Introduction

Hello to you all. My name is Edward Westfall. Gahlren and the team here at ID have been kind enough to invite me to join the team as a part-time contributor. To regular readers, you may have seen me mentioned incidentally in some posts discussing the Coast Guard and strategic communications. I have been an author on an official unit blog in the past.

My posts here are done in an unofficial capacity. I am an active duty officer in the Coast Guard with over 26 years of enlisted and officer experience. I have served at sea for over 17 years and have commanded four cutters in that time. I have been stationed in a variety of locations in the United States, as well as at the US Embassy in Mexico City. I will be starting my JPME II at the National War College in the next few weeks.

For those that wonder, the Coast Guard is very supportive of unofficial social and print media authorship in both policy and practice (You can see the Coast Guard policy guidance starting on page 10-8, Online Self-Publishing, in the Public Affairs Manual here). Of course, I am required to place a standard disclaimer in any post that reiterates the unofficial nature of the post, so here it is:

The views expressed herein are those of the blogger and are not to be construed as official or reflecting the views of the Commandant or of the U. S. Coast Guard.

I am proud of my experience and certainly have thoughts and opinions regarding topics relevant to ID. That being said, I also recognize that expertise is relative and that my perspective on issues is likely not the only one. I plan on focusing my posts on topics such as strategic communications, social media at the field level, joint and multilateral operations, leadership and command climate, organizational planning and development, illicit trafficking interdiction, and Coast Guard familiarization. I also ask that you pass along any questions or topic ideas through comments or the e-mail link to the right.

Thanks for your interest. I appreciate the opportunity to tell the stories of the hard-working Coast Guardsmen I have had the good fortune to serve with, as well as provide whatever insights that I can. I look forward to your thoughts and comments as well.

Best regards,

Edward Westfall