Quote Originally Posted by selil View Post
I think the tension between LIC and HIC camps is funny. The number of HIC operators is much larger and LIC/COIN is still struggling for a foothold in the Army.
...but that isn't the tension. The tension between the Nagl mob, and Gentile, my friend Doug MacGregor, me and probably a few others (Ken White?) is the perversion of the military mission, by moving towards the nation building bit. To quote:

John Nagl, author of Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife, is so cocksure of the efficacy of Army combat power that he believes it will have the ability not only to dominate land warfare in general but also to ‘change entire societies’… We are organizing ourselves around the principle of nationbuilding rather than fighting.


Fighting should be the foundation of an Army. Anything that detracts from that is dangerous and stupid.

For example, instead of having Intelligence and Recon teams, you have "Human Terrain Teams".

Large portions (not all) of the US COIN-club approach is "history free." They know it exists, but ignore the bits they want to invent and change the bits they need as evidence. What is more a great many of the COIN clubs' assertions about the future, past and present are wonderfully evidence free.