In light of PhilR's comment that IW defies boundaries, is there anything wrong with declaring that IW is not a conventional fight between nation states or otherwise established fielded force on force? In that case, we have
  • Regular warfare, which everyone who stared across the fields of Waterloo, trenches of the Seine, and Fulda Gap is comfortable with, and
  • Irregular warfare, which is just about everything else from insurgency to cyberattacks (though these may at some point become "regular" in the future)


As far as partisan politics goes, MikeF, the Air Force is clearly trying to find its role in the "new" world of IW, particularly in an urban environment, but to think that ground forces will always be the SUPPORTED effort is to misunderstand the meaning of the term. Ground forces in the Balkans were initially constrained by political realities, so the Air forces had to be the main effort. True, you can't seize and hold territory from the air, but you can certainly force capitulation to a diplomatic resolution, which is in fact what happened.
To RankA, from what I observed, there are plenty of grunts who feel their "assets" are not being properly utilized as well. The fact is, IW requires all elements of national power, especially diplomatic, informational, and economic efforts, which unfortunately have not received the preeminence they deserve lately. "Nation building" is not what the Army was designed for, despite the skill of CA and CE troops, nor should they be expected to carry out these missions.

The ideal IW warrior is a multi-lingual cultural anthropologist with a good business sense and close air support.