Identifying fear

[Kiwigrunt]

I just stumbled across this quote by Eric Hoffer:

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.

Then my thoughts drifted towards ‘terrorists’ and the extent to which this quote might apply to them.

So here’s a pretty loose hypothesis, with a whole range of questions.

Let’s assume that we could clearly identify the means he uses to frighten us, beyond what we see on the surface. (I can already see lots of questions here, like, is he actually frightening us or are we doing it ourselves?). What might they be?

Now would that be what would frighten him the most?

Would we be capable (beyond politically willing) of inflicting that on him?

So this is more about dealing with the enemy rather that the ‘nation building’ aspects, as intricately connected as they probably are.

Philosophise away….


P.S. I don’t have any particular opinions here myself and don’t expect anything concrete to come out of it. This thread could just be an entertaining time waster.

[Schmedlap]

I can think of lots of propaganda that he puts out to rally peers and lots of statements of defiance he makes to win support of fence-sitters, but I can't think of anything he does to try to frighten us.

[William F. Owen]

Now would that be what would frighten him the most?

Would we be capable (beyond politically willing) of inflicting that on him?

So this is more about dealing with the enemy rather that the ‘nation building’ aspects, as intricately connected as they probably are.

Philosophise away….

It's a war, therefore you have to seek to destroy the enemy. Focus on the enemy and all else flows from that. He fears being killed or captured, and even if he is willing to day, (like the Japs on Oki) then simply grant his wish.

If you have an army that cannot do that, then you probably shouldn't be playing.

[Uboat509]

This strikes me as an overly simplistic concept. The problem with that quote is that it assumes that the enemy has not applied any critical thinking to their tactics, that they do not observe what has worked and what has not or that they do not do research to determine what tactics that they will use. It would be nice to be able to assume that our enemies do not apply critical thinking, and in fact, some of them clearly do not. But some clearly do. Our enemy has proven on multiple occasions that he can be cunning and adaptive. Failure to consider that will, inevitably bite us in the back. I'm not sure just how useful quotes like this are.

[Uboat509]

I can think of lots of propaganda that he puts out to rally peers and lots of statements of defiance he makes to win support of fence-sitters, but I can't think of anything he does to try to frighten us.

9/11 was designed to frighten us but it failed. The Madrid train bombing was designed to frighten the Spanish and it worked.

IEDs could also also be looked at as a fear tactic of sorts. From a purely doctrinal perspective, IEDs are a failure. They are rarely, if ever, present in great enough numbers to truely deny terrain. They are rarely, if ever, tied into a broader tactical plan, ie. as canalizing or delaying obstacles etc. More often than not, they are not overwatched or covered by fires. They have certainly failed entirely to close to inflicting enough casualties on Coalition Forces to render them combat ineffective. The bulk of them will fail to cause any casualties at all, either because they detonate improperly, fail to detonate or get spotted and destroyed or safed. The combined total of all casualties caused by IEDs is less than the casualty counts from some battles in other wars we have fought. Yet despite all that, IEDs are generally considered our greatest threat and huge resources have been poured into defeating this threat. We have vehicles in our inventory that exist specifically as a response to IEDs and would likely be of limited or no value against a peer competitor. Why? Because, despite their failures from a doctrinal standpoint, they have served very well to create fear. Fear that is out of proportion to the actual effect that they have. Fear that seems to get magnified the further you get from the battlefield. I have met more than one civilian who honestly believed that assignment to Iraq or Afghanistan was all but a death sentence, by IED.

[Dayuhan]

9/11 was designed to frighten us but it failed. The Madrid train bombing was designed to frighten the Spanish and it worked.

I don't believe that 9/11 was designed to frighten us. I believe it was designed to goad us into committing forces to an environment where we could be worn down in a war of attrition.

One thing I think the AQ inner circle really fears is irrelevance: a day when Muslims no longer hate or fear the west, when the word "jihad" inspires as little passion as the word "crusade" inspires among modern Christians. A jihadi is nothing without a jihad.

IEDs could also also be looked at as a fear tactic of sorts. From a purely doctrinal perspective, IEDs are a failure... Because, despite their failures from a doctrinal standpoint, they have served very well to create fear. Fear that is out of proportion to the actual effect that they have. Fear that seems to get magnified the further you get from the battlefield. I have met more than one civilian who honestly believed that assignment to Iraq or Afghanistan was all but a death sentence, by IED.

Not that I know anything of doctrine, but I suppose whether anything is a doctrinal success or failure depends on what your doctrine is. AQ's, I suspect, is that they cannot defeat us in combat, but they can erode our home-front will to fight if they can impose a steady stream of casualties while denying us any convincing evidence of success. I think IEDs are less aimed at creating fear than at creating the perception of a quagmire, of an endless war where we sacrifice lives and money while gaining nothing. From that perspective I'm not sure that IEDs have been a complete failure.

[Firn]

The point about critical thinking is right.

One might quip that the whole fighting against the coalition forces in Afpak region, as well as partly in Iraq is in effect a great strategic delaying action, planned or not, which also undermines and stresses a lot of social and political relations all around the globe. (This does not mean that Kosha Pasthun fights for this very reason).

Terror as an instrument designed to cause fear and conflict is also still high on list of many.

Firn


P.S:

The Madrid train bombing was designed to frighten the Spanish and it worked.

This is acutally disputable.

[Schmedlap]

Uboat,

Maybe I'm relying too heavily on personal experience, rather than big-picture data, but my experience was that an IED was usually integrated into a broader plan, primarily being used to disable the vehicle in hopes of getting us out of the vehicle and exposed to their small arms and RPGs. On those occasions, the lack of casualties was more attributable to their awful marksmanship than to the poor utility of an IED. There were also occasions when they were detonated next to a house that was rigged to blow up, knowing that our MPCOA is going to be to get out of the kill zone and enter the nearest building. They also barricaded doors and windows near the kill zone to trap us in their fields of fire after exiting the vehicle (this might have explained why they included excessive propellants in the mix - in order to set the vehicle on fire and force us to exit). It was a common tactic to set up decoy IEDs to distract us and a real IED to kill us when we thought we were a safe distance from the decoy. There were secondary IEDs to kill Soldiers who attempted to evacuate casualties. We had roads in our AO that were littered with completely obvious, uncamouflaged real IEDs and decoy IEDs for the sole purpose of making travel on the roads impractical.

I could go on, but to get back on topic - I don't think the IED, 9/11, or Madrid were attempts to scare us. The IED was the response to the very wise observation that our public had a weak stomach for casualties. Who cares about "doctrinal perspective"? It was a simple, wise plan that worked very well and almost sent us home Vietnam-style. I don't see how fear plays into that. It's just cost-benefit.

[Uboat509]

Uboat,

Maybe I'm relying too heavily on personal experience, rather than big-picture data, but my experience was that an IED was usually integrated into a broader plan, primarily being used to disable the vehicle in hopes of getting us out of the vehicle and exposed to their small arms and RPGs. On those occasions, the lack of casualties was more attributable to their awful marksmanship than to the poor utility of an IED. There were also occasions when they were detonated next to a house that was rigged to blow up, knowing that our MPCOA is going to be to get out of the kill zone and enter the nearest building. They also barricaded doors and windows near the kill zone to trap us in their fields of fire after exiting the vehicle (this might have explained why they included excessive propellants in the mix - in order to set the vehicle on fire and force us to exit). It was a common tactic to set up decoy IEDs to distract us and a real IED to kill us when we thought we were a safe distance from the decoy. There were secondary IEDs to kill Soldiers who attempted to evacuate casualties. We had roads in our AO that were littered with completely obvious, uncamouflaged real IEDs and decoy IEDs for the sole purpose of making travel on the roads impractical.

I could go on, but to get back on topic - I don't think the IED, 9/11, or Madrid were attempts to scare us. The IED was the response to the very wise observation that our public had a weak stomach for casualties. Who cares about "doctrinal perspective"? It was a simple, wise plan that worked very well and almost sent us home Vietnam-style. I don't see how fear plays into that. It's just cost-benefit.

If it was simply cost benefit, there would have been a whole lot less of an issue. We have a history of throwing money at problems to fix them. The issue was that people were afraid that it would be their loved one or their friend who would be killed. Fear does not have to mean that I am afraid that I will be killed, it can mean that I am afraid that someone I care about will be killed.

I only mentioned the "doctrinal perspective" to illustrate that the goal of their operations was not the traditional goal of military operations. They were not trying to drive us out by force of arms. I doubt very much that even the most hard corps of them believed that they could drive us out by force. I don't believe that it was intentional at first, they were just fighting with the weapons they had, but, inadvertently or not, a mystique was created around the concept of the IED. It got to the point that many people seemed to believe that if you go to Iraq it is not a matter of if you will be killed or horribly maimed by an IED, but a matter of when. The response to IEDs far outstripped the actual tactical effect.

As for 9/11 and Madrid, what else were those for other than to sow fear? Reporting that has been made open source shows that they were surprised by our response to 9/11. And why shouldn't they have been? As Ken has pointed out numerous times, our response to attacks against us in the Middle East had been tepid at best. Look at our response to Beruit, Mogidishu, Khobar Towers, the USS Cole, and so on. Why would they have expected us to act any differently after 9/11?

I'm not in a position to argue about whether or not the Madrid bombings actually worked as they were intended but the perception is that they did and in this case perception trumps whatever the reality may have been.

[Ken White]

As for 9/11 and Madrid, what else were those for other than to sow fear?

major economic damage in both cases (in which they were quite successful...) and to elicit an excessive response.

Reporting that has been made open source shows that they were surprised by our response to 9/11. And why shouldn't they have been? As Ken has pointed out numerous times, our response to attacks against us in the Middle East had been tepid at best. Look at our response to Beruit, Mogidishu, Khobar Towers, the USS Cole, and so on. Why would they have expected us to act any differently after 9/11?

I think a lot of that surprise was at the effectiveness of OEF 1 and disbelief that OIF would occur, IOW, the type and location of both responses was not what they had expected due to our previous responses and that knocked them off balance for a bit. They did get an excessive response but it was not the one they had expected and somewhat prepared for.

Had we better prepared our response capability in the 90s as many wished, we could have surprised them even more...

[Dayuhan]

major economic damage in both cases (in which they were quite successful...) and to elicit an excessive response.

I think the intent was to elicit a very specific response: they wanted us to invade and occupy Muslim lands, providing them with an opportunity to put out the call for jihad and engage us in a war of attrition: the only type of war in which they could hope to win. Whether that response was or was not excessive is debatable; there is no doubt that it served AQ's interests.

Had we better prepared our response capability in the 90s as many wished, we could have surprised them even more...

This I'm not so sure of. Our ability to remove governments and occupy land was more than adequate. I'm not sure that any response capability that was desired in the 90s would have given us the ability to manage the post-occupation challenges.

Way back when I was ranting against the idea of invading Iraq, a friend asked me what I thought should be the guiding principle of what they were already calling "GWOT". I told him the principle I'd want to follow would be "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee". Hardly original, but I think useful. "Float like a butterfly" meaning, above all, do not ever occupy territory.

This has been my objection from the start to the whole clear/hold/build/transfer idea. When we're clearing, we have the initiative. We decide where we will clear, and when, and how, forcing the enemy to respond to us. Once we go to hold, that reverses. We're static, they're maneuvering around us. They decide where to engage, and when, and how. That's not good. Beyond that, our ability to build and transfer depends on our ability to conjure up a viable entity to which things will be transferred... and that is probably something we haven't the capacity to do.

I suppose it's restating the obvious, but I don't think we went about this in a very sensible way.

[Ken White]

This I'm not so sure of. Our ability to remove governments and occupy land was more than adequate. I'm not sure that any response capability that was desired in the 90s would have given us the ability to manage the post-occupation challenges.

Depends on what capabilities and who desired them. There was a school of thought inside the Army that urged far more effort toward managing such problems, foreign internal defense and security force assistance. There was a smaller school that advocated avoiding doing that post conflict/FID/SFA thing at all costs. They advocated tailored response and urged acquisition of equipment to do that; cheap disposable vehicles, very stealthy air transport with very long range and such in addition to major war items. Unfortunately, they got subsumed in the far larger crowd (almost half the Army was in Europe, that's where you had to go to get promoted...) who were major war / avoid FID etc crowd. As both Presidents in the 90s had no interest in any military adventures other than launching missiles -- though the first one did launch two major operations even while he was cutting the budget for the so-called 'peace dividend' -- the result was predictable. No FID, no exotic dangerous toys that might get Politicians in trouble...

"Float like a butterfly" meaning, above all, do not ever occupy territory.

I think we have to be prepared to do that while rigorously avoiding actually having to do it.

When we're clearing, we have the initiative.

Bingo! You've got it and just proved that going to the War College doesn't adequately prepare the wrong people to fight the nation's wars. That's the only time we do have the initiative, long a tenet of US doctrine. In most other circumstances, the opponent has the initiative. I've seen varying figures for Viet Nam, Iraq and Afghanistan on enemy initiated versus US initiated contacts. IIRC, in all cases they initiated over 60% of the contacts, in some cases as high as 90%.

That is just criminal. No reason for it to be that way -- it IS that way due to poor selection and training, poor personnel polices with concomitant almost forced lack of trust in subordinates and societally induced politically correct risk aversion. Not because it must be that way, poor ROE or the bad guys knowing their terrain better...

I suppose it's restating the obvious, but I don't think we went about this in a very sensible way.

Nope, not at all. We've lost the bubble...

All the problems were foreseen by many in the Army -- problem was no one on high listened and the US has no consistent mechanism for giving civilian policy makers the requisite strategic and military knowledge to avoid make less than sensible decisions about the application of force.

[Dayuhan]

Depends on what capabilities and who desired them. There was a school of thought inside the Army that urged far more effort toward managing such problems, foreign internal defense and security force assistance.

True... but we have to remember that FID/SFA is not what we're doing in Iraq and Afghanistan. We're not assisting a security force, we're trying to create one, and a government to go with it. I'm not sure that any level of procurement or focus in the US military would have left us able to do that, because the fundamental problems involved in trying to construct a government for someone else's country extend far beyond the reasonable scope of military expertise or involvement. We've actually managed the military aspects adequately; the non-military aspects are another story altogether.

I think we have to be prepared to do that while rigorously avoiding actually having to do it.

Probably true... but given the nature of this particular war, we would want to avoid it very rigorously indeed.

All the problems were foreseen by many in the Army -- problem was no one on high listened and the US has no consistent mechanism for giving civilian policy makers the requisite strategic and military knowledge to avoid make less than sensible decisions about the application of force.

I anticipated many of the problems, and I have no military background or knowledge at all. I looked at it from the perspective of the political problems of post-dictatorship political transition and the difficulties inherent in trying to construct a new government in a foreign environment, and concluded that we were grotesquely underestimating the difficulty of these tasks. I wish I'd been wrong about that.

[Ken White]

...we have to remember that FID/SFA is not what we're doing in Iraq and Afghanistan...We've actually managed the military aspects adequately; the non-military aspects are another story altogether.

Still FID/SFA as far as the armed forces are concerned, call it FID squared...

Disagree on the military aspects in toto but with respect to what I think you're addressing, we did okay. Agree on the non-mil being very poorly handled.

The issue is really the glaring lack of knowledge of most policymakers, civilian and military, in the run up to both Afghanistan and especially Iraq.

I anticipated many of the problems, and I have no military background or knowledge at all. I looked at it from the perspective of the political problems of post-dictatorship political transition and the difficulties inherent in trying to construct a new government in a foreign environment, and concluded that we were grotesquely underestimating the difficulty of these tasks. I wish I'd been wrong about that.

I believe that State did the same thing and tried to warn everyone. So did the Army War College and several others. All those warnings were not ignored by the WH and DoD, they were accepted and then discounted (perhaps overly so) because the long term results were deemed worth the known (and a few ignored, a few unforeseen) problems. It is still too early to tell if that was the correct decision or not. That'll take another 15-20 years or so. My original estimate was five years -- 2008 -- for the end of major insurgent effort; ten for the rough rule of law (ME good Variety; 2013 or so); about twenty to thirty for a decent functioning nation in accordance with world (NOT western...) norms. So I'd look for results in the 2020-2030 period.

I personally believe it was poorly thought out but I will give them credit for doing something instead of thrashing about ineffectually.

Militarily, we did fair -- could have and should have done far better. OGA wise, we failed miserably; mostly due to politics. The really terrible thing is that Saddam Hussein warned us publicly of precisely what he intended -- and we totally ignored him. The Army was as much at fault there as was any civilian policy maker. Egos are dangerous things...

[William F. Owen]

Said it before, but one of the things I just do not get about the US Army is their idea of "Strategy" - as being discussed here.

Policy changes as strategy is applied. It's not a set of rules of even a doctrine. It's a Crack Whores household budget - which shows Wienberger and Powell don't get it, but I'll leave that for now - The US Army cannot and should not attempt Strategy or any input into policy.

Military Power is a tool. It's not the policy, so basically, yes you can occupy any land you so wish, IF you are skilled enough to do at a cost that makes it sustainable within the policy. Lack the skill, and you fail the policy.

Some SWC folk seem intent on saying "OMG! We must not occupy" when the exam questions is "How can it be done well."

I know this is all very obvious, but it seems that it does need saying. - Apologies to anyone who feels it's TOO obvious.

[Bob's World]

I'll agree that military power is a tool; the question is who should write the operator's manual for that particular tool?

And while perhaps all warfare can be decided through the ruthless application of violence, not every ruthless application of violence is warfare.

So I for one am quite comfortable raising my hand to inform a politician who tells me to go "wage war" that while I understand he is applying a lay definition to the word "war" that what he is actually asking me to do in not war at all, and that to treat it as such is quite as likely to produce an effect the complete opposite of the one he seeks.

That is not the military mucking around in policy, that is the military being the expert in things the military does. Not much use in being an educated professional in ones field if one applies some bizzare code of duty that prevents one from pointing out key nuances that only such a professional could truly grasp.

America's problem today is not that it is ineffective at waging they type of war that it is in, it is that it is ineffective in recognizing that we are not at war at all. The war-like application of foreign policy in times of peace creates friction.

Didn't CvC say something to the effect that the most important thing is to know what kind of war one is in? I would argue that a branch of that tenant is that the most important thing is to also know if what one is in is even a war at all.

I say that we are not at war, and should stop acting like it. It's unbecoming, unproductive, and despite our recent history, unAmerican.

My reasons for this position are not obvious at all. They are complex and rooted in years of study and experience; all the more reason not to just sit back and hope the policy types just somehow "get it."

[marct]

Hi Folks,

Let’s assume that we could clearly identify the means he uses to frighten us, beyond what we see on the surface. (I can already see lots of questions here, like, is he actually frightening us or are we doing it ourselves?). What might they be?

You know, I think Dayuhan hit the nail on the head with this:

One thing I think the AQ inner circle really fears is irrelevance: a day when Muslims no longer hate or fear the west, when the word "jihad" inspires as little passion as the word "crusade" inspires among modern Christians. A jihadi is nothing without a jihad.

Given that "jihad" has a double meaning, personal and social struggle, my suspicion is that what they are truly terrified of is having their nice little Manichean model of "reality" made irrelevant . I also suspect that they are terrified of anyone noticing how Manichean their model actually is, although I have seen a few indicators that some mullas are starting to get worried about it (specifically about their apparent rejection / militarization of personal jihad and of the apparent ease with which their fellow travellers use declarations of takfir against any who disagree). I also find it quite interesting that their movement is often directly opposed by many of the followers of al-Ghazali, who tend to privilege the concept of personal jihad in its spiritual sense.

[Fuchs]

9/11 was designed to frighten us but it failed. The Madrid train bombing was designed to frighten the Spanish and it worked.

I disagree.

The two TWC attacks (9/11 and the garage car bomb) were directed against a prestige object. They look to me (and I am not really original here) as attacks designed to
a) ruin American complacency and pride by destroying a symbol of success and superiority
b) boost Arab (at that time not yet global Muslim) confidence and self assurance by exposing the vulnerability of America.

The Cole attack supports this. The attacked target was an expression of power (and power projection!) and a strong point, not a weak spot and not useful for instilling fear in America.

The post-9/11 attacks on non-US targets were likely designed as a pay back, meant to discourage European/Australian/Canadian support for the US.

The post-9/11 attacks on US targets finally seem to be designed for economic and even more fear effect because the completely exaggerated reaction to 9/11 showed AQ the effectiveness of such an approach.
Fear drives people crazy, the US even invaded a Muslim country for no reason, thus alienating many Muslims who weren't alienated before.
The continued attempts to attack the West are also serving to improve the morale of counter-Western radicals.


The Spanish removed a lying and unsuccessful government that did not rule in the interest of the people. AQ helped to expose that government by provoking some of its lies. The worked as a catalyst to the government change in Spain - it's too much to assert that AQ frightened the Spanish into changing their policy.

[Ken White]

...The US Army cannot and should not attempt Strategy or any input into policy.

While I agree with you in theory, the practicality is that our system and our laws require certain military inputs to policy decisions. The reality is that input is solicited but sometimes ignored or altered to the detriment of the nation -- and that applies to advice given, not given, taken and not taken. However, most often, that advice is asked for by the policy folks and is generally accepted with only those modifications deemed required for domestic political consumption -- which factor always outweighs both international and / or purely military considerations.

...Lack the skill, and you fail the policy.

Or more correctly, you are unable to implement the policy due to lack of skill -- or will -- or tools. Sometimes the skill is willing but the flesh is weak; other times the skill may be derelict...

Some SWC folk seem intent on saying "OMG! We must not occupy" when the exam questions is "How can it be done well."

The following question I mentioned above is; "Can it be avoided. If so, what alternatives are available?"

The question after that is "Do a cost : benefit analysis of courses of action. Show your work."

I know this is all very obvious...

Yes. I agree.

While all that is obvious, the US Political-Military dynamic is quite different to that in almost all other nations. Tends to confuse many...

[Dayuhan]

Said it before, but one of the things I just do not get about the US Army is their idea of "Strategy" - as being discussed here.

Policy changes as strategy is applied. It's not a set of rules of even a doctrine. It's a Crack Whores household budget - which shows Wienberger and Powell don't get it, but I'll leave that for now - The US Army cannot and should not attempt Strategy or any input into policy.

Military Power is a tool. It's not the policy, so basically, yes you can occupy any land you so wish, IF you are skilled enough to do at a cost that makes it sustainable within the policy. Lack the skill, and you fail the policy.

Some SWC folk seem intent on saying "OMG! We must not occupy" when the exam questions is "How can it be done well."

I know this is all very obvious, but it seems that it does need saying. - Apologies to anyone who feels it's TOO obvious.

It would be a sorry sort of civilian government that did not consult with its military before designing strategies that involve military action, and a sorry sort of military that failed to give an honest and thorough assessment in reply.

From a purely military standpoint it may be pointless to question political strategy; I don't see that we face any such constraint here.

If we speak of occupation, the capacity of the military to occupy is only half the question. Occupation is (one hopes) a means to an end, not an end in itself. If we lack the capacity to achieve the political objective of the occupation with the means available and within an acceptable time frame, the occupation will fail to achieve its objective regardless of the skill (or lack thereof) of the occupying military force. This may not be an a question the military commander in the field needs to address, but it's a question policy makers need to consider. They also have to weigh the collateral cost of occupation - which in this particular war are extremely high - against the intended benefits. Overall, I'd say that given the war we're fighting, occupation is a thing to be avoided at all costs. In a different sort of war it might be otherwise.

It's a war, therefore you have to seek to destroy the enemy. Focus on the enemy and all else flows from that.

Possibly I've got this wrong, but it was my understanding that wars are fought in pursuit of political objectives. In the current case we're fighting a war that was initiated by our enemies in pursuit of their own objectives, which leaves us pursuing our own political objectives while trying to prevent our enemy from achieving theirs. If we focus on destroying the enemy to an extent that leads us to lose track of the political objectives, we place ourselves on course to win every battle and lose the war. We have already been there and done that, I don't think we want to do it again.