Sanctuary (or perhaps just area) denial operations at the Afghanistan village level

[Bob's World]

Western Doctrine has become a bit "phase-obsessed" of late. What can be a helpful organizational construct in general, can in fact, become a mental straitjacket as well.

Often it is far more helpful to think of your operations in terms of what phase YOUR OPPONENT is in, in a given area, with a given populace, perhaps even time of day. Particularly this is true for COIN, which, by definition is a counter to another's operations.

Instead of thinking in terms of I need to get from Shape to Clear to Hold to Build (becuase you can do all of those things in theory and not affect what phase the insurgent is in a single, significant bit); it is to my way of thinking far more instructive to have your intel guys (hey, after all they love to brag how intel drive ops...) produce a product for you that shows you what phase the insurgent is in across your battlespace.

In this village or district they may be in phase I during the day, but surging to phase II at night. In this city they may be in high phase 0. In a district along historic ratlines in the mountains they may well be in Phase II 24-7. The goal never being to get your own operation to "Build," but rather to reduce the insurgent operations among critical populaces first, but expanding to everywhere, to Phase 0. This does not mean an end to insurgent activity, merely that you have reduced violence to below the socially acceptable level for that particular culture and populace, and have brought the populace within the ability of the civil governance to serve without military assistance.

Perhaps that is too disorderly for a SAMS trained planner to work with; but insurgency by its nature is disorganized and such an approach not only lends flexibility to ones operations, but it also has a built in exit strategy. You can even build a color coded overlay for your map that shows Green (ph 0), Amber (ph1), Red (Ph 2) and Black (Ph 3) regions. This allows you to explain to politicians, the media, and the populace back home, that you are not here to FIX (build?) the country, but merely to bring the situation within the realm of civil capacity.

[Infanteer]

Western Doctrine has become a bit "phase-obsessed" of late. What can be a helpful organizational construct in general, can in fact, become a mental straitjacket as well.

Often it is far more helpful to think of your operations in terms of what phase YOUR OPPONENT is in, in a given area, with a given populace, perhaps even time of day. Particularly this is true for COIN, which, by definition is a counter to another's operations.

Good points,

To me Clear, Hold, Build should, as mentioned above, be reflective of what the enemy is doing; if I have a large concentration of insurgents who have executed local government officials and are taking over a village, then I have clearly moved into a different situation, regardless if I was making progress the day before; and getting back on track may not even require a period of "Hold" if insurgent influence was minimal. This should simply serve as a construct for how to orient your focus ("Ok, I'll have to put the well project on hold and start shooting out some ambush patrols...."). To avoid the straight-jacket approach, these phases should be seen, as pointed out, as very fluid. It is not simply a matter of A-B-C-D-E and boom, you have victory, but rather how you intend on countering the insurgent at that particular point in time and space....

As much as "what the enemy is doing" should impact what you are doing, I think the key is "how are enemy actions impacting the locals" and that will ultimately define what "phase" you are in. Is greasing the local IED team really going to be the sign that you're defeating the insurgency? I've seen many assessments that say "Yes! We got 'em!" only to be disappointed when the next cool-named dude brings a few of his cousins up and starts the same cycle over again in a week or so.

Now, I may be lambasted as a "COIN-ista" pop-centric, unoriginal fad-chaser just regurgitating FM 3-24, but Colonel Jones has a point. If insurgents are laying bombs on my roads and I was continually shooting them, I could say I was stuck in the early stages of a counterinsurgency effort until the cows came home; the enemy will most likely do this until you leave and his movement has (hopefully) regressed into a criminal enterprise. If the locals are not throwing rocks at you and actively supplying you with information then you are probably making progress. Enemy activity against you can be quite consistent for long periods of time, but when a local leader friendly to government forces disappears, it should be a telling indicator of the potential for problems down the road.

Anyways, I'm off to read about Lawrence of Arabia....

Infanteer

[jcustis]

Instead of thinking in terms of I need to get from Shape to Clear to Hold to Build (becuase you can do all of those things in theory and not affect what phase the insurgent is in a single, significant bit); it is to my way of thinking far more instructive to have your intel guys (hey, after all they love to brag how intel drive ops...) produce a product for you that shows you what phase the insurgent is in across your battlespace.

Excellent points BW, and something I have been trying to get at with this thread all along.

You can even build a color coded overlay for your map that shows Green (ph 0), Amber (ph1), Red (Ph 2) and Black (Ph 3) regions. This allows you to explain to politicians, the media, and the populace back home, that you are not here to FIX (build?) the country, but merely to bring the situation within the realm of civil capacity.

Another excellent point. Fiddling in/around the BUILD phase, and wringing our hands over what part the host nation is playing, seems to be kicking our ass at the moment. Heck, it's been kicking our ass the entire time, with the analyses I've seen of our disjointed development efforts.

[Surferbeetle]

Many different knowledge models have been applied to the marketplace of ideas and motivations over the ages. Knowledge models can be characterized as communities who employ characteristic methodologies used to gain advantages for their respective stakeholders. The SWJ/SWC and USG knowledge models make for an interesting comparison.

SWJ/SWC could be described as a digital community frequented by stakeholders in the nuts and bolts of America’s day-to-day efforts to make the world a better place. The demographics include experts and students of the myriad facets of security, economics, and governance from various lands. Pacing daily changes, ‘best of breed’ ideas, concepts, and Tactics Techniques and Procedures (TTP) are examined and debated in a non-hierarchal, open, Socratean manner. The community is an example of the results of democratization and globalization of information and knowledge, in that transactional costs associated with gathering and analyzing information are very low and flash mobs of stakeholders can form, as time and resources permit, for 24-hour analysis of interesting/vexing problems. The quality of output from the SWJ/SWC knowledge model varies (trending towards stochastic) as a factor of the educational, experiential, and motivational levels of the participants.

The USG could be described as a physical and digital community comprised, primarily, of paid stakeholders in the nuts and bolts of America’s day-to-day efforts to make the world a better place. It uses a more common, closed model of vertical and hierarchical integration (with high transaction costs) in which information gathering and analysis is, more often than not, primarily limited to in house personnel specialized in the myriad facets of security, economics, and governance (among many other topics). Standardized training, and educational experiences are part of an attempt to provide a regulated and dependable (trending towards deterministic) output from stakeholders.

It is my thesis that the SWJ/SWC model offers the added potential for involving local stakeholders in a way, perhaps, that the USG does not currently attempt. It would be interesting to see if stakeholders who live in the area of interest agree with the proposed framework outlined by jcustis in post #18 of this thread.

It would also be interesting to see what the two communities could do to develop solutions, and how solutions would differ with the information available to each for an agreed upon area of interest.

[jcustis]

This thread has been the most important one for me since joining the SWC, from a practical aspect. I am about to put my moderator and contributor effort on hiatus due to my immediate OEF deploy, but I'll try to circle back around to this thread and provide feedback if this analytical framework actually bears any fruit. Stay frosty guys...

[slapout9]

This thread has been the most important one for me since joining the SWC, from a practical aspect. I am about to put my moderator and contributor effort on hiatus due to my immediate OEF deploy, but I'll try to circle back around to this thread and provide feedback if this analytical framework actually bears any fruit. Stay frosty guys...

Good luck and stay safe, Slap