COIN: A Symposium, April 16-20, 1962

[Jedburgh]

Another classic reprint from RAND: Counterinsurgency: A Symposium, April 16-20, 1962

This report is based on the Symposium on Counterinsurgency held at RAND’s Washington Office during the week of 16 April 1962. The purpose of the symposium was to bring together those with first-hand experience of guerrilla and counterguerrilla warfare for informal exchanges of information that might lead to fresh insights and a detailed body of expert knowledge. The subjects discussed include patterns and techniques of counterinsurgency, effective organizational and operational approaches, political action, psychological warfare, intelligence and counterintelligence, and requirements for victory. This new release of the report includes a new foreword by Stephen T. Hosmer that elucidates the relevance of this symposium to contemporary guerrilla and counterguerrilla operations.

Formal Participants
Charles T.R. Bohannan, Lieutenant Colonel, AUS-Ret.
Wendell W. Fertig, Colonel, USA-Ret.
David Galula, Lieutenant Colonel (French Marine Corps)
Anthony S. Jeapes, Captain (British Army)
Frank E. Kitson, MBE, MC, Lieutenant Colonel (British Army)
Edward Geary Lansdale, Brigadier General, USAF
Rufus C. Phillips, III
David Leonard Powell-Jones, DSO, OBEY Brigadier General (British Army)
John R. Shirley, OBE, Colonel (British Army-Ret.)
Napoleon D. Valeriano, Colonel (formerly with the Armed Forces of the Philippines)
John F. White, Colonel (Royal Australian Army)
Samuel V. Wilson, Lieutenant Colonel, USA

[bismark17]

What a classic! Galula, Kitson and Lansdale all in one room....

[SWJED]

A classic - great find, thanks for posting.

[slapout9]

Jedburgh, this is the best yet, I can not tell you how much I like this and you deserve much praise for finding it. I have been sick the past week so I haven't been keeping up with my reading, but this is helping me get well. I loved the part about the paraffin test for gun shot residue and how the insurgents were told to urinate on their hands to get a false positive. I had heard about this years ago when I first got into LE but I had no idea it was actually done. Talks about sting operations,stay behind teams, man and women teams dressed in civilian clothes, alarm systems, gotta go read some more.

[georgev]

Another classic reprint from RAND: Counterinsurgency: A Symposium, April 16-20, 1962

Thank you, very much.
Don't forget the history!
Regards,
George

[Jedburgh]

...I decided to tack these on at the end of this thread, since they are also from 1962:

US Army Special Warfare School, POI for Course 33-G-F6 Counterinsurgency Operations, Feb 62

US Army Special Warfare School, POI for Course 33-G-F7 Counterinsurgency and Special Warfare Staff Officer, Mar 62

US Army Special Warfare School, POI for Course 33-G-F8 Senior Officer Counterinsurgency and Special Warfare Orientation Course, Mar 62

[120mm]

Wendell Fertig. Wow.

Now THERE'S a guy who got a royal screwing-over, post-war.

[Bill Moore]

Jedburgh, much thanks for the excellent post. It couldn't have better even if it was gift wrapped and under the tree yesterday. I'm working my through it, but just a scan makes it evident there is much wisdom in these pages. Bill

[SWJED]

Meeting Lt. Col. David Galula - April 1962
by Rufus Phillips, Small Wars Journal Retrospective

Meeting Lt. Col. David Galula - April 1962 (Full PDF Article)

In April 1962, I participated in a RAND Symposium on Counterinsurgency held in Washington, D.C, along with my old boss from the 1954–56 days in South Vietnam, General Edward G. Lansdale, and a number of others. Lansdale had been the key advisor to Ramon Magsaysay in the successful campaign against the communist Huks in the Philippines and then in the successful birth of the Republic of South Vietnam in 1954–56. I had worked under him advising the Vietnamese Army in its occupation and pacification of large areas in South Vietnam previously controlled by the communist controlled Vietminh (predecessors to the Vietcong), and I had moved on to Laos to try to help that government counter Pathet Lao subversion in the villages through civic action.

I did not participate in the first few symposium sessions, but heard from Lansdale that there was a very unusual French officer named David Galula present, who had a lot of good ideas that sounded very much like our own. As I got involved in discussions with Col. Galula, I discovered he wasn’t anything like the vast majority of the French officers I had tried to work with as part of a joint American-French military advisory mission (called TRIM) in the 1954–55 days in Vietnam. Most had a colonial attitude toward the Vietnamese and saw them as lesser beings. Col. Galula, however, was different. He didn’t maintain an attitude of superiority. Rather, his mission involved trying to help the local Algerian population as their friend, and he imbued his troops with that attitude...