- and to think I was betting on General P. Where have I gone wrong?
- and to think I was betting on General P. Where have I gone wrong?
You didn't drink enough cool-aid.
Kool Aid
And Robb drank too much...
Clearly, he still hasn't drunk enough...Originally Posted by John T. Fishel
John Wolfsberger, Jr.
An unruffled person with some useful skills.
I'm by no means convinced by Robb's theories, and he loses me with some of the programmer talk occasionally, but I think they're very interesting. It seems people here are quick to dismiss him because he's former Air Force, and because he believes small wars have fundamentally changed and the old solutions no longer apply.
He believes small group of terrorists, "global guerrillas," have the ability to cause state failure by attacking critical nodes in infrastructure (power, water, etc.) and denying the state the ability to provide for the basic needs of the populace. Reversion to primary loyalties (ethnicity, religion, tribe, etc.) will be the result in places where the state is already weak (much of the Middle East and Africa). Along the same lines, he emphasizes the power of black globalization, i.e. drug traffickers, oil smugglers, and the economic interests at play in state failure. Far from being an Air Force guy trying to put firepower on targets, he's arguing that open source insurgencies, where there is no central direction, just a unifying theme, are extremely tough to combat.
GS - yes, that's a good description of the book. I didn't want to seem overly anti-USAF...sometimes it's hard to overcome.
Using John Mackinlays model for insurgents:
In some places it has become war as an extension of economics, where lumpen insurgents just want to continue looting the remains of the state and flogging their goods on the black market, most notably in West Africa. For clan insurgents like in Somalia and Afghanistan, govt collapse is great because it lets the clans get along with making money on the blackmarket selling drugs or whatever because the return of the rule on law means they go out of business. Most of the above don't care about taking on the West and just want a continuation of the status quo.
While global insurgents could, (and have done with Al-Qaeda) jump from one collapsed state / warzone to another its very hard for anyone to unify such disparate types of insurgents, and the best you can hope for is mobilising individuals with a grand narrative through the internet and media.
In Afghanistan you've got people who don't want the government to succeed because that would mean no more poppy money, and they don't want the Taliban back - which is one reason why the Taliban have moved on into Pakistan tribal areas, and people have stayed under their warlords. One of the biggest mistakes was taking the War on Drugs to the middle of a counter insurgency war.
The one thing I did like was 'open source warfare' while it does point out the obvious 'whatever works will be copied' it is important to remember because it does come up and surprise you, now and then, such as when the Somalians copied the Sudanese tactics of using RPGs as anti aircraft (who copied it off the Afghans.)
Need Clarification
I hope Robb is wrong. His statement "Further, the relative modernity of Iraq features vectors of cross-connection that undermine any and all attempts at clearing/holding territory (the core of the Petraeus plan)." doesn't make a lot of sense to me. How does that physically prevent clearing territory? Perhaps someone else can translate what he is saying for me.
As a veteran who was both in Tal Afar and Ramadi - if that's Robb's position, he doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.
Heh. Hear that...
Things just look different a few hundred feet above the fray.
Always been fascinated by the techno approach to 'organizing' ground combat and have noted that the bulk of proponents of such have little or no experience (or,really, concept...) of actually getting from point X to point Y or clearing point Z when someone who hasn't read the right books doesn't want you to do those things on 'his' turf.
I second that remark as one in the same demographic.
Example is better than precept.
I don't think he's saying you can't clear territory: just that clearing territory doesn't work like it used to. Here's an example off the top of my head. Kicking Philippine rebels off an island and holding the village might work because the villagers lose all communication with their leaders. (Holding territory destroys command and control.)
That's not true anymore. Occupying Sadr City won't do any good because Sadr can pick up a cell phone and order attacks whenever he wants attacks. Killing Sadr doesn't do any good, because people can post his old anti US speeches on the Internet. Holding territory no longer denies command and control to the insurgents.
To use an Iraq example. Holding territory in Ramadi didn't work. Cutting a deal with local sheiks did. Occupying Afghanistan just forced Al Qaeda to the net and terrorist attacks have increased.
Last edited by Rank amateur; 08-16-2007 at 09:44 PM.
This is becoming a conversation I have with my tactics students regularly.
Out of FM 1-02, Operational Terms and Graphics (All definitions are US Army definitions, as opposed to NATO or DoD):
Holding and Clearing are two different tactical tasks and missions. By themselves (by doctrine) you're not going to accomplish what you mentioned above in tasking units with clearing and holding. However...Clear - A tactical mission task that requires the commander to remove all enemy forces and eliminate organized resistance in an assigned area.
Hold - To maintain or retain possession by force, as a position or an area.
Suffice it to say, with technology are you ever going to truely isolate an insurgent in a free society? Probably not without infringing pretty heavily on the rights of the populace. What else is there?Isolate – A tactical mission task that requires a unit to seal off—both physically and psychologically—an enemy from his sources of support, deny an enemy freedom of movement, and prevent an enemy unit from having contact with other enemy forces.
So here's the question. Out of the above options, which is the most feasible and which is least? Why? Additionally, what is the purpose of the task? Even better (looking for the prospective planners out there) put it into task, purpose, method, effect format. You might win a chance to serve on a Corps staff if your answer is good enough.Control - A tactical mission task that requires the commander to maintain physical influence over a specified area to prevent its use by an enemy.
Contain – To stop, hold, or surround the forces of the enemy or to cause the
enemy to center activity on a given front and to prevent the withdrawal of any part of the enemy’s force for use elsewhere.
Occupy – A tactical mission task that involves a force moving into an area so that it can control the entire area. Both the force’s movement to and occupation of the area occur without enemy opposition.
Seize – A tactical mission task that involves taking possession of a designated area using overwhelming force.
Secure - A tactical mission task that involves preventing a unit, facility, or geographical location from being damaged or destroyed as a result of enemy action.
Example is better than precept.
Typical AF approach, I'm sorry to say. They don't understand that not every problem can be solved with a suitably large bombload or with some stealth system or another.
"On the plains and mountains of the American West, the United States Army had once learned everything there was to learn about hit-and-run tactics and guerrilla warfare."
T.R. Fehrenbach This Kind of War
John Robb wrote,OFF TOPIC:Since the American military's objective is to gain a monopoly on violence in Iraq, these developments indicate that it has sustained the commercial equivalent of a rapid loss in market share
The interchangeability of commercial thought and military thought scares me. You can't even read an article on the conflict without the terminology pervading it. War is not business.
Hardly off topic, mate! One is directly related to the other and we as a nation have struggled with this phenomenon forever. Sometimes itv has been a force for good: Elihu Root's reforms were a case in point. Then again we have the "Shock and Awe" (Translated "I'm shocked my model din't work and Aw, Sh%# they don't love us) crowd.
Best
Tom
War and business
Historically, it has been business thinkers who have appropriated military terminology while rarely internalizing or even comprehending the concepts. This is often seen in what business calls "strategy" which they seem to think has something to do with planning for quarterly profits.
I am reminded of the discussion among the wives of the test pilots in the film version of The Right Stuff where one says that her college friends married to businessmen talk about the vicious warfare on Wall Street but have no idea what it is like wondering if their husbands will come home from work that day alive, in a body bag, or at all.
War is business
War is absolutely business. I'm surprised Marc didn't raise the linguistic connections "made famous" in dialogues about privatization, such as the origin of words like freelancer, company, filibuster, soldier, and ideas about contracts. Also in the course of discussing privatization, especially historical models such as the Dutch Marc mentions, you see war, or simply war powers, are fully integrated into the business of making money.
Socrates wisely said all wars are fought for money.
Wars of national passions aren't. They're about treasure and the business of treasure acquisition, protection, distribution, etc.
Historically, using warfare for economic gain was common practice, I agree. To clarify,for guys at my level, where the metal strikes the flesh, the idea of war as a business is repulsive because there are men and institutions that make money during conflicts, but the individual soldier pays the highest price.
You forgot wearing a flight suit and neck scarf...that always helps the focus on COIN!
While I'm open to hearing new theories, discussions and approaches, there is nothing worse than criticisms without an alternate solution. We all know COIN is hard and there are no cheap or easy solutions. But if he want's to complain about the current theories/practices, offer up some new ones we haven't tried before. Or in the immortal words of Jerry McGuire..."SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!"
Back to my kool aid and coffee....
"But the bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet withstanding, go out to meet it."
-Thucydides
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"A Sherman can give you a very nice... edge."- Oddball,
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