British COIN (merged thread)

[JMA]

The size of grouping very much depends on the size of enemy you are fighting. In the early years it was rare to go out in less then platoon plus strength because the insurgents were operating in platoon plus strength. Now they operate in smaller groups and so do we.

No I don't think that is the correct approach.

The size of your operating call-signs should depend on the comparative military competence of your enemy and the location and the degree of mobility of your operational reserve.

Seems the Brit assessment is that of parity of soldiering ability? Surely not.

Then it is the impact of IEDs which requires a number of donkeys on each patrol to carry related 'stuff'.

Then what if any is the mobile reserve? The reserve section? Some vehicles with mounted MMGs which will drive on mined roads to support the patrol in contact?

Then (going back to exchanges I had with Wilf some time ago about) the aim of the patrol activity needs to be carefully assessed. You would have read 18 Platoon by Sydney Jary at Sandhurst (where it was I believe required reading) and learned that even then (between D-Day and VE Day) he (as a young subaltern) questioned the wisdom of patrolling for the sake of patrolling. From page 72:

During the campaign, 18 Platoon carried out three types of patrols: reconnaissance, standing and fighting. The first two were invariably useful because they provided information, if only negative. Fighting patrols, of which I led many, were a different and contentious proposition. Unlike the German and American armies, we had a vigorous policy regarding fighting patrols, particularly at night and when things were static with both sides on the defence. The thinking behind this policy seemed to me, at times, be superficial and probably left over from the Great War. If, when detailed for a fighting patrol, young officers queried the wisdom of this given object, there was always the standard reply: “I quite agree with you, but it all helps to dominate no man's land.” There is undoubtedly a certain validity to this argument but was it worth the consequent loss of good young officers and NCOs? I doubt it.

Note: for any young officers reading this you must read this book. For senior officers reading this make it available and required reading for your subbies.

I/we went through this period of (aimless) patrolling in Mozambique (1973-76) following Brit Malaya practice with fan patrols, base line patrols and river-line patrols etc etc where the large area and the low density of troops together with the lack of intelligence made the whole business very much a hit and miss affair. Sure we had chance contacts where they would shoot and scoot and we would drop our packs and give chase with generally low results - normally reported as a fleeting contact with no casualties either side.

Surely the idea of making contact with the Taliban is not once it happens to get rescued by air support or the arrival of vehicles to allow the patrol to pull back into their beau geste fort but rather to maintain the contact (iow fix them) then get a response/reaction team in to kill them?

I have suggested that you send out small patrols to make contact while an airborne reaction force is loitering just out of sound range and ready to come in and do the business once the Taliban have given away their position.

Hint: Read Skeens Passing it On - it proves that the Brits once knew what they were doing in Afghanistan. and sums up his paper as follows:

To Sum up
That is all of use I can tell you. But I think I have said enough to show that, as the Manual says, while the principles of war remain
unchanged, “The tactics and characteristics of the inhabitants and the nature of the theater of operations may necessitate considerable modification in the method” of their application to warfare on the North-West Frontier of India. And that unless a good working knowledge of the methods indicated by experience is acquired in peace and applied in war, trouble if not disaster is bound to be the outcome. But I also hope I have made it clear that previous training, energetic and common-sense application, and unrelaxing care will give you and your men complete ascendency over an enemy whose great natural advantages at first sight may seem to be unchallengeable. And I trust what I been able to pass on of my own experience and of my observation of others will help you in this. If so I have discharged my debt to those who taught me and to those who taught them, and to those, my comrades in war, with whom I proved the truth of those teachings.