Winning the War in Afghanistan

[Ken White]

How about the Philippines in the early 1900s?

See Bob -- it was never totally quelled, just kept on a low simmer -- and we eventually left...

Or how about all the insurrections put down by the Soviets within their empire, the USSR?

Describe today's USSR to me?

I know Malaya won't be accepted but I can never figure out why not.

Because the intervening Army was the army of the government of Malaya at that time. The British had total control of ALL aspects of government. That's something no one else has ever had, including us in the Philippines and the Russians in the various SSRs. On Malaya, the distinct and obvious ethnic tilt also was unusual...

(I am assuming IW means irregular warfare.)

it does. Not also my emphasis on large forces; a few have been turned by small forces.

My point is that commitment of large conventional forces to such efforts is pretty well a route to failure; certainly to less than stellar success -- there's always a great cost in all aspects to everyone involved for small to no benefit, possibly to detriment...

[Bill Moore]

Steve, you provided a great justification for specialists in general, but tapped danced all around my question and didn't provide an answer. We clearly provided all the specialists you mentioned above and more, what we didn't have was a capable generalist to pull them altogether in a cohesive way. More importantly, the nations we invaded didn't have that person or persons, or perhaps our actions prevented them from achieving power.