WM. Interesting, thought provoking comments. However, I would question the Taliban's technique of suppressing the will of the people as, in fact, an end to a political means....arguably a religious end. I agree with your ideas of the trinity, and contend they need to be tweeked for insurgent context. Obviously religious objectives create ambiguity.Originally Posted by wm
I would say that on the macro level, religious motivations are indistinguishable from political ones.
"The status quo is not sustainable. All of DoD needs to be placed in a large bag and thoroughly shaken. Bureaucracy and micromanagement kill."
-- Ken White
"With a plan this complex, nothing can go wrong." -- Schmedlap
"We are unlikely to usefully replicate the insights those unencumbered by a military staff college education might actually have." -- William F. Owen
Late reply, I have been out of the net. Concur with your comments. However, I submit that careful analysis must be conducted to ensure that we do not misconstrue aims and objectives between political and ideological based insurgencies.
Food for thought perhaps or you may leave you famished.
Political and ideological based insurgencies.
Hi John & welcome,
As to this:
What is your distinction between a politically-based insugency and an ideologically-based insugency ?However, I submit that careful analysis must be conducted to ensure that we do not misconstrue aims and objectives between political and ideological based insurgencies.
Yes, by all means keep the diet you feed me simple - a couple of examples of each would suffice.
Oh, and, another question: Do you feel that distinction is important to the practitioner at the basic local tactical level; and, if so, why ?
Regards
Mike
Jmm99, Concur. Isn't politics born of ideology? Wars can only be caused by politics. There are simply no other causes. What the politics is about may differ, but ALL War is ALWAYS political.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Chicken or egg?
Brother Wilf,
You know my thoughts on CvC, IMHO he focuses exclusively upon only one variable of a multivariate equation, and so I question your CvC inspired assertion that we can reduce the causative reasons for war to just a political variable. In my experience and studies Security and Economics variables are inseparably interrelated with Politics/Governance variables.
Whooptie...let's look further than just my opinion or yours and see if a holistic approach to war is quantifiable/politics can be disaggregated from the data set that describes war.
Political Instability Task Force
Political Instability Task Force (formerly known as State Failure Task Force) was a U.S. government-sponsored research project to build a database on major domestic political conflicts leading to state failures.The project was begun as an unclassified study that was commissioned to a group of academics (particularly active was the Center for Global Policy at George Mason University) by the Central Intelligence Agency's Directorate of Intelligence in response to a request from senior U.S. policy makers in 1994. A similar project (Project Camelot) generated much controversy in the 1960s.SteveThe task force repeated this analysis for global and regional data sets and produced fairly consistent findings. The three statistically significant variables most often associated with political upheavals were:
* regime type,
* international trade and
* infant mortality.
Last edited by Surferbeetle; 01-17-2010 at 06:50 AM.
Sapere Aude
Brother Beetle,
What is politics? Generally, every political armed group in the world conforms to a CvC trinity of People, Leadership and Armed Force. - so yes,
"Security and Economics variables are inseparably interrelated with Politics/Governance variables" - I agree. It's all politics.
Security is a political condition, just as much as a "social condition." Economies require governments of similar bodies. When those governments fail, so does all else and alternate policies flow in to fill the vacuum.
I think we may be in agreement.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Mike -
Thanks for the comments. Up front...I continue to wrestle with the distinction. Here are a couple of ideological based insurgent group ideas.... arguably religion could enter the discussion. I say the Ku Klux Klan, under the auspices of racism perhaps, but also ideological. Additionally, al Qaeda, depending on distinction, is ideological. Honestly, I believe the distinction, in the context of al Qaeda, is subtle if we agree that their strategic endstate is restoration of the Caliphate. Here is my thought, if one labels AQ, in a broader context as terrorists, than one could argue they are waging a war against governments to expand their ideology. Yet, that ideology is established to restore a political model.
I do believe a distinction must be made if it provides the practitioner a context for interaction with the local populace. Additionally, the distinction allows tactical units to differentiate between who they are "fighting": hardcore insurgents, criminal factions, accidental insurgents, etc.
What say you? I am always eager to explore ideas.
Best
John
Last edited by John; 01-17-2010 at 06:47 AM.
OK, so why the distinction? How does that distinction help you set forth the policy? I submit that the difference makes no differences when it comes to actions.
There is no such thing as an "accidental guerrilla" - it's an misnomer based on poor understanding and a worse description. They are fighting for a political purpose. They have a political aim that = "you go away and leave us alone." You may not have intended to upset them, but you did. That does not make their actions "accidental," or the fact that they oppose you "accidental". Replace "accidental guerilla" with "Stupid Policy" and we can have sensible discussions.
Yes, your response should be in line with the policy, but your policy can never usefully distinguish between "ideology" and "politics" - eg: go talk to a Right Wing Christian Republican, or a very Left Wing Democrat.
....and the Klu Klux Klan have political objectives, as did Malcolm-X.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
John,
I was going to respond that at some level religious motivations actually are political ones but the next post after yours by Intel Trooper made that point. We could probably tussle a while about what we mean by religion and religious, but I think I'll let Marc T chime in on that first, if he is of a mind to do so.
Instead, I'll just suggest a couple of interesting struggles between church authority and state authority for consideration that religious struggles can really be political struggles in disguise:
Consider Bishop Ambrose of Milan threatening to excommunicate Roman/Byzantine Emperor Theodosius I in connection with the effort for suppressing Arianism, or
Hildebrand of Sovana (AKA Pope Gregory VII) actual excommunicating (twice) Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV and Henry's response by installing the "anti-Pope" Clement III. This last initiated what we could easily call a "civil war" in the Catholic Church.
If we choose to define politics (as found in Clausewitz) as the process of conducting inter-state relations, then insurgency may well fall outside the pale of politics so defined. I say this because an insurgency usually is a matter of intra-state relations (returning to my point that an insurgency is really a struggle between two different parties for control of at least one of the three parts of Clausewitz' trinity). But at some point, an insurgent party may garner enough support that it may have its own trinity within the geographical boundaries by which we normal refer to nations as political entities. At that point, we might consider the struggle to be inter-state with the application of CvC now appropriate.
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit
The greatest educational dogma is also its greatest fallacy: the belief that what must be learned can necessarily be taught. — Sydney J. Harris
For emphasis.
CvC does not differentiate between Politics, religion or even "power". His analysis even stays good for the Mafia or any criminal gang that seeks to compete as a political, religious or any other form of entity that influences the conduct of a society. He talks about war between societies/political groups, not just nations. He was very aware of all the types of actors we see today.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Wilf,
I was not suggesting tht CvC differentiates between politics and religion. I agree that we may well find them in the same family as ways of understanding political action.
So a theological struggle for power across two elements (Arians and Athanasians for example) that may conjoin to form a community (Catholics) is war, but a struggle within the community (the electoral process for replacing a Catholic Pope, e.g. ) probably is not. A struggle between the Gambino family and the Genovese family over who drives garbage trucks in the South Bronx is a war. A struggle between Pete and Junior Gotti for leadership within the Gambino family is a little tougher to classify I think.
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit
The greatest educational dogma is also its greatest fallacy: the belief that what must be learned can necessarily be taught. — Sydney J. Harris
Not really it is just on a micro level as CvC said it all goes back to The Original Motive for the War. As I have said CvC would be a pretty good Cop. However I think he also created the Run On Sentence as my English Teacher used to say, which can make him hard to follow sometimes. He had a poor understanding of what periods are for.
Maybe so, but defining something as a war by depending on a description of original motives, which is part and parcel of the definition of war versus other means of conducting politics, seems just a little bit too circular for my logic. (And that is a criticism of CvC which would get us way outside this thread I suspect.)Not really it is just on a micro level as CvC said it all goes back to The Original Motive for the War. As I have said CvC would be a pretty good Cop. However I think he also created the Run On Sentence as my English Teacher used to say, which can make him hard to follow sometimes. He had a poor understanding of what periods are for.
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit
The greatest educational dogma is also its greatest fallacy: the belief that what must be learned can necessarily be taught. — Sydney J. Harris
So long as the element of force/violence is used as opposed to other political means I would say you are in the war framework of CvC again just on a micro scale.
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