More killing. Less good deeds
Started this thread, because I think this is spot on the money.
I like it because I think it is essentially correct. I hate it because this guy is saying everything I, and quite few other SWJ folks, have been saying for a long time, but just says it better. Plus being a Brigadier, can't hurt.
(I don't defer to rank, but the authoritarian tendency within most hierarchies does.)
I don't expect the "COIN-oil" folks to agree, but war is war, and winning wars hasn't really changed in 3,000 years.
History is not on the side of COIN...
Tom said:
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"Hearts-and-minds is also a strategy of exhaustion but one in which the enemy’s will to resist is undermined by largesse. "
Makes for a snappy read as in the 15 second sound bite to writing; does not reflect reality or COIN.
He's correct -- so is the statement he refutes. The COIN idea is more than largesse. However the COIN idea does rely on largesse to more than a small extent. The real truth is somewhere in between. That, however, is not the problem with COIN efforts, that problem is in application of COIN principle by a third party and not the government that has an insurgency issue. There are those who firmly believe in the need for such intervention and there are others that strongly doubt such interventions are or can be effective.
Those are two schools of thought. We are all exemplars of our inner selves. My suspicion is that if we could realistically categorize humans as pro-COIN or con-COIN, a heavy majority would be the latter and while an armed force can direct people to do things they do not agree with, the performance of people is enhanced when they believe in what they are doing and degraded if they do not believe. The basic problem is that the efficacy of COIN is in significant dispute; the rationale for its conduct is in dispute and the logic and / or morality of third party intervention is questioned by some.
This creates spotty performance which can exacerbate rather than solve the insurgency issue. That fact needs to be recognized.
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I agree that we need a clear view of Afghanistan. War is war is not a good start.
Maybe. War is war. That, as Wilf and Marc say, an aphorism and not an immutable fact -- but we need to recognize Afghanistan is a war; it is not a COIN operation. As was Iraq, it is more complex than that. In fact Afghanistan is far more complex and a far tougher nut than is Iraq. In any event, we are committed to a course in Afghanistan that entails the use of some COIN principles, no question.
kingo1RTR summarizes the current problem thusly:
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We must have the Afghan's 'hearts and minds' at the forefront of what we do if we are ever going see Afghanistan as a stable state that represents their culture and their way.
I suspect that is right at this point. We have started on a course and we have an obligation IMO to finish it reasonably successfully. He's correct that military victory is not on the agenda -- never was -- but an acceptable outcome can be obtained.
That is a problem with any COIN action, that's the best that can be hoped for in this era, an acceptable outcome.
The problem is that with an intervention, the slices of acceptability are smaller due to more players -- and the dominant player's "acceptable" may not coincide at all well with the goals and desires of the others -- particularly those who live in the nation that the dominant player can leave. Thus, that inclines the dominant player to go for a more warlike effort -- if his armed forces are involved -- than might the government with the insurgency.
Gian sums it up really well:
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It is time to get a clear view of what we think we are trying to do in places like Astan.
We are committed to an effort in Afghanistan. We should finish what we started.
Gian correctly addresses the broader issue for the future. What we should also do is determine whether this intervention stuff in other nations is advisable. We should then prepare to try to avoid such interventions OR be better prepared to perform them.
Either way, circumstances may dictate that we have no choice and must intervene -- but we need to insure that before we do, we sort out the roles and missions, understand the costs and that the armed forces are trained to perform the military functions and understand what those functions entail while the civil side of government is prepared and trained to undertake its responsibilities at the earliest opportunity.
Both J Wolfsberger and Entropy contribute very valid comments on the issue of Afghanistan. Points that should've been considered eight years ago -- and whose probable answers were known eight years ago...
marct:
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...then what are the limits of "war" if any?
Good question. I suspect the answer is that "You ain't seen nothin' yet." As my Mother used to say, it'll probably get worse before it gets better; a statement applicable both to Afghanistan and to war in general... :(
He then really wraps it up very neatly:
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... It's not that I disagree with you on the use of killing and destruction, I don't. What I disagree with is whether or not it "broke the back of the resistance". I would suggest that what it did was to establish, beyond an immediate doubt, that certain forms of "resistance" were currently "unacceptable" (and bloody dangerous to their advocates!). This doesn't change the likelihood of "resistance", it merely shifts the form of it.
And that is the problem with COIN... :wry:
It's an ill advised effort to solve problems that are better solved in other ways. If you commit Armed Forces to such an effort, you are placing an instrument of war in position to start and / or exacerbate a war and the probability is that it will not do that well. That can only end badly or, at best, with an acceptable outcome.
Acceptable to whom and for how long...
Defining the rules of the game
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Originally Posted by
marct
By that logic, I would argue that the US is engaged in an ongoing COIN campaign in LA - one, I would note, that they appear to be loosing ;).
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Counterinsurgency is military, paramilitary, political, economic, psychological, and civic actions taken by a government to defeat insurgency (JP 1-02).
Using the definitions of COIN found in JP 1-02 and FM 3-24, COIN is an action that a government takes to quell internal rebellion or strife. Along those lines, the only COIN that the US can accomplish is within our internal borders. When we intervene in another countries internal affairs, the matter is inherently difficult as we must pick a side. IMO, this distinction is important, and our failure to address the issue only muddies the waters. In effect, when we intervene, we are picking a side. In Iraq, we back the Shia-heavy government over the Sunnis. In Afghanistan, we back the Karzai-heavy government over the Taliban. Both governments were put in place through elections, and we are hoping that these governments will eventually stabalize internal strife AND share our collective national security interests.
Uboat suggests that those who rebel against the host governments do so out of ideology.
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They have an ideology (actually a series of ideologies, there is more than one insurgency going on. But that doesn't change the central point). That ideology is what attracts people to support and/or fight for them.
. In some cases, particularly AQ, I believe he is correct. However, many other insurgents are simply fighting over an internal power struggle. In Iraq, the majority of Sunnis refused to vote during the last election, and they simply are not willing to accept a Shia government. Moreover, many Shia groups within the government view their newfound power as payback time for years of repression and neglect during Saddam's Baath party rule.
Along these lines, I concur with Tom's comments in other threads as far as the current state of Iraq goes. For a time, we defeated AQI and Shia extremist groups, we stabilized the country, we continue to help build the Iraqi Security Forces, and we attempting to afford the Iraqis the opportunity to elect a permanent government. But how did we get here? I would suggest that this is where Wilf, COL Gentile, and Ken's points come in.
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1. Stop the violence.
2. Turn the country back over to its own people.
3. Leave.
Stopping the violence in Iraq was not simply population centric. Yes, in Baghdad, we secured the populace through urban reconstruction and secure neighborhoods, but in many other areas, we secured through blunt force trauma...i.e. killing bad guys.Rank amateur contends that
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Irregulars can control their loss rate by hiding in the population. Something the Luffwaffe - for exampe - couldn't do. Therefore, if you strategy is "kill more insurgents," your strategy is easily defeated.
I disagree. This statement assumes that one cannot seperate the insurgent from the populace.
So how do you find the enemy and kill him? Reconnaissance, Surveillance, Human Collection, and Targeting. As a company commander,
60-70% of ALL operations were devoted to intelligence collection. This allowed us to find the enemy. Next, we you find him, you attempt to persuade him to either join the government or settle his grievances on the political level. If he is willing, fine. If not, then you must attack and destroy him. At this point in the game, it is really that simple. Otherwise, the conflict is protracted and civilian casualties continue to soar.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, many General Purpose Forces (GPF) are transitioning to Security Force Assistance (SFA). In another time, these actions were known as Foreign Internal Defense (FID). In theory, Coalition Forces will mentor, train, and combat advise Security Forces. A conversation with several NCO's deploying on that mission disturbed me:
"So, when the Afghan Army refuses to do a mission, how will you react?"
"C'mon sir, you damn well know that we will do it ourselves."
I know this post has been long and covered the gambit of COIN theory to SFA to tactical operations, but I suppose it covers the difficult questions that we must attempt to answer:
What are we doing?
What should we be doing?
What can we accomplish?
There are no easy answers here, but I can attest that winning the hearts and minds is not one of them. Regardless, as long as the soldiers and marines are deployed, they will continue to fight the best that they can.
v/r
Mike
I agree with all you say.
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Originally Posted by
pjmunson
Some of the very simplistic arguments made in this thread are a bit disturbing. I know (hope) that the people making them have much more nuanced positions lying behind their short posts, but the black-and-white, either-or way in which the argument is being laid out by some is intellectually lazy at a minimum.
and will plead guilty to being intellectually (among other ways) lazy. It seems to me that you said pretty much the same thing Uboat509 said above. I agreed with him as well.
I'm not sure what's nuanced and what isn't and I'm also unsure anyone else has said anything that really contradicts either of you. No one that I recall has gone to a 'kill 'em all' position and no one has gone to a pure sweetness and light position. I just reviewed the entire thread to include re-reading Brigadier Kelly's comments and I have to ask:
Who has reduced it to an either or argument?
What, specifically is disturbing?
Thank you. Forest and trees problem on my part.
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Originally Posted by
pjmunson
Gian Gentile's post acknowledges that both killing and "hearts and minds" were used, but then states: "war is war, it is not "armed social science,"...but who is really arguing that you can fight COIN by hearts and minds alone?
No one here, really, not even Gian. He appears here from time to time and gets published in the Op-Ed pages of the NYT and other papers and has articles in the Armed Forces Journal among others. You will see occasional references to the 'Gentile-Nagl' due to the fact the Gian is Mr. Anti-COIN to the point of vehemence. Armor guy, had a Cav Squadron in I-rak , historian and now teaches that at West Point. His concern is that the Army overemphasizes 'the new COIN' (and as an active practitioner of the old COIN, it is new in many respects, not all improvements) to the detriment of it's primary mission which is war fighting. I tend to agree with him on all counts -- COIN elements are required; the Army should not go overboard as they are prone to do on the new COIN and so on. He's more vocal but then I'm shy and retiring.
That position is of course not shared with Dr. LTC Retired John Nagl, the author of "Eating Soup With A Knife." They've had some discussions back an forth here.
Neither Gian not I or any of the other 'war is war' folks who comment here deny there is a place for what is called COIN -- though it is really not that -- techniques. What we do say is that if you're committing Armed Forces to an effort there is or will be a war of some sort. War is war, unchanging but warfare is constantly mutating and shifting and COIN like TTP may be needed and the force must be able to apply them but don't lose sight of the larger effort -- preparation for the full spectrum of warfare.
Some say that COIN is the graduate level of warfare; I once contended that it is not -- it's like middle school with all the envy, cliques, in and out people and things, jealousies, backbiting and more. Stability operations can be psychologically demanding but they are not as challenging as major combat operations to any part of the force by several orders of magnitude. Gian agreed with that, John Nagl probably would not.
Wilf, BTW, is a consultant and author but he's also British -- when he was serving (during the Reign of George III...), they had a civil service that would fall in on any COIN effort and take care of the civil side leaving the Army to strictly military tasks -- as directed by said Civilians. Very different system. His 'war is war' mantra is 'cause he's a Clauswitz fan. That's all background. I knew all that and you didn't; it may or may not make any difference to your perceptions. Terribly long way of saying you can't tell the players without a program... :o
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The article rejects hearts and minds as a pipe dream...Germany; and abandon their cultural birthright of unrivalled hegemony over “Pashtunistan”...You aren't going to get Pashtuns to be eager "little Americans" but you can show them why it is worth their while to have you around.
Only if you can convince them you can keep the Talibs and all the other bad guys from visiting the villages in the night will they believe you are worthwhile -- and as soon as you do that, they'll want you gone. Afghans are not Arabs; they share some cultural similarities but they don't like the Ferenghee a bit better. I doubt that NATO et.al. will ever have enough troops to do that. So the 'COIN' approach cannot be fully implemented in Afghanistan and we'll have a hybrid op.
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At the end, I guess I just don't understand who is advocating a purely hearts and minds approach that doesn't advocate killing the insurgents to secure the population as an integral and primary goal.
No one to my knowledge; that's not the issue -- the issue is future strategy and force structure. Does the Army follow the Corps and go with some units tailored for stability ops? Does it adjust TOEs to provide units tailored for such ops. Brother Nagl is the President of CNAS and is presumed to have clout in high places; he and other think that's the way to go. Gian, me, others do not agree.
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And I'd also like to know what his vision of winning is since he labels his article as "How to Win in Afghanistan."
I thought he was pretty clear:
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""The approaches taken to countering insurgencies in Malaya, Vietnam, Northern Ireland and Iraq all contain some aspects that are transferable to Afghanistan but most are *. The counter-insurgency in Afghanistan is more intractable than any of these others.[* Believe a 'not' was omitted here / kw]
In Afghanistan a strategy focusing on the annihilation of Taliban power is the only way to achieve broad political progress...Until then NATO must be prepared to act as the proxy for the Afghan state in establishing control over the Pashtun population.
Without security there is nothing.""(all emphasis added /kw)
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My take on that is that he says more whittling down of the Taliban (and friends) or removal in some of way their ability to affect localities is required before the rebuilding can commence. My sensing from friends and all open sources is that is very much correct. Afghanistan is not an insurgency though there are aspects of one in place. It's a war with COIN like digressions.
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To me, it is disturbing that such a reductionist argument is still ongoing 8 years into this fight.
Me too. Though I'm not sure it's reductionist -- it is an effort to make sense out of a very chaotic situation that has been exacerbated over a period of eight years -- or, actually, over a period of eight or more one year or less tours with a number of people going in different directions and no unity of command.
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I would think that people would be arguing more about details rather than whether "hearts-and-minds" snake oil salesmen or people properly focused on killing and war as war has been for 3000 years are right. You need both and need to properly integrate all of your means and that is where the discussion should be: integration and synergy of the different means and ways.
True. That particular argument is not directed at Afghanistan other than peripherally. That argument is principally directed at FUTURE US Government policy, strategies and direction plus future (now in development) doctrine and force structure...
Afghanistan is on auto pilot with a coalescing mix of TTP -- no one's devoting much effort to it because what will happen there is pretty well locked in for the next three plus years.
It is simply being used as a How Not To Do It Training Aid by people on both sides of the very real doctrinal divide to point out their ideas for 2020. It's a big fight, it's real and has power players on both sides.
Sorry for the delay, two finger typist, sorry for the length, didn't want to leave much out; obviously discard all you think irrelevant. :cool:
They can and sure will be misused in our line of work
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Originally Posted by
Spud
I know its all semantics but it appears that semantics are everything in our line of work.
Mostly by those, who in the US Southern (Bogan like) vernacular, 'haven't never...' :wry:
in re: "Wilf is in the red-shorts" Yes, Marian did mention that... :D
I know. I didn't state my point well
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Originally Posted by
Tom Odom
I held that statement up as an example of putting a simple statement out and leaving it hanging as a 15 second sound bite.
It was but what I shoulda said was that it is a cheap shot but there is also danger in a myth that says we can buy support -- as you know, they'll take what you give and ask for more but that frequently doesn't change who they support. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. You have to try, no question but I think you also have to acknowledge that it sometimes isn't very successful and we sometimes buy / present the wrong things. The Hospital in Mosul comes to mind. It is not easy.
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The largesse the author refers to is targeted toward the population and shoring up their support for the government, not undermining the enemy's will to resist. Kill and capture is generally the best solution to the enemy.
Yep. Agreed. I'm sure you guys today do a better job than we did in Veet Nam -- a lot of Aid went to Chuck. Hard to tell who was who sometimes. Plus our 'Allies' sometimes cheated on us. Shameful behavior. :D.
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If the problem is as you state it, then state the problem, not a simplistic war is war aphorism as Wilf calls it, tautolgy as he so often uses it.
Stop with them ol big words, I ain't wrapped too taut. Nor very tightly either. ;)
On a more important note, you stay alert...
I'll put my thoughts forward and see what everyone thinks of it.
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Originally Posted by
William F. Owen
...but the vast majority of small wars have been won this way. That is inflicting so much pain on the enemy that he has given up military means. That is the limit of military power.
Those who say "Ahh... but the bad guys won by negotiation." Wallah! As long as the military has forced him to seek a resolution by peaceful means, then that is good enough. Military did it's job.
My perspective is (and I'll issue my standard disclaimer here - my experience is all in the trees so a view of the forest may be eluding me - hence my interest in SWJ and these forums) that the military serves a mission of greater scope than just the levying of military power. Like it or dislike it, mission creep is firmly entrenched in the NATO/ ABCA armies and we don't have to like it but we do have to work with it.
Military power is not just about 'inflicting so much pain on the enemy that he has given up military means', it is about either inflicting or threatening to inflict pain so that we convince, force or guide him into a course of action that is in-keeping with what we want.
In the current COIN environment the military is responsible for the sharp-end of persuasion, both in convincing the Afghan population that military opposition to us is too costly for them and futile, while simultaneously convincing them that 'our way' of security and governance brings greater benefit and prosperity than any alternative. Thus the 'limit' of military power cannot be neatly defined - we have to project power against the TB/ TB factions as you are saying, forcing him to either surrender or negotiative but simultaneously we have to present a viable alternative with the ANSF and development.
As to saying the military mission's success/ failure ends when the enemy accepts negotiation? Again, I'll put forward an alternative view. Having followed a number of your posts I'm well aware your a passionate Clausewitzian (and yes, I did just invent that term :) ) so I'll offer the view that with military endeavours being an extension of politics, political undertakings also require ongoing military activities. The military 'job' may be the continuation or threat of future violence to keep the enemy at the negotiating table or to increase the position of strength from which a settlement may be reached. It may also be maintaining sufficient forces and capabilities as deterrance to ensure the gains won.
Apologies if I am rambling - basically, I see the military mission as extending beyond merely forcing the enemy off the battlefield.
To put forward my own views, hopefully extending the topic in question and not taking away from it:
Yes, we do need 'killing' and violence in Afghanistan. Whether more or less I don't know.
What I do believe is that the military role should be related to security, incorporating both violence and the threat of violence to shape the population and eny in the AO in accordance with the friendly force mission. The military should be able to draw upon sufficient redevelopment resources to facilitate this mission through both the 'clear' and 'hold' phases of COIN to create security, providing the ability to bribe, persuade or convince the holders of power and the general population that our way indeed is a better way than the TB offer. Come the 'build' phase, however, civilian agencies must take the helm and become the driving force. Without doubt a military presence must remain in some sense but the main effort should change.
Simply put I think the military mission should be gaining consent amongst the population by the 'stick and carrot' application of military power, incorporating the ever-loved 'non-kinetic' effects to provide most of the 'carrot' that we can offer - reconstruction, prosperity, employment, etc. Nation building, reconstruction, capacity building - in my mind that is a civil/ state role that should be undertaken by civil players with the military in support.
And so ends my rant. The military job isn't in merely getting the enemy to the negotiating table, it's about getting him there while having shaped the environment so any negotiated success can be sustained. If that means the military has to engage in non-military tasks such as reconstruction then so be it - I just believe (and this was my contribution to the discussion) that the military should engage in the clear/ hold, and other actors should drive the build phase.
I trust I have grasped the essence and meaning of what you were saying William, and haven't debated away from the topic. I'm interested in this topic and accept my perspectives have been shaped more by personal preconceptions than by experience or wisdom, so I'm interested in your response.
Cheers! :)