Proponent notes

Military Intelligence Professional Bulletin, April-June, 2002 by Eric Fatzinger

While we do not anticipate that things will ever get back to the way they were before September 11, we are starting to see some "normalization" of the personnel management system. We have taken many of the short-term actions necessary to meet and adjust to the War on Terrorism. The Army has made and implemented immediate stop-loss decisions, where appropriate, while additional stop-loss discussions are anticipated. We have made some staffing manning adjustments in support of the warfighting effort and others are ongoing. Everything is moving forward as smoothly as one could expect under the present circumstances. Therefore, our focus is now returning to the longer range planning necessary for managing and building the right-sized force for the transformed 21st century Army.

By the time you read this, we will be heavily engaged with finalizing our Military Occupational Classification and Structure (MOCS) input for fiscal year 2002 (FY02). Resubmission of the military occupational specialty (MOS) 98Y (Signals Collector/Analyst) proposal is at the top of the list. Warrant Officer (WO) accessions continue to be a priority challenge and we are working hard in this area. Resolution of officer intermediate-level education issues may be at hand, especially where it concerns functional area (FA) qualifications. The Army Staff should make decisions before the end of this year. We will continue our active involvement in this for both the Military Intelligence (Ml) area of concentration (AOC) (35) and FA34 (Strategic Intelligence). This office will monitor these decisions closely. The Director, Office of the Chief, Military Intelligence (OCMI), is Lieutenant Colonel Eric W. Fatzinger.

Enlisted Actions

Military Occupational Classification and Structure (MOCS) Update. One of the most repeated questions we have received lately concerns the status of MOS 98Y merger proposal. In a previous issue of the Military intelligence Professional Bulletin (MIPB), we noted that we had submitted the 98Y proposal in FY01 but that it had been returned for further study because of the anticipated significant impact on the Army's transient, trainee, holdover, and student (TTHS) account. This review continues but we remain on track for FY02 MOCS submission and inclusion of the 98Y proposal.

98Y History. Since the focus of this MIPB issue is on echelons above corps (EAC), and since the two combining MOSs in the 98Y proposal reside predominately at the EAC level, some extended discussion of this topic is appropriate. The two MOSs are 98K, (Signals Collection/Identification Analyst) and 98J (Electronic Intelligence Interceptor/Analyst).

The initial study effort to determine which signals intelligence (SIGINT) MOSs would be good candidates for merger identified three general functional categories for consideration. These were signals analytic, signals externals exploitation, and signals internal exploitation. When the U.S. Army Intelligence Center looked closely at 98J and 98K and the signal characteristics on which they focus, we saw them easily falling into the exploitation category for signals externals. Other SIGINT MOSs such as 98G (Cryptologic Linguist) and 98H (Communications Interceptor! Locator) predominately fell into the internals exploitation realm, and of course 98C (Signals Intelligence Analyst), and parts of 98J and 98K fell into the analytic realm. This commonality of 98J and 98K functions ultimately became the basis for merger discussions. The initial studies, discussions, and decision papers highlighted the fact that the 98Y merger would not be easy to accomplish. Nevertheless, the consensus of all of those studies and paper s was that it could and should be done. Countless discussions later, the concept has now taken the form of a proposal in the MOCS process.

Ultimately, discussions on the 98Y merger lead to the bottom line question of "What does the field get out of this merger?" The answer is clear. The 98Y soldiers will provide greatly increased flexibility in both mission management and dealing with a rapidly changing signals environment. It is our hope that commanders will be better able to react quickly and surge capability as needed when faced with unexpected missions. More importantly, the new multiskilled 98Y soldier will be readily adaptable to technology changes in the collection, analysis, and reporting equipment of our trade.

STAR MOSs. In past issues of the MIPB, the Proponent Office has often highlighted the need to address the STAR MOS issue. In this column, we would like to provide some insight on why we are so concerned about these MOSs.

By definition, a STAR MOS is one that has unfilled noncommissioned officer (NCO) authorizations at the Sergeant and Staff Sergeant levels, while having an inventory of non-boarded Specialists and Sergeants who meet the time-in-service and time-in-grade requirements for a recommendation of promotion. When we identify an MOS as meeting this criteria, we are concerned for three reasons: