Quote Originally Posted by William F. Owen View Post
Sorry Bob. I don't understand. COIN is a commonly written about subject. Moreover, it was well understood until recently.

I'm not talking about "Nation building." I am talking about defeating armed rebels so as political progress can take place - to paraphrase the Sultan of Oman.
True, you don't understand; and

True it is a realatively straight forward matter to employ the military to kill the armed rebelling element of one's populace.

The hard part is resolving the reasons why they were acting that way. Defeating insurgents is easy (relatively); defeating insurgency typically requires the government to change how it does business. Dave talks about how to change the popualce. Governments like to hear that.

I talk about changing the government. They don't like to hear that.