Foreign Area Officer-Middle East/North Africa

Greetings to all members in this group.

* Requesting advice and assistance in joining this group and contributing. (Scouted out the links above without success.)

Am a U.S. Army FAO (Functional Area 48G Middle East - Arabic & Persian). Primary geographic concentration and operational experience encompass the Arabian Peninsula and Gulf (ARPEN) region, with some other short-term projects in Jordan, Turkey, Egypt, Sudan, and Yemen (counterpart VIP and military delegations visiting the US).

* IMPO, the USMC has a clear "sight picture" on the FAO-related functional area by establishing both FAO and Foreign Area Staff NCO (FAS) management system with professional development tracks and billets.

== BZ to the Marines, with special appreciation to the 24th MEU (SOC) of which hosted my US Embassy Turkey Field Liaison Team in NW Iraq durign Operation PROVIDE COMFORT I during spring-summer of 1991. The 24th MEU (SOC) was also an instrumental participant in an intelligence collection coup/masterpiece in regard to uncovering Saddam Hussein's clandestine program for R&D of nuclear WMD.

* USMC also has wisely assigned FAOs as OICs of the several COCOM-oriented Country Liaison and Training Assistance Teams (CLATs) at the U.S. Marine Corps Security Cooperation Group (MCSCG) at JEB Fort Story Little Creek, VA.

Any FAOs -- of all services -- who wish some bilingual references on (ahem) "military Arabic" and on features of Local Dialect Arabics (LDAs) prevalent in the ARPEN region is welcome to contact me at < shfranke@hotmail.com >. Similar items, albeit fewer, also available on request about the Persian ("Farsi") language, Iranians' communicative styles, and Iranian "operational cultures" (here borrowing the apropos term from USMC's CAOCL).

Regards to all FAOs. Today is Sunday, 9 June 2019.

Sincerely, Stephen H. Franke

LTC, FAO / MI / SOF / Attache /

Security Cooperation,

US Army Retired

San Pedro (Los Angeles Waterfront Area), California