Center of Gravity Construct

[TheCurmudgeon]

The one thing that I think is most significantly unique about COIN COG, at least revolutionary COIN COG (as opposed to resistance or separatist COIN) anyway, as compared to the traditional state vs state warfare that CvC studied, is that in COIN, the COG is something that both sides are competing for the support of, so there is just one prize to be won; whereas in conventional both sides have their own COG that the other side wants to defeat, and that they must protect.

That COG that the government and the insurgent are competing for the support of is the populace. Whichever side gains this will ultimately win.

Similarly the CRs and CVs are not then subsets to be identified and defeated, but rather supporting tasks that must be identified and accomplished.

Perhaps, but there are two sides to this coin. In Why Big Nations Lose Small Wars Andrew Mack points out that it is total war for the insurgency, and limited war for the large power - yet both are fighting to break the will of the other. The counterinsurgency (large nation) fighting to gain legitimacy for the Host Nation government while the Insurgency is trying to break the political will of the large nation by undermining its population's opinion that the war is a legitimate affair.

[Dayuhan]

Perhaps, but there are two sides to this coin. In Why Big Nations Lose Small Wars Andrew Mack points out that it is total war for the insurgency, and limited war for the large power - yet both are fighting to break the will of the other. The counterinsurgency (large nation) fighting to gain legitimacy for the Host Nation government while the Insurgency is trying to break the political will of the large nation by undermining its population's opinion that the war is a legitimate affair.

That seems to assume that "counterinsurgency" is by definition fought by a large power against insurgents in another country. Where does the host nation government fit in? Aren't they fighting for survival, and shouldn't they be just as motivated as the insurgents?

Seems to be that insurgency/counterinsurgency is essentially about a government threatened by insurgency. There may or may not be a great power or other nation in the picture supporting either or both sides.

[Bob's World]

Our definitions of insurgency and the related operations of COIN and UW trap us in ways that are very confining. These definitions create small boxes with high walls that prevent our minds from seeing answers that otherwise are near at hand.

I personally believe that the only healthy way to think about COIN is as a domestic operation, one that is in truth the vast majority of the time the day to day business of any system of governance to operate in a manner consistent with the will and expectations of the entire populace affected by their actions. That is always a difficult balancing act, and when governments begin to get that wrong - by intent or accident - the difficulties begin to build. Such a society then becomes vulnerable to both internal and external forces seeking to leverage the energy contained in such a populace toward their own goals and interests of the organizer. Often these are self-serving. They are not the insurgency, they are merely the exploiters of conditions of insurgency.

Our definitions tell us foreigners do COIN to, and that all insurgency is "violent." Little wonder we show up in foreign countries where we believe we have interests and begin to act in ways that are so destructive of the sovereignty and legitimacy of the governance in those places in the name of "COIN." Equally that we think we have "won" when we make the violence go away for some short period of time or in some small place. After all, with no violence, it is no longer an insurgency, right?

No, insurgency and COIN are two sides of the same domestic...coin. UW and FID are foreign injects into that internal system, depending on which side the foreign intruder thinks their interests are best represented by. Certainly we employ both as it suits us. Historically we have picked one. I believe in the future we will increasingly see where we are better served by some combination of both or neither. That is something we should think on.

But first we need to scrub large sections of our doctrine. It is dangerously biased and short-sighted. It focuses on tactical criteria we think are important, rather than upon the fundamental nature of such things that truly are. Important, that is.

[Bill Moore]

Our COIN doctrine, perhaps most of our doctrine, should open with the Nietzsche quote below. Too much of it is based on myth that has taken on the power of religion to explain how the world works. We need an event like Martin Luther's proclamation to start our own reformation. The doctrine church is corrupt.

"Convictions are a greater enemy of truth than lies" Nietzsche

[slapout9]

Our COIN doctrine, perhaps most of our doctrine, should open with the Nietzsche quote below. Too much of it is based on myth that has taken on the power of religion to explain how the world works. We need an event like Martin Luther's proclamation to start our own reformation. The doctrine church is corrupt.

Somebody say Amen!

[Fuchs]

Our definitions of insurgency and the related operations of COIN and UW trap us in ways that are very confining. These definitions create small boxes with high walls that prevent our minds from seeing answers that otherwise are near at hand.

I personally believe that the only healthy way to think about COIN is as a domestic operation, one that is in truth the vast majority of the time the day to day business of any system of governance to operate in a manner consistent with the will and expectations of the entire populace affected by their actions.

"Insurgency" is the sum of "Civil War" and "Violent Resistance to Occupation" (the latter including wars of independence).

The both are vastly different, and Westerners have come to think of the latter mostly and have begun to apply that thought to civil wars.

It is noteworthy that from the "host" or "puppet" government perspective an occupation war may be a civil war - see Afghanistan.


Civil wars are almost all about loyalty (or more generally: motivation), with hardware and even military competence being of relatively small relevance.
Occupation wars are largely about buying time and limiting expenses nowadays. Few countries still occupy in the Roman way, where breaking an uprising shall break an ethnicities' back and ensure lasting control (Russia and China still do and Sri Lanka did, not sure about Turkey).

[Bob's World]

Fuchs,

I appreciate where you are coming from, but I find violence to be such a poor indicator of anything. Certainly it is a metric that something is seriously wrong, but I don't think it uniquely identifies any fundamental aspects of what that problem is, which in turn would lead one to ways of going about solving it. We come to see violence as the ultimate criteria, and overly congratulate ourselves when our superior application of violence causes the other side to stop employing violence for a while.

Most often, violence is a tactical choice of one or more of the parties. Some times the state forces the populace to resort to violence, sometimes it is the other way around. At the most fundamental level, when the degree of violence and the organization of the sides are stripped away insurgency is simply this:

An internal, populace-based illegal challenge to some system of governance.

That is the base model with no frills. Everything else are just option packages one can pay extra for. But no matter how many options you add to a Pinto, it is still a pinto. We get so distracted by the options we forget what it is we're driving or buying into.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Fuchs,

I appreciate where you are coming from, but I find violence to be such a poor indicator of anything. Certainly it is a metric that something is seriously wrong, but I don't think it uniquely identifies any fundamental aspects of what that problem is, which in turn would lead one to ways of going about solving it. We come to see violence as the ultimate criteria, and overly congratulate ourselves when our superior application of violence causes the other side to stop employing violence for a while.

Maybe we should examine the problem from the "peace" aspect.

Our political masters keep telling us that making and maintaining peace is one of their top strategic goals. Why then do we invest nothing at all at collecting, studying, assessing and exploiting peace-related intelligence?

http://www.fpif.org/articles/where_a..._professionals