Quote Originally Posted by Bill Moore View Post
I do tire of the party line that we don't do COIN, we do FID and the host nation does FID. Hopefully that is true in most in most situations, but it sure as hell doesn't apply to Afghanistan where a large part of the fighting is still being done by U.S. and coalition forces.
Can't be 'cause I say it -- and I don't belong to any one party. Not the big war crowd, not the COIN crowd, not the SOF crowd or the GPF crowd -- I belong to all of 'em and none of 'em, been in all of 'em and they all have strong and weak points, good and bad doctrine -- and theories. I do try for pragmatic realism, don't like crowds and am suspicious of a lot of theory...
As the Zen instructor frequently yells during mediation sessions, WAKE UP! We do COIN. We are confusing the desired state (the Afghans lead he COIN effort) with reality, and delusions in war are dangerous.
Yep, I agree, delusions are dangerous, particularly in wars. However, we aren't doing COIN, we're using some (not all, not yet...) COIN techniques to assist the Government of Afghanistan. Admittedly while trying to nudge that Government to do what we'd like them to do. My perception is that we aren't being terribly successful at that...

WE need to wake up and realize that because that fact -- and it is a fact, a harsh one and not a semantic quibble -- will color everything that happens in that country in the next few years. We are not in total or even near total control of our own destiny there. Among other things, the US diplomatic coup of getting NATO to become involved has certainly been a double ed -- one of these (LINK). The delusion that we are -- or were -- 'doing COIN' is big part of the reason we're where we are eight years after we arrived.
Besides winning (still needs to be defined), we need to identify what's more important:

- Is the most important thing to win, no matter what? If a win is more important than who wins it, then perhaps we can do more by focusing on winning instead of focusing on nation building.

- On the other hand if it is more important that the Afghans win or lose this fight with the coalition in support, then that leads us to a different strategy (their strategy, not ours).

Which one is it?
It's 'C,' neither of the above. No body's going to win, there is no win in any insurgency; you can achieve most of your aims but you aren't going to win because lacking killing 'em all, the other guys aren't going away; they'll be back, one way or another and sooner or later. So winning isn't the issue. An acceptable outcome is the issue and that can be obtained without either of your alternatives.

Initially, We were going to just leave. then we decided to stay and told the Afghans we' fix it. That morphed into setting up a strong central Government -- and I think we're finally realizing that's not going fly -- it never was. Now, it's likely to be a mix of more COIN support -- and yes, that means fighting -- and 'nation building' without going full bore on either and getting to the point where there is borderline stability in the area and it's better than it was when we got there.

When we get to that point, we'll leave. Then we'll have four win-less wars in a row; I did the first two; these two are for you guys...

Where we gonna intervene and do COIN stuff next?