South Africa's COIN war in SWA/Namibia/Angola

[JMA]

Another video can be found here

This one seems to have been staged for the video but gives some idea how they operated. Being policemen and not soldiers the contacts were even more chaotic than normal but they did the business with a not so great kill ratio 25:1

[jmm99]

COL McCuen and COL Gentile faced off in Dec 2009 in a couple of Tom Ricks' pieces:

A challenge for COINhata Gentile, Thomas E. Ricks Friday, December 4, 2009 (counterpoint by McCuen to Gentile's Parameters article).

COIN (III): Do not go Gentile into that good night, Thomas E. Ricks Monday, December 7, 2009 (response by Gentile to McCuen's counterpoint).

These are (relatively) short postings which, however, cover a long period in US involvement in "COIN" and irregular warfare.

The Center of Military History has an online book (588 pp.), Birtle, U.S. Army counterinsurgency and contingency operations doctrine, 1942–1976 (2006), which covers the waterfront pretty well.

I found COL McCuen's brief bio (in the 2008 MR article) to have an interesting entry - that he was in Indonesia, where he was chief of the U.S. "military assistance group" (U.S. Defense Liaison Group, Indonesia). Indonesia at all times pertinent has been more important to SE Asia than Vietnam.

Regards

Mike