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Meeting the Language Challenges of NATO Operations

Policy, Practice and Professionalization

Ian P. Jones & Louise Askew 2014


E-Book: 247 pages

Price: Free

Download: Meeting the Language Challenges of NATO OperationsPolicy, Practice and Professionalization (Jones & Askew 2014).



After 40 years of Cold War, NATO found itself intervening in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Afghanistan, where the ability to communicate with local people was essential to the success of the missions. This book explains how the Alliance responded to this challenge so as to ensure that the missions did not fail through lack of understanding.

About the Author

Ian P. Jones joined NATO as a linguist in 1976. He served as Head of the Linguistic Service at the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) from 1989 to 2011 and was responsible for coordinating the Linguistic Services in the Alliance’s permanent and peace support operation headquarters.

Louise Askew has worked as a linguist for the US Government, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and was Chief of the Linguistic Service at the NATO HQ in Sarajevo from 2000 to 2004. In June 2011, she received a PhD on the language policy of international organizations in post-Dayton Bosnia-Herzegovina. She now works as an interpreter for the International Committee of the Red Cross.