Sunday, February 15, 2009
Diversions
As mentioned, John keeps his mind busy at oh-dark-thirty monitoring earthquakes. I said in Indonesia, but he actually does so worldwide. Indonesia has just been especially busy as of late. The attached list illustrates two days of multiple quakes in one area. Something extra-ordinary is obviously happening there.
Current maps and lists can be located: Map, List, Big List
Personally, my diversion is counterinsurgency, especially as it applies to Afghanistan. I have no more illusion of influencing any outcome than John does of influencing earthquakes, but I am intensely curious how we could win or loss—and why. Basically, the insurgent strategies date back to those used by Generals Washington and Greene in the American Revolutionary War. They were refined by Giap, in Vietnam, where we failed to adapt. It has become the norm since few, if any, can match us for lethality on the battlefield, though Saddam was insane enough to try.
Ironically, we initially were effective against insurgencies, succeeding the Philippines early in the 20th century, then later, in the 1920s and ‘30s, in the Caribbean and Latin America. From those conflicts, came the Marine Corps Small Wars Manual, in 1940. Our success in using insurgiency against the Japanese in World War II was lost to history, probably because MacArthur wasn’t behind it, but the resistance on Mindanao met the returning Americans with thousands of effectives including a military band in uniform. In order to keep OSS from operating in his sector, MacArthur had stated that guerrilla operations had been impossible.
Iraqi was thought lost and initial Democratic platform was a pullout, until the Army/USMC Counterinsurgency Manual came out with the generals in command of Iraq forces fully behind it. The surge was but a part of that strategy.
Now, in Afghanistan, we are locked in another struggle, largely inside our armed forces themselves to determine the strategy in Afghanistan, with Afghan success or failure basically in the balance. In the Army, this is analogized as a conflict between the jocks ad the nerds, the jocks being those all for pursuing the enemy with shock and awe, regardless of collateral casualties, while the nerds are after the “hearts and minds” (heard that term before?) of the Afghans themselves. I am amused the tough, “snake eaters” of Special Forces, the Green Berets, are in the nerd camp. I suggest hesitation in addressing one of them as “Nerd.”
To win, we need to furnish the villages 24/7 security (vs. patrolling periodically), help them build what they want and need, e.g., roads, electric grids, schools, and hospitals, and generate on-going jobs. When they have vested interest, they’ll defend it themselves. Our embedded teams know this; the FOBbites as the embedded teams call the denizens of Forward Operating Bases, Army speak for those behind the front lines, are those who choose not to understand or care about winning. This is summarized better than I can by an article in Foreign Policy. Here is another, this one from an embedded "boot on the ground."
Anyway, to make a long story short, America hasn’t been good at nation building, so our enemies repeatedly force us into just that scenario. We are basically in an internal debate of whether we’re going to get good at it or accept being unable to win. We can of course send in a few cruise missiles now and again. Clinton tried that with some cruise missiles aimed at mud huts. Let's see, at $1-million each, we use 19 against mud huts, then, they hit us back, taking out the twin towers, damaging the Pentagon, and targeting the Capitol—for 19 airline tickets.
Now, the pendulum seems to be swinging in favor of the nerds. Here is an article from the Washington Post, by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. There are also numerous good blogs on the topic should one be interested: Small Wars Journal, Afghanistan Shrugged, Bill & Bob's Excellent Afghan Adventure. Afghanistan Shrugged is from Vampire 6, the embedded boot on the ground earlier referenced. Now he can tell you about Fobbites.
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