SWJ and the book

[Mark O'Neill]

. "Small wars" would focus on the warfighting dimension. Some things which were part of low intensity conflict--peacekeeping and counterterrorism--would not, to me, be war.

Today, the primary doctrinal and strategy phrases are irregular warfare (IW) or irregular challenges, and stability, security, transition and reconstruction operations (SSTR)

I maintain a dissenting view - I think the 'small wars' label tends to be all encompassing. If one took the USMC manual as an example, it is about far more than 'merely' warfighting. That is the reason why it was written - most military people get the 'warfighting' piece - it is all the other stuff rolled into the label (pol, legal, dev etc) that required amplification and expansion. The rational is evident in C.E Calwell's work.

I think the posts have substantiated the view that our lexicon is problematic and remains contested.

[John T. Fishel]

Mark--

Just one more word. the term Small Wars as used by Callwell and the USMC 1940 appears to apply to conflicts that involve regular forces and what we today call non-state actors. To me, that seems a good enough definition for a term that, for all the tinkerig, hasn't been improved upon.

Cheers

JohnT

[SWJED]

.... though Bill and I did buy the domain name licmootwootwiwcoinsmallwarssasosstr.com just in case.

[Mark O'Neill]

.... though Bill and I did buy the domain name licmootwootwiwcoinsmallwarssasosstr.com just in case.

I bet there was not too much competition for that one!

[John T. Fishel]

Hooah!!! Oorah!!! Hip, hip, hooray!!!

[Granite_State]

I maintain a dissenting view - I think the 'small wars' label tends to be all encompassing. If one took the USMC manual as an example, it is about far more than 'merely' warfighting. That is the reason why it was written - most military people get the 'warfighting' piece - it is all the other stuff rolled into the label (pol, legal, dev etc) that required amplification and expansion. The rational is evident in C.E Calwell's work.

Was about to say the same thing. After all, isn't the consensus view that politics is generally more important than military force in the majority of small wars?

Another term for the mix is "aid to the civil power." The Brits used that one back in the day.

[Steve Blair]

I'll hop on the "small wars" bandwagon as well.

[Tom Odom]

Make it a 4-some

The very nature of small wars make them high risk because while they ideally are done out of sight, out of mind, they are politically explosive at all times.

Tom

[selil]

...... and when you add in the idea of de-centralized warfare (from the book) what happens to small wars? Is it still in the genre of low intensity conflict or totally different? Is it possible small wars is a sub genre of low intensity conflict or is it totally unrelated?

[Steve Blair]

I wouldn't really consider small wars per se to be part of LIC, but rather the reverse.

One reason I tend to prefer the term "small wars" is that it often reflects the overall level of a nation's commitment in terms of time and treasure to the conflict. Notice that I use "nation" in preference to "military" because that's the level of policy that is being discussed, IMO. It's still engaging all aspects of a nation's power, just at a lower (smaller) level than a full-scale war might. To me the term LIC is just too limiting, as it implies just the military side of things and tends to hint that somehow it isn't a war...which again to me sends up signals of "disposable" forces and objectives.

The commitment of Marines in Central America during the 1920s and the British colonial involvements over the years were questions of national policy and engaged many elements of both nations' political and military infrastructure. They were certainly wars (although with limited forces - the objectives weren't always as limited), but the overall commitment of time and treasure in comparison to other national activities was small.

I would hazard a guess that one reason the US has been so anxious to create new terms for this (LIC, MOOTW, alphabet soup....) has more to do with domestic political considerations (possibly including the fact that the use of the term "small war" might get some in Congress excited about needing a declaration of war) than it does actual utility. The resistance of some of the services to working with the State Department (and vice versa) may also play a role.