The Col. Gentile collection and debate

[wm]

I like MarcT's discussion of the illogic of the Gentile piece. Another way of understanding the problem is that Gentile has made a category mistake, sort of as follows:

'Counterinsurgency' (or 'COIN') names a category of things , or a set if you prefer. 'War' likewise names a category of things, or another set. In the passage quoted by MarcT, Gentile asserts, without any argument, that 'COIN' is a subcategory or subset of 'War.' (I suspect he also wants 'COIN' to be a proper subset of 'War,' but that point is not really relevant to this discussion, IMO.) He seems to presume that the set 'COIN' is wholely contained in the set 'War.' He has left out the possibility that the two sets may be completely disjoint (have no members in common) or only partially overlap/intersect (have some members in common). Either of these latter two options could put 'War' and 'COIN' at the same categorical level while Gentile's option makes 'War' a superset, a higher (or more fundamental and, therefore, more inclusive) category than 'COIN.'

Regarding the use of paradox, I submit that when one finds paradoxes in one's explanation that means that one's explanation is not as reflective of the truth (defined here as corresponding to reality) as one would like to believe. Additionally, paradoxes indicate that the truth of one's explanation (truth now defined as coherence, or the "hanging together" of the explanatory story one tells with other beliefs one holds) is not quite as likely as it could be.

Pointing out paradoxes in an explanation, in my experience, is most useful for rejecting that explanation's logical and practical efficacy. In other words, finding paradoxes in one's theory of how to counter an insurgency successfully would indicate that the theory might not be as good as one expects in achieving the desired results on a more universal scale.This is because as one expands the cases to be explained, more things come up that cause "disconnects" (or paradoxes) within one's explnatory schema.

I would suggest that the use of paradoxes is a) quite normal in getting anyone to perceive a new viewpoint, b) inherently "simple" in presentation but complex in "unfolding", and c) only deceitful when they contradict already internalized paradoxes (e.g. "Peace through superior firepower", etc.).
. . .
Gentile relies on an appeal to traditional authority to define "counterinsurgency war" as "war". The fact that they are perceived as somehow different, shown by the use of "counterinsurgency" as a modifier, appears to be irrelevant to Gentile who proceeds to assert an essence, in the philosophical sense, to "war" and, by a backwards chain of logic, assert the primacy of the same essence to "counterinsurgency war". This neatly avoids the annoying little point that "counterinsurgency war" is perceptually (and linguistically and doctrinally) defined as an intersection set of two classes: counterinsurgency and war. Where is the second "essence"?
. . .
Given the strawman and illogical "logic" already used, this conclusion is both unavoidable and, at the same time, tragically flawed. What he has missed is that FM 3-24 is, in fact, attempting to define the "essence" if you will of "counterinsurgency", not "war" (i.e. his missed class), and to show the intersection with "war".

[marct]

Hi WM,

Another way of understanding the problem is that Gentile has made a category mistake

Agreed. Personally, I prefer the use of fuzzy sets rather than crisp sets since they appear to be more reflective of human thought and characterization - "reality" if you will - but I believe that his argument is flawed in both.

Regarding the use of paradox, I submit that when one finds paradoxes in one's explanation that means that one's explanation is not as reflective of the truth (defined here as corresponding to reality) as one would like to believe. Additionally, paradoxes indicate that the truth of one's explanation (truth now defined as coherence, or the "hanging together" of the explanatory story one tells with other beliefs one holds) is not quite as likely as it could be.

I'm not sure I agree with you on this - it may be reflective of linguistic limitations pertaining to mapping reality. Still and all, that's a subject that probably needs a long discussion with lots of potables . On the other hand, I would note that there is a difference between using a paradox as an explanatory mechanism vs. using a paradox as an operational mechanism designed to shift perceptions so that a different mapping structure can be perceived (a point Gentile also misses IMO). The paradoxes in FM 3-24 are, to my mind, koans designed to induce a cognitive dissonance with "regular warfighting" perceptions. As such, I don't see them as explanatory paradoxes but, rather, as operational ones. I do agree with you that the use of paradoxes for internal explanation (coherence - your second definition of truth) is a danger sign.

Pointing out paradoxes in an explanation, in my experience, is most useful for rejecting that explanation's logical and practical efficacy. In other words, finding paradoxes in one's theory of how to counter an insurgency successfully would indicate that the theory might not be as good as one expects in achieving the desired results on a more universal scale.This is because as one expands the cases to be explained, more things come up that cause "disconnects" (or paradoxes) within one's explnatory schema.

Agreed. In fairness, though, all nomenological deductive theories are prone to this problem - it's an inherent attribute of mapping limitations. What is important, at the operational level or application level is whether or not the theory can "satisfice" in much the same manner as Newtonian physics works quite nicely below .3c. I think Ted's example of the "meaning" of tactical success is a good example of that.

[wm]

Hi WM,
I would note that there is a difference between using a paradox as an explanatory mechanism vs. using a paradox as an operational mechanism designed to shift perceptions so that a different mapping structure can be perceived (a point Gentile also misses IMO). The paradoxes in FM 3-24 are, to my mind, koans designed to induce a cognitive dissonance with "regular warfighting" perceptions. As such, I don't see them as explanatory paradoxes but, rather, as operational ones.

R. G. Collingwood described an interesting phenomenon in explanations that he called the Fallacy of Swapping Horses (as in "you can't swap horses in the middle of a stream.") I have no qualms about your distinction as long as we remember to keep astride of the same "horse of paradox" as that mounted by the author. The koan comparison is extremely apt IMO. I think we might also call out your use of paradox as a sub-category of cognitive dissonance. Your thoughts?

[Steve Blair]

I'd be curious to see what he has to say regarding what's been posted to date.

That said, I'm also curious as to why there is such a rush to both ignore the heritage of 3-24 and to attempt to have the Army repeat its past mistakes when it comes to COIN. 3-24 is in many ways a direct descendant of the USCM Small Wars Manual, and that clearly didn't damage the Marines' ability to conduct conventional operations. One the reasons 3-24 was needed was the rush to discard lessons learned in Vietnam (and elsewhere)...so in a certain sense the wheel needed to be invented again. I honestly don't think this is a "one or the other" proposition, and attempts to make it so (by either side) really damage the value of what's in 3-24.

[marct]

Hi WM,

R. G. Collingwood described an interesting phenomenon in explanations that he called the Fallacy of Swapping Horses (as in "you can't swap horses in the middle of a stream.") I have no qualms about your distinction as long as we remember to keep astride of the same "horse of paradox" as that mounted by the author. The koan comparison is extremely apt IMO. I think we might also call out your use of paradox as a sub-category of cognitive dissonance. Your thoughts?

Good point. I'm not sure I would call it a sub-category of CD; more of a technology designed to produce CD. Then again, I tend to view symbolic manipulation as a technology, at least in the sense used by Ellul.

One of the more interesting observations about the way paradox operates in religion, and I'm appalled to admit the reference has dropped out of my mind , is that paradoxes are crucial for religions but that the resolution of any paradox will shift the further that you work your way into the religion. I think that the same might apply in a COIN situation. Sorry, I'm looping back to the crisp vs. fuzzy distinction here. "War" has, at least on and off for the past 300 years or so, been a relatively crisp set - well defined rules, protocols, etc. Insurgency and Counter-insurgency, on the other hand, comprise a much more fuzzy set - sometimes "war", sometimes not. I would suspect that the "paradoxes" of "war" in the formal, crisp sense, are both well understood, mapped out and routinized within military institutions, while those of insurgency - counterinsurgency are not. This might explain the hysteresis effect on military institutions during peacetime.

Anyway, that's for another discussion sometime...

I'd be curious to see what he has to say regarding what's been posted to date.

I am too.

[Jedburgh]

I'd be curious to see what he has to say regarding what's been posted to date.....

Here's another view of Gentile's perspective on COIN:

....I went to this event at the Heritage Foundation this morning, titled "When Do You Know You're Winning? Combating Insurgencies - Past, Present, and Future." You can watch video or listen to the mp3 of it yourself if you want to - everything was on the record....

...the truly alarming thing was LTC Gian Gentile's presentation. LTC Gentile commanded a battalion in Baghdad up until a few weeks ago and is now a professor at West Point. He gave a rundown of the metrics he used. I'll list them in the order he presented them, which according to him is the order of importance:

Security:
- Body count (which he acknowledged as "backwards" but justified by referencing some Eliot Cohen article in 2006 that argued "counterinsurgency is still war, and war's essential element is fighting")
- Number of times he is attacked (he wants it to be as low as possible)
- Number of dead bodies found on the street
- Sectarian makeup of Iraqi units he's partnered with
- Number of local tips he gets
- Number of enemy captured

Governance:
- Opening shops on the main street
- Keeping useful local leaders alive
- "Normal" activity of people
- Willingness of Sunnis to travel across Baghdad
- Essential services, employment levels

These seem to be great metrics if your first priority is leaving Iraq with as many soldiers as possible, with little regard to the situation you are leaving to the guys relieving you. It is conducive to holing up in your Forward Operating Base and leaving only to react to events. There is no mention of the local political situation that the security situation is supposed to be oriented around. Furthermore he has as "metrics" things which aren't even nominally under his control, such as the makeup of Iraqi units and the willingness of Sunnis to travel in other commanders' Areas of Responsibility. His emphasis on body count as his primary metric was especially depressing - supposedly we had learned that was a poor metric back in Vietnam (and probably earlier).

LTC Gentile did say some useful things however - he pointed out that the situation can't be measured by quantifiable variables, and that gut feeling and judgment are the overriding variables, and that progress should be presented in a narrative form rather than through graphs, etc. However I was left with a fair amount of questions...

Bolded phrase reflects an aspect of the reported brief that is identical to the article currently under discussion.

[Gian P Gentile]

Clearly I have struck a nerve in many of the readers of this blog. I will say up front that at least I reply to criticisms made of what I have to say when others of more fame and fortune than I and of rock star status clearly see themselves above the fray of this blog.

Admittedly this piece was written in evocative and impressionistic form. That is to say I wrote this piece from the premise of how the coin’s paradoxes appeared to me when I read it at the end of my combat tour in command of a combat battalion in west-baghdad in 2006.

I must have missed the class as Dr Tyrell states and I never really did get Foucault or Derrida because for the life of me I don’t get what he is telling me. I guess I just must be slow. No matter, I will restate my impression of the coin manual’s paradoxes when I was in combat in Iraq and based on reflection upon my return: my impression was that the paradoxes removed the essence of war which is fighting. You might disagree with what I have to say but I think the logic is pretty clear.

Reference Dr Metz’s implication that I am stuck in the old “cold war mindset” I suggest that he along with so many other experts are the ones stuck in a box. He like so many others are a part of the great narrative that has been constructed on US involvement in iraq. It goes something like the army didn’t’ take coin seriously before the war and because of that the army has screwed up iraq. But happily with the help of experts and some enlightened thinkers within the active army we have now finally figured out how to do it; aka the surge. I argue that this entire construct is flawed. That by and large the American army has done pretty well in Iraq—even prior to the surge--with the strategic and political cards it was dealt. My article in fact threatens the intellectual base of the new coin doctrine because it calls its basic theoretical premises into question. Counterinsurgency war is not “armed social science” as Kilkullen has called it. Instead at its basic level is violence and death; this was my impression after a year in Baghdad.

As for Jedburg’s mean statement that I was hunkered down in a fob I point him to a recent oped piece that I had published in Army Times on that subject. He could also ask any number of 4 star generals on down to the lowest private in my squadron if I “got it” and new how to do coin. And finally, he might try asking other commanders who lost soldiers what their priorities were. I know what I said at that Heritage panel did not fit in with what the coin experts believe actual coin ops should be like, but again my impression of counterinsurgency warfare is that fighting is its basic element and so killing and not being killed were my top priorities. So go ahead Jedburg and ask people who knew of me and I trust you will not get the profile back that you have created on me.

I will pose a counterfactual again that I posted last week on this blog: If the army had read books like Nagl’s before the war and trained and taken seriously coin operations would things be any different in iraq than they are now? If the army had focused predominantly on coin prior to 2003 would the march to Baghdad gone the same way?

In my mind FM3-24 has become the army’s primary operational doctrine, and to its detriment. It has pushed us into doing things that make no sense to me: like arming the enemy of the government that we support; like dogmatically using the tactics of combat outposts in areas where other methods might be better but we do this because a French officer had success with them in the mountains of Algeria in 1958.

I think the coin doctrine has merit and can work under certain conditions; like French Algeria in the late 50s or El Salvador in the 1980s. But Civil War iraq in 2007? What we need is fresh thinking on how to operate there but the seduction of FM 3-24 in our army has pushed us into dogmatism.

One last point. A good friend of mine who was closely involved with the rebuilding of the army and its intellectual base after Vietnam told me recently that prior to its 1986 publication FM 100-5 had at least 110 articles written about it in the years leading up to its publication that fundamentally questioned its theoretical premises. How many articles written in Military Review, Parameters, etc have fundamentally questioned our new coin doctrine? Only a few.

If you want to read a quality piece written by another combat battalion commander read LTC Ross Brown’s recent article in Military Review on his experience in Iraq in 2005. Or ask some of our infantry leaders currently serving in Anbar if they are using FM 3-24 as their operational guide or the older FM 90-8 on counter guerilla operations.

To repeat, war is not “armed social science,” though many of you may want it to be.

[SteveMetz]

Reference Dr Metz’s implication that I am stuck in the old “cold war mindset” I suggest that he along with so many other experts are the ones stuck in a box. He like so many others are a part of the great narrative that has been constructed on US involvement in iraq. It goes something like the army didn’t’ take coin seriously before the war and because of that the army has screwed up iraq. But happily with the help of experts and some enlightened thinkers within the active army we have now finally figured out how to do it; aka the surge. I argue that this entire construct is flawed. That by and large the American army has done pretty well in Iraq—even prior to the surge--with the strategic and political cards it was dealt. My article in fact threatens the intellectual base of the new coin doctrine because it calls its basic theoretical premises into question. Counterinsurgency war is not “armed social science” as Kilkullen has called it. Instead at its basic level is violence and death; this was my impression after a year in Baghdad.

You misstate my point. Agree that the Army has done well in Iraq. The fact that the Army has done well and the chances of ultimate strategic success are still slim illustrates my point exactly: counterinsurgency is not a form of war to be won by the military. Treating it more like war will not alter this.

If we ultimately fail, it will not be because we did not kill enough insurgents. It is, in your phrase, "the strategic and political cards" I have a problem with, not with Army doctrine or performance. War may not be "armed social science" (a phrase, by the way, Dave did not invent--I heard Larry Cable use it at an SF branch conference in the mid 90s). But, by the same token, counterinsurgency is not war. But because we have this great military hammer, we treat all security problems as nails amenable to warfighting.

[Steve Blair]

To repeat, war is not “armed social science,” though many of you may want it to be.

Nor is war always the total "all or nothing" construct that many want it to be. And where exactly did Jedhburg accuse you of hunkering down in a fob?

In any case, I still think the main point of 3-24 is to get people to think about what they're doing. And the Army's track record in preserving any doctrine other than that of massive state-versus-state warfare is abysmal, going all the way back to before the Civil War. The Army as an institution has always enjoyed a certain level of dogmatism in its operational theory.

To pose an answer to your counterfactual, I would say that the situation in Iraq could certainly been different had more senior planners understood the implications of regime change and societal reconstruction...which is part of COIN. Would the march to Baghdad gone the same way? Quite possibly. Again, I present the example of the Marine Corps, which has managed to preserve both a focus on large-scale conflict and a fair stockpile of COIN lessons prior to 3-24's publication.

[Van]

In an ongoing discussion on this subject with an Air Force officer currently attending U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, I find myself coming to the conclusion that the Cold War model of a smooth continuum from low intensity to high intensity conflict is broken. The break occurs between Low and Mid intensity. The spectrum of conventional conflict, from the smallest fight to superpowers with nukes is a smooth continuum, but Small Wars operations fall in a discrete spectrum.

COIN falls in the Small Wars spectrum. It may be contemporaneous with a conventional fight, as Churchill tried to arrange for the Germans with the SOE and OSS units, and as the Germans arranged for themselves by invading the Balkans. It may be sequel to a conventional war, as for the Allied forces in Germany after WWII, and in Iraq today. It may be a prelude to a conventional war as in Indochina/Viet Nam and as envisioned in classical Latin American guerrilla theory. COIN may also occur in isolation from a conventional fight.

The bottom line is that COIN requires a different skill set than conventional war, and the U.S. military has to be ready for both. The British model as used Ireland and Bosnia is to train for the conventional war, retrain for COIN, and re-retrain after returning from COIN duty. The Canadians dual equip mechanized units with LAVs (wheeled) and tracked vehicles. I hope someone with better knowledge of Canadian doctrine can confirm or deny that they dual train also.

I don't know what would work best for the U.S. We seem to train for the current fight and continue until we've been burned by the other type of fight and throw everything the other direction until the wheel turns and we get burned again. U.S. officers (the ones I talk with at least) seem to like conventional conflict training better, and want to stay in their comfort zone, but they understand that you have to adapt, like it or not. The danger here is that we'll repeat the Air Force's mistake from the fifties and early sixties of thinking that one size of doctrine fits all (the early nuclear Air Force doctrine). (Actually, the Army wasn't much better with the Pentomic Divisions of that era.)

Utter heresy, but perhaps we should indulge the young firebrand Army, AF, and Marine Captains and Navy LTs. Find the smartest and most contrarian, and allow them a shot a writing the new model. It won't happen because of senior egos and rice bowls, but the younglings have some brilliant ideas and radical methods, and giving them looser reins could pay huge dividends.

[Merv Benson]

I will not try to bridge the differences between LtC. Gentile an others. I think most of his metrics make sense despite a different emphasis in the COIN manual. In fact, I think the current operations are doing a better job of destroying the enemy than we were doing with fewer troops. By being in the neighborhoods we are accomplishing two important things. We are denying access to the enemy and we are getting more intelligence on enemy locations through tips. It also means we do not have to buy the same real estate over and over. It is difficult to say that the kinetic operations in the Diyala valley were not aimed at destroying the enemy and his infrastructure in his remaining sanctuary in Iraq.

I think the reports coming out of Anbar provide at least anecdotal evidence that our new allies are not enemies of the central government and are in fact being paid by that government. In other areas we are organizing citizen watches made up of former adversaries who provide their own arms. I suspect this is a transition phase meant to gage their dependability and loyalty.

The Sheiks seem to be the key political component in Iraq to controlling the country. Saddam learned this during his war with Iran and it appears to be holding true as we see groups rallying to our side in both the Sunni and Shia area when the Sheik says to do it.

In short the result of current operations demonstrate less violence against the population by sectarian factions and more effective kinetic operations against both al Qaeda and the Shia militia.

[Jedburgh]

.....As for Jedburg’s mean statement that I was hunkered down in a fob I point him to a recent oped piece that I had published in Army Times on that subject. He could also ask any number of 4 star generals on down to the lowest private in my squadron if I “got it” and new how to do coin. And finally, he might try asking other commanders who lost soldiers what their priorities were. I know what I said at that Heritage panel did not fit in with what the coin experts believe actual coin ops should be like, but again my impression of counterinsurgency warfare is that fighting is its basic element and so killing and not being killed were my top priorities. So go ahead Jedburg and ask people who knew of me and I trust you will not get the profile back that you have created on me....

I never stated that you "were hunkered down on a FOB". My "mean statement", as you put it, was that your comments were reflective of a stereotypical conventional Armor officer that can't stand anything other than HIC. Thus far, you have not posted anything to counter that perception, other than suggest I go around conducting character interviews. Sir, I do not question your character - I question your grasp of unconventional warfare.

....In my mind FM 3-24 has become the army’s primary operational doctrine, and to its detriment. It has pushed us into doing things that make no sense to me: like arming the enemy of the government that we support; like dogmatically using the tactics of combat outposts in areas where other methods might be better but we do this because a French officer had success with them in the mountains of Algeria in 1958.

I think you greatly overstate the influence of FM 3-24. It is an important doctrinal publication, but our Army has seen tremendous change and evolution in doctrinal pubs across the spectrum since 9-11, many of which are completely new and not doctrinal rewrites. However, I refer you back to RTK's post on the interrelationship of operational doctrine. Your constant diatribes against the manual are beginning to sound strident; if you could bring up substantive issues of precisely how it impacts training and other doctrine, that would go a long way towards making your case.

Offhand, I'd also like to say that arming the enemy of the government isn't something that was pushed by anything between the covers of FM 3-24. My view on the matter is stated here.

...If you want to read a quality piece written by another combat battalion commander read LTC Ross Brown’s recent article in Military Review on his experience in Iraq in 2005....

If you are referring to his Jan-Feb 07 piece, Commander's Assessment: South Baghdad, you are right, that is a good read. However, he specifically addresses the importance of the core subject which I have said that you either avoid, ignore or dismiss: linking killing with building, the kinetic with the non-kinetic. Other than a summary dismissal of armed social science, I would like to hear you elaborate on the fusion of those two aspects of unconventional warfare, as well as on conventional maneuver units' experience with interagency collaboration (or the lack thereof - as LTC Brown states at the end of his article) at the tactical level.

[marct]

Hi Folks,

I must have missed the class as Dr Tyrell states and I never really did get Foucault or Derrida because for the life of me I don’t get what he is telling me. I guess I just must be slow. No matter, I will restate my impression of the coin manual’s paradoxes when I was in combat in Iraq and based on reflection upon my return: my impression was that the paradoxes removed the essence of war which is fighting. You might disagree with what I have to say but I think the logic is pretty clear.
....
Counterinsurgency war is not “armed social science” as Kilkullen has called it. Instead at its basic level is violence and death; this was my impression after a year in Baghdad.

Well, not being a proponent of either Foucault or Derrida, I'm not sure what they have to do with this. However, yes, your logic was clear. Let me use exactly the same logical form that you used.

According to Clausewitz, war is an extension of politics
Politics is a social science,
Therefore war is an armed social science

Reference Dr Metz’s implication that I am stuck in the old “cold war mindset” I suggest that he along with so many other experts are the ones stuck in a box. He like so many others are a part of the great narrative that has been constructed on US involvement in iraq. It goes something like the army didn’t’ take coin seriously before the war and because of that the army has screwed up iraq. But happily with the help of experts and some enlightened thinkers within the active army we have now finally figured out how to do it; aka the surge.

That is certainly the extreme form of that particular narrative and I believe that it is a narrative that has gained strength, at least in pop culture, over the past 3-4 years.

I argue that this entire construct is flawed. That by and large the American army has done pretty well in Iraq—even prior to the surge--with the strategic and political cards it was dealt. My article in fact threatens the intellectual base of the new coin doctrine because it calls its basic theoretical premises into question.

Why do you think it "threatens the intellectual base of the new coin doctrine"? I certainly don't see any attacks on the underlying premises of the doctrine. Also, I would suggest, that FM 3-24 is not meant as a stand alone but, rather, a complement for other types (classes or categories) of warfare.

I will pose a counterfactual again that I posted last week on this blog: If the army had read books like Nagl’s before the war and trained and taken seriously coin operations would things be any different in iraq than they are now? If the army had focused predominantly on coin prior to 2003 would the march to Baghdad gone the same way?

To answer: possibly. However, let me toss out my own counterfactual: If the Army or, more specifically the planners of the war, had read anything about the Marshall Plan in Germany after WW II, or had bothered to read The Chrysanthemum and the Sword by Ruth Benedict, then the current COIN fight might have been unnecessary. The goal of a strike such as the march to Baghdad should not be to create more situations for killing, but that is the effect it has had since there was only a limited understanding of either previous Army doctrine (e.g. the occupation strategies of Japan and Germany) or a solid institutionalization of COIN principles.

Marc

[Adrian]

As for Jedburg’s mean statement that I was hunkered down in a fob I point him to a recent oped piece that I had published in Army Times on that subject. He could also ask any number of 4 star generals on down to the lowest private in my squadron if I “got it” and new how to do coin. And finally, he might try asking other commanders who lost soldiers what their priorities were. I know what I said at that Heritage panel did not fit in with what the coin experts believe actual coin ops should be like, but again my impression of counterinsurgency warfare is that fighting is its basic element and so killing and not being killed were my top priorities. So go ahead Jedburg and ask people who knew of me and I trust you will not get the profile back that you have created on me.

Jedburgh was not accusing of you of being hunkered down in a fob (I assume you're talking about this post) - he was quoting from my blog post after that Heritage event. For the record I was not accusing you either, merely observing that the mentality of "kill the enemy" first and foremost could conceivably push a commander to only expend his resources when he has the best chance of killing the enemy. That view would make sense if there was a defined amount of enemies, but in a COIN environment where you can create new enemies even when you kill people who deserve to be killed, it doesn't make sense to me - probably because I don't conceive of COIN as a war-fighting mission as much as you do.

That said, anyone who takes on conventional wisdom gets kudos. Also I hadn't made the connection between the frustration factor and the torture issue - good point. Although apparently everyone here disagrees with you, obviously someone needs to write articles like this to force us to reexamine our starting points.

[Gian P Gentile]

Dear Adrian:

thanks for clarifying that point. I, like most of the participants on this blog, have lots of things going on during the day and i came to it in the afternoon and tried to answer as many points as i could rather quickly.

thanks again for the clarification and for your comments.

[wm]

I must have missed the class as Dr Tyrell states and I never really did get Foucault or Derrida because for the life of me I don’t get what he is telling me. I guess I just must be slow. No matter, I will restate my impression of the coin manual’s paradoxes when I was in combat in Iraq and based on reflection upon my return: my impression was that the paradoxes removed the essence of war which is fighting. You might disagree with what I have to say but I think the logic is pretty clear.

Conspicuous by its absence is any real logic (in the sense of reasoned argumentation) in this response. (Yearling USMA PY201 students would probably fail for an effort like this.) Also conspicuous by its absence is any attempt at rebuttal of my allegation of a category mistake in the article's subsumption of COIN under war. Category mistakes, btw, have been central issues in mainstream Western analytic Philosophy ever since Gilbert Ryle (a good old Oxford Don at Christ Church) coined the term in his 1949 Concept of Mind. Therefore, being confused by Foucault and Derrida (Continental philosophers of the "touchy-feely" sort) is not a good excuse, IMO. Actually the absence of any meaningful reclama or rebuttal discussion on this issue is fully understandable. It seems to indicate a blind spot in the author's conceptual schematism. For more on this topic, one might read the essay by Donald Davidson (another mainstream Anglo-American analytic philosopher of language so the Derrida dodge again won't work) "On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme," a response to WVO Quine's (Harvard logician) seminal essay "Two Dogmas of Empiricism." Since LTC Gentile is at USMA, perhaps a trip to the second or third floors of Lincoln Hall for some remedial training in logic and critical thinking might be in order. As a minimum, I would suggest a close reading of Historians' Fallacies: Toward a Logic of Historical Thought by David Hackett Fischer.

I argue that this entire construct is flawed. That by and large the American army has done pretty well in Iraq—even prior to the surge--with the strategic and political cards it was dealt.

Metrics are always tied to presumptions. If we accept the presumption that the Army's mission in Iraq has been to amass a body count, then I cannot disagree with the quoted claim. However, I tend to think that just accurately placing rounds on target is too narrow a view of the mission. Back in the days of SASO as an Army mission, racking up corpes was not a good metric for the success of that mission. And it still is not a good metric for SASO's replacement.

My article in fact threatens the intellectual base of the new coin doctrine because it calls its basic theoretical premises into question. Counterinsurgency war is not “armed social science” as Kilkullen has called it. Instead at its basic level is violence and death; this was my impression after a year in Baghdad.

This is a very telling statement about the author's preconceptions. What was witnessed was violence and death and the witness has choosen to describe this as "counterinsurgency war." However, what Kilcullen addresses is probably more like what Immanuel Kant calls a regulative ideal--not the state of thiings as they are but instead the future state of things that one is trying to attain. The article is a threat because it is reactionary, not because it is visionary. It seeks to turn back the hands of time, not move forward into a brave new world. I suspect that had people in the 18th Century taken the approach described in this rebuttal, then the world would still condone slavery and have many nations ruled under the pretense of the divine right of kings.

I will pose a counterfactual again that I posted last week on this blog: If the army had read books like Nagl’s before the war and trained and taken seriously coin operations would things be any different in iraq than they are now? If the army had focused predominantly on coin prior to 2003 would the march to Baghdad gone the same way?

This is a question that is misframed. It really does not matter how much training in COIN had been given prior to the start of OIF. What does matter is that the mission was assigned based on a misreading of the reality on the ground in Iraq. Apparently, senior leadership above the Service departments (and perhaps within them as well) did not forese the need for a COIN force after the regime change was effected. Instead, they seemed to believe that the swap out would be more like what happens between November and January after a Presidential election in the US.

To repeat, war is not “armed social science,” though many of you may want it to be.

War may not be "armed social science," but COIN is not necessarily war simpliciter. I submit that COIN is sui generis.

[Gian P Gentile]

I am not in a rush to ignore FM3-24; in fact in my “Eating Soup…” piece I say up front that its middle chapters are relevant and useful to senior commanders in Iraq. My critique of the manual was directed at its paradoxes in the first chapter. I based my critique on my impression of the paradoxes after a year of combat as a tactical battalion in Iraq. My impression expressed in the form of a critique argued that the paradoxes removed the reality of war—which at its most basic level is fighting—from the manual.

Understandably with this critique I questioned the theoretical and underlying premises of the Coin doctrine. I also argued at the end of the piece that the influence of the new Coin doctrine has pushed the Army into dogmatism in its current operational approach in Iraq.

I believe that FM3-24 has become the defacto operational doctrine of the United States Army and it has not been questioned or seriously debated as such. I do believe that what we are seeing is unique with the American Army. This Coin doctrine has become so overriding that it now prescribes action. In short, it has moved beyond the accepted definition that doctrine is authoritative but requires judgment in action to the point where it determines future action. As I have already argued in a previous posting I believe that the Surge and many of its tactics and methods are an example of our dogmatism run wild. Ironically during the Cold War Soviet Officers used to quip that they didn’t need to understand American Army doctrine because the American Army never followed it anyway. Now, ironically, one can argue the opposite. Want to know what the Americans are going to do? Just read FM3-24.

As far as your comment of not wanting to have the army repeat “its past mistakes from Vietnam” I couldn’t agree with you more which is why I have been thinking and writing about this topic. But brace yourself here: it is not me who is repeating these past mistakes but you. The mistakes from Vietnam as you imply were that the American Army became so consumed with conventional warfighting that they ditched and refused to consider problems of unorthodox war. Well, inversely, as I see it that is what we are doing now with Coin and to our detriment. I know this idea does not go over well with many because so called Coin experts and practitioners after being pushed to the sidelines during the Cold War now are enjoying their place in the sun and anything that challenges and questions their dominance is attacked.

Onward social science warriors….

[slapout9]

Sir,(LTC. Gentile) What would you recomned as a COA for Iraq?

[Steve Blair]

As far as your comment of not wanting to have the army repeat “its past mistakes from Vietnam” I couldn’t agree with you more which is why I have been thinking and writing about this topic. But brace yourself here: it is not me who is repeating these past mistakes but you. The mistakes from Vietnam as you imply were that the American Army became so consumed with conventional warfighting that they ditched and refused to consider problems of unorthodox war. Well, inversely, as I see it that is what we are doing now with Coin and to our detriment. I know this idea does not go over well with many because so called Coin experts and practitioners after being pushed to the sidelines during the Cold War now are enjoying their place in the sun and anything that challenges and questions their dominance is attacked.

Onward social science warriors….

I still fail to see where you can find a precedent for COIN replacing the sort of warfare that the Army has always preferred to prepare for. Training was reoriented during Vietnam, as was a certain level of doctrine (the level depended on the branch in question), but all that was quickly phased out as soon as the conflict ended. If memory serves the real peak for such training came in 1968-69, and most lessons had faded by 1975 or so. I have seen little to convince me that the same thing will not happen again. After all, we were "surprised" by Somalis using RPGs against helicopters...

If the political objectives of the United States call for the Army to be involved in COIN frequently (which is very possible given the number of failed states and the looming creation of AFRICOM), then at least some percentage of war preparation should be directed to that end...and not just a token 10% or so. That's just responsible planning.

[Van]

Rank Amateur et al;

There are no military solutions to Iraq’s political problems.

Better to say "There are no military solutions to political problems". I'm certain that most members of the Council understand this at least intellectually, and a majority have really internalized the concept. At the end of the day, militaries only buy time for politicians to sort out the solution*. This having been said, synchronization and deconfliction of combat and non-combat measures in Small Wars (including COIN) is essential to success (per the U.S.M.C. 1940 manual and other sources). The problem is often one of persuading the civilian leadership that the military is not the correct wrench with which to pound screws.

Re: optimism- In Iraq, we should be guardedly optimistic. It won't sort itself out in a fashion that will be to our liking, but if we can sever the outside support for the insurgents, not make any more gaffs on the scale of Abu Ghraib, and stick with it for the full decade it takes to succeed in COIN, we've got a great chance of success. Sadly, the media and the self-serving defeatists are doing every thing in their power to make this impossible, no matter the strategic damage they cause us. Note the long lasting geopolitical damage we suffered from the precipitous pullout from Somalia. Now increase that by an order of magnitude...
- In the GWOT, if we can avoid validating the allegations that the West is waging war on Islam, there is plenty of reason to be optimistic, especially as Muslims are coming out against violence and the irhabi. If the popular meme reverts back to a "Christian vs Muslim" perception of the conflict, it could rapidly degenerate into calls for genocide from both sides. Again, guarded optimism is in order, but we must remain cognizant of the risks and possible consequences.


*In a republic with civilian control of the military, won't comment on other arrangements.