Watched a very interesting movie last night, called "Bloody Sunday", directed by Paul Greengrass from 2002. It's about the killings of numerous unarmed Irish civil rights protestors by British army troops on Jan 30, 1972. Now I can't tell if it's entirely objective, but it does raise some very interesting points, that are still applicable today, maybe even more so.
The most obvious one is the military is not trained for the law enforcement mission. They can secure an area for the police-types to come in and do what they're trained for, but the military, for the most part, should not be charged with doing what is primarily a law enforcement mission (rounding up suspects, effecting arrests, searches and seizures, etc). In this movie, some members of 1 Para are so keyed up, they don't view these protestors as fellow citizens, but as hooligans who are responsible for the deaths of fellow troops, and are bent on revenge.
Another obvious paradigm that is clearly shown is, "the best laid plan never survives initial contact with the enemy." There's a scene where the staff shows some higher-level officer the placement of their troops, the route of march of the protestors, what they anticipate the protestors actions will be, what their reactions will be, etc. Although it may have looked great on the wall in the command post, once events started to unfold, it quickly got out of hand.
Some other TTPs that came into play are unity of command, maintaining good SA and discipline, and good comms. A lot has been mentioned about the Brits' experience with the "Troubles" in Northern Ireland, as a good source of lessons learned regarding COIN, strategic comms, etc. There's a scene at the end, where the member of Parliament who was the main organizer makes a statement that the British govt has just handed the IRA their biggest victory. This is a great example of the superior force losing the battle of the narrative.
All in all, a very well done movie, with lots of good discussion points relevant to today's operational environment.
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