Perry Center facilitates tabletop exercise to examine Guyana’s crisis response

The William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric Defence Studies on Tuesday facilitated a role-play tabletop exercise to examine Guyana’s crisis response.
Hosted by the Guyana Defence Force (GDF), the inaugural exercise here, called “KRISIS!” was done in partnership with the Guyana Government. It targeted 35 senior security and defence sector participants and observers in Georgetown.
“KRISIS!” examines the ability of government – institutions, procedures, personnel, protocols, legal frameworks, etc. – to respond to crises and disasters. Exercising crisis response allows participants to diagnose problems, identify gaps, and employ potential corrective measures. The Perry Center designed and facilitated the simulated exercise, which employs multiple disaster and crisis response scenarios – both natural and human-made – complemented with focus areas such as mission analysis, strategy development, and strategic communication.

In opening remarks, Perry Center Director, Dr Paul J. Angelo, noted the exercise “was developed to address the need to frequently review and revise decision-making processes and procedures to enable effective and rapid response in ever-changing landscapes.”
Dr Angelo added that “its application is not limited to crisis response but will inform and improve steady-state decision-making. The fact that Guyana and our partners in the Guyana Defence Force have offered to host our first-ever KRISIS! exercise speaks volumes about the level of trust we have built over the past 27 years with Guyana. We are honored and proud to be here.”
The Perry Center has a strong, collaborative relationship with partners in Guyana. During his visit, Dr Angelo also met with institutional partners to discuss ongoing and future collaborative efforts.
This visit by Dr Angelo builds upon his previous March trip to Georgetown to present the William J. Perry Award for Excellence in Security and Defence Education to the University of Guyana in recognition of the University’s Master of Science in Strategic Development Studies programme.
Distinguished Perry Center alum President Dr Irfaan Ali had participated in the March ceremony, and in two Perry Center-hosted forums in Washington, D.C.
In his address at the UG Turkeyen Campus in March, President Ali had said that with this recognition, the university is being positioned as “a central hub” for security training and integration of defence leadership in the region.
Consequently, the Guyanese Head of State had noted that UG will be the host of the National Defence Institute, which will be a “subset” of the United States’ National Defence University.
“We intend …this year to bring into establishment, the National Defence Institute. We are hoping that the home can be right here at the University of Guyana. So, we intend to have the defence national institute that will be a subset of the national defence university here because we find alignment between the academic curriculum and the strategic thinking of the national defence institute.”
President Ali went onto say that programmes and collaborations such as these will see the further development of the intellectual minds of those who are responsible for security policies. He noted the aim is for the National Defence Institute to serve the Caribbean Community (Caricom) as well as other regional partners such Brazil and even Venezuela.
“This partnership is about positioning us as a country and we want to position Guyana and the University of Guyana and the National Defence Institute as the premier regional security institution, where not only persons within CARICOM but we are looking beyond CARICOM; we are looking at Brazil as a major stakeholder and why not even personnel from Venezuela to be a part of our security infrastructure from an institutional perspective, from a training perspective.”
The William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric Defence Studies supports the community of security and defence professionals in the Americas to pursue collaborative approaches to mutual opportunities and challenges.
Through academics, research, and outreach, including ministerial-level consulting, we advance sustainable institutional capacity, strengthen the rule of law and democracy, and promote a greater understanding of US policy throughout the Western Hemisphere. Located at the National Defence University, the Perry Center is a US Department of Defence regional center for strategic studies.