"Non Cents" - Air Power vs. Land Power

**Shek** · 05-23-2007, 09:37 AM

A fascinating read. It is both amazing and saddening to see the zero sum game approach that services have. Maybe I am biased, but I tend to agree with Frank Hoffman that the USAF consistently oversells its capabilities to a degree to serve parochial interests rather the national interest. The other services are guilty of this as well at times, but I think that the USAF tends to be more egregious.

Quote:

â€œNon Centsâ€ (SWJ Blog)

"Non Cents"

Air Force Major General Charles Dunlap, a respected but frequently provocative author, has critiqued the Army/Marine counterinsurgency manual in a commentary titled “We have a COIN shortage” in the May Naval Institute Proceedings. I would have normally dismissed General Dunlap’s observations as a rare but poor example of discourse, as I have a lot of respect for him personally. But this commentary reflected more than just an inadequate grasp of irregular warfare. Having recently returned from a counterinsurgency symposium at Maxwell Air Force Base, it is clear that a broader misunderstanding exists about the nature of irregular conflict and FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 that needs to be cleared up.

General Dunlap opens with a tart observation that the Army/Marine Corps got a lot of publicity with the publication of the new field manual. Newsweek called it “The Book” on Iraq, which I think is a stretch but a natural reaction. He goes on to suggest that the publicity exceeded notable events such as the airstrike that killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi last summer or the “yet more debilitating air attacks against al Qaeda havens in Somalia.” This gives the reader an early hint about where our Air Force counterinsurgency theory is coming from.

General Dunlap goes on to lambaste the manual as the product of the nation’s ground forces and a thinly veiled attempt to establish a Joint/national approach that is protracted, costly, manpower intensive, and inherently a “traditional land component solution.” Such an approach is too costly for America, and is far too late for Iraq, the General adds.

While I happen to agree with his assessment about Iraq, the simple fact remains that the manual wasn’t written or intended to satisfy one of today’s insurgencies. It fills a 25 to 30 year void in our doctrinal library thanks to the Vietnam Syndrome and the Pentagon’s insistence on only preparing for wars we would like to fight instead of those our enemies are prepared to wage. My normally coherent Air Force partner would like to continue that trend despite consistent historical evidence to the contrary. The field manual is simply operational level doctrine for two Services, no strategic agenda other than ensuring that today’s ground warriors are ready for the most probable types of war that nation will face for some time.

My Air Force friends don’t accept that assessment of future conflict. If you have any doubts, read this, “Real innovation for 21st century conflict calls for devising techniques that avoid exposing thousands of young Americans to the hazards of combat.” Instead, General Dunlap argues that we should be seeking to exploit our technological genius and the “air and naval component’s way of war” which are high tech and low cost. This is the same way Admiral Owens used to sell his “systems of systems” model as well. It’s very attractive to naïve politicians who do not know better and want to eliminate risk. The problem is that these approaches have great applications in high intensity conventional combat, and have worked in Kosovo, Afghanistan and in Somalia when matched with some ground forces.

General Dunlap’s positive references to kinetic strikes in Somalia and Kosovo conveniently ignores a lot of history dating back to Britain’s ineffective applications of airborne killing power in Mesopotamia 80 odd years ago, and more recently in Afghanistan. Kosovo was simply high tech, high cost, and extremely low in effectiveness. Yes, airpower was decisive in toppling the Taliban in 2001, with ground forces from the Northern Alliance helping force the Taliban to mass in defensive positions. But the record goes both ways, as on April 29 and May 9 this year a number of air strikes were conducted to counter the Taliban’s preparations for an anticipated spring offensive. These strikes produced unexpected civilian casualties that have angered President Karzai and undercut NATO and Coalition efforts to secure the population’s allegiance. (Of course, ground units have also produced accidental collateral damage as well.) General Dunlap is confusing regime destruction with the more constructive requirements of COIN. This approach certainly didn’t do much for the IDF last summer against Hezbollah.

Down at Maxwell, the Marine and Army officers got an earful about the FM’s purported ground centricity. The Air Force, which made a belated and limited attempt to participate in the manual’s development, was unhappy that air power was relegated to an appendix vice a separate chapter. Frankly, I don’t think it rates a distinct chapter or an appendix.

Airpower, properly understood, is an invaluable contributor to successful counter-insurgency operations as it is to most other forms of conflict. Most Marines understand their own Small Wars history and recognize the early innovative applications of aviation in Nicaragua in the 1920s as a form of fire support, logistics, and medical evacuation, and reconnaissance. It is not an accident that Jim Corum and Wray Johnson’s Airpower in Small Wars is on the Commandant’s PME reading list, or that Professor Johnson (a retired Air Force officer) is the course director for irregular warfare at the Marine Corps Command and Staff College. A larger number of Marines have served in either OEF or OIF certainly recognize the critical contributions that airpower made to their own military tasks in theater. Aviation was critical to operational success in both fights for Fallujah and well as Najaf in 2004, including Air Force strike contributions. Many a Marine unit commander has told me that the sound of an AC-130 overhead at night is the best lullaby they’ve ever heard. Other forms of aerospace capability, like unmanned aerial vehicles, have also been noteworthy in both OEF and OIF. Marine commanders and their staffs recognize that air power is fundamental to the conduct of intelligence, fires, maneuver, and logistics in warfare in general, and to irregular conflicts as well.

Could that recognition have been more explicitly made in key chapters in the new field manual--sure. Was it critical to the Army and Marine generals and their respective doctrinal teams or school houses, apparently not. Senior Marines don’t consider themselves ground centric, and embrace a more comprehensive view of the Marine Air-Ground Task Force.

The Marines and our Army brethren also understand that the center of gravity for a host nation under attack by an insurgency is generally the population. It’s not about killing insurgents, or putting “warheads on foreheads.” COIN requires constructive and indirect approaches, not just strike sorties. This has led American, French and British doctrine to focus on principles and parameters for the conduct of irregular conflicts that center on controlling or securing the population from harm or interaction with the insurgent. It’s very difficult to do that from space or from a bomber. If success is ultimately tied to the people, I am sorry but they live on the ground. Their government operates on the ground, and people need to be secure to go about their lives. Until civilian populations take up residence in space or start to raise families at 10,000 feet, there will be limitations as to what airpower writ large, or the Air Force more specially, can accomplish.

Equally disturbing at Maxwell were comments from Air Force officers who bemoaned the nature of the fight in Iraq. I heard criticisms about Army dominance of the war’s conduct, too little apportionment of sorties to “deep battle” targets, and about the Air Force being relegated to an Army Air Corps. Some worried that decentralized and flexible command practices resulted in “penny packed” uses of airpower. What I never heard was a constructive argument for another way of doing business, strategically or operationally. Nor did I sense that most Air Force officers understood the fluid nature of the competition or the need to adapt. Does airpower have to be employed the same manner across the full spectrum of combat, or can the Air Force adapt its tool sets and mindset to a wider range than just optimized for interdiction into “kill boxes.”?

To advance its own development, as well as to better articulate its unique contributions to America’s security interests I think my airpower friends need to change tack. Instead of badly mischaracterizing the Army/Marine Corps efforts to prepare their warriors for the complexities of modern counterinsurgency, I strongly suggest they devote their intellectual energy to developing its own Service doctrine, to engaging OSD/Joint forums where IW and COIN concepts are being debated, and in ensuring that Air Force perspectives are voiced. Right now it’s living in a glass house. The Air Force should be more candid, it needs to catch up to what is now year six of a long war. A thorough articulation of Air Force contributions in irregular warfare, now in draft form, is obviously needed to ensure that it thoroughly understands and is intellectually prepared for the realities of modern irregular warfare. Until then, we don’t have a COIN shortage, just a lack of common cents.

Frank Hoffman is a frequent contributor to most military journals, and was a contributing author to FM 3-24.

wabpilot · 05-24-2007, 19:17 PM

Good read Shek. Forty-four years ago, I was firmly in General Dunlap's camp. If you asked me, a lowly J.G. at the time, the Viet Nam war would be wrapped up just as soon as my Phantom squadron got on station and could hammer a little sense to the North Vietnamese. Political bungling aside, I learned a stark lesson on the second day I went feet dry. The stuff I had bombed was no longer relevant to the battle that was still raging. Our own troops were still in contact and they still needed lots of air support. In those forty-four years not much has changed. Troops, on both sides, deal with air strikes and move on. We in the aviation end of war fighting can point to a lot of bridges destroyed, and the combat engineers can point to a lot of temporary river crossings built. Without question air power can affect the outcome of a particular engagement. But, that will only be permanent if troops on the ground can take advantage of it.

Bluesman · 05-24-2007, 20:41 PM

If all wars and battles were about seizing and holding terrain, you'd be correct.

But not all wars and battles are about that (especially now), so your blanket statement is incorrect.

wabpilot · 05-26-2007, 22:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bluesman

If all wars and battles were about seizing and holding terrain, you'd be correct.

But not all wars and battles are about that (especially now), so your blanket statement is incorrect.

I tend to agree that there have been a few battles that were not about holding terrain. Pearl Harbor from the Japanese point of view, Coral Sea from ours, the North Atlantic from both German and Allied perspectives, Hanoi and Haiphong from ours. But, wars? I have yet to see a war that was not about seizing and holding terrain, or keeping someone from seizing that terrain.

The Chap · 01-22-2008, 22:40 PM

There are wars of anihilation. Some brief, pehaps punitive. Others inspired by historical emnity, opportunism, vengence, manifest destiny (OK, that one was land

or finally Doctrinal.
To run through them with the intent not to bore.

Carthage. Plough salt.

Vikings. Rape it, steal it; and if not kill or burn it. I know that they eventualy settled etc.

See top. Or the opening weeks of WW2. Or the closing months of WW2

Anything in Chinese history.

To wind things up: MAD

Nothing left to claim, Well, for a few centuries ...

BadKharma · 01-22-2008, 22:46 PM

I would have to say that winning a war is all about getting boots on the ground. One of the problems the US faced in Viet Nam was we won the battles but didn't keep the terrain. And would find themselves fighting the same battle again. All the armed forces are concerned with their own interests first ie budgets thats a given. Anyway very good read there.

Bluesman · 01-22-2008, 23:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BadKharma

I would have to say that winning a war is all about getting boots on the ground. One of the problems the US faced in Viet Nam was we won the battles but didn't keep the terrain. And would find themselves fighting the same battle again. All the armed forces are concerned with their own interests first ie budgets thats a given. Anyway very good read there.

Incorrect.

Details later.

**Shek** · 01-23-2008, 10:15 AM

BadKharma,

Not sure if these are the details that Bluesman was going to follow with, but the key question is what was the proper "terrain" to hold? I'd submit that holding the Ia Drang Valley, as an example, wouldn't have mattered much. Fighting successive attrition battles was not the strategy of success, and holding dense jungle simply would have tied up forces.

The key terrain in the 1960s was human terrain, and instead of winning the "big war" battles, boots on the ground should have instead been reoriented towards the "village war". The NLF helped the US/SVN by imploding due to the Tet Offensive, creating a vacuum that allowed the government of SVN to expand back into areas where the NLF had controlled just a few short years earlier (the issue of gaining legitimacy in the villages is another matter).

However, once the NLF's reach was minimized, boots on the ground became less important and the utility of air power became greater as NVN shifted to a main force war. You can look to the battle of An Loc as an example where B52s could effectively supplement the SVN boots on the ground during main force battles. Air power was also somewhat effective in attriting supplies along the Ho Chi Minh Trail once sensor technology had sufficiently progressed to allow for more effective targeting. It wasn't enough to stop supplies from moving south, but it was enough to delay offensive plans and force NVN to rely upon proven stocks of supplies instead of assuming risk by depending upon the flow of supplies.

Air power would have been critical to protecting SVN indefinitely - boots on the ground in large numbers simply would not have been sustainable, even if the political climate had been more favorable.

1idvet · 01-23-2008, 12:53 PM

Good article.

The AF is crying because they're not the center of attention on this one.
The hit on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was nice, problem with that one though, there were boots on the ground pointing to the house.

Special Forces developed information that the spiritual adviser, Sheik Abd-al-Rahman, would be attending a meeting and likely would be with al-Zarqawi that day.

Good shooting AF, but it wouldn't have happened without troops there watching the house.

BadKharma · 01-23-2008, 15:20 PM

Shek and Bluesman of course I was being over simplistic. However air-power is an adjunct or support when it comes to warfare. As warfare has progressed it has become more dependent on multiple arms.

S-2 · 01-24-2008, 00:53 AM

By John A. Tirpak, Executive Editor

Air Force Magazine Online

The New Counterinsurgency; Airpower to the Rear; That Satellite Is Toast ....

The Petraeus Doctrine

"In a counterinsurgency, airpower is mostly useful as a means of hauling around ground forces while keeping an eye on the bad guys. Air strikes are probably too blunt an instrument to be of much value, and ground commanders should think twice before asking for them. If air strikes are used, though, a ground forces commander definitely should control them."

Quaint musings from a dusty, pre-“joint” Army field manual? Nope. Fresh ink from Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus, tapped by President Bush to be the new commander of Multinational Force-Iraq.

The strange comments about the applications of modern airpower are contained in the dead-last, five-page annex to a brand-new 335-page Army-Marine Corps combined arms doctrine on counterinsurgency (or “COIN”), co-signed by Petraeus and Marine Corps Lt. Gen. James F. Amos. Field Manual 3-24 was published in December...

...The views in FM 3-24 reflect a limited knowledge of airpower’s true role in the current operation and suspicion that airpower can all too easily prove counterproductive. This is all the more distressing in light of the view that Petraeus will set direction for the ongoing fight in Iraq.

The new doctrine argues that airpower is best put under control of a tactical ground commander or, at the highest level, the multinational force commander, but not an airman...

Army’s Little Helper

...Petraeus and Amos damn airpower with the faintest of faint praise, cautioning that, aside from the purely supportive functions of battlefield mobility and persistent ISR, airpower can be too heavy-handed to be of much use.

In the COIN fight, airpower “will most often transport troops, equipment, and supplies” for ground forces “and perform intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions,” Petraeus and Amos argued. These are air- and space power’s greatest contributions in the COIN fight, they said. Such a use offers “asymmetric advantages” over the enemy, allowing immediate movement of “land forces where they are needed,” especially in rough terrain.

Modern airlift can also “quickly deliver humanitarian assistance,” especially in isolated areas, and this builds great credibility and favor with the local population.

Offensive air strikes are useful if the insurgents “assemble a conventional force” and huddle together for easy air attack...

...However, they acknowledged that being too cautious with airpower isn’t good, either, noting that “avoiding all risk may embolden insurgents while providing them sanctuary.”

Airpower offers advantages in collecting ISR and signals intelligence for spotting and tracking insurgents and pinpointing their positions. Helicopters—the main air asset employed by the Army—“have been especially useful in providing overwatch, fire support, alternate communications, and medevac support,” the doctrine explains.

However, air assets should be at the disposal of the ground commander, according to the new doctrine manual...

...While the COIN fight is on, the Air Force should work as fast as it can to help the host nation build up its air capabilities, according to the doctrine. Those should focus on mobility and surveillance.

What the Air Force Thought

The Air Force wasn’t thrilled about the Army-Marine Corps counterinsurgency document, which the service said gave short shrift to airpower’s capabilities, as proved in the ongoing counterinsurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Maj. Gen. Allen G. Peck, commander of the Air Force Doctrine Center at Maxwell AFB, Ala., said he had seen the doctrine penned by Petraeus and Amos, and said that it reflected “a very two-dimensional view of how to fight a counterinsurgency.” If airmen had written it, it would be “different,” Peck observed.

The Air Force provides “maneuver” capabilities by backing up ground troops with kinetic and nonkinetic means, Peck noted.

The Air Force is working on its own COIN doctrine and is proposing to the Pentagon that a joint doctrine be developed. The Air Force version is on a fast track to be finished in August. The service is simultaneously pushing for a joint doctrine.

When that process is under way, “it will be helpful for us to have our Air Force doctrine in hand,” he said.

USAF agrees with Petraeus and Amos that air mobility is a powerful “asymmetric” capability and certainly endorses the view that ISR—air and space-based systems alike—are critical.

However, Peck said he was concerned about the doctrine’s tendency to low-rate the value of force applied from the air. He said FM 3-24 does “probably a bit too much hand-wringing over the potential for collateral damage,” because the Air Force exercises great care in selecting targets and uses the minimum explosive power possible to achieve the desired effect.

The notion that the Air Force applies “indiscriminate” power is obsolete and wrong, he said, adding, “We do not go out and do carpet bombing.” Moreover, worries about errant attacks should be extended to “include artillery and mortars,” which are imprecise when compared with laser or satellite guided bombs.

Peck went on to say Petraeus and Amos did not adequately take account of the contribution of airpower’s speed, range, and flexibility. “I would have liked to have seen more discussion, throughout the document, ... about how ground commanders can leverage this asymmetric capability in the fight,” said Peck. “I think that is a shortfall.”

The Air Force did make “some rather extensive inputs” into the Army and Marine Corps process of writing 3-24, Peck said. “Some were accepted and some were rejected,” he said. “They are under no requirement to include our views.”

He noted that it was “a bit of an uphill battle” to get the Army to accept that airpower should be under centralized control and not simply tethered to a tactical ground commander.

“I would give General Petraeus some credit for including some of these constructs that, frankly, not everybody was universally thrilled about,” Peck observed.

How dare the Army to assume some role in the targeting process!? Heaven forbid that, in acknowledging the leverage attained from mobility and ISR that the Army/Marine Corps may forget the value of overwhelming multi-capable strike packages aimed at those deep targets.

And why the hell are we on the last five pages of the last annex to FM 3-24?

Did anybody mention to the Air Force that COIN ops are undertaken with the presumption of air superiority from external threats to COIN airspace? Has it been mentioned that it's o.k. to take great pride in mobility and ISR missions?

Pathetic child-like petulance intended to shape the real war- the budget battles forthcoming.

ofogs · 01-24-2008, 02:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by S-2

the Air Force exercises great care in selecting targetsand uses the minimum explosive power possible to achieve the desired effect.

The trouble is, right now, the "minimum explosive power" is 500lbs in most cases, which is a little bit too much most of the time. I've got to think a big reason the Air Force is working on some of the smaller sized bombs is exactly because they've realized this internally. But right now, when their only tool is a big hammer, I'm sure they're trying to look for nails everywhere.

Since the key terrain in a COIN fight is the population, it's very difficult for the Air Force alone to interact with them. I think that's why 3-24 envisions air assets to be a tied in with the ground commander's plan. The guys on the ground have a better feel of the population they're trying to effect, and thus need to have some say about what the air is doing.

S-2 · 01-24-2008, 08:24 AM

"I think that's why 3-24 envisions air assets to be a tied in with the ground commander's plan. The guys on the ground have a better feel of the population they're trying to effect, and thus need to have some say about what the air is doing."

I may not have been too clear on that last post. I sorta got wrapped up in the artistry of it all.

Your above comment is perfectly correct. In fact it's obvious to most, I'd imagine, that it'll be a decentralized air-plan that shouldn't normally require the gathering of complex strike packages.

It's on the Air Force to carve a role in COIN/IW that'll be compatible w/FM 3-24, their institutional mindset, and our nat'l objectives. If forced to a trade-off, most Army commanders would ask for A-10s and the Air Transport/Mobility (whatever the ferk those guys at Scott AFB call themselves

) Command and send the rest home as more trouble and resource consuming than they are worth. Our operations presuppose air-dominance and are eternally grateful for the freedom of mobility that we're consequently afforded.

Beyond that, the risks begin to merit case-by-case consideration by ground commanders for the employment of attack sorties. In COIN, our ground troops own a piece of the neighborhood and have to later deal w/ the unintended consequences of a poorly executed strike.

Tirpak's article, written for a partisan audience, is parochial and ill-considered.

citanon · 01-24-2008, 16:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wabpilot

I tend to agree that there have been a few battles that were not about holding terrain. Pearl Harbor from the Japanese point of view, Coral Sea from ours, the North Atlantic from both German and Allied perspectives, Hanoi and Haiphong from ours. But, wars? I have yet to see a war that was not about seizing and holding terrain, or keeping someone from seizing that terrain.

How about the NATO air campaign against Yugoslavia? I had the impression that what ultimately worked was the political and economic pressure from air attacks against Yugoslavian economic infrastructure. However, I'm unclear as to the correlation between the timing of the Yugoslavian capitulation and NATO preparations for a ground offensive.

ofogs · 01-24-2008, 17:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by citanon

How about the NATO air campaign against Yugoslavia? I had the impression that what ultimately worked was the political and economic pressure from air attacks against Yugoslavian economic infrastructure. However, I'm unclear as to the correlation between the timing of the Yugoslavian capitulation and NATO preparations for a ground offensive.

On the contrary, the bombing campaign, while important, is a good way to illustrate the shortcomings of air power. The Air Force thought they were destroying far more of the ground forces than they actually did, and really failed to bring about capitulation on their own. We only learned about this after ground troops went in, of course. Air power can do a lot, but, to force the enemy to comply with your will, you need to have guys on the ground.

05-24-2007, 20:41 PM	#3 (permalink)
Bluesman WAB Bartender *Defense Professional* *Military Professional* Join Date: 11-24-04 Location: Vacaville, CA. Posts: 7,387 Country:	If all wars and battles were about seizing and holding terrain, you'd be correct. But not all wars and battles are about that (especially now), so your blanket statement is incorrect. __________________ "The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory." - George Orwell

01-22-2008, 22:40 PM	#5 (permalink)
The Chap *Senior Contributor* Join Date: 08-18-04 Location: UK Posts: 1,181 Country:	crib There are wars of anihilation. Some brief, pehaps punitive. Others inspired by historical emnity, opportunism, vengence, manifest destiny (OK, that one was land or finally Doctrinal. To run through them with the intent not to bore. Carthage. Plough salt. Vikings. Rape it, steal it; and if not kill or burn it. I know that they eventualy settled etc. See top. Or the opening weeks of WW2. Or the closing months of WW2 Anything in Chinese history. To wind things up: MAD Nothing left to claim, Well, for a few centuries ... __________________ Where's the bloody gin? An army marches on its liver, not its ruddy stomach.

01-23-2008, 12:53 PM	#9 (permalink)
1idvet *Military Professional* Join Date: 01-11-08 Location: California Posts: 52 Country:	Good article. The AF is crying because they're not the center of attention on this one. The hit on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was nice, problem with that one though, there were boots on the ground pointing to the house. Special Forces developed information that the spiritual adviser, Sheik Abd-al-Rahman, would be attending a meeting and likely would be with al-Zarqawi that day. Good shooting AF, but it wouldn't have happened without troops there watching the house. __________________ In Omnia Paratus

01-24-2008, 00:53 AM	#11 (permalink)
S-2 *Military Professional* Join Date: 09-11-06 Location: Portland, Oregon Posts: 2,110 Country:	More From Air Force Magazine By John A. Tirpak, Executive Editor Air Force Magazine Online *The New Counterinsurgency; Airpower to the Rear; That Satellite Is Toast ....* The Petraeus Doctrine "In a counterinsurgency, airpower is mostly useful as a means of hauling around ground forces while keeping an eye on the bad guys. Air strikes are probably too blunt an instrument to be of much value, and ground commanders should think twice before asking for them. If air strikes are used, though, a ground forces commander definitely should control them." Quaint musings from a dusty, pre-“joint” Army field manual? Nope. Fresh ink from Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus, tapped by President Bush to be the new commander of Multinational Force-Iraq. The strange comments about the applications of modern airpower are contained in the dead-last, five-page annex to a brand-new 335-page Army-Marine Corps combined arms doctrine on counterinsurgency (or “COIN”), co-signed by Petraeus and Marine Corps Lt. Gen. James F. Amos. Field Manual 3-24 was published in December... ...The views in FM 3-24 reflect a limited knowledge of airpower’s true role in the current operation and suspicion that airpower can all too easily prove counterproductive. This is all the more distressing in light of the view that Petraeus will set direction for the ongoing fight in Iraq. The new doctrine argues that airpower is best put under control of a tactical ground commander or, at the highest level, the multinational force commander, but not an airman... Army’s Little Helper ...Petraeus and Amos damn airpower with the faintest of faint praise, cautioning that, aside from the purely supportive functions of battlefield mobility and persistent ISR, airpower can be too heavy-handed to be of much use. In the COIN fight, airpower “will most often transport troops, equipment, and supplies” for ground forces “and perform intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions,” Petraeus and Amos argued. These are air- and space power’s greatest contributions in the COIN fight, they said. Such a use offers “asymmetric advantages” over the enemy, allowing immediate movement of “land forces where they are needed,” especially in rough terrain. Modern airlift can also “quickly deliver humanitarian assistance,” especially in isolated areas, and this builds great credibility and favor with the local population. Offensive air strikes are useful if the insurgents “assemble a conventional force” and huddle together for easy air attack... ...However, they acknowledged that being too cautious with airpower isn’t good, either, noting that “avoiding all risk may embolden insurgents while providing them sanctuary.” Airpower offers advantages in collecting ISR and signals intelligence for spotting and tracking insurgents and pinpointing their positions. Helicopters—the main air asset employed by the Army—“have been especially useful in providing overwatch, fire support, alternate communications, and medevac support,” the doctrine explains. However, air assets should be at the disposal of the ground commander, according to the new doctrine manual... ...While the COIN fight is on, the Air Force should work as fast as it can to help the host nation build up its air capabilities, according to the doctrine. Those should focus on mobility and surveillance. What the Air Force Thought The Air Force wasn’t thrilled about the Army-Marine Corps counterinsurgency document, which the service said gave short shrift to airpower’s capabilities, as proved in the ongoing counterinsurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Maj. Gen. Allen G. Peck, commander of the Air Force Doctrine Center at Maxwell AFB, Ala., said he had seen the doctrine penned by Petraeus and Amos, and said that it reflected “a very two-dimensional view of how to fight a counterinsurgency.” If airmen had written it, it would be “different,” Peck observed. The Air Force provides “maneuver” capabilities by backing up ground troops with kinetic and nonkinetic means, Peck noted. The Air Force is working on its own COIN doctrine and is proposing to the Pentagon that a joint doctrine be developed. The Air Force version is on a fast track to be finished in August. The service is simultaneously pushing for a joint doctrine. When that process is under way, “it will be helpful for us to have our Air Force doctrine in hand,” he said. USAF agrees with Petraeus and Amos that air mobility is a powerful “asymmetric” capability and certainly endorses the view that ISR—air and space-based systems alike—are critical. However, Peck said he was concerned about the doctrine’s tendency to low-rate the value of force applied from the air. He said FM 3-24 does “probably a bit too much hand-wringing over the potential for collateral damage,” because the Air Force exercises great care in selecting targets and uses the minimum explosive power possible to achieve the desired effect. The notion that the Air Force applies “indiscriminate” power is obsolete and wrong, he said, adding, “We do not go out and do carpet bombing.” Moreover, worries about errant attacks should be extended to “include artillery and mortars,” which are imprecise when compared with laser or satellite guided bombs. Peck went on to say Petraeus and Amos did not adequately take account of the contribution of airpower’s speed, range, and flexibility. “I would have liked to have seen more discussion, throughout the document, ... about how ground commanders can leverage this asymmetric capability in the fight,” said Peck. “I think that is a shortfall.” The Air Force did make “some rather extensive inputs” into the Army and Marine Corps process of writing 3-24, Peck said. “Some were accepted and some were rejected,” he said. “They are under no requirement to include our views.” He noted that it was “a bit of an uphill battle” to get the Army to accept that airpower should be under centralized control and not simply tethered to a tactical ground commander. “I would give General Petraeus some credit for including some of these constructs that, frankly, not everybody was universally thrilled about,” Peck observed. How dare the Army to assume some role in the targeting process!? Heaven forbid that, in acknowledging the leverage attained from mobility and ISR that the Army/Marine Corps may forget the value of overwhelming multi-capable strike packages aimed at those deep targets. And why the hell are we on the last five pages of the last annex to FM 3-24? Did anybody mention to the Air Force that COIN ops are undertaken with the presumption of air superiority from external threats to COIN airspace? Has it been mentioned that it's o.k. to take great pride in mobility and ISR missions? Pathetic child-like petulance intended to shape the real war- the budget battles forthcoming. __________________ "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski Last edited by S-2 : 01-24-2008 at 00:58 AM.

01-24-2008, 08:24 AM	#13 (permalink)
S-2 *Military Professional* Join Date: 09-11-06 Location: Portland, Oregon Posts: 2,110 Country:	Ofogs Reply "I think that's why 3-24 envisions air assets to be a tied in with the ground commander's plan. The guys on the ground have a better feel of the population they're trying to effect, and thus need to have some say about what the air is doing." I may not have been too clear on that last post. I sorta got wrapped up in the artistry of it all. Your above comment is perfectly correct. In fact it's obvious to most, I'd imagine, that it'll be a decentralized air-plan that shouldn't normally require the gathering of complex strike packages. It's on the Air Force to carve a role in COIN/IW that'll be compatible w/FM 3-24, their institutional mindset, and our nat'l objectives. If forced to a trade-off, most Army commanders would ask for A-10s and the Air Transport/Mobility (whatever the ferk those guys at Scott AFB call themselves ) Command and send the rest home as more trouble and resource consuming than they are worth. Our operations presuppose air-dominance and are eternally grateful for the freedom of mobility that we're consequently afforded. Beyond that, the risks begin to merit case-by-case consideration by ground commanders for the employment of attack sorties. In COIN, our ground troops own a piece of the neighborhood and have to later deal w/ the unintended consequences of a poorly executed strike. Tirpak's article, written for a partisan audience, is parochial and ill-considered.

05-24-2007, 19:17 PM	#2 (permalink)
wabpilot *Military Professional* Join Date: 12-05-03 Location: Commuting between Dresden and Ft. Worth Posts: 558 Country:	Good read Shek. Forty-four years ago, I was firmly in General Dunlap's camp. If you asked me, a lowly J.G. at the time, the Viet Nam war would be wrapped up just as soon as my Phantom squadron got on station and could hammer a little sense to the North Vietnamese. Political bungling aside, I learned a stark lesson on the second day I went feet dry. The stuff I had bombed was no longer relevant to the battle that was still raging. Our own troops were still in contact and they still needed lots of air support. In those forty-four years not much has changed. Troops, on both sides, deal with air strikes and move on. We in the aviation end of war fighting can point to a lot of bridges destroyed, and the combat engineers can point to a lot of temporary river crossings built. Without question air power can affect the outcome of a particular engagement. But, that will only be permanent if troops on the ground can take advantage of it.

01-22-2008, 22:46 PM	#6 (permalink)
BadKharma Patron Join Date: 01-18-08 Location: Milwaukee, WI Posts: 189 Country:	I would have to say that winning a war is all about getting boots on the ground. One of the problems the US faced in Viet Nam was we won the battles but didn't keep the terrain. And would find themselves fighting the same battle again. All the armed forces are concerned with their own interests first ie budgets thats a given. Anyway very good read there.

01-23-2008, 10:15 AM	#8 (permalink)
Shek *Military Professional* Moderator Join Date: 02-23-05 Location: Krblachistan Posts: 7,629 Country:	BadKharma, Not sure if these are the details that Bluesman was going to follow with, but the key question is what was the proper "terrain" to hold? I'd submit that holding the Ia Drang Valley, as an example, wouldn't have mattered much. Fighting successive attrition battles was not the strategy of success, and holding dense jungle simply would have tied up forces. The key terrain in the 1960s was human terrain, and instead of winning the "big war" battles, boots on the ground should have instead been reoriented towards the "village war". The NLF helped the US/SVN by imploding due to the Tet Offensive, creating a vacuum that allowed the government of SVN to expand back into areas where the NLF had controlled just a few short years earlier (the issue of gaining legitimacy in the villages is another matter). However, once the NLF's reach was minimized, boots on the ground became less important and the utility of air power became greater as NVN shifted to a main force war. You can look to the battle of An Loc as an example where B52s could effectively supplement the SVN boots on the ground during main force battles. Air power was also somewhat effective in attriting supplies along the Ho Chi Minh Trail once sensor technology had sufficiently progressed to allow for more effective targeting. It wasn't enough to stop supplies from moving south, but it was enough to delay offensive plans and force NVN to rely upon proven stocks of supplies instead of assuming risk by depending upon the flow of supplies. Air power would have been critical to protecting SVN indefinitely - boots on the ground in large numbers simply would not have been sustainable, even if the political climate had been more favorable.

01-23-2008, 15:20 PM	#10 (permalink)
BadKharma Patron Join Date: 01-18-08 Location: Milwaukee, WI Posts: 189 Country:	Shek and Bluesman of course I was being over simplistic. However air-power is an adjunct or support when it comes to warfare. As warfare has progressed it has become more dependent on multiple arms.

Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)

Thread Tools
Show Printable Version Email this Page
Display Modes	Rate This Thread
Linear Mode Switch to Hybrid Mode Switch to Threaded Mode	Rate This Thread:

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
Pakistan Airspace: Night before the nuke tests	Asim Aquil	Warfare in the Modern Age	19	06-13-2007 01:36 AM
Interview with PLAAF LGen Liu Yazhou	Officer of Engineers	The Field Mess	34	05-10-2007 15:44 PM
Sino-Indian War	rkam98	South Asian Defense Topics	66	05-09-2007 00:16 AM
India Infrastructure News and Discussions	Akshay	Political Discussions	364	03-21-2007 06:41 AM
India's First and Largest nuclear power plant..	Jay	Science & Tech	30	02-11-2006 13:50 PM