Posted on Oct 24, 2016
'Bloodline' Author On The Failures Of U.S. Counter-Insurgency Strategy
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"I think there's actually a very strong degree of continuity in U.S. counterterrorism strategy going back to about the end of 2004. And it basically involves three elements. One is to break up and to destroy the leadership of current terrorist groups. The second one is to prevent the emergence of new terrorist groups to take their place. And then the third is to work with partners to remedy the conditions that give rise to those terrorist groups in the first place.
We've done extraordinarily well on the first element. We've done pretty poorly on the second two. And what I recommend we do is we start with defeating the Islamic State."
We've done extraordinarily well on the first element. We've done pretty poorly on the second two. And what I recommend we do is we start with defeating the Islamic State."
'Bloodline' Author On The Failures Of U.S. Counter-Insurgency Strategy
Posted from npr.org
Warfare
Strategy
Tactics
War on Terror
Posted 8 y ago
Responses: 4
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In order to have an effective counter insurgency strategy you need to be willing to put people on the ground, in numbers large enough to create havoc, and keep the insurgency off balance and struggling for recruits, supplies etc. We are simply unwilling (recently) to do what needs to be done to counter the insurgency in Iraq/Syria and other places. Books like the Small Wars Manual are great sources for how to deal with conflicts such as the ones we find ourselves in today (there are others good books).
Drone strikes (which I support) are a one dimensional strategy and are so infrequent the enemy has time to reconstitute it's leadership. My guess is they have likely created some pretty solid succession plans knowing that they will, from time to time, get picked off.
The third one we are simply unwilling to countenance. That would require us to go after the religious leaders that spew the hate and violence and create the fertile recruiting pools. There is zero and I mean zero desire to do that under Obama or Bush before him. If HRC wins she will not either. DT is an unknown on this point.
Drone strikes (which I support) are a one dimensional strategy and are so infrequent the enemy has time to reconstitute it's leadership. My guess is they have likely created some pretty solid succession plans knowing that they will, from time to time, get picked off.
The third one we are simply unwilling to countenance. That would require us to go after the religious leaders that spew the hate and violence and create the fertile recruiting pools. There is zero and I mean zero desire to do that under Obama or Bush before him. If HRC wins she will not either. DT is an unknown on this point.
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LTC Eric Udouj
We have been as of yet unwilling to really wage a war with IS.... nor to finish the campaigns against AQ. Drone strikes are effective against small terror organizations - but ineffective against organizations like IS that can easy replace loses - and are not structured around individuals. What it does do is denies us the ability to know who our enemy is and to be able to know him well enough to counter his next move. We have the resources to conduct a war in multiple levels with IS - and to beat them - but the political will to do that is not present in the US - nor the national leadership. It takes a different approach than what we are doing - but in the end it places us against Assad - who is the real issue that we are dealing with that IS is but a symptom of - and against Iran as well. It does not take more forces from the US - it takes more support and logesticcs for some forces - and realizing that it aint the Iraqi Army that will do the job that needs to be done.
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