On War #250: Counter Counter-Insurgency

[thedrifter]

02-13-2008

On War #250: Counter Counter-Insurgency




Retired Air Force Colonel Chet Richards has published another short, good book: If We Keep It: A National Security Manifesto for the Next Administration. The “it” in question is a republic, which we are unlikely to keep since republics require a virtuous citizenry. But suggesting a rational, prudent defense policy for the next administration is sufficiently quixotic we might as well also pretend the republic can endure.



Richards’ first major point is that most of our armed forces are “legacy forces,” white elephants designed for fighting the Red Army in Europe or the Imperial Japanese Navy in the Pacific. They have little utility in a world where nuclear weapons prevent wars among major powers, wars with minor powers can be won easily and usually aren’t worth fighting, and legacy forces generally lose against Fourth Generation opponents. Although they are largely useless, these legacy forces eat up most of the defense budget. Richards would disband them, save the Marine Corps, some useful tac air (i.e., A-10s) and some sealift, and give the money back to the taxpayer.



That will happen when pork stops flying. But the point is a good one; most of what we are buying is a military museum. I disagree with Richards that the Marine Corps or any other major elements of the U.S. armed forces are Third Generation forces, forces which have institutionalized maneuver warfare. The Marines talk it, but it is not what they do. I would prefer to keep enough of the Army to face the Corps with some competition, rewarding whichever service actually makes it into the Third Generation. Bureaucratic competition is a good thing.



Perhaps Richards’ sharpest point is that DOD’s latest fad, counter-insurgency, is something of a fraud. He notes that whereas states have often been successful in defeating insurgencies on their own soil, invaders and occupiers have almost never won against a guerilla-style war of national liberation. Not even the best counter-insurgency techniques make much difference, because neither a foreign occupier nor any puppet government he installs can gain legitimacy. Despite the current “we’re winning in Iraq” propaganda, both Iraq and Afghanistan are almost certain to add themselves to the long list of failures. If neither the U.S. Army nor the Marine Corps can do successful counter-insurgency, what can they do? That brings us back to Richards’ first point.



While all these observations are useful, there is one suggestion in If We Can Keep It the next administration desperately needs to follow, namely Richards’ recommendations on grand strategy. As Germany discovered in both World Wars, if you get your grand strategy wrong, nothing else you do well matters; you still lose. At the moment, America’s grand strategy suggests we have the national character of a rich kid schoolyard bully.



Somebody hit us pretty good from the back, so in retaliation, we’ve beaten up on some weak kids in the playground, one of whom had nothing to do with it but whom we had been wanting to thrash anyway. In the meantime, we’ve left the real perpetrators alone, even though everybody is sure we know where they are, and we’ve been careful not to pick on kids who look like they might hit back.



No very attractive, is it?



The best passage in Richard’s book prescribes the grand strategic antidote:



As a first step, therefore, the country needs to return to its roots. We need to restore our innate suspicion of foreign entanglements and concentrate on being the best United States of America we can be.



With the ghosts of our Founding Fathers, I reply, Hurrah! This is advice the next administration can take, should take and will take – if, and only if, our next President is Ron Paul.





William S. Lind, expressing his own personal opinion, is Director for the Center for Cultural Conservatism for the Free Congress Foundation.



To interview Mr. Lind, please contact:



Mr. William S. Lind

Free Congress Foundation
717 Second St., N.E.
Washington, D.C. 20002

Direct line: 202-543-8796

Ellie

[thedrifter]

02-04-2008

On War #249


One of the more intriguing questions Clio poses is the degree to which great military victories were the fruit of smart plans as opposed to dumb luck. Did the North Vietnamese expect the Tet Offensive to be a tactical defeat but an operational victory? They now claim they did, but we will not know until their archives are opened.



The war in Iraq poses a similar question: to what degree was the Sunni insurgency part of Saddam’s plan, as opposed to a reaction generated largely by bad American decisions after his government fell? The January 26, 2008 Washington Post ran an article about Saddam Hussein’s main American debriefer, George Piro, which may shed some light on that question. According to the Post,



Hussein’s strategy upon facing the U.S. invasion was to tell his generals to try to hold back the U.S. forces for two weeks, “and at that point, it would go into what he called the secret war,” Piro said, referring to the Iraqi insurgency.



This “straight from the horse’s mouth” statement would seem to settle the issue. It doesn’t, because it was given after the fact. Just as we now claim the “surge” led to the improved security situation in parts of Iraq, so Saddam, in American captivity, might have sought to bolster his place in history by claiming the insurgency had been his idea all along. The widespread caching of weapons and explosives lends credence to his claim, but until we find documentary evidence dating back before the campaign opened, we cannot be sure.



Why is the question important? Because if Saddam did plan to defeat America by going to guerilla warfare after losing the conventional campaign, we can be reasonably certain anyone else we threaten with invasion will adopt the same plan.



Saddam was neither a wildly popular nor a particularly secure dictator. Few Iraqis saw him as the father of their country, the way many Chinese saw Mao or many Cubans look on Castro. The Kurds hated him, the Shiites hated him, and he had to hide behind elaborate security measures even among Iraqi Sunnis. If Saddam can take the risks associated with preparing for guerrilla warfare, including spreading arms thickly all over the country and devolving much power of command downward, so can almost anyone.



That in turn creates a not insubstantial roadblock in front of neo-con or neo-lib plans to “liberate” other countries. Even if the American military triumphs in another “race to Baghdad” campaign, do the American people or Congress have the stomach (or wallet) to face another guerrilla war that drags on for years? Like any good defense plan, a plan for guerrilla war against a conventionally superior invader has deterrence value. No one in his right mind wants to get into the briar patch with the tar baby.



After his capture, Saddam played for a place in history, and he played that role well. If the Sunni insurgency was part of his plan for defeating the American invasion, he will have earned some credit as a military leader, despite his gross blunders in other wars. If, as I think inevitable, other countries faced with an American threat adopt the same plan, Saddam will have lodged a barb in his assailant whose poison will work for years. He died, but perhaps he also won. In the Arab world, at least, that is a respected combination.



William S. Lind, expressing his own personal opinion, is Director for the Center for Cultural Conservatism for the Free Congress Foundation.

Ellie