Stateside COIN Academy

[MikeF]

MikeF,

I have two reservations about the teaching as you've described; it is centred around your American experience and outlook. History has a nasty habit of placing you - soldiers - in unexpected places, whilst there are common features in COIN, there are also differences.

Agreed. I look at all the "I's" that I typed in the last post, and it disturbs me, but in that time period, working in tribal village areas, I represented my company.

As a cadet studying economics, Major John Nagl was the wicked smart Rhodes Scholar working on important stuff that I looked up to. Maybe he got part of his studies wrong.

v/r

Mike

[Ken White]

As a cadet studying economics, Major John Nagl was the wicked smart Rhodes Scholar working on important stuff that I looked up to. Maybe he got part of his studies wrong.

Indeed. All things are possible...

You have experience he does not. Don't sweat the small stuff, keep on pushing.

As a smart old general once told me, "If you don't blow your own horn every now and then, People will start thinking it's funnel."

[MikeF]

Indeed. All things are possible...

You have experience he does not. Don't sweat the small stuff, keep on pushing.

As a smart old general once told me, "If you don't blow your own horn every now and then, People will start thinking it's funnel."

I know Ken, and I know that you'll jump in when I'm off base.

At our Superbowl party tonight, I showed some of my boys what I'm doing, and they just laughed.

"Sir, no one's going to believe it. No one will every understand it. Yes, please come teach our boys on how to do business."

I made them do push-ups. They made me do shots.

Life was good .

Final thoughts before I sleep. 40 beers accumalated around my sink. I looked around the room and the boys that I know. I counted up the years that they had served in Bosnia, Iraq, and A'stan. The number far exceeded the beers around my sink. I;ve written and published before. Initially, I wrote trying to understand my own experiences. I wrote for me. Now, as I gazed at the beers and my friends with tours upon tours upon tours, I'm starting to believe that future writings and instruction will actually teach and help others. Now, I'm that major that cadets look up to.

[MikeF]

So, that's the first third of the class- if you're going to use a hammer, here's the appropriate way to use it. I'm trying to decide if I should just use the case study of Zaganiyah or extend it out and include others. We'll see.

Ultimately, that answer can best be described as a post-colonial pseudo-occupation. We've used the American regular army to take back areas that the host-nation couldn't govern (Bob's World is upset). We crushed the enemy (Wilf is happy). Now, we're stuck being in charge. It sucks. As displaced families start coming back into the village or neighborhood, we have to determine land rights and property ownership. Teachers are coming to us asking for funds, books, pens, and paper to start school. Doctors are asking for Class VIII materials to reopen the clinics. Mohammed and Ahmed come to try to settle a dispute over some cow that got run over by a car. Sheik Septar, who used to roll with al Qaeda, is now an American "friend," and he's now coming by everyday to ask for compensation for the house we destroyed that was used to make VBIEDs. Everyone wants something.

So, what do you do now? You're stuck governing, and you realize that dismantling the insurgency was the easy part. Higher command is very happy with your efforts because the metrics look good. Attacks have gone down from 12 a day to one every five days. That looks good on a powerpoint slide while drinking Green Beans I guess. Generals fly in to observe your success. Reporters come by to hang out with the real "Spartans" living out in patrol bases. Command wants you to move on to clear the next village. They want you to make storyboards capturing TTPs and "lessons learned" to send across the force.

Back in the real world, back in the village, the insurgency has just moved back into a Phase One/Zero. They've gone underground, and they are carefully planning a counter-attack. The underlying tensions between the tribes and families and sects that allowed the initial problems are still simmering. As some of the Shias come back, fights break out and ten people are killed.

So what do you do now? That's the second part of this course. You've moved from the role of the counter-insurgent to the arbitrator. Here's what we did...

1. Delegation/Decentralization. No man is an island. A commander can't do this part on his own unless he is a natural dictator. My platoon leaders became the village elders. My platoon sergeants took different jobs: 1st platoon became the Police Chief. 2nd platoon remained focused on recon operations at night to keep the roads safe. 3rd platoon became the City Manager/Planner working schools and medical stuff. My mortar platoon sergeant became the Mayor of Zaganiyah. Every night we'd have a huddle and talk things out.

2. Partnering with the Iraqi Army. The first IA unit was part of the problem. They were commiting war crimes against the Sunnis. So, we placed the commander in jail and sent that unit down to Baqubah. Major Aziz and his boys showed up. Three weeks into it, Major Aziz and I realized that we fought against each other in Nassiriyah on the first night of the war. He was an infantry commander defending Talil Airfield. I was a tank platoon leader. After we found this common ground, we became best friends. Within 120 days, his unit to over full responsibility for Zaganiyah. We moved into an advisor role. Major Aziz just walked in one day and said, "Mike, this is my country. This is my fight. You're boys stay here, and I'm taking charge."

3. Conflict Resolution. Sheik Aziz showed up one day. He was a Baghdad lawyer working under the Ayatollah Sistani's movement out of Najaf. We drank some tea and smoked some cigarettes. We discussed the issues in my village, and he smiled. "Mike, it's not your village. These are Iraqi problems and only Iraqis can solve them." He started a movement of reconciliation and rebuilding. He began leading a series of negotiations to help the people

So, that's a portion of the second part. The final part is the most important. It describes my journey since I last left Iraq trying to understand it all and look for better ways to do business and other tools besides the hammer. For this part, I had to study under men that worked in the Phillipines, El Salvador, and Colombia, a woman who tried to establish governance in Afghanistan for the UN in the late 1990s. I had to work on a gang problem in Salinas. I read about this guy that builds girl schools, some dude who is the banker for the poor, and a quiet professional that works one village at a time. More to Follow...

Mike

[marct]

Mike,

You should look at some of the CORDS stuff for this and, if you really want to go back a ways, some of the Roman stuff. In keeping with calling it "post-colonial", you could also call it "pseudo-indirect rule".

[Steve Blair]

You could also look at the Indian Wars for some examples of power transition and the tension that arises when military and civilian organizations both try to do the same thing. It can also be very instructive regarding what happens when both organizations get the initial read wrong or when they fail to understand the basic nature of the culture they're working with. There was a great deal of tension between the Army and the Indian Bureau during the entire period, with the Army convinced that only they had the experience to administer the reservations while the civilian agency was convinced that the Army officers were amateurs or too disposed to violent solutions to the problem. And of course there were the corrupt and venal on both sides who just stirred the waters.

And with Nagl, the more I re-read his stuff, the more I'm convinced that his real focus was the way the Army deals with and learns (or doesn't learn) lessons and not so much the insurgencies themselves. It's a good example of how folks with agendas can grab onto a book and twist it to suit their own needs (and I'm thinking of people on both sides of the COIN issue).

[Ken White]

...his real focus was the way the Army deals with and learns (or doesn't learn) lessons and not so much the insurgencies themselves. It's a good example of how folks with agendas can grab onto a book and twist it to suit their own needs (and I'm thinking of people on both sides of the COIN issue).

Regrettably, people will do that...

[Commando Spirit]

OK, but to clarify, Small Wars, as in warfare conducted against irregulars, by a regular force is predicated on killing and destruction, ("kinetic") and not diplomacy ("non-kinetic") - that is why it is warfare.

Point taken William but I disagree with your presumption that non-kinetic effect is diplomacy; it isn't. Granted diplomacy is a non-kinetic effect but it is not the only non-kinetic effect. For example, an aggressive, ground dominating patrols programme is non-kinetic and yet it is explicit in it's need to be conducted by military forces.

[John T. Fishel]

about the Indian wars, I'd recommend Fred Chiaventone's novel about the Fetterman "massacre" - A Moon of Bitter Cold.

Cheers

JohnT

[Steve Blair]

about the Indian wars, I'd recommend Fred Chiaventone's novel about the Fetterman "massacre" - A Moon of Bitter Cold.

Cheers

JohnT

That is a really good one, John, as is his previous outing about the Little Bighorn.

Mike, if you decide to include anything from this era, let me know. I might be able to kick a couple of source ideas your way.

[MM_Smith]

Marc T & Mike F,

Thanks for the kind words. Marc, does being Socratic mean I should go drink some poison?

Mike, you have a very ambitious outline. I won’t go into my current work save to say it is connected to advanced training and/or education in what we’re now calling irregular warfare (IW). Training for a specific civil-military-political-cultural scenario is one of the issues we face; what worked one tour in Baghdad can’t be expected to work next tour in Khost. You mentioned the number of years of experience accumulated in your living room. May I ask how many of those troops had repeat tours to an area with which they had familiarity? There is a considerable amount of discussion within the military about developing non-FAO regional or cultural specialists. One of the requirements would be to spend multiple tours, multiple years, on station. This, of course, does not sit well with branch managers (detailers). I won’t go into the “ticket punchers” because they aren’t interested in this stuff anyway.

Marc, you mentioned CORDS and SWJ just published a SWJ prize winning article on CORDS. I have my own opinions about CORDS, of course, but won’t inflict them on you. What I find most objectionable is the fact that CORDS like projects had been going on for years but were ignored until it became obvious even to the dunderheads that a purely military, force-on-force, solution was impossible. We, meaning then international community, have a number of civil-military-political-cultural options in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. What we lack are comprehensive, cohesive, integrated, long range, etc., plans to make use of the full range of these options.

Clausewitz hat recht! War is an extension of policy; ergo we need a policy.

In order to secure and stabilize an area, both bottom up and top down approaches are needed. Why should the locals follow a desired course of action if it will antagonize the insurgents and they have no reason to believe the “official” government?

Just for grins I found a copy of the very first COIN book I ever read. It has a 1962 copyright date (I think) and focuses on the Communist threat and revolutionary warfare, but you know what? Many of the lessons and observations are still valid. And, if you don’t have it, I suggest putting the RAND Corp. document “Counterinsurgency: A Symposium, April 16-20, 1962” onto your hard drive. It is report number R-412-1 (http://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R412-1/); just take a look at the list of participants.

And now I’ll go back into foxhole defilade for a while.

[Bob's World]

Something worth considering is that perhaps no amount of "good tactics" can overcome poor policy/strategy.

Think about the way the military has been vigorously doing what we do: Accomplish the mission. If something doesn't work, just keep adjusting and re-attacking until it does.

The problem is that we've let the policy/strategy types totally off the hook, as they sit back and watch the military dutifully churn itself apart, changing virtually everything about how we think, organize, train, operate, equip, etc over the past 8 years in the elusive search for that one magic answer, that one silver bullet, that will accomplish this mission. And the policy/strategy types wring their hands in nervous disappointment at the lack of progress. How can the military be failing them so?

News flash: we are not dealing with military failure here; we are dealing with the failure to recognize that the military is not the primary solution to the problems we face. In an age where logistics (surge) and tactics (pop-centric) are considered strategy; we are probably in an age of "Strategic Uncertainty."

So, what is the role of the military in an Age of Strategic Uncertainty? There is no "right answer" for what we need to do. I do believe that the first step to getting to good answers though, is to recognize that the world is in what I believe will be looked back upon as a historic era of transition; and to ask long hard questions at the policy/strategy level as to what changes are relevant, which are not. To hold to what should be held to, and to accept risk and change that which appears to be no longer as valid as it once was seen to be.

Through all of this though, the military will still be on point, working dutifully to accomplish "the mission." In other words, Mike, don't be too hard on yourself if you feel like you and your men have been out there kicking intellectual and physical ass and not seeing the effects or recognition you expect. There is a Dutch boy "finger in the dike" aspect to what we do. Someone need to run and tell higher that the dike is failing, but you're there all alone and to pull your finger out of the dike may well cause it to fail as well.

So we go out, and we stick our finger in the dike. That is our duty. I do not think it is an abrogation of our duty to also inform higher that from our perspective, the dike is failing and that our efforts will only mitigate that for so long.

[William F. Owen]

For example, an aggressive, ground dominating patrols programme is non-kinetic and yet it is explicit in it's need to be conducted by military forces.

Sorry Spirit, but that is fine slicing the doctrine cooky to no good effect. Did that come from DCDC?
Patrolling is part of the Core Functions - explicitly, it is a fixing action, predicated on the delivery of lethal force. If you patrol for any other reason than to reduce the enemy's freedom of action, you're a clown. - Reducing the enemy's FOA can and might "reassure" the population. Flying a flag over a FOB might do the same for less risk!

The only actions that can be usefully described as non-kinetic are those not predicated on the use of force - eg: delivery of aid, Medical assistance etc.
If we start calling Patrolling "Non-kinetic" and "Influence," we've lost the plot completely.

The word "Kinetic" only appears in the 2005 UK ADP Land Operations once! - and "non-kinetic" is never used.

[MikeF]

Good comments all. Keep 'em coming. I'll try to respond to several posts. I gotta think some more on some of the comments .

Just for grins I found a copy of the very first COIN book I ever read. It has a 1962 copyright date (I think) and focuses on the Communist threat and revolutionary warfare, but you know what? Many of the lessons and observations are still valid. And, if you don’t have it, I suggest putting the RAND Corp. document “Counterinsurgency: A Symposium, April 16-20, 1962” onto your hard drive. It is report number R-412-1 (http://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R412-1/); just take a look at the list of participants.

You're a lucky man to have that as the first small wars book that you read. That symposium is one of the most influential writings that I've ever read. I just nodded my head the entire time saying "yes, yes, yes" outloud. As each war is different, each war is really the same. All that changes is METT-TC. Small Wars Journal is one of the closest things that we have to reproducing that form of learning.

You should look at some of the CORDS stuff for this and, if you really want to go back a ways, some of the Roman stuff. In keeping with calling it "post-colonial", you could also call it "pseudo-indirect rule".

In keeping with Steve Blair's suggestion about the Indian wars, I'd recommend Fred Chiaventone's novel about the Fetterman "massacre" - A Moon of Bitter Cold.

Great suggestions. I've got to be a bit more picky on my reading list this year, but I want to get smart on the Indian Wars, and Fred seems to be the man to read. First, I gotta focus on one piece of the puzzle that I haven't studied yet- Africa and the role of the Foreign Area Advisor. I'm gonna take a look at Tom Odom and Stan's adventures.

May I ask how many of those troops had repeat tours to an area with which they had familiarity? There is a considerable amount of discussion within the military about developing non-FAO regional or cultural specialists. One of the requirements would be to spend multiple tours, multiple years, on station.

Oddly enough, I can only think of two guys (outside of my SF and Seal brothers) that have worked the same areas in multiple tours. I'd argue that there are advantages and disadvantages to the current system. At a minimum, at least we're deploying as units and not individual augmentees like in Vietnam.

Mike, you have a very ambitious outline.

I'm a dry-erase board and map and acetate type of guy. I'll start broad to try and encompass as much stuff as possible, and I'll narrow things down as I go along. Take two of the questions- Why do men rebel? Why do people blow themselves up? Entire books are written on these topics.

In reality, I have a very small area of expertise- working in and around the denied rural areas. My urban experience is limited to the "Thunder Runs" in Baghdad and several weeks of patrols in Baqubah.

Commando Spirit- I'd suggest taking a look at the thread on Presence Patrols here. Bill Moore and JCustis do a good job talking things out. Personally, I'd get rid of the terms kinetic and non-kinetic. As with so many other things in life, these labels are minimizing that makes war seem zero-sum when it's not.

Bob's World- I gotta let your comments simmer for a day. What you wrote is parallel with what I was thinking.

I guess I'll end this part with some of Ken White's mantras. There are many variables in war, but

1. Everything is METT-TC.
2. Well trained combat units can accomplish ANY type of mission.
3. Small wars are best to be avoided.

[Steve Blair]

Mike,

Chiaventone's work is fiction, but he brings a very solid history to it and manages to explore some of the issues in ways that history just can't. For the frontier period, ALWAYS start with Robert Utley and then narrow down. His two books on the Frontier Army are simply outstanding and will give you a good groundwork for further research.

[marct]

Hi Bob,

News flash: we are not dealing with military failure here; we are dealing with the failure to recognize that the military is not the primary solution to the problems we face. In an age where logistics (surge) and tactics (pop-centric) are considered strategy; we are probably in an age of "Strategic Uncertainty."

So, what is the role of the military in an Age of Strategic Uncertainty? There is no "right answer" for what we need to do. I do believe that the first step to getting to good answers though, is to recognize that the world is in what I believe will be looked back upon as a historic era of transition; and to ask long hard questions at the policy/strategy level as to what changes are relevant, which are not. To hold to what should be held to, and to accept risk and change that which appears to be no longer as valid as it once was seen to be.

You and I have batted this one around a few times before in various forms. Let me start by saying that the first thing we need to do is to consciously bring back the term "Grand Strategy" to replace the newer (incorrect) meaning of strategy as logistics and tactics.

What are the key environmental variables that condition a successful grand strategy? I think you have listed a fair number of them already over various threads: WMD proliferation, increasing economic and communicative interdependency, an increasingly even playing field at the international level (mainly as a result of changing the game rules, but...), etc., etc. This is the type of environment in which COIN operations are taking place and which act as the selection pressures on the tactics and grand tactics Mike is talking about.

Mike, you are in an interesting position planning / teaching this course. One thing that I didn't think about earlier (mea culpa!), was that you have to make a decision on your - let's call it grand strategic - approach. Are you teaching it from a retrospective, analytic framework or from a prospective one? Basically, are you trying to teach them an analytic model to understand insurgencies / COIN or are you trying to teach them how to analyze current situations and come up with (new) solutions to them?

Cheers,

Marc

[John T. Fishel]

His books are fiction. That said, he told me that in Moon of Bitter Cold he was specifically looking at analogies to the kinds of Small Wars we had been engaged in in the 90s.

Cheers

Johnt

[MikeF]

Mike,

Chiaventone's work is fiction, but he brings a very solid history to it and manages to explore some of the issues in ways that history just can't. For the frontier period, ALWAYS start with Robert Utley and then narrow down. His two books on the Frontier Army are simply outstanding and will give you a good groundwork for further research.

Thanks Steve (and John). When I drove back cross-country, I stopped at some of the Frontier Army battlegrounds and historical sites. I was trying to envision what it was like for them. Now, I got the bug and want to read up on it.

Mike, you are in an interesting position planning / teaching this course. One thing that I didn't think about earlier (mea culpa!), was that you have to make a decision on your - let's call it grand strategic - approach. Are you teaching it from a retrospective, analytic framework or from a prospective one? Basically, are you trying to teach them an analytic model to understand insurgencies / COIN or are you trying to teach them how to analyze current situations and come up with (new) solutions to them?

Hi Marc, I'm not sure yet. I've never let the initial parts of the creative or decision-making process be hampered by things like rules and questions. I'm gonna try to push out one more posts on "alternative" approaches, listen to y'alls feedback, and then start thinking critically on design, intent, and process.

Mike

[MM_Smith]

-I wasn't clear when talking about books. I've been in love with the RAND report since I found it but that was relatively recently.
-The first COINish book I read was "The Guerrilla and How to Fight Him" edited by T.N. Greene. It is a collection of selections from the Marine Corps Gazette and does have a 1962 copyright. I wasn't sure of the title or date so went to the library to check and, wonder of wonders, someone has it checked out!
-I'll have to go back into the cave and do some more searching. I have a vague recollection of a collection of insurgency case studies. The printing was horrible which leads me to believe it was one of the "Special Texts" Army schools were so enamored of.

At a minimum, at least we're deploying as units and not individual augmentees like in Vietnam.

-To which I can only say "Amen"

-Semper White Board!

[marct]

Hi Marc, I'm not sure yet. I've never let the initial parts of the creative or decision-making process be hampered by things like rules and questions. I'm gonna try to push out one more posts on "alternative" approaches, listen to y'alls feedback, and then start thinking critically on design, intent, and process.

Best way to do it, Mike ! Hey, I'm using this discussion to help design my own COIN course as well, so it really is an "inter-active" process .

BTW, let me know if you want an online course site at any point (I run my own courseware and I'd be happy to give you one).

Cheers,

Marc