WEBVTT

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Today we have in training across

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Afghanistan , 58,000 Afghan

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recruits or Currently serving soldiers

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or policemen who are in literacy

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programs . 58,000 in training since

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last April , we've already graduated

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61,000 . So we're about 120,000

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have either been trained or in training

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at this point . Now that's significant .

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When you look at The whole security

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force today is about 270,000 people ,

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approximately Just a little higher ,

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but about approximately 270 . And

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we've got 100 and 20,000 either being ,

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have been trained or in training ,

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being brought up to about a first grade

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level where they can do numbers ,

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simple math and write their name and do

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a little bit of reading . We equalize

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the pay between the army and police .

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They now get paid parody . So whether

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you're a brand new policeman or brand

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new soldier , you get paid the exact

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same thing and then we then incentivize

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paid too so that if you've served three

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years or longer , you get increasing

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your pay . So for longevity you get

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additional paying increments . We also

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recognize that if you're serving in a

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hazardous area like Hellman or Kandahar

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or someplace like that that we're going

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to pay you additional money every month

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to because you're in a high threat area

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where there is a lot of insurgent

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activity . So you get extra pay for

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that and then if you get promoted , you

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get extra pay for that . And then if

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you have a very unique specialized

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skill set like an explosive ordinance

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person or counter I . E . D . Person

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improvised explosive device person , we

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give you additional pay beyond that .

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So a brand new soldier today or

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policemen will draw the basic living

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wage which is about today .

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165 U . S . Dollars is what it

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is here in Afghanistan . And then you

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get additional these additional pays on

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top of that . So they actually are

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making a decent wage . Now being a

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member of the armed forces or the

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police forces in Afghanistan . We

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started the vocational schools , we

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call branch schools in the military but

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their vocational schools where we teach

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him communications , we teach them

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maintenance , we teach them logistics ,

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you know we teach them those kind of

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things that will make this army self

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sustaining out in the future . It's not

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going to happen for a couple of years .

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But we've got to start training

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soldiers today building the units and

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then starting to put them into action .

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The leader thing there is very very

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important . We recognized that the

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shortage of leaders was having a real

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impact on um morale , attrition

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retention and everything else . So we

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literally kept building more leader

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development programs And opening more

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leader schools here in Afghanistan to

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where we've increased as you can see by

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about about 500% . Now you do qualify

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in your weapon . If you go out to one

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of our rifle ranges today and again I'd

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love to take it out and let you just

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wander through a training facility or

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retraining folks . One of our 70 of

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them you'll see on the , on the

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Marksmanship range , two Afghan

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recruits And one NATO trainer . I mean

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it's that's the ratio now . So they're

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getting that individual personalized

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attention when they go on the rifle

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range Than in other classes of maybe 1

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- 20 . But it's better than it used to

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be , about 1-70 . So much more

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personalized attention in the training .

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And again , another thing we've been

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really proud of , Leaf . We wanted to

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set it up so that we could develop an

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indigenous capacity inside of

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Afghanistan so they can produce their

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own uniforms , their own boots , their

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own t shirts , pillowcases , blankets .

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Um and so we set up a program where we

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reached out to prospective business

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people who are willing to start a

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business and worked by giving them

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basically almost see money that if they

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could prove that they could develop

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something , they had a business

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development plan and they just needed

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some money for us to upfront pay for

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their first product that would meet a

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certain quality of standard . Also ,

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then we started doing that and I can

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talk more about that . But we're We're

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really excited today because all of our

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boots , we now buy today are 100% made

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in Afghanistan . All of our uniforms

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are 100% made in Afghanistan T shirts ,

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socks . When you think about it , it's

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a 300,000 person security

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force we're building , that's a lot of

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uniforms and boots and everything else

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for the new people coming in . You know ,

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we've made it mandatory in every one of

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our programs that you have to go

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through literacy training And we've

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hired 100% just Afghans to do the

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teaching too . So we have all Afghan

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teachers , there's no International

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teachers doing is 100% Afghans , um who

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can do it much better than any of us

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could . So We , in the training base ,

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it's 100 taught by Afghans and

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everybody does it 100% mandatory , but

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we do recognize that there are a lot of

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police and army out there today that

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never had the opportunity to go through

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what we're doing now . So we're now

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starting to hire teachers and send them

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out to Police Districts and two Army

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Course . Um , so that the units that

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have already been fielded that are

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operating today now have the

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opportunity to bring people in for

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different time periods and actually

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have them go through literacy training .

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Now , we're just at the beginning of

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that , I don't want to over sell it .

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We recognize the need for it , we're

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starting to hire teachers to do it ,

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but it's going to take us probably a

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good year to fully implement that out

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in the field of force . The key is

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we know we need to do it , we've begun

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the process and we'll just keep

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expanding that over this next year ,

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you know . But it won't happen

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overnight . I'd say another big part

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about all this too is when we bring

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somebody who want to teach them .

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Communications remain tense . What

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we're finding is , even though we put

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them through that basic mandatory

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training up front and get up to about a

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first grade level , that's not

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sufficient enough to go into

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maintenance training or communications

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training . So what we're having to do

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is We'll put him through our initial

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eight weeks of entry training With 64

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hours of literacy training in there and

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get him about a first grade level .

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Then we pull them off for two full

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months of nothing but school , we just

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went to school for two months , so we

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get them up to a third grade and once

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we get them up to the third grade level ,

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we then start the communications

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training in the maintenance training .

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So the training pipeline , the time

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period it takes to produce a

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communications person or a Maintenance

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person is a very long time . It's 5 , 6

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months . Got to do that now . So we're

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starting to do that for , for key

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vocational skills . You know , we're

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teaching engineers now and we have to

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teach them how to use a a tape measure

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to measure something . So you can cut

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things the right way well , they have

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to know their numbers to read the tape

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measure . And so it's proven very

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challenging . But we've now put the

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programs in place just specifically

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train them so that they can get

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educated enough to be able to master

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that skill in the next level of their

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training .