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Introduction
The operational environment and threats to the United States have evolved drastically since Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. As a result, the curricula for both the Active Component (AC) Military Intelligence Captains Career Course (MICCC) and the Reserve Component (RC) MICCC were revised to meet current and future asymmetric threats. Shifting back to peer threats as described in FM 3-0, Operations, and the decisive action training environment in the Operation Unwelcome Guest scenario allows AC and RC MICCC students to regain essential military intelligence (MI) critical tasks and doctrine. Aspects of these MI fundamentals were lost during the last 15 years, when the basis of the focus and mission were solely on counterinsurgency operations.
The design of the RC MICCC is to develop Components II and III Reserve and National Guard officers and prepare them to provide commanders and staff intelligence support with a program of instruction (POI) nearly equivalent to the AC. This article will discuss the current curriculum structure and changes implemented to the RC MICCC in fiscal year 2017. It will also address the educational equivalency between the RC MICCC and the AC MICCC, showing that the RC MICCC is not only meeting the mission and end state of the 304th MI Battalion, but it is also exceeding expectations by producing the same caliber of intelligence officer as the AC MICCC in a constrained timeframe and non-resident environment.
Reserve Component Military Intelligence Captains Career Course History
The One Army School System concept generated past and present discussion among senior leadership regarding the equivalency between the AC and RC MICCC. The equivalency debate focused on POI hours and minimized the fact that active duty, U.S. Army Reserve, and Army National Guard have three distinctly different mission sets. Nonetheless, the RC MICCC is required to prepare future MI leaders to be successful in the fundamentals of intelligence support and warfighting. This poses a unique set of challenges and ignites several questions. For example, how do you measure the quality of an RC MICCC graduate versus an AC MICCC graduate? And, is the RC MICCC graduate meeting the same standard as an AC MICCC graduate with fewer (POI) hours?
Comparisons are different because of the unique backgrounds of RC officers. The professional...