Hammers, Nails, and Counterinsurgency
Matt notes that one of the subtexts of the Iraq war debate is an intra-military struggle between advocates of conventional warfighting capabilities and those who think the military needs to bulk up on counterinsurgency tactics. I agree that it’s disheartening to see the counterinsurgency folks being co-opted into supporting a longer Iraq war, but I don’t agree about this:
The trouble here is that though the counterinsurgency people are, I think, generally correct about the sort of scenarios we should be preparing our military for, Iraq is, at this point, completely lacking in strategic rationale. But the two ideas — should we be fighting in Iraq, versus should we be preparing more for stability operations rather than big state-to-state warfare — really ought to be considered separately.
I think it’s important not to underestimate the extent to which the existence of a government capability makes it more likely that that capability will be put to use. Clearly, the ease with which we won the first Gulf War, and the relatively large size of the US military made it easier for the Bush administration to make the case that we should invade Iraq. Had the military been smaller or had less advanced weaponry over the last couple of decades, proponents of war would have had to face tough questions about where they would find the personnel and hardware to launch a second war in Iraq before the war in Afghanistan was completed. Similarly, I think one of the major things holding the Bush administration back from a war in Iran is that even the hawks in the administration realize that we simply don’t have the troops necessary to do the job properly.
It seems to me that the same principle applies to a beefed-up counterinsurgency unit. Right now, one of the most potent arguments against nation building is that our military isn’t designed for it. Our military is trained to kill people and blow stuff up, and so if you stick them in a foreign country where they have to worry about the nuances of the local culture and avoid killing too many civilians, that creates some serious problems. But if we start training a special counterinsurgency corps, policymakers will naturally be more inclined to test those units out in places where they appear to be needed.
Now, obviously that wouldn’t be a problem if we had a counterinsurgency corps that was so effective that it always led to good outcomes. But I think it’s hard to draw from Iraq the lesson that the only problem was the lack of proper counterinsurgency training. Obviously, if our troops had been well trained in counterinsurgency tactics, the odds of success would have been higher. But they still would have been quite small. My understanding of the history of counterinsurgency is that they practically never work, and in the rare case where they do work the costs are often unacceptably high.
All of which is to say that it’s almost never a good idea to get ourselves into counter-insurgency operations. And indeed, if we get to the point where counter-insurgency forces seem desirable, that should be a sign that we ought to start looking for the exits. Creating a dedicated counterinsurgency unit will create institutional pressures for near-perpetual counterinsurgency operations. I suspect that most of the time even the best counterinsurgency efforts won’t be effective, but if we’ve got a hammer, we’ll be awfully tempted to keep pounding any nails we see.
Mr. Lee you are factually wrong. Most insurgencies FAIL, but linger on for over ten years as weak governments lack the resources to totally crush them. Counterinsurgency or rather UW (Unconventional Warfare) seeks to do the following: build up institutions, usually the army, in local areas. Seek allies among divided tribal peoples. Block hostile actions to national security interests through the alliance and built-up institutions.
That doesn’t mean turning nations into Switzerland, but does mean an end to free-harbor zones such as Somalia under the ICU, or Sudan in the 1990’s, or Pakistan’s Waziristan now, for AQ and other Jihadists.
UW advocates argue that America is unprepared to pay any significant combat price being too affluent and suburbanized. That the way to deal with nascent threats before they become big ones is to strangle them in their cribs. Deny an Osama in Sudan for example the ability to plot and plan, or to flee. To have local Sudanese allies kill him for you, outside the anti-American screaming eyes and mouths of the deranged press. They also point to Afghanistan as a success story for UW and the limits of conventional warfare.
Look at a map. Afghanistan is landlocked and can be supplied only from the Air. Only limited amounts of troops can be supplied, and then only with the agreement by Central Asian nations dependent on Russia. Pakistan could also shut down air-bridges.
Meanwhile, Iraq has it’s own seaport and Kuwait as well. Significant amounts of troops in the field require lots and lots of supplies, basically a 10-1 tail to “tip of the spear” ratio in manpower and supplies. That realistically can only come by the sea.
Afghanistan is by geography unwinnable unless we break in via Pakistan or Iran. Should Musharraf fall and Islamists kill the air bridge and aid the Taliban who already control most of the South, we’d face a situation like Britain’s China Gordon in the 1880’s in Sudan. Meanwhile Iraq is winnable simply because we can supply our troops there.
Finally you make an assumption error. You assume that the US can and should be constrained in military action because other means (diplomacy) are more effective in securing national security objectives. The record of failed diplomacy: North Korea’s nukes in spite of a promise not to make them, Iran’s nukes, Pakistan’s nukes, North Korean-Syrian nuke cooperation, the help Osama got from Saudi, Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Malaysia all make that an obvious failed policy.
If the US lacks any conventional warfare options, we are left with the following choices: 1. surrender aka “diplomacy” or “peace in our time!” 2. Nuclear weapons (which were briefly considered for Afghanistan following 9/11). 3. UW ala Afghanistan and the Northern Alliance, combined with air strikes. Aka “Kosovo upsized.”
If anything the ability to realistically offer all three military options, at relatively low cost, will enable diplomacy to succeed. All carrots and no sticks means taking the carrots and doing what the opponent wanted to anyway. The ability to threaten realistically (at low internal political cost to the US) makes terms that secure US national security objectives more realistic. Particularly in an era of nuclear proliferation and multiple distributed threats capable of nuking US cities through “deniable” proxies
Sorry for the length.
— Jim Rockford · Nov 25, 11:39 PM · #