The David Kilcullen Collection (merged thread)

[Ken White]

...and you could superimpose it over the Jones Insurgency Model.

As the latter came after the former one could also say the Jones Insurgency Model is the announced codification of "The building of a revolutionary movement" with a few current era tweaks and some personal beliefs added.

Nothing wrong with that -- and as I've long said the model is good.

Though I have also long said and still do suggest not getting too enamored of the pyramid or the model because there have been, are and will be some variations on the themes therein contained that can make target fixation a potential -- and problematic...

[jmm99]

my hardcopy of the 1966 SORO study; and it told me that, since it has been sitting upright on my bookshelf for so long, it just wasn't about to bend over for a newbie. Obviously, a stubborn product of the Cold War (the book, not moi).

Regards

Mike

[slapout9]

by LTC Mark Grdovic

http://www.soc.mil/swcs/swmag/Assets...de%20Final.pdf

[Backwards Observer]

So, that's what I've been missing all these years .

As dem rasta say, "who feels it, it knows it, Jah." My slack-jawed impression was that thousands of years of wife-beating had created virtually unbeatable (so to speak) mistresses of fem-insurgency. Respect.

[Bob's World]

As the latter came after the former one could also say the Jones Insurgency Model is the announced codification of "The building of a revolutionary movement" with a few current era tweaks and some personal beliefs added.

Nothing wrong with that -- and as I've long said the model is good.

Though I have also long said and still do suggest not getting too enamored of the pyramid or the model because there have been, are and will be some variations on the themes therein contained that can make target fixation a potential -- and problematic...

I only pointed this out as the two products, developed wholly independently, tend to validate each other.

Personally I think the pyramid is WAY to specific and suggests a long, complex list of complex steps that an insurgent has to move through sequentially, which of course is probably never the case. But if viewed as general examples of how an insurgency can manifest as it grows and shrinks naturally as it wends its course to either victory or defeat, it is a good product. Insurgencies don't run on checklists.

Mine may be too generic for some, but it is intentionally so for the very reasons described above. So the suggestion of looking at the two together is show how that when viewed together they are consistent, but also help those who find one too specific or one too generic in of itself.

[Ken White]

I only pointed this out as the two products, developed wholly independently, tend to validate each other... I think the pyramid is WAY to specific...Insurgencies don't run on checklists...Mine may be too generic for some, but it is intentionally so for the very reasons described above.

However someone has to keep you in check and I was reminding you that the SFOC may have helped ever so slightly in the development of some of your independent product...

[jmm99]

for a good reason - to keep folks from jumping to conclusions such as this:

from BW
Personally I think the pyramid is WAY to specific and suggests a long, complex list of complex steps that an insurgent has to move through sequentially, which of course is probably never the case.

The anti-Com "warriors" of the 60s were well aware that revolutionary phases do not necessarily flow sequentially; that one part of a country might be undergoing "phase 1", another "phase 2" and a third "phase 3". E.g., John McCuen, The Art of Counter-Revolutionary Warfare (1966) (also on West Point's reading list).

SORO makes this clear (p. 1 of 5 page pdf, here):

SORO para 1.jpg

I realize, Bob, that you are unlikely to change what you think; but others here should be aware that those in the 60s were capable of nuanced thinking.

Regards

Mike

[MikeF]

(also on West Point's reading list)

Ugh, I must have slept through that class. Maybe I should have done a little less rugby and a bit more study .

[Bob's World]

for a good reason - to keep folks from jumping to conclusions such as this:



The anti-Com "warriors" of the 60s were well aware that revolutionary phases do not necessarily flow sequentially; that one part of a country might be undergoing "phase 1", another "phase 2" and a third "phase 3". E.g., John McCuen, The Art of Counter-Revolutionary Warfare (1966) (also on West Point's reading list).

SORO makes this clear (p. 1 of 5 page pdf, here):

SORO para 1.jpg

I realize, Bob, that you are unlikely to change what you think; but others here should be aware that those in the 60s were capable of nuanced thinking.

Regards

Mike

Mike,

Brother! You wound me! I am constantly refining my positions, I just refuse to abandon them and run away the first time someone lobs a poorly aimed round in my general direction...

What is interesting in much of the 60s products though is the fixation on Communism; just as we overly fixate on Islamism in much of the products on the street today. This is what led me to write one of my early pieces on the true role of ideology in insurgency.

One great thing about the 60s work was that the SF community took ownership of insurgency-based theory and doctrine far more effectively in those days than they have for the past 8 years. As Ken says, yes, the SFQC lays a foundation in UW, which is the art of waging insurgency. This is a foundation laid only in the SF community, and I am firmly of the belief that one can never truly understand counterinsugency until they first achieve an understanding of insurgency itself. This does not need to happen at the SFQC, and many who come out of the SFQC are no experts in the field either, but at least they have been exposed to the concepts.

My big beef with the current COIN manual, is that for all of its great TTPs on COIN, it is sadly, and I believe dangerously, disconnected from a solid rooting in insurgency itself. They are talking re-write, and I hope like hell USAJFKSWCS is forced (at gunpoint if necessary) to be a full partner in that effort. My one suggestion (besides making SF participate) is to lay a foundation right up front on what insurgency is; leaving room for the fact that reasonable minds can indeed differ on the subject. I would then follow that by a chapter on the American experience (as this goes to our principles as a nation, and suggests how we should approach others based on rights and duties we deemed essential for ourselves). Then, and only then, would I get into how to best go about intervening in the insurgencies of others.

(I feel about 50 other suggestions coming on, so I'll just leave it at this)

[slapout9]

Page 14 of the PDF from the UW handbook that has one of Zen diagrams(some folks call them Venn) that shows an easier way to look at a resistance movement but it is based on the SORO diamond. The ratio of Guerrilla to underground and axillary may be as high as 1 fighter to 30 underground!


http://www.soc.mil/swcs/swmag/Assets...de%20Final.pdf

[MikeF]

(I feel about 50 other suggestions coming on, so I'll just leave it at this)

I'd go further to say that the old language 1890's-1960's is much more adequate than our stuff. The eloquence of the verse is descriptive and explanatory in ways that we only now minimize.

I feel much more comfortable reading the old small wars voice.

[slapout9]

(I feel about 50 other suggestions coming on, so I'll just leave it at this)

First suggestion read the handbook I posted This is almost straight up what I was taught in the 1 minute guerrilla course by a real Green Beret who had been to NORTH Vietnam at the end of the operation I sat on hill with him behind a Fish Camp and drank a lot of beer and just generally acted like a big sponge!

[Steve Blair]

I'd go further to say that the old language 1890's-1960's is much more adequate than our stuff. The eloquence of the verse is descriptive and explanatory in ways that we only now minimize.

I feel much more comfortable reading the old small wars voice.

Business-speak and its offspring have much to answer for, and this is only part of it.

I always felt that the old Small Wars Manual was very good when it came to describing its subject, and some of the things I've read from the Indian Wars era are also very good (even though there wasn't much formally written about the techniques used in the field). Mayhap someday we'll get that back...

[Bob's World]

(If you guys keep droning on about how "older is better" we'll never hear the end of it from Ken!!)

[MikeF]

(If you guys keep droning on about how "older is better" we'll never hear the end of it from Ken!!)

94 comments into this thread, the old men are debating the significance of pyramids over circles, and I haven't even read through Dr. K's introduction yet.

Either we're all senile, or this thread is going somewhere .

[slapout9]

(If you guys keep droning on about how "older is better" we'll never hear the end of it from Ken!!)

Who do you think the Green Beret I was talking to on the side of the hill was.....thats a joke calm down

[jmm99]

Mike, the bad news is being senile. The good news is not knowing you are senile.

And my eyes are going because I first read the quote as "Either we're all sterile, or..."

Cheers

Mike

[Steve Blair]

(If you guys keep droning on about how "older is better" we'll never hear the end of it from Ken!!)

It's not so much that the concepts were better back then (in many cases they are quite inadequate), but their way of presenting and articulating them was far better than what we get today. The original SWM is a good case in point. It has some failings conceptually (mainly in the political realm), but its presentation is very clear and to the point. I've seen the shift in writing myself between doctrine written before and during Vietnam and some of the stuff that came out for both Active Defense and Air/Land Battle.

And Ken will still be waiting for this to be transcribed to stone tablets before he can respond.... I think we have time yet....

[Ken White]

I have the Tablets.

[SJPONeill]

My big beef with the current COIN manual, is that for all of its great TTPs on COIN, it is sadly, and I believe dangerously, disconnected from a solid rooting in insurgency itself. They are talking re-write, and I hope like hell USAJFKSWCS is forced (at gunpoint if necessary) to be a full partner in that effort. My one suggestion (besides making SF participate) is to lay a foundation right up front on what insurgency is; leaving room for the fact that reasonable minds can indeed differ on the subject. I would then follow that by a chapter on the American experience (as this goes to our principles as a nation, and suggests how we should approach others based on rights and duties we deemed essential for ourselves). Then, and only then, would I get into how to best go about intervening in the insurgencies of others.

Possibly the issue here is that 3-24 is not really about COIN but more related to what the Marines call(ed) Countering Irregular Threats (CIT) and the UK Countering Irregular Activity (CIA - an unhappy acronym if ever there was one), of which COIN is a subset. We reviewed most of the available 'COIN' doctrine in 2007/Early 08 and were already thinking in terms of CIT when we got to 3-24 and in that context it made a ton of sense but was less applicable perhaps to the classic COIN campaign a la Vietnam or perhaps the myths of Malaya and Kenya.

Also I think it is important to remember that 3-24 was written against the very specific problem of Iraq and so does not lend itself as a template for other campaigns problems - but then, COIN has never been about simply applying a template to pass Go and get $200 and a stable democratic host nation government. Every contingency needs to be considered on its own merits and issues, and plans/policies/strategies developed accordingly. That seems to where we go off the rails in considering COIN 'doctrine'.

The beauty of the CIT?CIA construct is that, even though it brings in a broader more diverse range of potential problems, it all encourages earlier intervention (by the most appropriate arm of government, not necessarily the military) to head off potential instability before the situation goes over the precipice. 20/20 hindsight would probably show that most campaigns since the end of WW1 probably had adequate warning signs (if people had been looking for them) that conflict could have been averted or at least minimised or contaiined.