The Defense of Jisr al-Doreaa
reviewed by Nick M. Masellis
Small Wars Journal
From Nightmares to Dreams (Full PDF Article)
While some have called the U.S. involvement in Iraq a nightmare, the authors of The Defense of Jisr al Doreaa used a series of dreams to discuss the adaptation of counterinsurgency in today's conflict environment. The book particularly exemplifies the lack of such thought in 2003, as well as consistent gaps in unit combat readiness that preside today. The book immediately brought back a personal account of the former, and encapsulates the latter.
Stowing all of the battle-worn rucksacks and bulky weapons on the commercial flight, there was a sense of disbelief that we were finally heading home. I turned to a couple of my friends and said, "what would you do if you took a nap on this flight, woke up, and realized that you were just arriving to Iraq -- that the whole past year was just a dream?" I received laughter and mixed responses of who would jump out of the plane first. Only after reading The Defense of Jisr al-Doreaa do I realize that I wish that I would have had such dreams before serving my time in Iraq, where only persistent nightmares prevailed.
This captivating book brings to light the intricacies and imbroglios of counterinsurgency warfare for the tactical leader and soldiers on the ground. The authors, Army majors Michael Burgoyne and Albert Marckwardt, served tours in Iraq, observing the situation as it evolved from the dreams that they portray throughout their book. This novella is a contemporary reinterpretation of E.D. Swinton's account of the Boer War, a counterinsurgency campaign fought by the British in South Africa. In that account, Swinton describes the situation in a version of a dream in a tale called The Defense of Duffer's Drift, which has been long taught to infantrymen in learning the fundamentals of small unit tactics (Swinton's original work is included in the second half of the book).
About the Author(s)
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Jumping Dimensions
Some cultures regard dreams as arrows being shot forth from the soul, others regard dreams as arrows coming into the soul. Perhaps from the perspective of counterinsurgency, they are best regarded as both incoming and outgoing rounds. In this manner and from the perspective of dreaming, the value of intuition and instinct and hunches and imagination are given more leeway and credibility and are allowed to flow and manifest. It coincides nicely with the COIN tenet that leadership and talent is not restricted to rank alone. Just prior to the battle of the Little Big Horn, Sitting Bull had a vision of soldiers falling dead into the Indian camp. As such, he did not engage with the 7th Cav when they came calling. He was a senior field commander but he simply was not needed. I doubt the actual tactical response of the Indians was in any way altered by Sitting Bull's dream but other, atypical dynamics unfolded. For one thing, the Indians counted very little coup during this battle. Crazy Horse rode back in forth between his men and the 7th unscathed, reinforcing the dream and pumping up the adrenalin of his men. It is reported by some Indian participants that Gall, another senior leader, did very little shooting - the enemy was already dead, falling into camp, the dream was reality that had already happened.
We are not conditioned and acculturated to make the jump, to transcend from the perception of 'dreams' as anything other than wishful thinking and hope and faith to the assertion that they are reality simply waiting to manifest in the material world. The above referenced book I would suppose follows a conventional cause and affect plot where hindsight is more than 20/20, especially when lives have been lost. The shock and awe of a high tech, linear, cause and affect culture penetrating what is essentially a circular society has given us considerable pause for thought and adaptation. The above synopsis seems a guide then for metamorphosis, to make the jump from assumption to conviction of belief which will manifest in the material world. Its a tough jump to make because the average man tends to look askance at mysticism and particle physics and 4 dimensional thinking. Patton had no problem making the jump - he had already fought on some of the ground he was again taking, his 'dream had already happened and was reality. There are good indicators that our linear line having penetrated the Iraqi circle is morphing into a circle itself and some good things continue to happen because of it.