Support Grows for Standing up an Unconventional Warfare Command - Sean Naylor, Armed Forces Journal.

An idea that wouldn't die may be getting a new lease on life. Despite years of the idea being shot down at the highest levels, there are again growing calls from inside and outside the military for the establishment of an "unconventional warfare command" that would oversee those special operations forces whose primary mission is not killing and capturing the enemy.

Recent leadership changes in Congress, the Defense Department and U.S. Special Operations Command have given supporters of the idea fresh hope that the PowerPoint slides might finally become reality.

At the core of the debate are the Army's Special Forces, who specialize in working "by, with and through" indigenous forces. They have long complained that they play second fiddle in U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) to those units that specialize in direct action, i.e. missions focused on capturing or killing enemies. SOCom gives direct-action units, particularly those that fall under Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), priority in resourcing, and it is from those units that most of SOCom's leadership is drawn, they say. Only by the creation of an unconventional warfare command will the special ops units that emphasize indirect action get a fair shake on the battlefield and inside the bureaucracy, their argument goes...