In this second of three interviews, Major Greg Ford discusses serving as the division intelligence collection manager for the 101st Airborne Division and as the commander of Charlie Company, 311th Military Intelligence Battalion from the Kuwait border through combat operations to the Tall Afar area in 2003 in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Ford describes how time consuming his position as collection manager was and how utterly unreasonable he was in his demands on everyone to provide him with more information, always mindful that his efforts could make the jobs of those at the battalion level much easier. He also explains how much more difficult gathering intelligence becomes once a unit goes into the attack since ground-based sensors are rapidly bypassed, signals intelligence (SIGINT) assets are not in position to best support the unit, and human intelligence (HUMINT) sources disappear or become irrelevant. He describes how there were a number of instances where he felt intelligence had failed, specifically pointing to the battle at An Najaf as a fight which should not have been fought as it was, and to an impossible radar return indicating 500 tanks which could not have been there but which still absorbed scarce intelligence resources. He notes that once major combat operations ceased, many intelligence assets left, especially those associated with the Air Force. When Ford took command of his company, he found that the previous commander had lost the confidence of his brigade commander and Ford had to establish a reputation for providing a valuable product before his company could really be productive. He explains that half of his company was fluent in Korean and had to work hard to remain proficient in an Arabic environment. He praises the quality of his soldiers conducting HUMINT but says that their effectiveness was limited by a local culture which values age over competence. While placing a SIGINT team atop Mount Sinjar helped maximized their efforts in that area, he lost $500,000 worth of ground sensors along the Syrian border to wandering shepherds who would pick them up. Ford explains that there was a Turkish liaison team with them who was invaluable in collecting HUMINT from the Turkmen in Tall Afar, but they had their own agenda. He also states that professional development is an everyday process that rests with the individual. Ford closes this interview by saying that the modular brigades need a third maneuver battalion to provide the commander with sufficient flexibility.

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