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US Marine and Afghan forces lose many due to lack of support...

The Army Manual on Counterinsurgency was written by General Petraus, who changed the direction in Iraq and followed these general rules prescribed by past leaders whom were also dealing with an insurgency.

T.E. Lawrence, the British adviser to Arab guerillas during World War 1, defined tactics as....


First of all....no it wasn't. He lent general and basic ideas towards parts of it as did many others. The actual writers were from think tanks and largely drew from scenarios that have nothing to do with today's insurgency make up and merely regurgitated past theories. The final product was far better than the initial version that was largely rejected at the war college and senior leadership in the Army, Marine Corps and tactical experts, but it is still immersed in politicial correctness and avoids the very topics at the heart of present day insurgencies.

Second of all, Iraq turned around because of Patreaus, Nasr, Lake and the fact that Iraqis grew tired of the senseless internal slaughter they were orchestrating.

Third, the default position of the manual is still the Maoist model, with soundbites of T.E. Lawrence tossed in. This manual defends the old intellectual order. It's an attempt to validate somebody's doctrinal thesis. It's a dishonest look at history because it picks and chooses that which helps people to define the wars they want to fight versus the wars they are actively fighting. This isn't fair to the troop nor the leaders that guide them on the battlefield.
 
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The Army has failed to follow this before; most notably when the 82nd Airborne followed a system of tracking wherever an incoming mortar round had come from and responding to it with a volley of artillery fire. The response to this system from the insurgents was to setup in a random persons' home and then leave after firing a few shots, causing the 82nd to decimate that innocent persons' home and achieving nothing but an angry Iraqi family.

In a case like that, the Iraqi family in question only has the insurgents to be pissed off at. If they're too stupid to realize that, then I don't know what we can possibly do for them.

Sherman said it best: "War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over."

Civilian casualties are the nature of war. Allowing more of our own troops to die, in the name of good sportsmanship, is self defeating.
 
That is not what he advocated at all. "Shock and Awe" was Rumsfeld bull**** meant to prove that the "soldier" was now obsolete and that our wars are to be won through sheer techonology. The idea was that our enemy would come running towards the barest minimum of troops with their hands in the air as they did in the Gulf War (The Drive-by War to some of us). But the Gulf War was a war gamer's dream. It was fought in the open desert far form civilian populations and void of urban settings. Rumsfeld's jack-assery set the military up for a fight thsat was harder than it should have been.

"Shock and Awe" was garbage and this is not what is being advocated by anyone in regards to defeating today's insurgencies.

...this misses another point I was trying to make e.g., collateral damage is not as detrimental to our strategic objectives as everyone would like to think. If it was those insurgents wouldn't have bargained with us, period.

And since we know collateral damage does not preclude the completion of strategic objectives, considerations of such should not jeopardize the safety of our troops.

According to its original theorists, Shock and Awe renders an adversary unwilling to resist through overwhelming displays of power

He is essentially saying that demonstrating American firepower wins hearts and minds through force even if it causes collateral damage. That is what a detracted from his posts. if I interpreted it wrong then fine, come out and tell me what you actually meant please.

GunnySgt said:
Oh, c'mon. I have no idea where you are basing your opinions, but this makes absolutely no sense. And by the way, the new manual on "counterinsurgency," known as MWCP 3-33.5 to the Marine Corps, misses the mark as well. Your opinions do not reflect on what history has taught us. Nor do they reflect accuracy in regards to what we face today.
How is that?

GunnySgt said:
The manual states (and yes, i have an official copy right in front of me ordered through the military PUBS system) that "killing insurgents-while necessary, especially with regard to extremnists-by itself cannot defeat an insurgency." This is wrong. Over the past 3,000 years, insurgencies overwhelmingly have been put down thoroughly by killing insurgents. In our own American history, insurrections and insurgencies have been defeated only with military force - Whiskey Rebellion, a long succession of Indian Wars, our Civil War, the Boxer Rebelion, the Moro insurrection, "banana wars," etc. If you truly know this history, you would state that these solutions didn't last forever. But the truth is that they consistently proved more sturdy than negotiating treaties, which is what our politicians look to do today over some ignorant sense that insurgencies are more powerful than anything our military could ever go up against.
If you truely know this history, then you would know that the Qing Dynasty only put down the Boxer Rebellion once 20,000 foreign troops arrived. Even then, the Qing dynasty was weakened to such an extent it was overthrown only a decade later. The Boxer Rebellion was quelled for the time being, but it eventually achieved its objective of overthrowing the imperialist prone dynasty and establishing a more secluded Republic.

The US never faced an insurgency in Puerto Rico or Cuba... it was a much lighter police action.The situation in the south after the American Civil War was an insurgency, with whites forming organizations like the KKK to terrorize the black populace and oppose Reconstruction. They largely succeeded as well.

Another error in this manual states that "insurgencies and counterinsurgencies have been common throughout history, but especially since the beginning of the 20th century." Hmmm. The Roman legions serving from Britian to Gaul, on to Asia minor and Palestine, and back to northern Africa? The age of ideology across Europe? Latin American was ravaged through a never ending of succession of insurrections for centuries. The revolution of Mexico in 1910? Thousands of years of insurgencies in China? Multiple revolutions and insurgencies of 1848 in Europe? Balkan insurgencies against Turkish rule? Tribal insurgencies in Africa? Multiple uprisings against British rule on the Northwestern Frontier? the Mahdist revolt? Boer uprisings? They literally go on forever, yet the 20th century saw an escallation? The writers of this manual should have studied a bit more.

British military doctrine in 1987 defined an insurgency as: “Illegal measures including the use of force to overthrow a government or to persuade or force people to do things they do not want to do.” Looking it over, I think all of the events you listed do constitute an insurgency. But even then they are seperated by huge gaps of time. That is not true for the 20th century, when there were 89 insurgencies:

Just a few:

The Basque insurgency in Spain
The North Caucaus Insurgency
Taureg Insurgency in Mali
The Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka
Philippinnes Insurrection
Algerian National Uprising
People's War in China
Communist uprising in Cuba
Communist insurgency in Mozambique, Angola, the
Democratic Republic of the Congo, Chad, Western Sahara, Uganda,
Liberia, Sierra Leone, Kashmir, and elsewhere

Okay... That took a while so I'm done making the list. I'll respond to the rest later, I have to go now.... this took me wayy longer than I thought it would.
 
British military doctrine in 1987 defined an insurgency as....

This is my point. Today's insurgencies do not reflect on the simple definitions of old as this manual suggests. You may as well produce doctrine on how to conduct open heart surgery in accordance to what people stated decades ago. Today's insurgencies are rooted in deep religious conviction. It is a driving force of their opposition. This manual purposefully shys from such topics for favor of a nice neat package with specific rules to ensure victory.

I stated quite clearly that virtually all insurgencies failed when they faced an unwavering government or a strong military force. Those that survived did do because the government was weak and negotiated. The Boxer rebellion was squashed via military force. Later...a weakened government compromised itself into failure.
 
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This is my point. Today's insurgencies do not reflect on the simple definitions of old as this manual suggests. You may as well produce doctrine on how to conduct open heart surgery in accordance to what people stated decades ago. Today's insurgencies are rooted in deep religious conviction. It is a driving force of their opposition. This manual purposefully shys from such topics for favor of a nice neat package with specific rules to ensure victory.

I stated quite clearly that virtually all insurgencies failed when they faced an unwavering government or a strong military force. Those that survived did do because the government was weak and negotiated. The Boxer rebellion was squashed via military force. Later...a weakened government compromised itself into failure.

Allow me to add to that and point out that an insurgency has never succeeded in defeating a strong conventional force.
 
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