Adapt Or Die

[Mark O'Neill]

Hmmm,

Nicely written article - but, for mine, 100% ignorant.

You can 'lose' a COIN fight at each level of war - Tac, Op and Strat. But you can only win it at one level - the Strategic.

Yes, it is an imperative that you have tac forces that act in the correct manner. Yes, you need a comprehensive OP level Campaign plan where COIN agencies are properly synchronised - and yes, it all comes to nought if the Strategic level is 'wrong'.

An insurgency reflects an 'ill' in a society or a state that causes people to become insurgent. The historical record tells us that many have tried to do well in COIN by being tactically or operationallly 'proficient' but have ultimately failed. I tender the Rhodesians or the Apartheid era South Africans as examples. Great at tactical and operational levels , dud strategic concepts.

Here is the crunch. The Military do not 'own' the strategic level in COIN. That belongs firmly in a 'western' liberal democacy to the Politicians (what I tend to think of partially as 'Huntington's curse' , but that is another rant....)and what we in Australia call the 'WOG" ('Whole of Government') or , in the USA 'The Interagency'.

ANYONE WHO BELIEVES THE MILITARY ALONE CAN 'WIN' THE COIN FIGHT IS A FOOL. IT TAKES A NATION.


Read that Blog offering with that idea in mind and then see if you agree with the author. end rant, climb off soapbox .....