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Army MOS · Support

48J Foreign Area Officer, Sub-Saharan Africa

Current service use not established

This code is listed in the directory. Inclusion alone does not confirm current service use.

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Overview

A Foreign Area Officer specializing in Sub-Saharan Africa fills positions requiring expertise in Africa south of the Sahara. The officer applies regional training and language qualifications to these assignments.

Minimum clearance: TS/SCI

Core Skills

  • Regional political and cultural assessment
  • Political-military advice for senior decision-makers
  • Foreign military and interagency liaison

Civilian Career Paths

Career associations are editorial assessments of the cited evidence, not an official crosswalk unless the evidence explicitly says so. O*NET supplies civilian occupation information, not proof of a military match. Related experience does not confer civilian qualifications. Tasks and tools below describe civilian work, not military training.

Foreign Affairs Officer (Federal Civil Service)

Sub-Saharan Africa expertise and documented FAO political-military advisory experience transfer to regional policy analysis, briefings and advice to senior officials.

How to prepare: Build a federal resume mapping your actual regional and advisory assignments to an OPM 0130 basic qualification route: relevant education, a qualifying combination of education and experience, or four years of appropriate foreign-affairs experience, which may include suitable military service. Check the announcement's grade and hiring-path requirements; GS-12 and higher require the specified high-level specialized professional experience or direction and coordination of relevant professional work.

Notes & Sources

  • FAO assignments vary; match opportunities to duties actually performed and languages actually held, not every function in the classification.
  • The representative State Department GS-13 posting requires U.S. citizenship and a Top Secret clearance and is restricted to its stated State Department employee and career-transition hiring paths; it is not an opening available to all veterans.
  • This path is federal civil service, not the Foreign Service selection process.
Evidence for this guidance (4 documents)
  1. Army COOL MOC feed: 48J Foreign Area Officer, Sub-Saharan Africa

    [1] data/authority/army-codes.json entry 48J (OSD COOL feed, fetched 2026-07-25); DB rank officer, authority codeType officer

    Supports: Regional political and cultural assessment, Foreign Affairs Officer (Federal Civil Service)

  2. Army officer classification guidance: Foreign Area Officer functional scope

    [2] Section 3-48, version effective 202210, paragraphs a and b; use this version rather than the separately reproduced 201810 version

    Supports: Regional political and cultural assessment, Political-military advice for senior decision-makers, Foreign military and interagency liaison, Foreign Affairs Officer (Federal Civil Service)

  3. OPM: Foreign Affairs Series 0130 qualification requirements

    [3] Basic Requirements and Evaluation of Experience; retrieved September 2026

    Supports: Foreign Affairs Officer (Federal Civil Service)

  4. Department of State: Foreign Affairs Officer, representative federal role

    [4] Duties, qualifications and hiring-path restrictions; announcement P/IO-MPI-2026-0007

    Supports: Foreign Affairs Officer (Federal Civil Service)

Defense contractor jobs for 48J

Descriptions may be summarized for clarity. Verify all information with your branch career counselor or official military documentation before making career decisions.

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