Could Someone Please Explain the "Surge Strategy" to Me

[SteveMetz]

I'm flummoxed. I've spent most of the past five years analyzing, thinking about, writing about, and speaking about the Iraq conflict so I think I'm at least modestly conversant in it. But I just don't understand what the "new" strategy is or how it is "new."

I'm a regular reader of publications like the Weekly Standard. In fact, I just finished reading Tom Donnelly's essay in the most recent issue. Problem is, that one, like most there, spend all their time making the point that everyone who takes issue with the "new" strategy is an idiot or evil (or an evil idiot), but I have yet to see a cogent explanation of how the new strategy will lead to success.

The administration (except for Gates who seems to have the most nuanced view of Iraq) and the Weekly Standard crew (incuding Donnelly, Fred Kagan, and Bill Kristol) seem to feel there are only two options in Iraq: "victory" which means that the existing Shiite dominated government eradicates AQI, all the Sunni sectarian components of the insurgency give up and become compliant, and the Iranian backed Shiite militias go out of business. Or "defeat" which is everything else.

What I need is for someone to connect the dots for me and explain how the surge gets us toward that definition of "victory." The Weekly Standard crew likes to slam the "failed Casey-Abizaid strategy" which focused on ramping up Iraqi security forces to replace American ones but how, for the love of pete. is the "surge strategy" different? Assuming we won't sustain the surge for ever or ramp it up even further, what comes next if NOT exactly what Casey and Abizaid sought?

At an even deeper level, I question the core logic of the "surge strategy." To me (and I'll admit that I don't understand it and could be wrong), it is based on three assumptions: 1) secure areas can be kept secure; 2) eventually the whole country can be kept secure without a massive increase in American troops; and 3) the insurgents will simply lose their will and give up if they can't penetrate the secure areas (resulting in "victory").

Again, I just don't get it. How will the current surge lead the insurgent to give up? Someone help me!

[Tom Odom]

At an even deeper level, I question the core logic of the "surge strategy." To me (and I'll admit that I don't understand it and could be wrong), it is based on three assumptions: 1) secure areas can be kept secure; 2) eventually the whole country can be kept secure without a massive increase in American troops; and 3) the insurgents will simply lose their will and give up if they can't penetrate the secure areas (resulting in "victory").

MG Mixson and I go back to when we were young lieutenants in 2-505. He is a frank, thinking man. Yesterday he said that if the troop levels were not sustained he would not be able to sustain security improvements in his AO.

You are correct in the assumptions; it is rather like we were in September 2005 watching this huge spinning storm called Rita head toward us. We preferred to assume it would loop and go elsewhere. It did not.

Insurgency, global insurgency, civil war, and old fashion crime swirl in the current mix of conflicts. Looking from the outside with an experienced eye, I see 2 as dominant: insurgency against the coalition driven by the fact that we are there and civil war driven by the resurgence of long present schisms exacerbated by war. The fight against AQI--the global insurgency--is by all accounts a third tier, but one that dominates both official and news media reporting. Underlying all of this, crime provides a connective tissue between insurgent and ethnic/religious forces. The extent of tribalism's influence on that phenomenon I suspect is quite large. Current efforts to use the tribal disenchantments with AQI to our advantage show short term success; how feeding tribalism serves establishing a functioning central government is one of those questions left unanswered.

Taking apart the insurgency is a challenge in itself as we all know. But taking it apart in a civil war perhaps ratchets up that difficulty beyond the doable. In a COIN, you are supporting a government against an insurgent movement. In a civil war, you have a society at war with itself. In Iraq that is occuring on three main levels with secondary conflicts played out on intervening steps along the way. Choices in a civil war amount to: A. Get out and let it fight itself out; B,. Pick a side and work for that side's victory; and C. Stay neutral and hope you won't get caught in a crossfire. The dilemma in Iraq is that fighting the insurgency dictates picking a side in the civil war, one that we know has much larger implications in the region, that is backing the Maliki government and validating Shia ascendancy. Meanwhile we simultaneously court the support of the Sunni tribes, going so far as to arm them because they--right now--have turned against AQI. So we have picked a side in the civil war but we use an element that has opposed us (and the government) in the insurgency to take on our enemies who represent a golbal insurgency (AQI). And finally in regards to the Kurds, we have remained "neutral" as they continue to establish themselves as an independent entity nominally within the state of Iraq.

All of this affects just how long we can sustain the surge as we call it; that is the long pole in the security tent we call Iraq. We debated on here whether the surge was an escalation or a surge because the latter does not imply sustained numbers. We keep watching this storm spin and we keep hoping it will turn back somehow, based on the wishful assumptions you list.

Best

Tom

[Mark O'Neill]

but one of the recurrent things that has been thrust at me for the last 2.5 years of 'book learning' is that the mil effort in COIN is just 20% (ie , 1 in 5 parts ) of the overall effort in a COIN fight.

Accordingly, the 'surge' , if we are serious, cannot be the 'strategy' - by accepted definition in the literature it is only (at most) 20% of one.

So, before I would even presume to try and guess or deduce an answer to Steve's provocative question, I think I need to know what the other 80% of the strategy is comprised of. Trouble is, I haven't come across any explanation of what that is.

One thing I am pretty sure of is that the body of historical example to date tells us something. No matter how good an effort GEN Petraeus (and any number of clever military COIN adviser folks) come up with within the mil tactical and operational realm, it will not be enough. Without commensurate effort in the Strat Pol, Civ and Societal realm it will, at best, only delay the inevitable. Bizarrely, the public debate has ignored this, continually laboring under the misapprehension that the military effort alone can deliver 'victory'.

[SteveMetz]

MG Mixson and I go back to when we were young lieutenants in 2-505. He is a frank, thinking man. Yesterday he said that if the troop levels were not sustained he would not be able to sustain security improvements in his AO.

You are correct in the assumptions; it is rather like we were in September 2005 watching this huge spinning storm called Rita head toward us. We preferred to assume it would loop and go elsewhere. It did not.

Insurgency, global insurgency, civil war, and old fashion crime swirl in the current mix of conflicts. Looking from the outside with an experienced eye, I see 2 as dominant: insurgency against the coalition driven by the fact that we are there and civil war driven by the resurgence of long present schisms exacerbated by war. The fight against AQI--the global insurgency--is by all accounts a third tier, but one that dominates both official and news media reporting. Underlying all of this, crime provides a connective tissue between insurgent and ethnic/religious forces. The extent of tribalism's influence on that phenomenon I suspect is quite large. Current efforts to use the tribal disenchantments with AQI to our advantage show short term success; how feeding tribalism serves establishing a functioning central government is one of those questions left unanswered.

Taking apart the insurgency is a challenge in itself as we all know. But taking it apart in a civil war ratchets perhaps up that difficulty beyond the doable. In a COIN, you are supporting a government against an insurgent movement. In a civil war, you have a society at war with itself. In Iraq that is occuring on three main levels with secondary conflicts played out on intervening steps along the way. Choices in a civil war amount to: A. Get out and let it fight itself out; B,. Pick a side and work for that side's victory; and C. Stay neutral and hope you won't get caught in a crossfire. The dilemma in Iraq is that fighting the insurgency dictates picking a side in the civil war, one that we know has much larger implications in the region, that is backing the Maliki government and validating Shia ascendancy. Meanwhile we simultaneously court the support of the Sunni tribes, going so far as to arm them because they--right now--have turned against AQI. So we have picked a side in the civil war but we use an element that has opposed us (and the government) in the insurgency to take on our enemies who represent a golbal insurgency (AQI). And finally in regards to the Kurds, we have remained "neutral" as they continue to establish themselves as an independent entity nominally within the state of Iraq.

All of this affects just how long we can sustain the surge as we call it; that is the long pole in the security tent we call Iraq. We debated on here whether the surge was an escalation or a surge because the latter does not imply sustained numbers. We keep watching this storm spin and we keep hoping it will turn back somehow, based on the wishful assumptions you list.

Best

Tom

I guess I'm just frustrated because Donnelly, Kagan and, to a lesser degree, Kristol are friends of mine and they just keep beating the drum of the new strategy but I have yet to see a cogent explanation of what it is. A troop surge is an operation, not a new strategy. Rather than explain how the new strategy will better to lead to "victory" (or exactly what that is), they just spend all of their time lambasting anyone who isn't on board.

In a broader sense, I'm afraid that the conceptual underpinning of the "new strategy" is the idea that Andy Krepinevich and others were espousing that says that population security should be the central factor in counterinsurgency. In my tiny little mind, that is one more example of extrapolating general lessons from Cold War insurgencies. In Vietnam, El Salvador, etc., the "people" were "undecided" so the counterinsurgency campaign was designed to win them over with development, security, and reform. But in ethnic/sectarian insurgencies, people don't decide which side to support based on the provision of development, security, and reform. Loyalty is more primal.

Take the Palestinian insurgency. Nothing the Israelis can do will win the "hearts and minds" of the people. They understand that. But we're mucking around in Iraq with this Cold War conceptual framework. Hence we've designed a strategy based on providing development, security, and reform. As an American, I sincerely hope it works. As a student of insurgency, I doubt it will.

I buy the idea that what is driving the conflict is the simultaneous desire for sectarian security and domination by Sunni Arabs. If that is true, the only strategies that might work are either to truly subjugate the Sunni Arabs (and solidify Shiite domination), or play the role of mediators and peacekeepers.

[selil]

The surge according to my aging father....

"Son what you have here is a classic throwing good money after bad money. Only people bleed in this here situation".

[120mm]

The surge according to my aging father....

"Son what you have here is a classic throwing good money after bad money. Only people bleed in this here situation".

I am slowly coming around to this point of view. But then I was never for any sort of occupation. I personally think that wrecking a despot's government and then leaving chaos has a utility, but then I understand that is a point of view that can be seen as heartless and politically incorrect.

Personally, I would've liked to seen Iran intervene in late 2003 as we pulled out, and then Iran could be facing the morass we are currently involved in.

[John T. Fishel]

Dr. Jack's point is well stated. We all understand strategy as the relation of ends to means (through ways) or some similar phrasing. Moroever, Dr. Jack points out that the President did articulate a grand/national strategy for the war in ends, ways, and means terms. Of course, calling the "surge" a strategy is absurd. It confuses strategy with one of its components, in this case one of the means (resources) to achieve its goals. But this is not what Kilcullen did.

In the section of his blog I quoted he articulates strategic ends as
1. Provide security for the people.
2. Marginalize insurgent groups from the population
3. Achieve the required political and economic development
This will be achieved by the following Ways
1. Simultaneaous operations to clear and hold
2. Actitivies to rebuild infrstructure, provide government services, and local security
3. Building partnerships with Iraqi institutions at all levels from local to national
Means
1. US troops (the 'surge")
2. Iraqi troops
3. Iraqi police
4. Intel assets both US/coalition and Iraqi
5. Iraqi government programs
6. USAID
7. International aid organizations

My point is that Kilcullen's blog has all the elements of a military strategy in it and many of the components for a political/economic/military strategy. Operations are, of course, the ways that means are applied to achieve ends.
Kilcullen said it well. The question is whether it will work or perhaps, whether it will have time to work. Another critical question is whether the military strategy will be undermined by the failure of the political/economic strategy on which it depends.

Too bad that Ambassador Ryan Crocker doesn't have his own Kilcullen to articulate what he is trying to do in both strategic and operational terms as well as analyze the effects of the pol/econ efforts.

[Mark O'Neill]

I guess I'm just frustrated because Donnelly, Kagan and, to a lesser degree, Kristol are friends of mine and they just keep beating the drum of the new strategy but I have yet to see a cogent explanation of what it is. A troop surge is an operation, not a new strategy. Rather than explain how the new strategy will better to lead to "victory" (or exactly what that is), they just spend all of their time lambasting anyone who isn't on board.

In a broader sense, I'm afraid that the conceptual underpinning of the "new strategy" is the idea that Andy Krepinevich and others were espousing that says that population security should be the central factor in counterinsurgency. In my tiny little mind, that is one more example of extrapolating general lessons from Cold War insurgencies. In Vietnam, El Salvador, etc., the "people" were "undecided" so the counterinsurgency campaign was designed to win them over with development, security, and reform. But in ethnic/sectarian insurgencies, people don't decide which side to support based on the provision of development, security, and reform. Loyalty is more primal.

Take the Palestinian insurgency. Nothing the Israelis can do will win the "hearts and minds" of the people. They understand that. But we're mucking around in Iraq with this Cold War conceptual framework. Hence we've designed a strategy based on providing development, security, and reform. As an American, I sincerely hope it works. As a student of insurgency, I doubt it will.

I buy the idea that what is driving the conflict is the simultaneous desire for sectarian security and domination by Sunni Arabs. If that is true, the only strategies that might work are either to truly subjugate the Sunni Arabs (and solidify Shiite domination), or play the role of mediators and peacekeepers.

Full agree, you are deadly right.

It comes down to what you think 'strategy' is. The 'surge' does not fit my requirements for the label. To paraphrase what Colin Gray said in his 'Can the US adapt?' SSI monograph, strategy is not 'saying what you are doing'.

Of course, the fact that the notion that the surge is an operational conops rather than a strategy hasn't been challenged because of the fact that most of the polity and commentariat are strategically illiterate.

[LawVol]

the term "new strategy" when applied to the "surge" is simply a political term. If memory serves, the administration first annouced an intent to "surge" because it began to believe that more troops were needed to accomplish the mission, i.e. the same mission as before the surge.

In an effort to paint a different picture of Iraq, and possibly deflect some political heat (you don't hear Bush saying stay the course anymore), this "new strategy" term was applied so that republicans could distance themselves from the fallout that was/is generating. Every wanted change, so change was invented.

BTW, I out "surge" in quotes because I don't really see it as a surge per se. Estimates of troops needed were in the neighborhood of 400,000 and we now have about 150,000. We're still deficient.

But in ethnic/sectarian insurgencies, people don't decide which side to support based on the provision of development, security, and reform. Loyalty is more primal.

Does this mean that "winning hearts and minds" isn't really possible in Iraq?

[SteveMetz]

Does this mean that "winning hearts and minds" isn't really possible in Iraq?

I personally don't think it is in the traditional, Cold War terms of "winning over" the "undecideds" by providing things to them. I think Americans gravitated to that idea because we wanted to understand the unfamiliar--cultures that work on patronage and primal ties--through a lens we understood. We conceptualize politics as a process where the dedicated cadres of each side try and win the support of the undecideds by providing (or promising to provide) things they want, whether projects, jobs, or policies.

I don't think all of the world operates like that.

So, to your question. I don't think Americans can win "hearts and minds" in Iraq. It has frustrated us because we reel off the number of school we've built, and people are still shooting at us. I just don't think people are going to support us because we provide goodies. Plus, they know that eventually we'll be gone and the insurgents will not. I think most people caught in insurgencies pursue survival strategies--they attempt to stay out of the mess. When that is not possible, they "support" whoever is most likely to hurt them.

So, this leads me to conclude that we've approached the Iraq insurgency with an inapplicable conceptual model.

[Tacitus]

Gentlemen,

As best as I can follow things, the plan is to put more troops in Al Anbar province and selected neighborhoods in Baghdad. This will result in a decrease in violence, which will then allow Prime Minister Mailiki’s government to have some “breathing space” (I’ve heard that term used several times by our government, but it is not clear what they mean by that). This then will then create the conditions enabling the Iraqi Parliament to pass a law to share oil revenues, and begin the political reconciliation of the various factions in Iraq.

I’m not sure that amounts to a strategy, either. We just sort of assume that these additional American troops will deliver calm in key places, which then triggers this great political compromise among Iraqis. But isn’t Al Sadr the muscle behind Maliki’s coalition government? Why is he all of a sudden going to bury the hatchet with his internal enemies, and vice versa? Heck, he’s part of our problem over there, not a catalyst to a solution.

I don’t know whether our government and high command believes its own rhetoric, or not. It is as if all this negative karma has been built up to date over there, despite our good intentions, that things just HAVE to work out okay because…well, if you do good things, then good things will happen to you. Call it a Hindu faith-based strategy.

It feels like more of a political strategy to me, to prolong our efforts in Iraq beyond the 2008 elections. How many times have you heard, “Hey, we can’t pull out now, we haven’t give the new “surge” strategy a chance to work”? The idea is to leave it to the next guy/gal in office to deal with the ultimate resolution of the policy there. Then, if things collapse, you can blame it on them.

[Granite_State]

I guess I'm just frustrated because Donnelly, Kagan and, to a lesser degree, Kristol are friends of mine and they just keep beating the drum of the new strategy but I have yet to see a cogent explanation of what it is. A troop surge is an operation, not a new strategy. Rather than explain how the new strategy will better to lead to "victory" (or exactly what that is), they just spend all of their time lambasting anyone who isn't on board.

In a broader sense, I'm afraid that the conceptual underpinning of the "new strategy" is the idea that Andy Krepinevich and others were espousing that says that population security should be the central factor in counterinsurgency. In my tiny little mind, that is one more example of extrapolating general lessons from Cold War insurgencies. In Vietnam, El Salvador, etc., the "people" were "undecided" so the counterinsurgency campaign was designed to win them over with development, security, and reform. But in ethnic/sectarian insurgencies, people don't decide which side to support based on the provision of development, security, and reform. Loyalty is more primal.

That's a great, great point, and I kind of feel like an idiot that it never occurred to me in that way. Thanks.

Only question is, what happened to the supposed mass of secular, well-educated Iraqi professionals? My guess is the majority have left or are leaving for Syria, Egypt, Jordan, etc.

[Culpeper]

When I first saw the term, "The Surge", for the latest offensives I was sort of baffled myself by the name they chose. It just appears to me that someone making decisions finally read, "Counterinurgency Warfare", by David Galula while waiting in the lobby for a dentist appointment.