I'm a big advocate for expanding our view and doctrine for conflict, but to be frank I have been very disappointed with all the new ideas since 9/11 that have gotten us no where (it takes a network to defeat a network, human terrain, you have to change their political system, we have to develop their economy, then they'll stop fighting, etc.). All of these views and many more have simply distracted us from our objective of defeating the enemy.

We tend to hold up several of these ideas as validated principles for COIN and small wars, even though we continue to suffer set back after set back when employing them. I don't alway agree with Wilf, but I do agree there have been very few great military theorists since Clausewitz.