More killing. Less good deeds

[MikeF]

By that logic, I would argue that the US is engaged in an ongoing COIN campaign in LA - one, I would note, that they appear to be loosing .

Counterinsurgency is military, paramilitary, political, economic, psychological, and civic actions taken by a government to defeat insurgency (JP 1-02).

Using the definitions of COIN found in JP 1-02 and FM 3-24, COIN is an action that a government takes to quell internal rebellion or strife. Along those lines, the only COIN that the US can accomplish is within our internal borders. When we intervene in another countries internal affairs, the matter is inherently difficult as we must pick a side. IMO, this distinction is important, and our failure to address the issue only muddies the waters. In effect, when we intervene, we are picking a side. In Iraq, we back the Shia-heavy government over the Sunnis. In Afghanistan, we back the Karzai-heavy government over the Taliban. Both governments were put in place through elections, and we are hoping that these governments will eventually stabalize internal strife AND share our collective national security interests.

Uboat suggests that those who rebel against the host governments do so out of ideology.

They have an ideology (actually a series of ideologies, there is more than one insurgency going on. But that doesn't change the central point). That ideology is what attracts people to support and/or fight for them.

. In some cases, particularly AQ, I believe he is correct. However, many other insurgents are simply fighting over an internal power struggle. In Iraq, the majority of Sunnis refused to vote during the last election, and they simply are not willing to accept a Shia government. Moreover, many Shia groups within the government view their newfound power as payback time for years of repression and neglect during Saddam's Baath party rule.

Along these lines, I concur with Tom's comments in other threads as far as the current state of Iraq goes. For a time, we defeated AQI and Shia extremist groups, we stabilized the country, we continue to help build the Iraqi Security Forces, and we attempting to afford the Iraqis the opportunity to elect a permanent government. But how did we get here? I would suggest that this is where Wilf, COL Gentile, and Ken's points come in.

1. Stop the violence.
2. Turn the country back over to its own people.
3. Leave.

Stopping the violence in Iraq was not simply population centric. Yes, in Baghdad, we secured the populace through urban reconstruction and secure neighborhoods, but in many other areas, we secured through blunt force trauma...i.e. killing bad guys.Rank amateur contends that

Irregulars can control their loss rate by hiding in the population. Something the Luffwaffe - for exampe - couldn't do. Therefore, if you strategy is "kill more insurgents," your strategy is easily defeated.

I disagree. This statement assumes that one cannot seperate the insurgent from the populace.

So how do you find the enemy and kill him? Reconnaissance, Surveillance, Human Collection, and Targeting. As a company commander,
60-70% of ALL operations were devoted to intelligence collection. This allowed us to find the enemy. Next, we you find him, you attempt to persuade him to either join the government or settle his grievances on the political level. If he is willing, fine. If not, then you must attack and destroy him. At this point in the game, it is really that simple. Otherwise, the conflict is protracted and civilian casualties continue to soar.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, many General Purpose Forces (GPF) are transitioning to Security Force Assistance (SFA). In another time, these actions were known as Foreign Internal Defense (FID). In theory, Coalition Forces will mentor, train, and combat advise Security Forces. A conversation with several NCO's deploying on that mission disturbed me:

"So, when the Afghan Army refuses to do a mission, how will you react?"

"C'mon sir, you damn well know that we will do it ourselves."

I know this post has been long and covered the gambit of COIN theory to SFA to tactical operations, but I suppose it covers the difficult questions that we must attempt to answer:

What are we doing?
What should we be doing?
What can we accomplish?

There are no easy answers here, but I can attest that winning the hearts and minds is not one of them. Regardless, as long as the soldiers and marines are deployed, they will continue to fight the best that they can.

v/r

Mike

[carl]

Leaving the Luftwaffe out as an irrelevancy, the answer to your statement is that you have to weed them out with good intel; thus your strategy is not defeated; your job is simply made a lot harder harder and it will take longer.

The best intel to weed out the bad guys comes from the people in the village or the neighborhood. They are not likely provide intel if they are pissed off at having been dissed by troops, had their fields ruined by a tank or having some of their relatives, friends and neighbors, near or distant, killed or maimed by an airstrike. Another disadvantage of the above listed events is their excitable teenage sons might go off and join a war band to get some revenge.

The advantage of COINdinistada is that it tends to highlight the disadvantages of making the locals mad at you.

It seems to me that part of what this discussion is all about is how you kill the ones who need to be done away with when the miscreants are near or among the people. Do you get them mostly with rifles and try to eschew air strikes, which I imagine can complicate things and will almost certainly result in more friendly casualties; or do you use the heavy weapons more, even thought that will most likely (given the recent history in Afghan, certainly) increase casualties amongst the locals?

[slapout9]

After all, joining an insurgency which has a good chance of ending in your death is irrational, right? Unfortunately, in my experience, rationality is not necessarily an inborn trait in humans.
SFC W

IMO this is the real problem and it is the same for kids joining gangs in America or anyplace else for that matter. Don't have an answer but this is the problem

[Fuchs]

IMO this is the real problem and it is the same for kids joining gangs in America or anyplace else for that matter. Don't have an answer but this is the problem

The answer lies in the perception/subjective estimation of the chance of success. That's (one of the reasons) why morale is so important.

Gang members underestimate the drawbacks and overestimate the advantages, especially their chance of becoming part of an elite group of (obviously few) really rich gangsters.
They do also have seemingly strange preferences, like an apparent overvaluation of things like prestige and reassurance.

They drop out once they become disillusioned and realize that selling pot means much more trouble, but not much more money than working at McDonald's in most cases.

Both gang members and combatants have a problem, though: They cannot easily drop out of their system. Desertion is associated with huge risk.
And as long as they're stuck in the system they depend on group loyalty, comradeship*. Many German WW2 veterans agreed that their primary motivation to fight was because they were responsible for their comrades who in turn were responsible for them. Soldiers fought/fight for their comrades*, and that motivation is very difficult to crack.

(*: Is this a correct translation at all? In German it's Kameradschaft and Kamerad(en), btu I'm not sure about the translation.)

[Ken White]

The best intel to weed out the bad guys comes from the people in the village or the neighborhood...

All true -- for some, for others, not so much. Every thing you say also applies to the opposition. said opposition is far more likely to antagonize the locals than are most western armies who take classes in how to be nice and usually don't steal the goats and chickens. So that aspect is about a wash. The issue then becomes who pays more...

Then, those western hunters also have several other means of intel gathering that do not rely on locals. Net advantage, the hunters.

The advantage of COINdinistada is that it tends to highlight the disadvantages of making the locals mad at you.

True. So too do common sense and human decency let halfway decently trained troops behave properly with no COIN knowledge at all. What COIN also does is convince you that human decency and logic are possessed by your opponents. That is not always true. COIN will also 'convince' you that you can fix things that you really cannot...

Or that you have a way to fix things that either don't really need to be fixed or for which you should not be the one to attempt the fix.

It seems to me that part of what this discussion is all about is how you kill the ones who need to be done away with when the miscreants are near or among the people...

There is no one size fits all, every war and every situation are different; one has to know and apply the principle of METT-TC. All day, every day.

COIN warfare is not the answer to any problem; it is a problem applied to correct another problem. Usually wrongly and usually too late -- almost invariably at great cost for little lasting change. The COIN fans are fond of telling us of insurgencies defeated. Name me one that has 20 or more years later proven to be a net benefit the major power involved. *

What started this whole thread was Wilf's very accurate statement that war is war. May irritate some but you can't sugar coat it and make it less than it is -- trying to do so has put us in deep Yogurt four times in my lifetime; the first two were tied games; the second two have yet to be determined but all four indubitably cost this nation a great deal in many respects. The inane belief that you can fight war 'nicely' is stupid and dangerous; we have killed a good many people because of that idiocy. War is war -- and COIN doesn't make it nice. Quite the contrary. 'Fixing' failed states is super arrogant and prone to failure.

If you have to engage in a stability op, do you need to use 'COIN principles?' Certainly -- and you have to apply them as UBoat said while you're trying to tamp down the insurgents. But you need to get the max number of insurgents dead quickly in order to let the civil sector take over the aid effort that the military force began. If you do not do that, you are headed for a very long slog and a rocky effort.


Wilf posted this: LINK. That caused Coldstreamer to post this: LINK. Exactly.

If you did it right, you wouldn't have to do COIN.

[Ken White]

The answer lies in the perception/subjective estimation of the chance of success. That's (one of the reasons) why morale is so important.

Also why attacking that morale is important.

(*: Is this a correct translation at all? In German it's Kameradschaft and Kamerad(en), btu I'm not sure about the translation.)

You got it right. The British and Australians would use 'Mate' (mateship), Americans would more likely say Buddy or buddies, maybe Friends (friendship). Canadians are eclectic -- all three...

That very critical factor also applies to other forces aside from organize armed services. In Afghanistan, there are always a number of Temporary Workers types, hired for a job. Some are local, some are Pakistanis that have made the hike, a few from elsewhere. Most are not ideologically wedded to the cause, it's just money. So they're likely easily deterred from returning if they make it out of that contract alive.

If and as they make more trips, the become semi-professionals or even pros and the either the ideological or the comradeship effect take hold. It can be worked upon.

[IntelTrooper]

All true -- for some, for others, not so much. Every thing you say also applies to the opposition. said opposition is far more likely to antagonize the locals than are most western armies who take classes in how to be nice and usually don't steal the goats and chickens. So that aspect is about a wash. The issue then becomes who pays more...

Then, those western hunters also have several other means of intel gathering that do not rely on locals. Net advantage, the hunters.

As an especially insightful Marine LtCol and ETT mentor once said, "The Taliban get a lot more mileage out of threats than you do out of rice and blankets."

In my experience, the intel provided by concerned citizens was rarely of much use. And even then, we never charmed them into giving up their insurgent neighbors. I had a lot of lieutenants and squad leaders looking at me all puzzled because I refused to try to recruit sources when we were out having key leader engagements and such. We had more effective means of collection, and I didn't want the locals to associate my face with an American trying to pump them for information all the time, like some kind of armed Jehovah's Witness showing up every week to harass them.

When all the LLOs are in place and progressing, the masses who find that their best interest is to assist the counterinsurgents will find us. And then you get that pretty intelligence <--> operations loop thing. Until then, you have to be more creative.

[carl]

Ken: I don't know how to insert parts of quotes so I will answer as best I can.

Mission of course is the first thing. What concerns me about "war is war" is that if killing becomes the prime requirement, that will lead to sort of an industrial view. If killing is the prime mission, then efficient killing is a good thing. If efficiency is defined as your losses vs. bad guys killed that leads to a lot of heavy weapons use which is bad for the locals. COIN theory as I understand it stresses that killing isn't the ONLY thing, and in some circumstances it is much less important. It tends to change the view of the mission which would change behavior.

That a defeated insurgency ultimately benefits the big power involved just confirms the wisdom of the big power.

Sometimes the opposition irritates the locals more than our guys. AQI really irritated the locals. But if AQI hadn't been there, would our guys have irritated the locals more than the nationalist insurgents? Did the VC in their hey day irritate the locals more than the ARVN? I don't think it is always a wash and our guys are more likely to trained not to step on toes if COIN has some influence.

As far as technical means go, we have that advantage in Afghan and I wonder how far it is getting us.

Having to apply COIN is the result of a mistake made before, granted. But those mistakes are going to be and have been made and we must use the best tool to deal with it.

Sometimes, as you said the enemy is as decent and logical as your side. If COIN teaches you that, that is good. It is always good when you realize the enemy can be as good, bad, smart or stupid as you.

I don't think COIN says that war is nice, quite the opposite. I read about decades long, frustrating operations where close combat by infantry is preferred over heavy weapons. That does not sound clean to me. That sounds grim and bloody.

Fixing failed states is as you said. In our two current cases though, as Powell said, we broke it so we bought it.

[pjmunson]

Some of the very simplistic arguments made in this thread are a bit disturbing. I know (hope) that the people making them have much more nuanced positions lying behind their short posts, but the black-and-white, either-or way in which the argument is being laid out by some is intellectually lazy at a minimum.

A number of people have brought some of the nuance back in. I'll add my two cents.

What are the dangers? Applying means unsuited to the ends desired. Failing to recognize the nature of the war. "Kind-hearted people" thinking that a war could be won with little bloodshed. Thinking that an insurgency can be defeated quickly by technology and targeting. Thinking that military means alone can create lasting stability.

A purely hearts and minds strategy applied in the most simplistic and optimistic way could certainly fall into a number of these danger areas. But so too could a "war is war" approach. Many would argue that killing more people, better, faster, with more accurate targeting could lead to a neat and quick end to our problems. This is equally simplistic and dangerous. There are a number of crackpots, some who are in positions of responsibility and authority that they do not deserve, who subscribe to simplistic fantasies of the kinetic and non-kinetic kind. Fortunately, however, I believe that the vast majority of professionals have attained much more nuanced views in the past 8 years.

Security is an absolute requirement and security requires killing. At the same time, this kinetic campaign must not so alienate the populace to be secured that they would rather side with the insurgents anyway. Many of the tools to avoid alienating the population, from understanding their culture and language to precisely fixing the identity, aims, and factions of the insurgents and various other bad actors, come from the realm of social science. Social science can improve your kinetic targeting and therefore should not be poo-pooed out of hand.

Once security is initially attained, much if not all will be lost if you then abandon the populace to go seek out more killing as the insurgents will often come back to seek their revenge, again working against your ends.

Finally, even once you clear and hold, you have to build. This is cliche if taken at face value, building only playgrounds, pools, or schools. More broadly, you have to ensure that the populace begins to build the institutions, from security forces, to social services, to dispute resolution/justice systems, that will maintain stability. Not only does this promote long-term stability, but it also takes away a major aspect of many insurgents' attempts to create legitimacy in the eyes of the populace. They offer these services where the government cannot.

Neither a pure "hearts and minds" approach (which is a very poor choice of phrase as an earlier poster noted) nor a pure military kinetic approach will produce the desired results. Kill more better so we can leave is just as divorced from reality as win hearts and minds by building schools and women's centers. It takes kinetic, non-kinetic, arms, and social science to set the conditions for success. Kill the right people as efficiently as possible, which is a long and messy task, do so in a way that minimizes alienation of the populace (extremely challenging and often works against efficiency in task 1), and win loyalty to the host nation government by providing security and assistance while they build the institutions for long term stability. Reducing this to an either-or argument makes little sense.

[Ken White]

What concerns me about "war is war" is that if killing becomes the prime requirement, that will lead to sort of an industrial view.

You can never forget that war is war and it means killing -- there is no other way and no easy route. That does NOT mean you take an 'industrial' view.

If killing is the prime mission, then efficient killing is a good thing.

Yes it is -- but not nearly as good as effective killing; i.e. the right versus not the wrong persons --and don't kill their goats and dogs.

If efficiency is defined as your losses vs. bad guys killed that leads to a lot of heavy weapons use which is bad for the locals.

That would be a really stupid metric and I don't know anyone who'd advocate that (except Robert McNamara and he's dead).

COIN theory as I understand it stresses that killing isn't the ONLY thing, and in some circumstances it is much less important.

All combat training emphasizes that and everybody gets the Law of War.

It tends to change the view of the mission which would change behavior.

Thank you for making my point.

It does not change the view Joe and most NCO take toward the mission; it does not change the view of all Officers toward the mission -- it can change the view of people in the rear and at home and of the politicians. That's the danger.

That a defeated insurgency ultimately benefits the big power involved just confirms the wisdom of the big power.

I don't understand that comment, if it's a response to my question:

"The COIN fans are fond of telling us of insurgencies defeated. Name me one that has 20 or more years later proven to be a net benefit the major power involved."

Note the wording. My contention is that no major power obtained a net benefit (outcome versus all costs) from participating in a COIN action.

Did the VC in their hey day irritate the locals more than the ARVN? I don't think it is always a wash and our guys are more likely to trained not to step on toes if COIN has some influence.

Yes to the VC being slightly more annoying most of the time to the population. With respect to stepping on toes that's dependent on many things and COIN training is absolutely no guarantee of proper performance. That whole bit is very much unit dependent.

Sometimes, as you said the enemy is as decent and logical as your side. If COIN teaches you that, that is good. It is always good when you realize the enemy can be as good, bad, smart or stupid as you.

I don't recall saying that but it's true. I do know that much COIN oriented training is more likely to inculcate a belief that the opponent is deserving of better treatment and that can adversely affect a lot of folks and make them hesitant to act.

Fixing failed states is as you said. In our two current cases though, as Powell said, we broke it so we bought it.

Powell said a lot of things he probably shouldn't have. Be that as it may, as I said, we are in Afghanistan, we do need to finish the job we started because we said we would -- we shouldn't have, but we did -- we will continue to apply some COIN principles but that does not change the fact that it's a war, not a COIN operation.

"War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over."

William Tecumseh Sherman

[Bob's World]

While I can't get on the "war is war" wagon (the resolution of conflict lies in the roots of the conflict, and not all roots are the same even if the plants that break the surface look the same. To carry that further, if our job is just to trim it down to bare dirt and not worry about what springs back up or when, then I guess "war is war." To me though that is a dangerously simplistic approach.

Will agree with Ken as to neither Iraq or Afghanistan being COIN for the US, and add that I think it dangerously blinds us to what we reallly need to do to finish up and go home when we look at it as "COIN."

My take (and this is my take alone, so place full blame on my shoulders and not any organization I may support) is that:

Afghanistan is "Post-UW FID" and Iraq is "Post-regime change FID." Only HN forces conduct COIN in my view, and to believe that we are doing that HN business is to risk dangerous degradation of the HN governments already shakey legitimacy, and also increase perceptions of US legitimacy that IMO placed us on the target list of groups like AQ in the first place.

Just one guy's perspective.

[Rex Brynen]

Neither a pure "hearts and minds" approach (which is a very poor choice of phrase as an earlier poster noted) nor a pure military kinetic approach will produce the desired results. Kill more better so we can leave is just as divorced from reality as win hearts and minds by building schools and women's centers. It takes kinetic, non-kinetic, arms, and social science to set the conditions for success. Kill the right people as efficiently as possible, which is a long and messy task, do so in a way that minimizes alienation of the populace (extremely challenging and often works against efficiency in task 1), and win loyalty to the host nation government by providing security and assistance while they build the institutions for long term stability. Reducing this to an either-or argument makes little sense.

Well said!

There might have been some value in the initial starkness with which the debate was framed, whether to point to the weaknesses of a kinetic-only approach, stress the importance of social analysis and engagement, highlight the dangers of an institutional overemphasis on COIN, or raise legitimate warnings about COIN fetishism. That being said, in the blogosphere it now approaches point of mutual caricature (straw insurgents?)

Meanwhile, on the ground, it seems perfectly evident IMHO that both the kinetic and non-kinetic strands are important, at times working at cross purposes, but even more often mutually supporting when done right.

The key issue, it seems to me, is context. When do assertive kinetic activities pay major dividends in terms of weakening opponent capabilities and will, and when do they alienate locals to the point of fueling the insurgency? When does building school and well help to shift local attitudes, and when does it have negligible effect (either because gains can't be secured, or because the locals aren't swayed)? This is complicated stuff--it not only varies from insurgency to insurgency, but from town to town, valley to valley, and month to month. Likely, not even the locals can agree on what might be needed to stabilize the situation (ask ten random people in a shopping mall how to fix the health care system, and see what I mean).

In one of the other threads, Davidpfpo posted a link to a scathing newspaper article that, among other things, mentions building a park for women and children in Lashka Gar at a time when security was deteriorating--much to the annoyance of the locals. Understandable--it sounds a stupid project. But in a better security environment, it might have sent power signals to the population about the benefits of stabilization, and the hopes for their children might have for a better future. Again, the context matters.

How then do we know what works, why, when and how? To some extent this is an analytical issue. To some extent it is an intelligence collection challenge. To a large extent it is, in my view, addressed through leadership, training, preparation, empathy, and common sense within military, diplomatic, and aid agencies. Precisely because of the complexity and variation involved, I think there is only so much you are going to resolve by sharpening analytical (or doctrinal) tools.. I think a very great deal depends on who exactly is on the ground, and the individual qualities that they bring to process (and also help promote within their units).

In many ways, therefore, its a human resource management problem too. I'm struck how many times, when participants in successful stabilization missions are asked to explain that success, they highlight the key role not of a particular $1 million, or a new piece of kit, or a press release from a donor conference, but key individuals who, at critical times and critical places, knew how best to deal with complex political, military, and humanitarian-developmental issues.

[Ken White]

Some of the very simplistic arguments made in this thread are a bit disturbing. I know (hope) that the people making them have much more nuanced positions lying behind their short posts, but the black-and-white, either-or way in which the argument is being laid out by some is intellectually lazy at a minimum.

and will plead guilty to being intellectually (among other ways) lazy. It seems to me that you said pretty much the same thing Uboat509 said above. I agreed with him as well.

I'm not sure what's nuanced and what isn't and I'm also unsure anyone else has said anything that really contradicts either of you. No one that I recall has gone to a 'kill 'em all' position and no one has gone to a pure sweetness and light position. I just reviewed the entire thread to include re-reading Brigadier Kelly's comments and I have to ask:

Who has reduced it to an either or argument?

What, specifically is disturbing?

[pjmunson]

was probably better said here:

And neither are you, Gian. You both are offering reductionist viewpoints poised against a red herring reductionist view.

I agree that we need a clear view of Afghanistan. War is war is not a good start.

Tom

The argument was framed in ways that seemingly reject a large body of thought and practice with some relatively smug comments that are equally simplistic and reductionist as that accused of the other camp:
""COIN-oil" folks"

Gian Gentile's post acknowledges that both killing and "hearts and minds" were used, but then states: "war is war, it is not "armed social science," and real war, not happy war sold through clever-speak of "hearts and minds" language involves killing and death. And in actuality the historical models that we use to prop up this ostensible notion of "hearts and minds" were won through killing and destruction that broke the back of the resistance." Again, his own post shows that it is not either-or, but he ends with a statement that makes it seem like "hearts and minds" is a crock. I'd agree that imagining that you can win a war through hearts and minds alone is insane, but who is really arguing that you can fight COIN by hearts and minds alone?

The article rejects hearts and minds as a pipe dream: "A hearts-and-minds approach is predicated on the proposition that we foreign, Western, culturally Christian, invaders can persuade a sizeable proportion of the Pashtun population to cut themselves off from their cultural roots; subject themselves to an equally foreign and incomprehensible form of government resting largely on the customs of the tribes of pre-Roman Germany; and abandon their cultural birthright of unrivalled hegemony over “Pashtunistan”. To do this we offer some new buildings, some cash and more reliable electricity—none of which have been important to them so far in their history." This is a strawman argument. The hearts and minds he describes is of course a failing proposition. Yet, securing the population by killing, then staying, and helping to rebuild, while working to show why it is good to have you around is a good "hearts and minds" campaign. You aren't going to get Pashtuns to be eager "little Americans" but you can show them why it is worth their while to have you around.

At the end, I guess I just don't understand who is advocating a purely hearts and minds approach that doesn't advocate killing the insurgents to secure the population as an integral and primary goal. Unless there are large bodies of military leaders and policymakers that think you can "win" without killing by "winning hearts and minds", it seems that Kelley's argument is framed against a straw man. And I'd also like to know what his vision of winning is since he labels his article as "How to Win in Afghanistan."

To me, it is disturbing that such a reductionist argument is still ongoing 8 years into this fight. I would think that people would be arguing more about details rather than whether "hearts-and-minds" snake oil salesmen or people properly focused on killing and war as war has been for 3000 years are right. You need both and need to properly integrate all of your means and that is where the discussion should be: integration and synergy of the different means and ways.

[Ken White]

Gian Gentile's post acknowledges that both killing and "hearts and minds" were used, but then states: "war is war, it is not "armed social science,"...but who is really arguing that you can fight COIN by hearts and minds alone?

No one here, really, not even Gian. He appears here from time to time and gets published in the Op-Ed pages of the NYT and other papers and has articles in the Armed Forces Journal among others. You will see occasional references to the 'Gentile-Nagl' due to the fact the Gian is Mr. Anti-COIN to the point of vehemence. Armor guy, had a Cav Squadron in I-rak , historian and now teaches that at West Point. His concern is that the Army overemphasizes 'the new COIN' (and as an active practitioner of the old COIN, it is new in many respects, not all improvements) to the detriment of it's primary mission which is war fighting. I tend to agree with him on all counts -- COIN elements are required; the Army should not go overboard as they are prone to do on the new COIN and so on. He's more vocal but then I'm shy and retiring.

That position is of course not shared with Dr. LTC Retired John Nagl, the author of "Eating Soup With A Knife." They've had some discussions back an forth here.

Neither Gian not I or any of the other 'war is war' folks who comment here deny there is a place for what is called COIN -- though it is really not that -- techniques. What we do say is that if you're committing Armed Forces to an effort there is or will be a war of some sort. War is war, unchanging but warfare is constantly mutating and shifting and COIN like TTP may be needed and the force must be able to apply them but don't lose sight of the larger effort -- preparation for the full spectrum of warfare.

Some say that COIN is the graduate level of warfare; I once contended that it is not -- it's like middle school with all the envy, cliques, in and out people and things, jealousies, backbiting and more. Stability operations can be psychologically demanding but they are not as challenging as major combat operations to any part of the force by several orders of magnitude. Gian agreed with that, John Nagl probably would not.

Wilf, BTW, is a consultant and author but he's also British -- when he was serving (during the Reign of George III...), they had a civil service that would fall in on any COIN effort and take care of the civil side leaving the Army to strictly military tasks -- as directed by said Civilians. Very different system. His 'war is war' mantra is 'cause he's a Clauswitz fan. That's all background. I knew all that and you didn't; it may or may not make any difference to your perceptions. Terribly long way of saying you can't tell the players without a program...

The article rejects hearts and minds as a pipe dream...Germany; and abandon their cultural birthright of unrivalled hegemony over “Pashtunistan”...You aren't going to get Pashtuns to be eager "little Americans" but you can show them why it is worth their while to have you around.

Only if you can convince them you can keep the Talibs and all the other bad guys from visiting the villages in the night will they believe you are worthwhile -- and as soon as you do that, they'll want you gone. Afghans are not Arabs; they share some cultural similarities but they don't like the Ferenghee a bit better. I doubt that NATO et.al. will ever have enough troops to do that. So the 'COIN' approach cannot be fully implemented in Afghanistan and we'll have a hybrid op.

At the end, I guess I just don't understand who is advocating a purely hearts and minds approach that doesn't advocate killing the insurgents to secure the population as an integral and primary goal.

No one to my knowledge; that's not the issue -- the issue is future strategy and force structure. Does the Army follow the Corps and go with some units tailored for stability ops? Does it adjust TOEs to provide units tailored for such ops. Brother Nagl is the President of CNAS and is presumed to have clout in high places; he and other think that's the way to go. Gian, me, others do not agree.

And I'd also like to know what his vision of winning is since he labels his article as "How to Win in Afghanistan."

I thought he was pretty clear:
...................
""The approaches taken to countering insurgencies in Malaya, Vietnam, Northern Ireland and Iraq all contain some aspects that are transferable to Afghanistan but most are *. The counter-insurgency in Afghanistan is more intractable than any of these others.[* Believe a 'not' was omitted here / kw]

In Afghanistan a strategy focusing on the annihilation of Taliban power is the only way to achieve broad political progress...Until then NATO must be prepared to act as the proxy for the Afghan state in establishing control over the Pashtun population.

Without security there is nothing.""(all emphasis added /kw)
...................
My take on that is that he says more whittling down of the Taliban (and friends) or removal in some of way their ability to affect localities is required before the rebuilding can commence. My sensing from friends and all open sources is that is very much correct. Afghanistan is not an insurgency though there are aspects of one in place. It's a war with COIN like digressions.

To me, it is disturbing that such a reductionist argument is still ongoing 8 years into this fight.

Me too. Though I'm not sure it's reductionist -- it is an effort to make sense out of a very chaotic situation that has been exacerbated over a period of eight years -- or, actually, over a period of eight or more one year or less tours with a number of people going in different directions and no unity of command.

I would think that people would be arguing more about details rather than whether "hearts-and-minds" snake oil salesmen or people properly focused on killing and war as war has been for 3000 years are right. You need both and need to properly integrate all of your means and that is where the discussion should be: integration and synergy of the different means and ways.

True. That particular argument is not directed at Afghanistan other than peripherally. That argument is principally directed at FUTURE US Government policy, strategies and direction plus future (now in development) doctrine and force structure...

Afghanistan is on auto pilot with a coalescing mix of TTP -- no one's devoting much effort to it because what will happen there is pretty well locked in for the next three plus years.

It is simply being used as a How Not To Do It Training Aid by people on both sides of the very real doctrinal divide to point out their ideas for 2020. It's a big fight, it's real and has power players on both sides.

Sorry for the delay, two finger typist, sorry for the length, didn't want to leave much out; obviously discard all you think irrelevant.

[William F. Owen]

Wilf, BTW, is a consultant and author but he's also British -- when he was serving (during the Reign of George III...), they had a civil service that would fall in on any COIN effort and take care of the civil side leaving the Army to strictly military tasks -- as directed by said Civilians. Very different system. His 'war is war' mantra is 'cause he's a Clauswitz fan. That's all background. I knew all that and you didn't; it may or may not make any difference to your perceptions. Terribly long way of saying you can't tell the players without a program...

"For those of you watching in black and white, Wilf is in the red-shorts"

Thanks, Ken. Yes, I am a product of my environment, and thanks to nuances of language, style and just plain good looks, I may not be as well understood, as I would hope. Let me clarify:

1. War is War. Read Clausewitz or Thucydides. Irregular Warfare against an insurgent, rebel, criminal, partisan or separatist relies on same basic dynamics of any war. In order to win, you have to break the enemies will to endure.
2. Breaking his will should be done by making him fear for his life or freedom.

The "how" of breaking the will (as opposed to why -cos it's a war!) has to done in a way that does not create popular support for the enemy, because popular support creates benefits for him. - the same way it does for some criminals.
You want to make the population as hostile (or neutral) as possible, primarily to enable the gathering of intelligence so as you can target the enemy. Try looking for Robin Hood in a village full of "Maid Marrions" (actually the biggest skank in Nottingham, but that's another story.)

The basis of a competition that says,
"If you support us (Govt.) we will make you safe, and better your life."
The insurgent says,
"Support us or we will kill you. They can never make you safe. We have friends living here, we know all about you, and we will remember who our friends and enemies were a 1,000 years from now."

What I dislike about "that competition" , is that it draws the population into the fight, when the purpose should be to exclude them!

If the population says, "we don't care about NATO, because they don't bother us. They only kill Talib," then I suggest that this is a basis on which to proceed. If NATO turn up once in a while and drop off food, do some medical care, and offer security advice, then the villagers have a chance to say "I know where the Talib are hiding."

.... of course the villagers may just hate you because of who you are, and support the Talib because they are family. Hearts and Minds will not help then anyway.

Gian, Ken and I are not the "Slay them all. God will see the souls of his own," brigade.

[Spud]

My take (and this is my take alone, so place full blame on my shoulders and not any organization I may support) is that:

Afghanistan is "Post-UW FID" and Iraq is "Post-regime change FID." Only HN forces conduct COIN in my view, and to believe that we are doing that HN business is to risk dangerous degradation of the HN governments already shakey legitimacy, and also increase perceptions of US legitimacy that IMO placed us on the target list of groups like AQ in the first place.

Just one guy's perspective.

Thanks Sir ... that's exactly the argument I've been pushing around the college over the past few weeks -- the only time we can be doing COIN is if we're fighting an insurgency in Australia. (Must've got some notice because they just asked me to drop my preferred COIN elective in the final term and take on Complex Planning instead ). I'm noticing an overwhelming desire by most to be the "COIN" guy but utilising what we've been doing over the past 18-months as the example of COIN campaigning. I've always said we're just (supposedly) helping the other guy do COIN.

I know its all semantics but it appears that semantics are everything in our line of work.

[Ken White]

I know its all semantics but it appears that semantics are everything in our line of work.

Mostly by those, who in the US Southern (Bogan like) vernacular, 'haven't never...'

in re: "Wilf is in the red-shorts" Yes, Marian did mention that...

[Tom Odom]

He's correct -- so is the statement he refutes. The COIN idea is more than largesse. However the COIN idea does rely on largesse to more than a small extent. The real truth is somewhere in between. That, however, is not the problem with COIN efforts, that problem is in application of COIN principle by a third party and not the government that has an insurgency issue. There are those who firmly believe in the need for such intervention and there are others that strongly doubt such interventions are or can be effective.

Ken

I held that statement up as an example of putting a simple statement out and leaving it hanging as a 15 second sound bite.

The largesse the author refers to is targeted toward the population and shoring up their support for the government, not undermining the enemy's will to resist. Kill and capture is generally the best solution to the enemy.

If the problem is as you state it, then state the problem, not a simplistic war is war aphorism as Wilf calls it, tautolgy as he so often uses it.

Wilf,

When you actually go beyond the bumper sticker, you start to make sense as in:

What I dislike about "that competition" , is that it draws the population into the fight, when the purpose should be to exclude them!

If the population says, "we don't care about NATO, because they don't bother us. They only kill Talib," then I suggest that this is a basis on which to proceed. If NATO turn up once in a while and drop off food, do some medical care, and offer security advice, then the villagers have a chance to say "I know where the Talib are hiding."

Tom

[Ken White]

I held that statement up as an example of putting a simple statement out and leaving it hanging as a 15 second sound bite.

It was but what I shoulda said was that it is a cheap shot but there is also danger in a myth that says we can buy support -- as you know, they'll take what you give and ask for more but that frequently doesn't change who they support. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. You have to try, no question but I think you also have to acknowledge that it sometimes isn't very successful and we sometimes buy / present the wrong things. The Hospital in Mosul comes to mind. It is not easy.

The largesse the author refers to is targeted toward the population and shoring up their support for the government, not undermining the enemy's will to resist. Kill and capture is generally the best solution to the enemy.

Yep. Agreed. I'm sure you guys today do a better job than we did in Veet Nam -- a lot of Aid went to Chuck. Hard to tell who was who sometimes. Plus our 'Allies' sometimes cheated on us. Shameful behavior. .

If the problem is as you state it, then state the problem, not a simplistic war is war aphorism as Wilf calls it, tautolgy as he so often uses it.

Stop with them ol big words, I ain't wrapped too taut. Nor very tightly either.

On a more important note, you stay alert...