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Military Professional
Join Date: 01-11-08
Location: California
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More on COIN
America's enemies at present, and likely in the future, will be irregular fighting forces and they will fight in an unconventional manner. Our forces have to adapt to this type of warfare and still maintain the ability to fight a conventional war.
Where to strike a balance on this issue is the problem. Invest heavily in special operations forces, or continue to feed the conventional forces from the same coffer and sacrifice the needed capability? Or, train our conventional forces in irregular tactics and sacrifice their ability to fight a conventional war?
In my opinion, units such as the 82nd Airborne, 101st Airborne, and 173rd Airborne can be transitioned to units that are more adaptable to special operations. They are already doing a lot of missions that could be considered a part of the special operations realm in Afghanistan and have also done so in Iraq. Maybe if they were more dedicated to this type of fighting, we would be better prepared for irregular warfare and our conventional forces would be able to adapt to the style after the conventional part of the war is over with the support of those units already proficient at it.
Just thinking.
Here's an interesting article from the Strategic Studies Institute:
The article discusses irregular forces and strategy.
IRREGULAR ENEMIES AND THE ESSENCE OF STRATEGY:
CAN THE AMERICAN WAY OF WAR ADAPT?
Here's the summary:
Quote:
Can the traditional American way of war adapt so as to be
effective against irregular enemies? An endeavor to answer that
question shapes and drives this inquiry. In order to address the
question constructively, the author is obliged to explore and explain
the nature and relations among three elements fundamental to our
problem. Those elements are strategy, irregular enemies, and the
American way of war. Carl von Clausewitz offered his theory of war
in terms of a “remarkable trinity composed of primordial violence,
hatred, and enmity . . . the play of chance and probability . . . and
subordination, as an instrument of policy, which makes it subject to
reason alone.” He defined his task as a need “to develop a theory that
maintains a balance between these three tendencies, like an object
suspended between three magnets.” The theoretical analogy may be
imperfect, but still it is useful. Just as Clausewitz sought to explain
war, and wars, as the product of inherently unstable relations among
passion, chance, and reason, so this monograph has at its core the
unstable interactions among irregular enemies, strategy, and the
American way of war. Unlike Clausewitz, however, our purpose is
not to develop or improve on general theory. Instead, the intention is
to confront and try to answer the very specific question with which
this summary began. To that end, strategic theory is deployed here
pragmatically, as an aid to soldiers and officials who face challenges
of a most pressing and serious character.
This inquiry defines and explains the essence of strategy. Next,
it identifies what is distinctive about irregular enemies and the
kinds of warfare they wage. Then the analysis proceeds to outline
the fairly long-enduring traditional American way of war, and
considers critically the fit between the many separate elements of
that “way” and the requirements of sound practice in the conduct of
warfare against irregulars. It concludes with a three-point argument
which binds together the otherwise somewhat disparate topics and
material.
The purpose of this monograph, beyond the commitment to offer
some useful education, includes a desire to help explain better to the
defense community both what it ought to know already, and—most
vi
especially—how the separate pieces of the trinitarian puzzle relate to
each other. Much, probably most, of the content of the monograph is
already familiar to many people, but it is not really familiar enough.
Everyone interested in security affairs, surely, believes he/she
understands strategy, irregular warfare, and the American way in
war, but just how well are these elements comprehended, and are
the consequences of their unstable interaction grasped securely? We
think not. The monograph should make it difficult, not impossible,
of course, for its readers to remain confused about the basics. These
pages lay out in explicit detail the nature of strategy, irregular
warfare, and—last, but not least—the long-preferred American way.
But what does it all mean?
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In Omnia Paratus
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