How to Win: Village Stability Operations by Douglas A. Samuelson, Best Defense Book Review
A retired U.S. Army Special Forces officer offers a new perspective on the political debate raging over how to defeat terrorism: “They’re all wrong.” What we need, he contends, is a change in focus from conventional force, applied in support of national governments, to village stability operations (VSO), emphasizing developing local leadership and building from there.
Lt. Col. (ret.) Scott Mann should know. In his 22 years of service, he led VSOs in Iraq, Afghanistan, Colombia, Peru, and Ecuador. Leading U.S. experts labeled his accomplishments, and those by his Special Forces colleagues, as the “game changer” in Afghanistan in 2010-2012. In his new book, Game Changers: Going Local to Defeat Violent Extremists, he outlines the VSO approach in four steps…
Comments
Given the author (LTC Mann's) suggestion that we are engaged in war to defeat "violent extremists," it is important, I believe, to put these (violent extremists) -- yesterday and today -- into a proper strategic context. I will attempt to do this by comparing, in very general terms, these "violent extremist" folks (a) in the Old Cold War of yesterday and (b) in the New/Reverse Cold War of today.
I. Violent extremists, in the Old Cold War of yesterday, might have been viewed in the following strategic context:
a. An expansionist great power (the Soviets/the communists back then) bent on spreading its political, social and economic systems/models throughout the world; this, giving (logical) rise to both state and non-state actor resistance and, indeed, "extremist" groups -- all seeking to defend their preferred way of life, their preferred way of governance, etc.
b. Versus: A status quo great power (the U.S./the West back then) who, in sharp contrast, was committed to containing the spread of communism. Herein, often coming to the aid of/enlisting the support of the "resisting" state and non-state actor groups (noted above), and herein often working with the so-called "violent extremists;" all this, to achieve the strategic goal of "containment."
(One might suggest that the Soviets/the communists back then, by attempting the unenviable task of "world revolutionary change," had the proverbial crappy end of the strategic stick; while the Rest of the World, back then, had the much nicer [obstruction; containment] strategic handle to work with.)
II. In the New/Reverse Cold War of today, however, this strategic context has essentially been reversed; with such great nations as China, Russia and Iran, now, playing the "containment" role and coming to the aid of/enlisting the support of certain other "resisting" entities today. Thus, it is:
a. The U.S./the West today that is the entity seeking "world revolutionary change;" in this case, via the spread of our way of life, our way of governance, etc., throughout the world; this, giving (logical) rise to both state and non-state actor resistance and, indeed, "extremist" groups -- all seeking to defend their preferred way of life, their preferred way of governance, etc.
b. Re: our worldwide "expansionist" ambitions today, consider the following from our present State Department:
"Over the past quarter-century, a large number of nations have made a successful transition to democracy. Many more are at various stages of the transition. When historians write about U.S. foreign policy at the end of the 20th century, they will identify the growth of democracy--from 30 countries in 1974 to 117 today--as one of the United States' greatest legacies. The United States remains committed to expanding upon this legacy UNTIL ALL THE CITIZENS OF THE WORLD have the fundamental right to choose those who govern them through an ongoing civil process that includes free, fair, and transparent elections." (Emphasis added.)
http://www.state.gov/j/drl/democ/
c. Thus, to suggest that the U.S./the West sees "violent extremists" -- in the New/Reverse Cold War of today and re: our contemporary expansionist ambitions -- in much the same way that the Soviets/the communists saw "violent extremists" in the Old Cold War of yesterday and re: their expansionist designs back then. (In both cases, as standing directly in the "expansionist" nations way.)
(Note here that, in the New/Reverse Cold War of today, and with the U.S./the West now having embraced the unenviable "expansionist" mission, it appears that the U.S./the West now has the proverbial "crappy end" of the strategic stick. This, while the Rest of the World today appears to have the much nicer [obstruction; containment] end of the strategic stick to work with.)
Again, and as per my comment below, all this is background.
But you should be able to tell where this heading, re: VSO, etc., which I will attempt to handle in my next installment.
Bill...would disagree to a degree about militias not able to hold their own with regular NVA.....a lot of the Camp units would often and repeatedly engage NVA units and walk away winners.
The Mobile Strike Forces ie QRFs in each War Zone coupled with the National Mike Force B55 were often tasked to attack directly key areas held by regular NVA line units....and often beat up on even larger NVA units quite successfully where regular US Army units had not been previously been able to.
Why...it was interesting that our FACs could get literally anything flying to support our combat ops and most US Army artillery units would fire immediate missions for us as we controlled the fire clearances in our own AOs....and in the areas where the Army had major copter units copter CAS was available usually within minutes if needed thus a relatively small unit like mine could if need be bring massive firepower to bear within 15-20 minutes after starting a fire fight. If you were the RO for that op even as an advisor you more than often than not were also the fire control officer if engaged as well as a combat advisor/ground forces leader and it was not unusual for a SGT to be controlling artillery, heavy air strikes and copter CAS as well as medivac as well as talking to your FAC...all this now done by a AF JTAC...an interesting way to keep the AF in jobs BTW....
The key use though of the camp militias was really an intel one....picking up on the infiltrating NVA and mainline VC units in their respective AOs and passing that initial info to regular Army units as well as the SVN army as well as defending local villages in their AOs.This due to the fact that the camps formed a line of early warning camps along the border infiltration routes backed up by a second line directly behind the first line acting as a gap filler between the border camps and a tad deeper into SVN......making it hard for NVA and VC units to infiltrate and not be detected by any camp. The border camps were more or less the Fulda Gap speed bumps of SVN.
Spent time in one border camp where the average incoming count stopped at 1000 rounds per day as it was to boring to count after 1000...all rounds being fired at us out of Cambodia...and yes one learns to even sleep through a 24 X 7 shelling attack.
In the Easter invasion and the final NVA 1975 invasion they were facing major NVA armor units and heavy artillery units with virtually no weaponry that could handle the threat...AND not often mentioned was the serious lack of munitions due to Congress cutting off funding and slowing down the supply of urgently needed munitions of all types after the Easter invasion attempt.
Many do not remember that the NVA both times attacked using in excess of 300-400K troops and many do not remember that at the height of say 1970 the NVA was fielding roughly 500K actual combat troops whereas our 500K consisted largely of supply and support with the actual combat troop numbers being in 90K-125K actual fighters the rest "tail"..
Example...in 1970 I saw 1st Cav companies in III Corp in the 60-70 manning range with a company commander at say 1st Lt if they were lucky..CPTs were rare even saw once a BN commanded by a senior CPT.
But that is another story altogether.....
Outlaw,
I think there were a lot of reasons this program has failed to date, and arguably despite the greater successes of the CIDG program it also failed ultimately because a village militia was never intended nor capable of defeating NV regulars.
I agree that toxic ideology has impacted every military organization to varying degrees. Another difference and serious problem today compared to your days in Vietnam is the degree of micro-management due to information technology (they have the means to micromanage), too many officers in the decision chain, and to some extent a culture of risk aversion (creates a feedback loop that links into micromanagement). This doesn't bode well for success in what should be a decentralized operation.
At the tactical level, there several VSO successes, not just the one you mention, which actually may have been a failure if the team's approach was to support one village fight another, when the strategy was to unite the villages to stand against the Taliban. I don't know what happened, but I know what the team leader wrote. If true, then in street terms, they got played by the locals and tried to spin it into a success.
The successful distributed logistics that supported these operations across a large part of Afghanistan is another story that needs to be told. There were some failures there, but they were bureaucratic failures, versus tactical failures. Teams would make deals, promise weapons as an example, based on the guidance they received, then someone in the rear would second guess them, not deliver the weapons, and basically undercut any credibility they had. That crap happens, it isn't right, but it always has throughout military history to varying degrees.
The large issues that led to less than stellar outcomes was the program wasn't nested with the overall strategy (which was deeply flawed). Although they tried to get the Afghan government to take ownership, they failed to do so for a lot of reasons, not the least being the means to do so. Corruption also played a big role, the security forces in some cases that were supposed to protect the people, were exploiting the people, simply making it easier for the Taliban. It seemed that the VSO program success was largely tied to a large and effective U.S. logistics system and U.S. firepower (as you said several times, the American with the radio had credibility with your indigenous partners in Vietnam, because you could direct U.S. airpower or artillery on the enemy). Once you take that away what do you have left? I don't think the intent was the pull rug out from under the Afghan people, but since we did . . . .
The villages were rarely going to be powerful enough to stand up to a large Taliban force on their own. The Taliban were never defeated militarily (meaning reduced to the point they couldn't execute a war of movement), so winning over the population was not decisive at this point. Failure to address the military versus subversive threat across the border and pretending we could win by simply winning hearts and minds was absurd. There is a place for it, but in this case it is almost equivalent to saying if we won the hearts and minds of the French in France, we would have prevented the Nazis from the conquering France (O.K., an exaggeration, but you get my point). That doesn't mean I don't think winning over the population is critical for a long term political success, but it is not enough. In other words, it never was the center of gravity at this phase of the conflict.
There are a lot of other issues most are familiar with, starting with illegitimate government, lack of a national identity, a U.S. conventional force mentality to dealing with the Afghan people, yet a failure to employ that combat power across the border against Taliban strongholds (I know the reasons why). In the earlier phases of the war putting SF up on the border, and conventional forces in the population areas (a disaster waiting to happen), etc.
We should take Scott Mann's lessons to heart, they are valuable, but we also should consider how they fit to the larger strategic context. How should have everything been aligned from the top to tactical end of the spear to make this work? The successes were tactical, and the SF teams have a right to be proud and should share those lessons. The failures were operational and strategic, and we need to learn from those also.
Here is the core problem and it has been seen in AFG with VSO but not loudly talked about even inside Special Forces and to a degree explains why the SF CIDG program in Vietnam was far more successful than that similar program in AFG.
To make the CIDG program work...we were under the CIA and COORDs and that gave the program a certain amount of flexibility and adaptability that has been missing since then with the exception of one ODA in AFG that went native and got some of them tossed out of SF BUT at the same time they were highly successful in their operational area and that is all that counts in a guerrilla war.
Here is another key success point...every ODA member was empowered to make it work down to the young unexperienced SP/4....if you worn the Green Beret you were empowered....and nothing else mattered and the higher SF Commands did not get into your business at the camp levels...they actually did everything possible to make you successful down to providing supplies and equipment that "where not quite legal in their acquisition"....
Example...as a young SGT leading a Cambodian recon company I could if I was tracking a NVA or mainline VC unit....I could decide to engage and or simply fade away, report their movements and survive to fight another day....does the current SF have that ability..not so sure.
The current US Army Special Forces is far to politically correct to run VSO and or any program similar to the CIDG program as it takes a Special Forces that is totally grounded in guerrilla warfare and willing to be politically incorrect as the success of the program is what counts not how you dress in a combat zone and or many of the other small/large things that make the difference when you are driving a VSO style program.
AND here is the kicker.....the current SF structure is officer top heavy and tends to micromanagement which will kill any VSO concept trying to be implemented by ODAs in the field that are a long way from the "flag pole".....and living among the "natives" trying to build trust.
While we have a few VSO successes to analyze it does not match the total overall complete success of the CIDG program in Vietnam which in the end transitioned over 80,000 well trained and reasonably well led Vietnamese/Cambodian CIDG units into both the SVN RF/PF and the SVN Rangers and who fought exceptionally well in the eastern NVA invasion and fought extremely well in the 1975 invasion until rolled over by a far superior in manpower/arms NVA..
I remember the intense VSO debate that broke out here in SWJ back when the program was first written about if my memory is correct in about the 2009 timeframe by a ODA team leader headed to AFG who firmly believed it was the way forward...heck he took so many bullets for the idea and it was not pretty with a majority critiquing it and saying it would not work.
Now we see this article which claims it is the next best thing to sliced bread.
The proven/successful CIDG program has always been the way forward and it was out there to be analyzed and modified but the world of COIN simply ignored it until it way to late to even attempt in a way to field test it in Iraq and or AFG.
I. Let's start where we need to start here:
a. The goal of the Soviets/the communists -- when they were doing "expansion" back-in-the-day -- was to transform outlying states and societies more along communist political, economic and social lines.
b. The goal of the U.S./the West -- when we are doing "expansion" today -- is to transform outlying states and societies more along modern western political, economic and social lines.
Re: these such "expansionist" endeavors (those of the Soviets/the communists back then and those of the U.S./the West today), these great powers encountered both state and non-state actors that did not wish to be so "transformed;" neither by the Soviets/the communists back-in-the-day nor by U.S./the West today.
It is within this context (folks who do not want to be "transformed" more along the alien and profane lines of either communism or westernism and, specifically, the non-state actor such folks) that we find, shall we say, the "violent extremists."
II. Having gotten this important background before us, now to consider -- within this specific context -- LTC Scott Mann's new book "Game Changers: Going Local to Defeat Violent Extremists;" wherein, LTC Mann suggests methods that we might use to
a. Overcome these "resisting transformation" violent extremists and to
b. Achieve -- in spite of such resistance -- our goal of transforming these outlying states and societies more along modern western political, economic and social lines.
III. In this regard, note that LTC Mann immediately acknowledges the "asymmetric" nature of these wars. Thus:
a. The much more powerful U.S./the West fighting only a "limited war" for "limited ends" (to wit: a war to transform "the other" more along our own political, economic and social lines). And, thus, a war that the U.S./the West must find an economical way to pursue. (As per LTC Mann, this such economical method is via Village Stability Operations/FID?) Whereas, and as LTC Mann also points out,
b. For our much weaker opponents -- to wit: the "resisting transformation" violent extremists (for whom a better "narrative," "terrorism" and adaptability may be his only effective weapons?) -- this is, indeed, a "total war;" a war for all the marbles. (To wit: a war to defend and retain his ancestral and preferred way life, his ancestral and preferred way of governance and his ancestral and preferred values, attitudes and beliefs.)
IV. That (see "a" and "b" immediately above) is, in fact, (a) what these fights are all about and, thus, (b) the criteria by which we should evaluate LTC Mann's recommendations?
More to follow.