Government and military work is where this network began. Since 1995 our Russian interpreters have supported federal agencies, uniformed services and their contractors on assignments that range from a two-hour briefing to a six-week field exercise: bilateral talks, arms-control inspections, technical exchanges between laboratories, flight-line and ship-board training, and the long evenings of hospitality that follow the official program.
What this work demands is not only language. An interpreter on a military assignment must understand rank and protocol, keep up with acronyms that change from one command to the next, hold a composure that does not crack in a tense room, and know when to render every word and when a speaker expects a cleaner version of what he just said. Most of the interpreters we assign to this work have passed the U.S. Department of State interpreting examination at the conference level, and several have thousands of hours on cabinet-level and flag-officer assignments. Where an assignment requires it, we can propose interpreters who hold or have held a security clearance, and we are used to the paperwork that comes with access to a base or a facility.
We work in both modes. For plenary sessions and briefings we provide simultaneous interpretation with our own portable equipment or a full booth system; for working groups, inspections and site walks we provide consecutive interpreters who can keep pace with engineers and operators in the field. Travel anywhere in the United States or abroad is routine for our people, and all of them hold the documents to do it.
If you are planning an exchange, an exercise or a visit by a delegation, send us the dates, the location and whatever you can share about the subject matter. We will come back within a day with the names and backgrounds of the interpreters we propose and a firm estimate.
