Army, Marine special operators fail to keep up with language training

[Timber Rattler]

https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2023/11/07/army-and-marine-special-operators-fail-to-keep-up-on-language-training/

Fewer than half of all Army and Marine Corps special operations personnel completed any of their annual foreign language training in recent years, prompting a call to overhaul how the community prioritizes and accounts for language standards, according to a recent report.

The Government Accountability Office reviewed five years’ worth of data and interviewed various special operators and commanders following a fiscal year 2022 congressional request for a report on the status of foreign language proficiency within special operations.

The GAO report also reviewed Navy and Air Force special operations language requirements. However, the two services discontinued or suspended their requirements during the period assessed, 2018 to 2022. The report noted that Air Force special operations approved a new requirement for SOF personnel in the newly formed Theater Air Operations Squadrons in May 2023. The report did not provide details as to why Navy special operations discontinued its language requirement in 2021.

Several SOF operators and commanders told GAO staff that training for other skills qualifications, deployments that did not require language training and a lower prioritization of the language training by their chain of command often meant that the training went uncompleted.

EXCERPT

Further erosion of basic military intelligence skills...

https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-105849

This part reeks of hidebound incompetence:

An official from the Army’s 10th Special Forces Group that manages foreign language training said that although French is an assigned language for SOF personnel, it is not widely spoken in locations within Europe where SOF personnel are deployed, and there are limited opportunities to work with French forces. Further, the official said the current environment in Eastern Europe means that speaking Russian (another assigned language) has limited use.

• Army SOF personnel that have been assigned to speak Russian told us that, in some countries, speaking Russian is culturally offensive and limits their ability to use the language.