I am sure that his statement is correct. "...the time it takes for social incentive structures to change in any organization so that doctrine can be consistently translated into strategy and tactics (human behavior)." is always a problem -- and that really amounts to "failure to adapt to a doctrine." In this particular case it is because the 'doctrine' has to overcome more than 30 years of inertia, fight a bureaucracy that is inimical to that doctrine, force change to deeply embedded training and education practices and is not accepted as totally correct by many in the institution to whom the doctrine nominally belongs.

In other words, there are a lot of people fighting the problem instead of the supposed enemy...

We need to get over the myth that COIN and allied efforts are exotic efforts requiring special training, education, practices or people. It is simply a part of the job. A part we elected to ignore for years because it's dirty work; more importantly to that neglect, it's also tedious work and does not provide instant feedback (bad ju-ju for impatient Americans who like quick results...). Effective training will produce people competent -- and willing -- to do what the job requires.