Best Defense

Thomas E. Ricks' daily take on national security.

The growth of MNSTC-I

I was intrigued by this comment posted in response to Col. Dave Maxwell’s guest commentary in this blog last week eon the inexorable growth of U.S. military organizations: When created under then LTG Petraeus it was a tight little organization with about 4 total general officers and upwards of 1400 personnel over 55 locations. As ...

583421_090707_mnstc2.jpg
583421_090707_mnstc2.jpg

I was intrigued by this comment posted in response to Col. Dave Maxwell’s guest commentary in this blog last week eon the inexorable growth of U.S. military organizations:

When created under then LTG Petraeus it was a tight little organization with about 4 total general officers and upwards of 1400 personnel over 55 locations. As of last fall it now has…you aren’t going to believe this…13 general officers and two SES civilians (GO equivalents) over far less locations and the same personnel or less. How does an organization with actually less mission than it had (the MiTT’s and PTT’s all went over to MNC-I in 2006) grow the number of senior positions? All of these new organizations mean other staffs are drained of personnel to fill the all important combat mission.

Anyone got a good explanation for this growth of the top end?

Sniper One/Flickr

Thomas E. Ricks covered the U.S. military from 1991 to 2008 for the Wall Street Journal and then the Washington Post. He can be reached at ricksblogcomment@gmail.com. Twitter: @tomricks1

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