Quote Originally Posted by Bob's World View Post
For what it's worth on the indian stuff; our GWOT strategy is almost a direct lift from our strategy for subduing the Sioux. Pick a leader for them, expect them to govern and live like us, then label anyone who refuses to confrom to our wishes as a "terrorist" and conduct capture/kill operations on them.
We'd tried that with other tribes before and after the Sioux, with mixed success. FWIW, the technique worked best (and that's a relative term) with tribes like the Kiowa who had their own fairly developed political infrastructure (although it didn't work along our lines, it was close enough for early officers and agents to manipulate) and failed horribly when applied to tribes without that framework (the Apache peoples spring first to mind, although the Comanche had a similar loose clan-like structure). And even with the Kiowa, there was a lack of understanding of the social structure that underpinned the politics, which contributed in no small measure to the 1874 Red River War.