ABSTRACT
Throughout the Afghanistan campaign, Sweden has deployed and employed organizational units that have not been part of its regular force structure. Despite a pronounced national strategy to develop and maintain a standing force structure of readily deployable units usable for operations in Sweden and abroad, several unique unit types have played a central role in Sweden’s largest military effort of the last decade. For example, in the beginning of the Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) era, small military observation teams (so-called MOTs) were not only the eyes and ears of the Swedish PRT commander in the remote provinces of his area of operations, but also his mouth and hands. Monitoring – the activity that the MOTs performed in their provinces and districts – actually defined the business of the PRT for several years, even though the MOT concept was something new and unfamiliar. Similarly, during the latter part of the campaign, operational monitoring and liaison teams (OMLTs), also an organizational novelty, were responsible for the core task of raising the proficiency of the Afghan National Army. None of these unit types were part of the Swedish Armed Forces force structure, yet they constituted core components of the contribution.
