Friends and Colleagues:
Greetings to one and all, in a little over three months we will gather In Zambia to once again plot and strategize on how to make AFRICA ENDEAVOR 2013 the best AFRICA ENDEAVOR exercise ever. Though four months seems like an eternity away, the facts of the matter is that for us Americans, it is a period of time that is replete with significant holidays. Veteran's Day on November 11, The Thanksgiving holidays, 22-25 November, and of course the Christmas and end of year celebrations which seem to occupy the whole of the last week of December and the first week of January. All of which to say is that time is going to be flying by and we will find ourselves with February just around the corner.
CDR Bryan McRoberts just returned from conducting a pre-deployment site surey (PDSS) and he is very pleased to be able to report that our Zambian hosts have the situation well in hand not only for the Main Planning conference, but for the exercise itself. It is now up to us, all of us, to make sure that their efforts are matched by our common efforts.
The Scenario Development Group is already hard at work preparing a set of documents that will move the scenario portion of the exercise in a manner to will more closely reflect the issues faced by communications and signals officers.
The Procedural Working Group is gearing up to more closely incorporate into the scenario and the training portions of the exercise, the signals procedures that have been developped by the African Union for use by the African Stand-by Forces. Much thought is also being given to the interaction of the procedures developped and used in anticipation of their continued use during the course of AMANI AFRICA II which is to occur in 2014.
I will be communicating with you on a regular basis between now and the conclusion of the exercise. I am urging those of you who of course are already member of the AFRICAN ENDEAVOR community on APAN to assure that the new AFRICA ENDEAVOR participants join APAN as soon as possible as we are going to be passing and sharing information on APAN and are planning on using it extensively during the course of the exercise.
Best Regards,
Patrick Ganne
Looking forward to welcoming all the delegate in Livingstone Zambia in January for the MPC as well as in Lusaka for the exercise.