Last April, over 200 people gathered in Washington D.C. for the State Department-sponsored kickoff of an innovative, web-enabled, interagency community of practice, the Consortium for Complex Operations. This project, sponsored by the leadership among the “3D’s,” (diplomacy, development, and defense), was designed to link civilian and military educators, trainers, thought leaders and practitioners to focus on theoretical and practical problems associated with stability operations, counterinsurgency, and irregular warfare.

As the CCO approaches its first anniversary, the CCO Support Office will be moving to the Center for Technology and National Security Policy (CTNSP) at the National Defense University (NDU) under the oversight of Hans Binenndijk and Bernie Carreau. This move introduces clear advantages as well as some manageable challenges to the CCO's charter and has thus generated some moderate debate. Based on my experience in leading the development and launch of the CCO, I thought I would offer the following insight for the SWJ readership and the CCO community of interest...

Continue reading "CCO Update: New Home for the Consortium for Complex Operations" »

Bravo! to the dedicated team of bureaucrats and thought leaders who toiled for 2 years to produce the new US Government Counterinsurgency Guide.

This guide, written in a collaborative "whole of government" process and endorsed at the highest levels of our diplomacy, development, and defense leadership, reflects the latest doctrine (FM 3-24 and also FM 3-07). It is not, however, a tactical or operational "how-to" guide. Rather it is intended to be a "COIN 101" for policy-makers contemplating US intervention abroad.

As reflected in the debate over the Army's new doctrine on Stability Operations (FM 3-07), some cringe at the mere articulation of COIN principles in an official government publication; suspecting it might lead us to attempt more such intervention. But as I pointed out in my blog post on FM 3-07, doctrine is not grand strategy or policy. "For those who worry that this new doctrine will make it more likely that we will try to invade and occupy more countries, consider that it might just have the opposite effect…Having a better understanding of the complexity and cost of these missions can only enhance the policy and strategy-making processes." Indeed, this is the core theme – and purpose- of this new publication:

"Such understanding provides the foundation for policy formulation when the risks and costs of intervention are weighted against US interests in determining whether to become involved and what form that involvement should take. This decision should not be taken lightly: historically COIN campaigns have almost always been more costly, more protracted and more difficult than first anticipated." (COIN Guide, p. 3)

The guide provides policy makers a framework for understanding the complexity and risks associated with COIN and, importantly, under what circumstances an attempted COIN intervention might actually be "folly." As with the latest publication of the Army's FM for stability operations, FM 3-07, this Handbook should generate debate about the wisdom of- and trade-offs associated with US involvement in these interventions. It should be read, understood, and debated by political leaders and anyone else interested in the what, why, and how of US intervention abroad.

Continue reading "USG COIN Guide" »

Janine’s Speaker’s Notes….
Combined Arms Center Senior Leader Conference
Fort Leavenworth, KS, 3 February 2009

Earlier this month, I was invited to address the senior leaders of the U.S. Army’s Training and Education community at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. This event, hosted by LTG William Caldwell, brought together the commandants of the Army’s training and education centers to discuss issues of importance to their community. LTG Caldwell asked me, along with Beth Cole of the U.S. Institute of Peace, UK LtCol. Mike Redmond, of the U.S. Army’s Stability Operations Office, and retired French LTG Raffenne to discuss how to operationalize the “Comprehensive Approach,” which is the guiding theme of the Army’s new Field Manual, FM 3-07 Stability Operations. Although I did not have formally prepared remarks, the following is an attempt to transcribe my messy handwritten speaker notes from my little brown book into something more concrete to share with the SWJ readership...

Continue reading "Operationalizing the Comprehensive Approach: The Military as “Enabler…”" »

Janine Davidson

The recent release of the Army’s latest Field Manual, FM 3-07 Stability Operations, has generated as much controversy as it has praise. On one side of the debate are those who see it as a great step forward in helping the military make sense of the complex, violent, and population-focused environments in which it increasingly finds itself. To the extent that our future conflicts are likely to look more like our current ones as Secretary Gates has asserted, it is high time we stopped muddling through and got serious about learning how to do this stuff. On the other end of the spectrum, however, are those who see the new doctrine as another dangerous step on the slippery slope toward U.S. imperialism. The better we become at nation building the critics claim, the more likely we are to try to do more of it. Moreover, teaching soldiers how to do stability operations not only erodes their war-fighting skills (i.e. their “real” mission), but it lets the civilian agencies who are supposed to do it off the hook in building their own capabilities and capacities. There are merits to both arguments, but on balance FM 3-07 should be seen as a great accomplishment.

Why FM 3-07?

It is perfectly understandable to hope that the military will conduct fewer stability operations in the future, but hoping does not make it so. The military still needs to prepare itself for the missions it will most likely be called on to perform. Given the thousands of troops over the last 200 years who have repeatedly been called to conduct these messy stability operations with little to no doctrine, education, or training, it seems high time someone put some rigorous effort into understanding how to conduct them better.

The concern over the U.S. as an imperialist power may be valid, but let’s not get carried away. Doctrine is not grand strategy. For those who worry that this new doctrine will make it more likely that we will try to invade and occupy more countries, consider that it might just have the opposite effect. If there is one thing this manual makes very clear, it is that stability operations are not rocket science – they are actually more complex and uncertain. Having a better understanding of the complexity and cost of these missions can only enhance the policy and strategy-making processes...

Continue reading "The New Army Stability Operations Manual: Fact, Fiction, and Perspective on FM 3-07 " »