Setting up effective, local security forces

[Bob's World]

The real question is, are we attempting to build a security force to protect a government that we think is best from its own populace; or, are we attempting to help a government that its own populace wants protect them from some rogue threat (internal or external). If internal, does that "rogue" threat have any legal, trusted and certain options for engaging its government, or are they forced to resort to illegal / violent arguments?

This is a fine line, and it is one where the perceptions applied matter. Our perceptions as the intervening power are the ones that matter least, and one can rest assured that the perceptions of the government in question will be heavily biased to the preservation of their own status quo.

I am happy to argue to any audience that in Afghanistan we attempt to do the former and that more than any other factor is why we are still there slogging away after all this time and why the security force can't seem to become a competent, self-sufficient organization. GIRoA is a Northern Alliance monopoly. We think that is the right answer, and GIRoA seeks to preserve the monopoly. The excluded segment of the populace have no trusted, legal and certain means avialable to them, so they act out illegally. We brand them all "Taliban" with little regard to which are revolutionary actors seeking to force GIRoA to break their monopoly, and which are resistance actors who are simply weary of our foreign occupation of their home and the violence we bring to them on behalf of GIRoA.

Such approaches were the model for both Colonialism and for Containment as well. In the modern era, however, the pursuit of such approaches is demanding ever increasing energy and producing ever decreasing effects. It is also a major driver of the motivations that lead young men frustrated with the governance of their own country to not only join nationalist insurgency movements, but to also volunteer to support trans-nationalist terrorist organizations such as AQ.

Sometimes there may still be times and places where creating and sustaining artificial systems of security designed to protect and preserve some government against the express insurgent will of its own populace. I suspect those cases are rare.

Increasingly we are better served by employing our influence to bring those governments and populace to the table to work out new guards for their future security, and be willing to work with whatever and whomever emerges from such a process.

We need to evolve.

[davidbfpo]

I wonder whether the impact of increasing urbanisation across the world will have an impact here. To date much of the counter-AQ and counter-AQ partners has been in relatively isolated / remote / extreme climates / rural locations.

The scale of FID could well increase. Imagine if Nigeria or Egypt was the setting.

The French experience in Algeria for example, where the French at one point had security forces of 500k IIRC and this included a not insignificant local element. At that time Algeria was split evenly between rural and urban IIRC; today it is very urbanised.

[Bill Moore]

Posted by Davidbfpo

I wonder whether the impact of increasing urbanisation across the world will have an impact here. To date much of the counter-AQ and counter-AQ partners has been in relatively isolated / remote / extreme climates / rural locations.

The scale of FID could well increase. Imagine if Nigeria or Egypt was the setting.

The French experience in Algeria for example, where the French at one point had security forces of 500k IIRC and this included a not insignificant local element. At that time Algeria was split evenly between rural and urban IIRC; today it is very urbanised.

I think increasing urbanization already has had an impact on military operations, and I'm not sure why you appear to be dismissing the rather large urban CT operations in Baghdad, Tikrit, Falujah, Mogadishu, Kandahar, etc.

On the other hand I think your point is still interesting, it does seem AQ affiliates/partners generally establish strong holds in rural areas (where in theory they should be easier to target). I suspect part of the reason their activity is limited in the larger urban areas is due to security concerns. A lot of citizens watching and reporting, so unless they could establish control in an urban area this will likely remain the norm (of course there will also be exceptions that we may to respond to). I don't think too many people in the world, even the Muslim world view AQ as liberators, so I suspect AQ will generally be at greater risk in larger urban areas and forced to work in a traditional underground cellular in these areas for security.

FID encompasses a broad range of activities and actors, and if the scale of the AQ presence and activity in an urban areas is, the appropriate response is generally small scale security assistance composed mainly of personnel from intelligence, special operations, and contractors with speciality skills. This is often enough to enable the affected state to defeat/suppress this threat.

[Bob's World]

Bill,

The Soviets promoted a worker's movement, focused in the Cities. Mao tried that and it fell flat, so they shifted to rural areas where their message of land reform resonated more effectively in their agrarian society. Bottom line is, as an insurgent leader go with what works, not with what the book says. Actually that is some damn good advice for our COIN gurus as well...

There can be many reasons why more activity happens outside a city rather than in, some as simple as the old rule of not defecating where one eats.

Most of the insurgency we see inside of Afghanistan is the resistance (small t taliban) against the US forces, and the populaces with the most reason for resisting the US/NATO forces are in the rural areas where we have been operating.

Similarly, the revolutionary aspect of the insurgency (coming out of Pakistan where the Big T Taliban take sanctuary) primarily targets the low hanging fruit of GIRoA governance, and it is much easier to take out a police outpost or disrupt traffic on some remote highway than it is to storm the Provincial HQ.

[ganulv]

There can be many reasons why more activity happens outside a city rather than in[.]

The days of an urban cadre in the Guatemalan civil war with which I am familiar were numbered indeed (and s/he knew it). On the other hand, I suspect that during the darkest days of the conflict guerrillas in the hills slept more soundly than did civilians in the cities and pueblos. Something like a third of the Guatemalan population was urban at that time, as compared to about two-thirds of the contemporary Iraqi population. And in Iraq, outside of the north there isn’t much in the way of highlands to abscond to. And of course the stability of governance in Iraq in 2007 didn’t approach that in Guatemala in 1983. So, as you say, lots of reasons.

[Mike in Hilo]

Regret (1) I stumbled onto this belatedly and (2) the sidetrack
Nevertheless, Fuchs, to clarify: Both sides made ample use of Montagnards. We even had a name for the ones on the other side: "VCM." Their collaboration and guidance (literally) were essential to allowing NVA units to pop up "out of nowhere," as it were--on the coastal plain in northen Binh Dinh....

A couple of the main ethnic groups from which US recruited, the Rhade and Jarai, were easy to attract because they feared and hated lowland Vietnamese---whether communist or GVN....and had formed FULRO, their own independence "Front." They saw an association with the US as a counterbalance to the hated ARVN. Their anti-Vietnamese sentiment did not play entirely into US hands, as they also sought strength from a noted, local, anti-Viet force--namely, the Khmer Rouge.....An interesting side note is the fact that Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot's personal guard unit was, from the '60's until his end, composed solely of Jarai.

Cheers,
Mike.

[ganulv]

A couple of the main ethnic groups from which US recruited, the Rhade and Jarai, were easy to attract because they feared and hated lowland Vietnamese---whether communist or GVN....

I know a fellow in my hometown who worked with Montagnards during the war and he told me one of his best guys had been with the ARVN until an in broad daylight incidence in which he turned his rifle on fellow ARVN—ethnic Kinh who wouldn’t leave off yelling various takes on “####ing Montagnard!” at him from across the street. Possibly a stolen and/or invented story, but indicative of a more general truth, I’m sure…

[davidbfpo]

Bill,

That will teach me to post on a Sunday afternoon after gardening. How could I overlook Baghdad and Basra?

I would disagree with you and this is not the subject of this thread:

I suspect part of the reason their activity is limited in the larger urban areas is due to security concerns. A lot of citizens watching and reporting, so unless they could establish control in an urban area this will likely remain the norm...

Citizens do not always watch, let alone report. I do still wonder if AQ & partners switched to an urban area, let alone a huge metropolis, how external FID would work today. In Iraq AQ was not the main enemy, rather a local coalition.

[Bill Moore]

David,

Agree part of this is not on topic, but still necessary to put things in context. There are few places that AQ would be welcome in urban areas. You can't compare them to the Leninists, but people do inappropriately compare them to the Maoists, so you can't win in that regard.

The Brits had to deal with a very tough IRA problem that appeared to those of watching from the outside to be mostly urban. From that problem set a number of useful urban fighting tactics (not to be confused with strategy) we're propogated throughout the West (and perhaps beyond). We now have our own lessons that we can teach in this regard, but the key in my mind is not to confuse teaching tactics with helping the partner get their strategy right.

Long way of saying I think we're quite capable of helping a nation through FID with urban security problems (especially AQ), but we haven't overcome our own deficiencies in getting the strategy right. This generally seems to be area of friction. A local government may have the right strategy, but the wrong tactics, and we show up and often teach good tactics, but push the wrong strategy based on our view of how the world works. Probably taking this down a path you don't want to this thread to go down, but I think it is relevant. If we get the strategy right (more accurately those we're assisting get the strategy right), and communicate it effectively, is likely the forces we help train will fight more effectively. There are a lot of reasons those we train often don't fight well, and one of the intangibles is they often don't believe in the cause and method. The whole world can see it on u-tube, Frontline, National Geographic, and other news specials where the media accompanies our guys into battle with their Afghan counterparts. The most interesting parts of those shows are when they translate the discussions between the Afghan forces and the locals and the Afghan forces apology for the tactics, but say right now they're being forced by the coalition to act this way. We're not good at listening, so I doubt many in our nation focus on those cues, but instead focus on the boastful U.S. NCO or officer explaining how inept the Afghan security forces are because they don't act like us.

Back to your point, what significant change and challenges do you think we would face with our FID doctrine if the focus shifted from the rural to the urban? I think I'm still missing your point.

[Dayuhan]

There are few places that AQ would be welcome in urban areas.

Perhaps not welcome, but urban areas can be a very hospitable place for them. It really depends on what they're trying to do. For an individual or small cell that's lying low, hiding out or building a terror plot with a limited contact cell a city is ideal: you have anonymity, freedom of movement, easy access to communication, banking, etc. For the aspiring insurgent trying to win recruits and spread the message, the city is a lot more dangerous, especially if the local security services are at all competent: the message you preach will be heard in many places, and the same anonymity that can be a shelter to a small cell makes it very difficult to fully vet new recruits.

I personally suspect that AQ and similar groups maintain a quite substantial urban apparatus... of course they would be trying very hard not to draw attention to themselves, and you'd expect them to have little or no contact with local militant groups other than with a few trusted individuals.