| HN Mirror

My apologies. A few others have filled in for me. I'll expand a bit hoping to make it up to you.

CONUS is the contiguous/continental US. Generally used to mean "back home". Outside of CONUS is OCONUS. You wouldn't say OCONUS to mean a combat theater. The two terms are designations for military assignments rather than geographic shorthand. During a deployment to a combat zone (documented more frequently as a hazardous duty zone), you wouldn't say you were OCONUS. Stationed in Germany, however, you would.

An ODA is Operational Detachment-Alpha. It is an element of Special Forces, which is Army branch. You might be familiar with A-Team. There's also an Operational Detachment-Bravo. Their mission is to support the ODA. While it is true they are the 'B-team', it is more often that they are awaiting an opening on an A-Team (perhaps lacking experience), rather than being less stellar. Additionally, there is an Operational Detachment-Delta. Think Delta Force or The Unit. The three detachments differ in mission set and operational demands (intensity, perhaps).

A CONOP is a concept of operation(s). It is a proposal. One of the unique aspects of Special Operations Forces is the way they are engaged in the fight. Traditional units are given orders from higher command. They are told the objective and given clear guidance on how to best achieve the command's intent. Unconventional units, like an ODA, are very different. They are given the commander's intent, often in general language, and then propose operations to accomplish the intent. The practice was popularized with blitzkrieg. The depth of training given to an ODA is meant to ensure that they can conduct operations in the absence of centralized command (faster execution). When possible, CONOPS compete so that the best ideas for achieving intent are the ones that are chosen. This includes a CONOP that proposes to circumvent an engagement through careful execution of several small operations (a point I make because some might not know that raids are not common).

The intent is rarely to obliterate an area. More often, it is to disrupt or defeat the effectiveness of an oppositional force. Countless CONOPS have been approved, and later studied, for finding a way to win the favor of locals who might then refuse to support the operations of the oppositional force. Rather than scouring a country looking for fire fights, we more often try to bring medicine to remote areas. On occasion, we discover a desperate area. A CONOP is prepared to conduct extended operations in the area to establish a clear interest in the betterment of the locals and country. The hope is that word spreads that most of our work is productive, rather than destructive. An ODA traveling far from the main element, and with numbers only at a dozen or so, appears to be an easy target. The risk to the ODA is high and the gain is much higher for locals than the ODA. We once had an easy time communicating the importance of taking that risk to show locals that an ODA was very different from a conventional 'warrior'. Following 9/11 (that landscape shift of blame and CYA), it grew incredibly difficult to get such a CONOP approved.

Special Operational Forces have been quietly working to convince command from the bottom up that it is much more important to "win hearts and minds" than to crush everything that moves. This is the longest running tradition of Special Forces, which is why every SF soldier is required to demonstrate a functional proficiency in a target foreign language in order to graduate the training. It has always been our greatest source of pride that we deploy to liberate oppressed peoples, not triumph over poorly equipped opposition.

A bit off the mark from explaining acronyms but defining ODA would never have covered what it really means.