MAJ Eric Ala served as an individual augmentee with the Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan (CSTC-A) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Training Mission-Afghanistan (NTM-A) in Kabul, Afghanistan during 2009 and 2010 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF). In this May 2011 interview, MAJ Ala discusses his training and deployment as an individual augmentee, the challenges of implementing an accountability system for supplies in Afghanistan, and some of the frustrations he experienced with his changing mission. MAJ Ala concludes his interview with the observation, "The whole IA timeline should be really 12 months. I could see nine months but I can't see anything less because of the complexity of what you're trying to do over there and being able to grasp the situation to be able to do something with it. That requires a certain amount of time to acclimate yourself to the environment."

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