Flight Lieutenant Catherine Baily - IJC Logistic Planner Future Ops

Planning for complex operations such as MOSHTARAK involves a lot of agencies working together to make sure people; kit and materiel are in the right place at the right time. As well as dealing with all the Regional Commands in Afghanistan, Flight Lieutenant Catherine Baily deals with the Afghan logistics chain at the very highest levels.

“I routinely meet with Colonels and Brigadiers from the Afghan MOD and Ministry of Interior. At first they found it difficult to deal with someone so junior and with me being a woman too. However, they have now got used to me, particularly as they like dealing with the same people and they do see me regularly”.

Cath has found it interesting dealing with the mindset Afghans have towards logistics. Most of their planning is based on a Russian-centric concept of everything coming from a central supply; rather than the preferred hub and spoke approach used within ISAF processes. “We are trying to initiate a distributed system”, she says.

Her highlights to date have been involvement with Op MOSHTARAK. She worked heavily with Regional Command (South) and establishing supply nodes at Shorabak (Afghan National Army base at Camp Bastion) that both the ANA and Afghan police could tap into. This is no mean feat in getting Afghan military and police forces to work together when generally they prefer to work independently.

Another claim to fame for Cath was being the only military female officer to attend the recent International Women’s Day event in Kabul. “It was fascinating to see the range of occupations that women are involved in here in Afghanistan. Many of the women though are over 50 and much discussion was held over how younger women need to come through the system”.

Editor: Sqn Ldr S N Moore.

Photography: Corporal Dave Blackburn RAF