It's all in the job title

One of the interesting little quirks is the details in job titles.  I am the Naval Forces Central Command liaison officer to Qatar, so I do things like coordinate training and events with the Qataris, as well as any joint operations.  I do NOT help sell things like US weapons or training to them - that is specifically outside my job description.  There are other people at the Embassy who do that sort of thing.  One of them is the Naval Attache' - another Navy officer at the embassy.  He has a different job scope and does much more 'big Navy' stuff, where I am mostly the conduit for the HQ in Bahrain.  The international attache' group gets together regularly for socials and each nation periodically hosts events and they get together... a few weeks ago there was an event on a warship from India, then Oman National Day, and then German National Day.  All are dress up affairs where they get together, eat, drink, and talk.  Part of the attache' job description is to host events like that.

I was invited to the India event, so I dressed up in Summer Whites and went down to the base.  A Frigate from India was there, and it was nice time.  They had a tent over the back of the ship (where the helicopter would normally go...) and people serving hors d'oeuvres, soft drinks, and later a meal and more adult drinks.

Banner celebrating the event

INS Trikand

 The fantail of the ship

There were people from all over, and though I mostly socialized with the ones I did know (from a couple of other attache' events I was invited to...)  I did get out and meet new people.  Besides briefly chatting with Chinese attache', I bumped into and talked briefly with the attache' from the Iranian embassy here.  Though our nations are not exactly friendly, I had a nice but brief chat.

One of the things we do is arrange for training of locals in the US - well, the attache' does that.  Given the recent events in Pensacola, one might question that...  But having US trained members in foreign military forces is a good thing, actually - it builds relationships that last a long time and helps cooperation.  Most of the more senior Qatari officers I work with have been trained outside of Qatar, though UK and France have trained the majority of them.  And we train a lot of foreign pilots in the US as well - the Iraqis trained their F-16 pilots in Arizona, for example.  So a logical thought after the recent events is to ban foreign students here, but that is NOT a good idea from a military cooperation perspective.  Though they might go to someplace like the UK or India, they could also go to Russia or China instead...