During a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing prior to the congressional recess, Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) questioned Colby Jenkins, who performs the duties of Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict, about avoiding civilian harm while in combat.
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00:00I'm out of time. Chairman Reed, you're recognized.
00:03Thank you very much, Senator. Gentlemen, thank you for your service and your sacrifice and that of your family.
00:10And I endorse your tribute to the non-commissioned officers, General Fenton.
00:17I would be in Fort Leavenworth, not the military side, the other side, without my NCO. So thank you.
00:25I think we all would.
00:26Yes, sir.
00:27Ms. Jenkins, SOLIC is a work in progress, and I think we're making great progress.
00:36We want, as we envision, a service secretary like civilian overlooking the special operations.
00:46And I would note in the prepared partial statement for today, it says,
00:50SOLIC requires the requisite tools, workforce, and resources to accelerate the implementation of these priorities.
00:57And enable special operations to be the most effective, disciplined, and strategically relevant force it can be.
01:04Could you tell us what additional tools, workforce, and resources you need?
01:09First, thank you.
01:09And thank you to Congress for having the vision and foresight to make sure that SOLIC exists,
01:15that we do have the tools that we do have right now.
01:17And I'd just like to point out, thanks to Section 922 and Congress's vision, you can see the physical manifestation back here with Dr. Sandra Hobson,
01:26who's the first to sit in that position that 922 facilitated.
01:31So we are underway in establishing the service secretariat side of special operations, and that's thanks to Congress.
01:37So we welcome your continued engagement and reinforcement.
01:40In terms of additional authorities or funding that we would need, we certainly welcome that, your continued engagement.
01:47One area that comes to mind is in the realm of talent management.
01:51We want to make sure that SOF officers and enlisted leaders, that we have the ability as SOF enterprise leaders to advocate for their advancement,
02:00just like our service counterparts would for theirs as well.
02:06As a Green Beret, I come from the Army, but I'm also a SOF officer, and so we want to make sure that we have that.
02:12Then in terms of acquisition authorities, we welcome additional discussion on how we can have more agile, more abundant acquisition authorities
02:20so that we can answer the need of those quick problems that we encounter out on the battlefield
02:25and be able to innovate and modernize and fund those accordingly.
02:29Thank you very much.
02:30And General Fenton, from your perspective, have you seen the benefits of this empowered senior civilian-like secretary?
02:41Senator, absolutely.
02:43I think this will be my third time at this table saying how critical it is, how much we appreciate the work this Congress has done in that arena.
02:50I think the first thing I offered you before, and maybe even yesterday, and thank you for the office call,
02:55was that having Secretary Jenkins at the service secretary tables, along with the SECDEF, representing special operations and SOCOM issues is critical.
03:05And I think about that on the service side of the SOCOM organization.
03:10I'm also advocating for issues that support our service members, our civilians, and our family members, and those run the gamut.
03:19Certainly the human performance program, preservation of the force and family, and many other items that we have inside of our enterprise.
03:28I would also offer, in terms of thinking through modernization and certainly transformation.
03:33So I think there's a great deal that we've been able to achieve together as a team of teams in the SOF enterprise.
03:40Well, thank you very much.
03:41And after some notable civilian casualties several years ago, the Department of Defense set up the Civilian Harm Center of Excellence.
03:50And in the last year's prepared statement submitted, it pointed out that these policies and procedures outlined by the Department through the Center assist with counter-violent extremist organizations' efforts as they prevent the underlying dynamics from creating more extremism.
04:08I think in layman terms, it means if you're out there and you're hurting a lot of civilians, the reaction is the enemy gets more recruits, essentially.
04:19But I've heard public indications that the Department is considering to rescind the policy guidance and to eliminate the Center of Excellence.
04:30Mr. Jenkins, what's your understanding of that?
04:34First, Senator, thank you for pointing that out.
04:36We agree that the ability and requirement to mitigate and limit civilian harm on the battlefield is paramount responsibility for us.
04:45And second, it's the law.
04:46It's the law.
04:47And so we have to be respondent to that.
04:51I can also say there have been no decisions made on what the program may be called or the form that it will take.
04:58But the requirement and the need to report back and make sure that we are always mitigating civilian harm will always be present, no matter what it's called or how it looks.
05:07And again, let me answer the point.
05:10It's not only the law and the sense of humanity.
05:14It's also a very practical situation because by antagonizing the population, you lose ground.
05:22Yes, sir.
05:22It's irregular.
05:23You don't gain it.
05:25Just a general final question.
05:26Can you say if SOCOM has received adequate support from the center and that you've had – it's been an asset to your operations?
05:36Senator, I'm not – from the center?
05:38From the center.
05:40Senator, I think certainly.
05:41Certainly, as we've thought through it, I go back to Secretary Jenkins' piece.
05:46We absolutely, as your SOCOM team, always aim to do the mission, especially in the kinetic ops that you're referring to,
05:53and then protect noncombatants and civilians as part of who we are and what we stand for.
05:59And I think, to your point, that sends a very powerful message across the globe that we're there to eliminate or disrupt a bad actor,
06:10yet at the same time protect innocents and vulnerable and noncombatants.
06:15That's a very different signal from a nation.
06:17And that's what your SOCOM team works for every day.
06:20Madam Chairman, thank you.