Quote Originally Posted by Rank amateur View Post
Anyway, IDF COIN is achieving somebodies objective, therefore it is - in my opinion - successful. Though, of course, it's fair to say that the objective is highly controversial. I'd also say it is a lot closer to Dr. Metz's Roman COIN than British COIN, but I tend to agree with the good doctor's thesis that Roman COIN is more successful, especially short term.
There is some common misconceptions at play here. British COIN, prior to Ulster, was characterised by a brutality and severity that most would find hard to stomach. Almost every measure used by the IDF for COIN was a measure previously used by the British during the mandate, including home demolition. Trying to draw parallels between the West Bank and Ulster is idiotic - as proved by Basra.

Yes, IDF COIN is pretty harsh, and even unnecessarily so, but not compared with 99% of other nations on earth (Columbia, India, Sri Lanka, Burma, Indonesia, Syria, Iran, Russia, Georgia, Turkey, Lebanon, Pakistan, etc etc.) and some of the COIN practices in Iraq and Afghanistan are nothing to be too proud of.