 
command to continue to share its experiences and lessons learned with 
DOD and its interagency partners, as we noted in our report, in an 
effort to continue to improve whole of government efforts in 
addressing challenges in the region. 

DOD further stated that SOUTHCOM has already begun addressing the 
organizational issues identified during the Haiti disaster response 
effort, modifying its staff structure and comprehensively reviewing 
its allocation of personnel to meet mission requirements. While DOD 
did indicate it was addressing these issues as quickly as possible, it 
did not provide specific timelines for when SOUTHCOM would have a 
revised Organization and Functions Manual aligning manpower resources 
to the command's identified mission requirements and have personnel 
augmentation plans to respond to small, medium, and large 
contingencies. Since both the Organizations and Functions Manual as 
well as the personnel augmentation plans are important to ensuring the 
command's ability to conduct the full range of missions that may be 
required in the region, we believe DOD and SOUTHCOM should establish 
specific timelines for implementing our recommendations. 

We are sending copies of this report to other appropriate 
congressional committees and the Secretary of Defense. This report 
also is available at no charge on the GAO Web site at [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov]. 

If you or your staff have questions about this report, please contact 
me at (202) 512-3489 or at pendletonj@gao.gov. Contact points for our 
Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on 
the last page of this report. GAO staff who made key contributions to 
this report are listed in appendix V. 

Sincerely yours, 

Signed by: 

John H. Pendleton: 
Director, Defense Capabilities and Management: 

[End of section] 

Appendix I: Joint Interagency Task Force South: 

Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATF South) is a national task 
force under the command and control of U.S. Southern Command 
(SOUTHCOM), which according to JIATF South officials, was established 
by the Office of National Drug Control Policy, as part of the National 
Interdiction Command and Control Plan. The national task force has the 
primary mission of detection, monitoring, and interdiction support to 
disrupt illicit trafficking, to include narcotics trafficking, in the 
Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and the eastern Pacific. JIATF South's 
joint operating area consists of 42 million square miles, crossing 5 
combatant commanders' boundaries, 3 U.S. Coast Guard districts, 15 
interagency partners' areas of operations, and 30 independent nations 
and 11 territories.[Footnote 35] The national task force detects, 
monitors, and provides interdiction support to a range of suspect 
modes of transport such as small civil aircraft, business-type 
aircraft, fishing vessels, go-fast boats,[Footnote 36] cargo vessels, 
and self-propelled semi-submersibles.[Footnote 37] Figure 8 displays 
examples of JIATF South's interdiction targets. According to JIATF 
South officials, in 2009, the task force contributed to the removal of 
234 metric tons of cocaine worth a reported $4.5 billion, and is the 
lead cocaine interdiction supporting agency in the world. 

Figure 8: JIATF South Interdiction Targets: 

[Refer to PDF for image: 3 photographs] 

Examples of the types of vessels that are suspected of trafficking 
drugs. 

Source: JIATF South. 

[End of figure] 

While the national task force has the responsibility for the detection 
and monitoring of suspect air and maritime drug activity in its joint 
operating area, it also serves to integrate and synchronize 
interagency counter drug operations. JIATF South embeds non-Department 
of Defense (DOD) personnel throughout its organization to better 
integrate DOD, U.S. law enforcement, intelligence agencies, and 
international partners into these operations. For example, the 
national task force's Director is a rear admiral from the U.S. Coast 
Guard, while the Vice Director is from U.S. Customs and Border 
Protection. According to JIATF South officials, most of the non-DOD 
embedded personnel do not operate under memoranda of understanding, 
which permits greater flexibility in defining embedded personnel roles 
and responsibilities, thereby allowing more mutually beneficial 
relationships.[Footnote 38] JIATF South officials further stated that 
it is a continued mutually beneficial relationship which determines 
the length of stay for embedded personnel. Key elements within JIATF 
South are its Tactical Analysis Teams and intelligence liaisons, which 
support the flow of information between the U.S. law enforcement 
agencies and international partners in the joint operating area and 
the task force. The Tactical Analysis Teams and intelligence liaisons 
are placed in key locations in North, Central, and South America, 
Western Europe, and West Africa. These Tactical Analysis Teams and 
intelligence liaisons consist of one to two members co-located within 
the U.S. embassies or missions, are proficient in the local language, 
and serve between 2 and 5 years in country. They are often co-located 
with officials from the Drug Enforcement Administration at the U.S. 
embassy to further enhance information sharing between law enforcement 
assets in country and interdiction assets in the field. 

[End of section] 

Appendix II: Continuing Promise: 

The Continuing Promise mission is an annual humanitarian and civic 
assistance operation in the Caribbean, Central and South America led 
by U.S. Southern Command's (SOUTHCOM) Navy component, U.S. Naval 
Forces Southern Command. The mission provides training to U.S. 
military personnel and international partner nation forces while 
providing free medical care to communities with limited access to 
medical treatment, construction and engineering services, and 
donations and support to selected nations. It is executed in 
collaboration with other interagency partners, such as the U.S. Public 
Health Service Commissioned Corps, as well as nongovernmental 
organizations and other international partners. Specifically: 

* Training. The mission provides U.S. military personnel and 
international partner nation forces with training on using medical 
capabilities and conducting construction and engineering services and 
projects. The mission also provides training on how to plan and 
coordinate a broad spectrum of humanitarian assistance and disaster 
response missions. 

* Medical care. The mission includes general surgeries, basic medical 
evaluation and treatment, preventive medicine treatment, dental 
screenings and treatment, optometry screenings, eyewear distribution, 
veterinary services, and public health training. Follow-up treatments 
are arranged with local medical professionals. 

* Construction and engineering services. The mission includes civic 
action programs designed to assist each participating nation in 
providing local communities with a range of construction capabilities, 
such as building repairs and improvements, new small construction 
projects, utility system repairs and construction/technical 
assistance, pier repair, drainage projects, and trenching. 

* Donations and support. The mission delivers donated food and medical 
supplies to selected countries. 

As of June 2010, SOUTHCOM had conducted or scheduled four Continuing 
Promise missions. Table 2 identifies prior and future Continuing 
Promise mission ships, deployment dates, countries visited, and 
reported numbers of patients treated for those missions completed. 

Table 2: Continuing Promise Mission Deployment Dates, Countries 
Visited and Reported Patients Treated: 

Ship: USNS Comfort; 
Deployment dates: June to October 2007; 
Countries visited: Belize, Guatemala, Panama, Nicaragua, El Salvador, 
Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, and 
Suriname; 
Patients treated: 98,658. 

Ship: USS Boxer and USS Kearsarge; 
Deployment dates: April to November 2008; 
Countries visited: El Salvador, Haiti, Guatemala, Peru, Nicaragua, 
Colombia, Dominican Republic, Trinidad and Tobago, and Guyana; 
Patients treated: 71,000. 

Ship: USNS Comfort; 
Deployment dates: April to July 2009; 
Countries visited: Haiti, Dominican Republic, Antigua, Panama, 
Colombia, El Salvador, and Nicaragua; 
Patients treated: 100,049. 

Ship: USS Iwo Jima; 
Deployment dates: July to November 2010; 
Countries visited: Haiti, Colombia, Panama, Suriname, Guyana, 
Nicaragua, Guatemala, and Costa Rica; 
Patients treated: To be determined upon completion of the mission. 

Source: SOUTHCOM: 

Note: Patients treated include the number of basic medical evaluations 
and treatments provided during the deployment. It does not include 
general surgeries, preventive medicine treatment, dental screenings 
and treatment, optometry screenings, eyewear distribution, veterinary 
services, and public health training. 

[End of table] 

In July 2009, we observed the Continuing Promise mission while it was 
deployed in Nicaragua. During this visit, we observed the mission 
onboard the USNS Comfort and in two mission medical sites in 
Chinandega and Somotillo, Nicaragua. Deployed with the mission, in 
addition to DOD personnel, were U.S. Public Health Service medical, 
engineering, and environmental health officers, volunteers from 
various nongovernmental organizations and international partner nation 
medical professionals from Antigua and Barbuda, Brazil, Canada, 
Dominican Republic, El Salvador, France, Haiti, the Netherlands, 
Nicaragua, and Panama. Figure 9 lists the locations visited by USNS 
Comfort during Continuing Promise 2009, while figure 10 displays USNS 
Comfort activities during the mission. 

Figure 9: Locations Visited by USNS Comfort during Continuing Promise 
2009: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map of Central America and the 
Caribbean] 

Locations visited are depicted: 

Port Au Prince, Haiti; 
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic; 
St. John’s, Antigua; 
Colon, Panama; 
Turnaco, Colombia; 
La Union, El Salvador; 
Corinto, Nicaragua. 

Source: SOUTHCOM, Map Resources (map). 

[End of figure] 

Figure 10: USNS Comfort Activities during Continuing Promise 2009: 

[Refer to PDF for image: 3 captioned photographs] 

Surgeries are performed onboard the Continuing Promise during the 2009 
mission; 

Dentists work on a patient during the Continuing Promise mission; 

Canadian military personnel are involved in the Continuing Promise 
mission. 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of figure] 

In October 2009, we observed the initial planning conference for the 
2010 Continuing Promise mission. Table 3 lists the nongovernmental 
organizations involved in the 2009 Continuing Promise mission. 

Table 3: Nongovernmental Organizations Involved in the 2009 Continuing 
Promise Mission: 

2009 Continuing Promise Mission Nongovernmental Participants: 

Agua Viva; 
Alliance for Rabies Control; 
FACE; 
Food for the Poor; 
Haiti Resource Development Foundation; 
Hugs Across America; 
International Aid; 
Kazoobie Kazoos; 
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints; 
Lions Club; 
Nour International Relief Aid Foundation; 
Operation Smile; 
Project Handclasp; 
Project HOPE; 
Rochester Medical Missions; 
Rotary International; 
The Wheelchair Foundation; 
University of California, San Diego Pre-Dental Society; 
Islamic Relief, USA. 

Source: SOUTHCOM. 

[End of table] 

[End of section] 

Appendix III: Scope and Methodology: 

To conduct our work, we obtained and reviewed a wide range of 
Department of Defense (DOD), U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) and 
interagency partner documents, to include strategies, plans, polices, 
directives, after-action assessments and other documentation detailing 
interagency collaboration at the geographic combatant command level. 
In addition, we interviewed officials at many agencies including DOD, 
the Department of State, the U.S. Agency for International 
Development, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department 
of Justice to gain their perspectives on SOUTHCOM's collaborative 
efforts (see table 4). We selected these agencies to interview because 
they were identified by either SOUTHCOM documents or officials as 
playing key collaborative roles in SOUTHCOM's area of responsibility. 
To complement our broader view of collaboration effort at the command 
level, we identified two areas of collaboration to observe in further 
detail: illicit trafficking interdiction efforts and humanitarian 
assistance efforts. We chose these two areas based on our review of 
SOUTHCOM strategic objectives and based on the large involvement of 
U.S. government agencies, international partners, and nongovernmental 
and private organizations in these efforts and the timeliness of some 
of these efforts to our review. We supplemented our review with 
additional information regarding collaboration highlighted by 
SOUTHCOM, SOUTHCOM's components, DOD, Department of State, the U.S. 
Agency for International Development, Department of Homeland Security, 
and Department of Justice officials. 

Table 4: Agencies Interviewed During our Review: 

Name of agency: Department of Defense; 
Office visited during our review: 
* Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy: 
- Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Partnership 
Strategy and Stability Operations; 
- Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for 
Counternarcotics and Global Threats; 
- Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western 
Hemisphere Affairs; 
* Defense Security Cooperation Agency; 
* U.S. Navy: 
- Office of the Chief of Naval Operations; 
- Center for Naval Analyses; 
* Joint Staff: 
- Directorate of Operational Plans and Joint Force Development; 
- Directorate of Strategic Plans and Policy; 
* U.S. Southern Command, Headquarters; 
* Joint Interagency Task Force South. 

Name of agency: Department of State; 
Office visited during our review: 
* Bureau of Political-Military Affairs; 
* Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs; 
* Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. 

Name of agency: U.S. Agency for International Development; 
Office visited during our review: 
* Office of Military Affairs; 
* Office of Regional Sustainable Development, Bureau for Latin America 
and the Caribbean; 
* Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance. 

Name of agency: Department of Homeland Security; 
Office visited during our review: 
* U.S. Coast Guard; 
* U.S. Customs and Border Protection; 
* U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; 
* Federal Emergency Management Agency. 

Name of agency: Department of Justice; 
Office visited during our review: 
* Federal Bureau of Investigation; 
* Drug Enforcement Administration. 

Source: GAO. 

[End of table] 

To assess SOUTHCOM's efforts to enhance and sustain collaboration with 
interagency and other stakeholders, we identified best practices in 
prior GAO reports, and to determine the extent that SOUTHCOM 
demonstrated these practices, we interviewed DOD and interagency 
partner officials and reviewed related documents.[Footnote 39] 
Specifically, we interviewed SOUTHCOM officials and embedded 
interagency staff from the Department of State and U.S. Agency for 
International Development at SOUTHCOM's headquarters in Miami, 
Florida, in June 2009 to obtain their views on SOUTHCOM's 
collaborative efforts. In addition, we interviewed and gathered 
documentation from a number of SOUTHCOM's interagency partners in 
Washington, D.C., including officials from DOD, the Department of 
State, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Department 
of Homeland Security, and the Department of Justice to gain their 
perspectives on SOUTHCOM's collaborative efforts. We interviewed 
officials at Joint Interagency Task Force South in Key West, Florida 
in August 2009 and reviewed documentation including guidance, plans, 
and interdiction reports detailing the task forces' efforts. We also 
observed a humanitarian and civic assistance mission-the 2009 
Continuing Promise-in Nicaragua in July 2009, and attended mission 
planning sessions in Jacksonville, Florida, in October 2009 and Panama 
City, Panama, in December 2009, during which we interviewed U.S. 
government, international partner, and nongovernmental organization 
officials involved in planning and executing the mission. 
Nongovernmental organizations we spoke with included Rotary 
International, Project HOPE, University of California, San Diego Pre-
Dental Society, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and 
Inter Action. We also visited the U.S. embassies in Panama, Colombia, 
and the Dominican Republic in December of 2009, interviewing U.S. 
government and international partner nation officials to obtain their 
views on SOUTHCOM's collaborative efforts. Each country we visited had 
been visited during the 2009 Continuing Promise mission, supported 
SOUTHCOM's illicit trafficking interdiction efforts, and represented a 
different region within SOUTHCOM's area of responsibility: Panama in 
Central America; Colombia in South America; and Dominican Republic in 
the Caribbean. 

To evaluate SOUTHCOM's efforts to develop an organizational structure 
that facilitates interagency collaboration and positions the command 
to conduct a full range of military missions, we identified DOD's 
guidance for the organization of a combatant command as outlined in 
DOD joint publications, instructions and other documents, and analyzed 
SOUTHCOM's strategic documents, policies, guidance and directives 
outlining the command's mission, organizational structure, and staff 
functions. We interviewed SOUTHCOM and interagency partner officials 
from each directorate within the organizational structure in Miami, 
Florida, in June 2009 and reviewed and analyzed documentation 
regarding SOUTHCOM's 2008 organizational structure changes. We also 
conducted follow-up meetings with SOUTHCOM officials in Miami, Florida 
in April 2010 to obtain information on the effectiveness of the 
command's organizational structure in supporting international 
disaster relief efforts following the January 2010 earthquake in Haiti. 

We conducted our review from April 2009 through July 2010 in 
accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe 
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

[End of section] 

Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Defense: 

Department Of Defense: 
United States Southern Command: 
Office Of The Commander: 
Commander: 
3511 N.W. 91st Avenue
Doral, Florida 33172 

16 July 2010: 

Mr. John H. Pendleton: 
Director, Defense Capabilities and Management: 
U.S. Government Accountability Office: 
441 G. Street, N.W. 
Washington, DC 20548: 

Dear Mr. Pendleton, 

This is the Department of Defense (DoD) response to the Government 
Accountability Office (GAO) Draft Report GA0-10-801, "U.S. Southern 
Command Demonstrates Interagency Collaboration, but Its Haiti Response 
Revealed Challenges Conducting a Large Military Operation," dated July 
2010 (GAO Code 351338). 

The Department appreciates the opportunity to comment on the draft 
report and commends the thorough and balanced professionalism of the 
GAO Team throughout the more than year-long assessment period. 

The Department concurs with the GAO's two recommendations and is 
addressing these issues as quickly as possible to ensure readiness for 
future contingencies. The scale of the Haiti disaster would have 
challenged the response capabilities of any organization; U.S. 
Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM), with assistance from DoD and 
interagency partners, adapted quickly to the task and helped avert 
even greater suffering and loss of life in Haiti. 

USSOUTHCOM has aggressively tackled organizational issues identified 
during the Haiti disaster response effort, modifying its staff 
structure and comprehensively reviewing its allocation of personnel to 
meet mission requirements. 

USSOUTHCOM's ability to respond to the crisis quickly was in part a 
byproduct of close, collaborative relationships developed with a range 
of U.S. Government interagency partners over many years. USSOUTHCOM 
has striven to become a center of excellence in interagency partnering 
and has actively shared its experience and contacts with the other 
geographic combatant commands. 

Thank you again for the opportunity to demonstrate USSOUTHCOM's 
interagency capabilities and the constructive recommendations that 
will help the Command remain responsive to national security needs in 
its area of responsibility. Our point of contact for this matter is 
Mr. Todd Harvey, Director, J9 (Partnering) at 305-437-3660 or 
thomas.harvey@hq.southcom.mil. 

Sincerely, 

Signed by: 

Douglas M. Fraser: 
General, USAF: 
Combatant Commander: 

[End of section] 

Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

GAO Contact: 

John H. Pendleton, (202) 512-3489 or pendletonj@gao.gov: 

Acknowledgments: 

In addition to the contact named above, Marie Mak, Assistant Director; 
Richard Geiger; Mae Jones; Arthur Lord; Jennifer Neer; Steven Putansu; 
Michael Shaughnessy; and Amie Steele made major contributions to this 
report. 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] SOUTHCOM is one of the six geographic combatant commands included 
within the Department of Defense. 

[2] We use the term "other stakeholders" in this report to refer to 
international partners and nongovernmental and private organizations. 

[3] GAO, Interagency Collaboration: Key Issues for Congressional 
Oversight of National Security Strategies, Organizations, Workforce, 
and Information Sharing, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-904SP] (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 25, 
2009). 

[4] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-904SP], GAO, 
Results Oriented Government: Practices That Can Help Enhance and 
Sustain Collaboration among Federal Agencies, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-15] (Washington, D.C.: October 21, 
2005), and GAO, Results-Oriented Cultures: Implementation Steps to 
Assist Mergers and Organizational Transformations, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-03-669] (Washington, D.C. July 2, 
2003). 

[5] Humanitarian and civic assistance missions provide training to 
U.S. military personnel and international partner nation forces, while 
providing humanitarian assistance, such as medical, dental, and 
veterinary care and engineering projects to communities in need. 

[6] Geographic combatant commands are responsible for a conducting a 
variety of missions to include support to stability, security, 
transition and reconstruction operations; disaster relief; and 
humanitarian assistance, as directed. 

[7] U.S. commonwealths, territories, and possessions within the 
Caribbean are the responsibility of U.S. Northern Command (i.e., 
Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands). 

[8] SOUTHCOM operates three joint task forces. JIATF South, located in 
Key West, Florida, serves as the catalyst for integrated and 
synchronized interagency counter-drug operations and is responsible 
for the detection and monitoring of suspect air and maritime drug 
activity in the Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and the eastern 
Pacific. Joint Task Force Bravo, located at Soto Cano Air Base, 
Honduras, operates a forward, all-weather day and night airbase. The 
task force organizes multilateral exercises and supports, in 
cooperation with partner nations, humanitarian and civic assistance, 
counter-drug, contingency and disaster relief operations in Central 
America. Joint Task Force Guantanamo, located at U.S. Naval Station 
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, conducts detention and interrogation operations 
in support of the war on terrorism, coordinates and implements 
detainee screening operations, and supports law enforcement and war 
crimes investigations as well as the military commissions for detained 
enemy combatants. The task force is also prepared to support mass 
migration operations. 

[9] SOUTHCOM's three forward operating locations in Comalapa, El 
Salvador, Aruba, and Curacao, Netherlands Antilles, allow U.S. and 
partner nation aircraft to use existing airfields in support of the 
region's multinational counter-drug effort. According to SOUTHCOM, 
these locations are the result of cooperative, long-term agreements 
between the U.S. and the host nations. 

[10] SOUTHCOM maintains security assistance offices in Argentina, 
Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, 
Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, 
Honduras, Jamaica, Suriname, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru, Panama, 
Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, and Venezuela. 

[11] Information on SOUTHCOM's reorganization can be found in the 
command's written response to a House Armed Services Committee report, 
H.R. Rep. No. 110-652, at 409-410 (2008). 

[12] Memorandum from the Deputy Secretary of Defense, DOD 
Transformation Priorities (Oct. 24, 2007). 

[13] See GAO, Defense Management: Improved Planning, Training, and 
Interagency Collaboration Could Strengthen DOD's Efforts in Africa, 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-794] (Washington, D.C.: 
July 28, 2010). 

[14] Department of State's Mission Strategic and Resource Plans, 
formerly the Mission Strategic Plan, is a strategic document created 
by each U.S. embassy and consulate detailing (1) the mission's highest 
foreign policy and management priorities; (2) the goals it wants to 
achieve; (3) resources required to achieve those goals; and (4) how it 
plans to measure progress and results. 

[15] Illicit trafficking includes narcotics trafficking, weapons 
trafficking, human trafficking, and money laundering. 

[16] JIATF South was originally established in 1989 as Joint Task 
Force-4 when DOD was identified as the single lead agency of the 
federal government for the detection and monitoring of aerial and 
maritime transit of illegal drugs into the United States. See National 
Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Years 1990 and 1991, Pub. L. No. 
101-189, § 1202(a)(1) (codified as amended at 10 U.S.C. § 124). In 
1994, the National Interdiction Command and Control Plan created a 
national task force, JIATF South, which fully integrated the military, 
law enforcement, and intelligence agencies. 

[17] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-15]. 

[18] The Foreign Disclosure Tool allows information to be shared 
properly and quickly among stakeholders. 

[19] The international liaisons at SOUTHCOM include representatives 
from eight countries--Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, 
Ecuador, Peru, and Uruguay. 

[20] GAO, Results-Oriented Government: Practices That Can Help Enhance 
and Sustain Collaboration among Federal Agencies, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-15] (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 21, 
2005). 

[21] For purposes of this report, we use the term daily mission 
requirements to refer to the average workload expected to occur on day-
to-day basis for the next 3 years. 

[22] Department of Defense Directive 5100.1, Functions of the 
Department of Defense and Its Major Components (Nov. 21, 2003); Joint 
Chiefs of Staff, Joint Pub. 1, Doctrine for the Armed Forces of the 
United States (Mar. 20, 2009); and Joint Forces Staff College 
Publication 1, Joint Staff Officers Guide 2000. 

[23] Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction 1001.01, Joint 
Manpower and Personnel Program (Dec. 28, 2004). 

[24] Department of Defense, Unified Command Plan (Dec. 17, 2008). 

[25] The traditional joint staff headquarters organization generally 
includes directorates for manpower and personnel (J1), intelligence 
(J2), operations (J3), logistics (J4), plans (J5), communications 
system (J6), as well as additional directorates as deemed necessary. 

[26] The command strategy, formally updated every two years, provides 
overarching guidance for SOUTHCOM. The hemispheric goals of SOUTHCOM's 
Command Strategy 2016 were to ensure security, enhance stability, and 
enable prosperity. It also had one governmental goal--to transform the 
enterprise. These objectives were subsequently modified in SOUTHCOM's 
2018 Command Strategy to ensure security, enhance stability, enable 
partnerships, and evolve the enterprise. 

[27] U.S. Chiefs of Mission are the principal officers in charge of 
U.S. diplomatic missions and U.S. offices abroad. 

[28] Foreign Policy Advisors are senior Department of State officers 
within the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, Office of the 
Coordinator for Foreign Policy Advisors, detailed as personal advisors 
to U.S. military commanders to provide policy support regarding the 
diplomatic and political aspects of the commanders' military 
responsibilities. 

[29] According to U.S. Agency for International Development, Senior 
Development Advisors operate under memoranda of understanding with six 
of DOD's combatant commands--U.S. Special Operations Command, 
SOUTHCOM, U.S. European Command, U.S. Central Command, U.S. Pacific 
Command, and U.S. Africa Command--serving as advisors to the combatant 
commanders. DOD has provided corresponding military representatives to 
the U.S. Agency for International Development's Office of Military 
Affairs to improve day-to-day coordination and promote synchronization 
of efforts. 

[30] Joint Interagency Coordination Group is a full-time, 
multifunctional advisory element of the combatant commander's staff 
that facilitates information sharing throughout the interagency 
community. It comprises mostly civilian personnel with strong 
interagency experience who formulate, articulate, advocate, and 
implement the combatant commander's policies, priorities, programs, 
and procedures for interagency engagement. 

[31] SOUTHCOM's mission to support the federal government's disaster 
relief efforts in the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti, named 
Operation Unified Response, is in support of the U.S. Agency for 
International Development, which provides foreign disaster assistance 
and coordinates the U.S. government response to disasters abroad. 

[32] According to Joint Publication 5-0, Joint Operation Planning 
(Dec. 26, 2006), as an operation progresses planning generally occurs 
in three distinct but overlapping timeframes: future plans, or long 
term planning; future operations or near term planning; and current 
operations or current operations planning. 

[33] Joint Task Force-Haiti was established to support Operation 
Unified Response. 

[34] Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Pub. 1-0, Personnel Support to Joint 
Operations (Oct. 16, 2006) provides doctrine for planning, 
coordinating, and providing personnel support to joint operations, and 
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction 1301.01C, Individual 
Augmentation Procedures (Jan. 1, 2004), provides guidance for 
assigning individual augmentation to meet the combatant commanders' 
temporary duty requirements. 

[35] JIATF South's joint operating area covers the boundaries of 
SOUTHCOM, U.S. Northern Command, U.S. Africa Command, U.S. Pacific 
Command and U.S. European Command. 

[36] A go-fast boat is designed with a long narrow platform and a 
planing hull to enable it to reach high speeds and avoid interception. 

[37] A self-propelled semi-submersible is a vessel similar to a 
submarine that rides low in the water to avoid detection. 

[38] The Department of State Political Advisor assigned to JIATF South 
stated that his position operates under a memorandum of understanding. 

[39] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-904SP]; GAO, 
Results Oriented Government: Practices That Can Help Enhance and 
Sustain Collaboration among Federal Agencies, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-15] (Washington, D.C.: October 21, 
2005); and GAO, Results-Oriented Cultures: Implementation Steps to 
Assist Mergers and Organizational Transformations, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-03-669] (Washington, D.C. July 2, 
2003). 

[End of section] 

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