A Conversation with Dr. Douglas Porch
A Conversation with Dr. Douglas Porch
Entry Excerpt:
A Conversation with Dr. Douglas Porch:
Relooking French Encounters in Irregular Warfare in the 19th Century
by Michael Few
Download the Full Article: A Conversation with Dr. Douglas Porch
To complement the recent interviews conducted by Octavian Manea, we reached out to the defense analysts experts at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA. In the first interview of this series, Dr. John Arquilla described how he felt that French Encounters with Irregular Warfare in the 19th Century can inform COIN in our time. This rebuttal comes from Dr. Douglas Porch, a historian in the National Security Affairs (NSA) department. This department specializes in the study of international relations, security policy, and regional studies. NSA is unique because it brings together outstanding faculty, students from the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines, National Guard and various civilian agencies, and scores of international officers from dozens of countries for the sole purpose of preparing tomorrow's military and civilian leaders for emerging security challenges. Notable alumni from the NSA department include LTG William H. Caldwell.
Download the Full Article: A Conversation with Dr. Douglas Porch
Douglas Porch earned a Ph.D. from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge University. Currently, he is a Professor of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School.
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Porch shines a torch on COIN
Professor Douglas Porch, of NPS, has a new book due out at the end of July 'Counterinsurgency: Exposing the Myths of the New Way of War', which is likely to arouse interest, if not controversy.
From the summary:
Quote:
Douglas Porch's sweeping history of counterinsurgency campaigns carried out by the three 'providential nations' of France, Britain and the United States, ranging from nineteenth-century colonial conquests to General Petraeus's 'Surge' in Iraq, challenges the contemporary mythologising of counterinsurgency as a humane way of war. The reality, he reveals, is that 'hearts and minds' has never been a recipe for lasting stability and that past counterinsurgency campaigns have succeeded not through state-building but by shattering and dividing societies while unsettling civil-military relations.
(Elsewhere)The reality, he reveals, is that 'hearts and minds' has never been a recipe for lasting stability.
Link:http://www.amazon.com/Counterinsurge...=douglas+porch and http://www.amazon.co.uk/Counterinsur...=Douglas+Porch
A very partial review by a Guardian journalist, which includes this:
Quote:
The book came from listening to his students, many of whom are seasoned officers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan and who repeatedly told him that COIN hadn't a hope of changing the countries for the better. And when he lost two students to "green on blue attacks", he felt an obligation to expose the official doctrine and, in some way, to stop scholarship being militarised.
Link:http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...oad?CMP=twt_gu
Professor Porch's NPS entry:http://www.nps.edu/Academics/Schools...lty/porch.html
I have read and enjoyed two of his books on French military history.
Porch and Gentile books ordered....
http://www.amazon.com/Wrong-Turn-Ame.../dp/1595588744
Both have books on COIN coming out and I've pre-ordered both (I think I've mentioned that in a previous thread around here. Maybe I won't be so lazy for a change and write up a review or something. I also plan to read what I suppose might be a bit of a rebuttal, the book by Peter Mansoor on the surge.)
Sorta kinda related to the point made on the 'benevolence' of "hearts and minds", a recent review:
Quote:
“The Imperial lion has roused itself, invoking the Spirit of Clive and of Hastings and Dyer, he roars again,” observed The Daily Tribune in August 1942. Tiring of Gandhi and the Indian National Congress agitating during the war, the British Raj unsheathed the sword. Mass arrests, censorship, and suppression of civil liberties coerced India’s cooperation against the Axis Powers. All pretense of enlightened benevolent rule vanished as Britain showed that its empire, like all others, rested on force.""
http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin...iberal-empire/
As I said in a note to a friend, the last sentence seems to be the point of the papers by Porch that I've read: that force mattered.