Optimizing the Marine Corps for small wars

[William F. Owen]

@ How do we develop Marines to understand, operate, and positively influence what Robert Tomes writes in Relearning Counterinsurgency Warfare; as the “central tenant of counterinsurgency warfare: winning the allegiance of the indigenous population”?

@ This education and training is all very relevant to winning in a small war, but what is lacking in our development revolves around what Tomes cites Lieutenant Colonel Roger Trinquier as concluding in Modern Warfare: A French View of Counterinsurgency; “that the guerrilla’s greatest advantages are his perfect knowledge of an area…and the support given him by the inhabitants…this total dependence upon terrain and population is also the guerilla’s weak point.” It is the ‘terrain and populations’ Marines must master in order to succeed in future small wars.

@ I would suggest that this is view is at best simplistic and confuses means with aims. It's WHY the allegiance is necessary, not that gaining it is a pre-requisite. 7% of Thailand's population is Muslim and a minute part of that is effectively sustaining a very bloody insurgency. It could be argued that US and Southern Irish support for the IRA, in the 1970's, was way more effective than that of the local Republicans.

@ If that's a direct quote, could you cite it for me. It might just save me a bunch of work!

[Nomad]

William,

Here's the citation.

Tomes, Robert R. "Relearning Counterinsurgency Warfare". Proceedings. 34-1(2004):16-28.

You might be able to find the article on the internet as well. Enjoy. I would be interested to hear your views on Granite States post.

[William F. Owen]

I would be interested to hear your views on Granite States post.

...that you are interested, humbles me to a crippling degree.

In all honesty, I have no view on the matter, other than to suggest that the idea of Small Wars is not an accurate enough criteria, on which to base force development.

In some ways the USMC already is and was a security force/colonial police, in terms of it fleet protection, Evacuation, and Embassy security functions.

Get the description of the mission right and that may be some use, but you'll still end up defining things that you don't want the USMC to do, and that may not be useful.

[Granite_State]

Abu Muqawama has a couple of posts on this and the current commandant, whose attitudes have been mentioned here:

http://abumuqawama.blogspot.com/2007...ot-get-it.html

http://abumuqawama.blogspot.com/2007/12/cmc.html