So now--on top of trying to understand the complex dynamics of insurgency and counter-insurgency--I need to wrap my head around Starbuck/Karaka Pend virtual body-swapping?Originally Posted by MikeF
It's too much I tell you!
Brilliant, useful
Interesting, perhaps useful
Of little utility, not practical
Delusional
So now--on top of trying to understand the complex dynamics of insurgency and counter-insurgency--I need to wrap my head around Starbuck/Karaka Pend virtual body-swapping?
It's too much I tell you!
They mostly come at night. Mostly.
- university webpage: McGill University
- conflict simulations webpage: PaxSims
I'm glad Kilcullen qualified his work as such. Its two major flaws are as follows:This book is far from a definitive study on this ancient subject about which so much has already been written. It is merely an incomplete selection of tentative, still-developing thoughts, from a practisioner's perspective, on the guerrilla wars we are currently fighting. I hope that other practisioners and students will find in it much to agree and to disagree with, and that it will thereby form part of a continuing critical debate.
1.) Those of you who hang around the SWJ community and Tom Ricks' blog will have likely read much of the subject matter before.
2.) It's too ambitious for a practitioner's guide to COIN, but not comprehensive enough for an all-encompassing work. I think he might have done best saving his last chapter for another book.
Proverbs 6:16-19
So is the military involvement in the Great Commission a response to this? How effective do you see it being in the long run?Kilcullen suggests that the takfiris have made the world their theatre of operation, with the endstate being the renewal of the Islamic caliphate and expansion of Islam to the whole of the world. (from Karaka Pend's review)
http://www.charitychoices.com/charit...in/default.asp6. Change Continents for Christ. Working through indigenous military leaders, we help to train, equip and send military members in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America into their own nations in the name of Jesus.
Number 6 is interesting. That's probably a topic worthy of it own thread.
One of my relatives was a Brigadier General in the Malaysian Army. As a Christian (does being Catholic count?), he may also find it interesting. Are there any metrics I might be able to share with him? He's also interested in the Golf Commission, are the two linked by any chance?
I don't know. My brother is a pastor that does extensive mission work in Kenya and other parts of Africa with other pastors. I'll ask him. This seems odd to me that we'd work FID through the Great Commission or is it the Great Commission through FID? I've heard rumors of others doing that in Burma, but it seems like too much colllusion in my mind.
Mike, thanks for your reply. I don't mean to put you on the spot, I get the feeling that this is a topic without any easy answers. It seems odd to me as well, but it's not easy to judge what a superpower believes to be feasible. If Indonesia is seen as being the next hotspot, will converting the Kopassus to Christianity prevent a flare-up?
Methodology and Research Questions
One lesson that I learned through the hard lessons of platoon leader and company command in combat that was reinforced in the advanced studies of academia was the importance of asking the right questions when trying to understand difficult problem sets.
Regardless of whether one is trying to conduct initial IPB (Intelligence Preparation of the Battlefield) of a new AOR (Area of Responsibility) in a small war or embarking on a master's thesis, the questions asked drive the process.
Dr. Kilcullen begins with these questions that drives his thoughts,
Is he asking the right questions?1. What kind of state are we trying to build or assist?
2. How compatible is the local government's character with our own?
3. What kinds of states have proven viable in the past, in this country and with this population?
4. What evidence is there that the kind of state we are trying to build will be viable here?
I'm about 50/50 with him. I think that he missed two big questions.
Last edited by MikeF; 07-02-2010 at 02:34 AM.
What two questions do you think he missed? As I am also in the process of reading Kilcullen's 2nd book right now.
Btw, I think this thread would be better placed in a another section since it is about a book and related discussion then recent news.
Four Missing Questions...
My bad if I placed it in the wrong section.
Okay, IMO, other questions to consider,
1. Do we intervene in third-country counterinsurgencies?
2. If so, to what degree? Ranging from one advisor to a million man army.
3. Whom do we send? Ranging from political advisors to occupation forces.
4. What do they do? Ranging from advising in safe, rear areas to taking charge of clearing denied guerrilla safehavens.
The discussion, debate, and answers to those questions define the crux of the current dillemma in A'stan.
better mousetrap
If you wanna make a million you should write a 50-100 page Counterinsugency and You pocket guide. Who will be the first to do it? No articles dont count.
It has been done
WO2 Mick Craig of the Australian Army wrote a Junior Leader's Counterinsurgency Guide in 2008/9. It has been published as 'developing doctrine' by the Australian Army. Through the ABCA it is available on as either a pdf or html document on the Australian Army doctrine web page. You can access this via your AKO and the US Army doctrine portal.
Steady Rex, steady! Stay strong and focused. BTW, yesterday Glenn Beck compared us bloggers to the pamphleteers of the 1760/70s. Absorb that one as us Americans celebrate our Independence DaySo now--on top of trying to understand the complex dynamics of insurgency and counter-insurgency--I need to wrap my head around Starbuck/Karaka Pend virtual body-swapping?
It's too much I tell you!
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