Why America keeps Losing Small Wars

[Ray Levesque]

We need to be careful when comparing one small war with another. While there's a temptation to compare the US experience in Vietnam to Iraq, or any other small war, there are significant differences that must be considered before drawing any conclusions.

While I would agree that one difference between North Vietnam and the US was a difference of will (we fought a much more limited war), we also need to ask ourselves whether or not our strategy was in line with our strategic goals and whether or not our strategy suited the threat. Keep in mind that our experience in Vietnam was reactive, not proactive. We fought a counterguerrilla war because the enemy chose to fight a guerrilla war, for good reasons. We made little to no effort to change the nature of the war to suit us, and accepted, by default, war on the enemy’s terms.

To state that Vietnam, Somalia, and Iraq, “underscore the limits of U.S. conventional military superiority,” is incorrect. American military superiority is understood and accepted by many of our enemies. While Vietnam was fighting the US it chose to fight a guerrilla war, but remember that in the end they won via a conventional invasion of the south. Even in Iraq (2003) the main part of Iraqi resistance was not based on their conventional forces, as in Desert Storm, but on the use of unconventional Fedayeen (sp?) supported by miscellaneous Iraqi army units using guerrilla tactics. Both Vietnam and Iraq recognized “U.S. conventional military superiority” and chose guerrilla tactics, and prolonged warfare, as their strategy.

I would say that our failure is not with our military capabilities, but with our military and political strategies, and that one size does not fit all. Iraq and Vietnam were two different wars. Just one factor to consider is that of outside support. North Vietnam enjoyed the support of China and the Soviet Union and enjoyed the safety of protected bases (N. Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia) from which to launch their operations. Insurgents in Iraq do not enjoy that type of open support; their's is more subtle and based far more on the ethnic and religious divides of Iraqi society, which are related to outside Arab and Persian factions, than existed in Vietnam.

Two different wars and two different strategies are required. While “will” is always an important factor, what’s more important is developing a strategy that is in alignment with your goals given existing constraints (the reality on the ground). I believe the problem in Iraq is not, at root, one of “will” but one of a failure of U.S. strategy. Our strategy focused on Phase III operations without consideration of how we would transition into Phase IV; our means were not aligned with our goals.

Having said that -- as our strategic failure becomes more obvious, and therefore we perceive a lack of progress, “will” becomes more of a factor. We want to see success; we want to see forward motion – without it we begin to doubt why we’re there, which leads to a lack of will. My bigger concern is that whereas our previous strategic goal was to create a secure democratic state in Iraq, a goat for which we did not provide adequate resources, it appears our new political goal is merely to “not lose.” Hmmmm…..

[Tom Odom]

Never been much of a Jeff record fan; he trots out repackaged stuff from time to time such as

The relationship between the belligerents is asymmetric.

He has been doing it since the early 80s when I first started in the Int affairs arena.

Best
Tom

[ipopescu]

It is interesting that the Record quotes Collin Gray apparently to stregthen his argument, as Gray's latest book "Another Bloody Century" in a sense predicts a lot of these messy small wars in the future. The concept of "Hybrid warfare" as future warfate describe a mix of regular/irregular/catastrophic/disruptive modes of war.
The author's basic argument that "Small Wars are hard, let's not do them anymore" is not a position that the world's only superpower can afford to take. Moreover, we can pretend to start a "conventional war", like in OIF, but the enemy's "vote" can quickly transform it into a very different kind of operation than what we planned. So believing that we can just decide to fight only conventional wars is problematic, unless we choose to drastically reduce the scope of our interests worldwide. How exactly are we to fight the Long War if we are not willing to intervene in places like Somalia or Afghanistan or whatever third world messed up place where the Salafi jihadists are finding sanctuaries. We may want to avoid an Iraq-like full-scale invasion in the future, but the idea that small wars happen only when the US gets involved in a "strategically unnecessary" war is ridiculous. Afghanistan is a small war, would Record suggest we shouldn't be in there? In fact, maybe thinking like his prevented us from being there before 9/11, just like now Somalia is being taken over by Islamists without USG doing much about it.
The new interest in COIN demonstratedy by USA and USMC through the new field manual shows the way to adapt to the new strategic era, by (re-)learning how to defeat irregular enemies. Whether it will be succesfull given the difficulty of taking a whole-of-government approach is a debateable question, but at least it's a step in the right direction.
Some Air Force people may be uncomfortable with the centrality of ground troops to Small Wars, but this author's argument is just not persuasive enough.

[Ray]

First of all one must understand why these Small Wars come into being.

Then, one must understand why the US gets involved in these Small Wars.

While indeed one small war is not the same as the next small war, yet the reasons why the US gets involved and then has a tough time is the same.

I can say so being a well wisher of the US and yet not an American!

May I request you to read the book 'Ugly American'

Here is the review

WILLIAM J. LEDERER AND EUGENE BURDICK
The Ugly American

The multi-million-copy bestseller that coined the phrase for tragic American blunders abroad.

First published in 1958, The Ugly American became a runaway national bestseller for its slashing exposé of American arrogance, incompetence, and corruption in Southeast Asia. Based on fact, the book's eye-opening stories and sketches drew a devastating picture of how the United States was losing the struggle with Communism in Asia. Combining gripping storytelling with an urgent call to action, the book prompted President Eisenhower to launch a study of our military aid program that led the way to much-needed reform.

I believe it is available with Amazon.com for a price that is unbelievably ridiculous.

A serious strategist should read this book and understand the underlining problem.

I have lost this book since someone must have forgotten to return it, but it always reminds me of the ineptness of American policy and its translators on ground!