Early engagement

摘要

With Iraq behind it and the end of its role in Afghanistan scheduled for 2014, the operative term used by U.S. Army Human Terrain System managers these days is "Phase Zero." The term refers to sending small teams of Army human terrain experts to gather information about local populations -- their customs and sensitivities -- perhaps in peacetime and certainly before areas boil over into a conflict that might require a larger number of U.S. forces. Human Terrain System advocates see Phase Zero as a way for the program to survive in a more austere military, the likely result of flattened defense spending. That military "will not retain force structure in the ground forces for large and prolonged stability operations such as have been required in Iraq and Afghanistan," Deputy Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter said at a reporters' briefing in January.