But Wilf, for "love" to be "good", there has to be a strong "pain" component. Doesn't it??? At least it has in my experience. So what if you can get the mission done without the pain?Originally Posted by William F. Owen
(I typed this tongue-in-cheek but the more I reread it, the more I like it.)
"Jointery" raises some funny questions
Last month I spoke at our Command and Staff College ( a joint school) about the need for National policy for the conduct of small wars and insurgency. The presentation seemed to go well and the questions were quite benign (it was the lecture before morning tea...) until...
One of the Naval O4 students posed a question that was actually a statement. He queried why when I spoke about the issue of counterinsurgency that I took an "land centric' approach.
After reassuring the audience that there were valuable tasks for all of the joint team in the fight, ultimately I had to point out that most populations live on land.... I did conclude by reassuring the white suiters that when populations started to live underwater we would be guaranteed to start talking a whole lot more about the naval roles in COIN.
You have no idea how many times I had this conversation with my brothers from PACFLEET and PACOM. Tremendous energy and money were committed to complex programs to control the waters of South East Asia. Radar systems, etc. And this was all sold as COIN. My standard line to them was very similar to yours. "Insurgency doesn't happen at sea."
This points to a larger issue though, that the Army guys get just as wrong as the Navy - the issue of border control to solve insurgency. Be it the PAK-AF border, the many "borders" of sub Saharan Africa, or the waters between MY-RP-ID. The fact is that these populaces have been "globalized" for thousands of years, and their culture and commerce rely on what is now considered illegal trade across these modern borders. To close borders has a tremendous negative impact on the very populaces that are already supporting insurgency against their respective governments, all in the name of stopping trans-national crime/terrorism. This, even though everyone also knows that criminals and terrorists have no particular recognition or concern for these borders either, and that networked operations can much more effectively be short-circuited by identifying and taking down the critical nodes on either side of the border where these actions either originate, terminate, or transit through.
So, yes, the Navy looks at the problem in a very Navy way. control the seas. The Army looks at it in a very army way. Defeat the enemy, control the borders.
I take a populist approach. Understand the populace, and the failures of governance that is causing their unrest. Also understand the legitimate cultures and activities of the populace as well. Then design and implement a program to help the governance address its failures and better care for the populace, while at the same time implementing a tailored security program and operations against the insurgent. Never forgetting that the insurgent also a member of the populace.
As to those outside actors, that come into a country waging UW to leverage these insurgencies (AQ all over, the JI in the Philippines, Iranians in Iraq, etc) Apply CT to these, and also seek to understand and then disable their network.
I guess the key thing to remember is that we are all slanted by our training and experience, and will try to fit any given problem into that paradigm. I never met a Marine who didn't think any military problem could not be resolved by an amphibious assault, nor an Air Force pilot who was not convinced that air power, or "global strike" was not the key to victory.
Know your enemy and know yourself...Joint doesn't fix us, but we are getting to know ourselves a lot better, and that is a start.
*Cough* Somali Pirates *Cough*
Sam Liles
Selil Blog
Don't forget to duck Secret Squirrel
The scholarship of teaching and learning results in equal hatred from latte leftists and cappuccino conservatives.
All opinions are mine and may or may not reflect those of my employer depending on the chance it might affect funding, politics, or the setting of the sun. As such these are my opinions you can get your own.
That's not counter insurgency, that's counter piracy
and it's been a naval role for centuries. So not COIN but COPI.
How are they doing on that nowadays, by the way...
What he said
Selil,and it's been a naval role for centuries. So not COIN but COPI.
How are they doing on that nowadays, by the way...
Mate, surely after all this time on SWJ and the countless posts, you don't mistake the criminal act of piracy for insurgency? where have we failed?
Mark
Selil and Bill Moore raise some very interesting issues, and I for one am not ready to dismiss the issue of whether or not piracy is insurgency.
Nor am I convinced that piracy is a Navy problem; God help us if it is.
The topic deserves more and deeper analysis.
I have used the Barbary Pirates as an example of Small Wars and Irregular War--with a dash of COIN thrown in as in the pirates against the world's maritime-based economy of the day. Interesting that recent statements by the Somali pirates point to their "country"'s disastrous state and say they turned to piracy against the world. Recent connections between the Muslim extremists and the Somali pirates reinforce that connection. All of that may be streched a bit too far but I feel very comfortable in seeing the phenomenon as an element of irregular warfare. Our Navy runs hot and cold on the issue of brown water operations; sometimes they are for the concept, sometimes they are not. At least some of them are looking at it.
This relates well to the DoD Directive on IW under discussion on the blog. That directive gives JFCOM the mission to push the training for IW rather than SOCOM. I see that as a good thing not because SOCOM cannot handle IW--they can and do so quite handily. Too many folks however across the services would have seen that as a reason to once again forget about IW, COIN, or any related matter.
Tom
Counter Piracy was certainly the reason we created a Navy, and shaped their engagement from 1803 to Stephen Decatur in 1815(or so). But the decisive actions in those campaigns happend on land and were executed by Marines.
The at Sea portion of countering piracy is important today as well, but the ocean is a big area. There those who say that we then need to implement a blockade. Well as I recall the coast of Somalia alone is as long as the coast of California. Navy ships are big, pirate "ships" are more like 11M RHIBs. That too is too costly and too much area. Once again we will need to follow the vipers to their nest and kill them there.
Young men are becoming pirates in growing numbers because they escape the norm and gain rockstar-like status and money. Governments turn a blind eye because they are not held accountable for doing so, and also gain money to their weak economies in general, and to their own pockets in particular.
Simple cost/benefit analysis by all. We need an engagement plan where the benefit exceeds the cost; and we (we being the global maritime economy) need to make the cost of being a pirate exceed the benefit. It will always exist, but clearly the current balance is tipped the wrong way.
ISTM piracy can be symptom of an insurgency, but if one is looking for true "naval" insurgents, there is always the LTTE, which has the most advanced naval capability of any insurgency that I'm aware of.
Last edited by Entropy; 12-05-2008 at 02:10 PM.
We rarely differ but this is one of the differs...
Seems to me that piracy is piracy and insurgency is insurgency. The DoD dictionary agrees:
Insurgency: An organized movement aimed at the overthrow of a constituted government through use of subversion and armed conflict.
Piracy: An illegal act of violence, depredation (e.g., plundering, robbing, or pillaging), or detention in or over international waters committed for private ends by the crew or passengers of a private ship or aircraft against another ship or aircraft or against persons or property on board such ship or aircraft.
That does not mean that insurgents may not use piracy to further their goals nor, I suppose, does it mean that Pirates cannot be insurgents but the two still remain distinct acts.Oh, I dunno, they've been landing the Marines to take care of land based pirates around the world since 1801 in Tom's Barbary effort; dozens of landings from the Caribbean to Sumatra and even to Korea. Generally successfully. There've even been a few Naval and Marine officers court martialed for 'exceeding their authority.'Nor am I convinced that piracy is a Navy problem; God help us if it is.Perhaps. Probably deserves action at some point...The topic deserves more and deeper analysis.
cough?
Yep, the pirates are winning over the cargo ship population by first coercing them to act in accordance within pirate expectations, and then as the world's cargo fleets realize that the world's navies can't protect them they'll recognize the pirates as the new government of the sea and willingly start supporting them. This must be an insurgency, and it is obviously the Navy's problem.*Cough* Somali Pirates *Cough*In all seriousness, pirates like other organized criminal groups do present a challenge to the State. I still think our definitions for COIN, FID, UW, etc. are inadequate to address the security challenges we face today. Words have meaning, and many times those meanings can lmit our understanding of reality.
As for joint operations, our joint doctrine has some flaws, for example the aspects of it that are ATO centric (time table driven operations that nests well with the way the Air Force manages operations, but not necessarily with the other services), which is one example of a process that should be largely service doctrine, yet in many ways the ATO drives our joint targeting process.
I think the reality is that most of the problems with joint operations (I don't want to touch procurement and similiar issues) is not the doctrine, but rather how the doctrine is put into practice (if it is put into practice). In this case the shortfalls are due to the personalties involved, not the doctrine. All people, even our best commanders, are not without fault. It is a human trait we cannot overcome (even with EBO); it is simply part of the uncertainty of war. So when I read comments on one joint command being Army centric, and another Navy centric, that isn't a reflection of our joint doctrine, it is a recognition of the failure of people to transition from service centric methodology to joint methodology. Still I believe we are getting better at joint operations each year. I personally wouldn't want to fight an OIF-1 like fight without the synergized capabilities of our joint force empowered by our joint doctrine. Call me bias, but like many of you I have seen the power that this joint force can bring to bare on a situation.
Admittedly our joint doctrine is largely focused on warfighting, NEO, etc., so it doesn't sufficiently address the role of the services in an irregular warfare scenario (we'll get there). The reality is IW is largely ground pounder focused, with air and sea power providing critical enablers. All the services play critical roles, but part of our service culture, based perhaps on our captialist social norms and our Congressional funding process, motivates many officers to attempt to undermine the other services and overly boost the value of their service (or branch). This iis what causes jointness to fail.
Look at the bright side, we know we have our faults, but generally our enemies are much worse. They're stuck with the imperfection of being human too.
...and only half in jest. There is an old Jewish saying that the perfect woman must be the devil.
Seriously, "Joint" is like "comprehensive," "holistic" or "System". It's a word loaded with supposedly benign effectiveness and utility. Of course everyone wants to work towards a common cause, all in agreement and all being more than the mere sum of the parts - nice if you can get it.
"Armoured Infantry" are neither good armour or good infantry, not because the logic is bad, but because the human understanding is poor. Someone skilled in "Joint Planning" is not as skilled as someone in "Land Operations" planning, at planning land warfare operations.
Personally to me, Joint means saving money and reducing effectiveness.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Wilf,
I think "joint" is more than that and is an overall boost to effectiveness. Let's look at the official definition: "...activities, operations, organizations, etc., in which elements of more than one service of the same nation participate." That pretty much describes almost every military operation.
Also, to me its about making the services cooperate and reducing service parochialism. Standardization through joint doctrine and procedures have been very beneficial in many areas. Minimal joint procurement standards are also necessary - in the bad old days the services literally couldn't communicate with each other because of radio incompatibility, or one service's piece of equipment would disrupt that of another service.
120mm,
Agree with your comments on training.
Ken,
Don't get me started on uniforms. The AF has screwed that up as well. The only two positive things I can say about the ABU is that it is wash-and-wear and it has sizes that fit females much better than any of the older uniforms.
And like the ACU, I'm dubious the color scheme provides much camouflage except in cases such as this:
Unfortunately, the same thing is true of many who tout jointness...
At least the first part is; they mean well but fail to realize that increased efficiency does not equate to increased effectiveness -- and that, frequently it can actually decrease effectiveness.
There are some benefits of increasing joint efforts and most who wish to do so are well intentioned but the big drivers have been just as you say -- an effort to save money which has, even if often inadvertently, adversely affected effectiveness in many areas.
There's nothing wrong with the concept, it's fine -- it's the implementation that counts and to let the Program and Budget folks drive ANY train is an invitation to disaster.
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