Journal

While we pay lip service to ‘partnership’, the US military is still used to being the dominant player. This  ‘reality’ is changing. 

This essay seeks to de-literalize the word strategy—theorizing that its meaning has been morphologically displaced from an ancient Greek wartime phenomenon. 

At present, for every US Soldier there is at least one 20-foot container of equipment in Afghanistan; a quantity that cannot be overemphasized as our military begins to face the challenges of retrograde in earnest.

Despite the media hype, the Druze and Alawi communities are not likely to seek rule of minority cantons in the south or west of the country, while the Kurds are likely to retain de facto control over the northwest of Syria.

Part One of this series covered conflicts in Asia that the U.S. military must consider as it turns its focus toward the future. Part Two will investigate two conflicts in the Middle East.

While impressive on paper, in practice the NSR is a hollow concept that will not translate into any substantial economic benefits for Central Asians, Afghans, or Pakistanis.

Conventional and cyber conflict diffusion diverge on two points:  third-party intervention (escalation) and collateral damage (pathogen).  The findings raise questions regarding state neutrality, non-state actors, and authenticating attackers.

Beware the lure of "credibility."

Counterinsurgency is often a small-unit battle, with company-sized elements requiring organic intelligence capabilities to leverage information into tactical success.

Building a culture that accepts risk requires frank discussion about what words mean and how they translate into action. The Battle of Bunker Hill provides excellent fodder for any leader seeking to develop that shared understanding.

Today SOF are being asked to do more than ever before and with increasingly vague and hubristic-sounding missions and concepts. New paradigms are needed.

A lesson for today’s Army and the next twenty years.

If critical issues are not dealt with prior to 2014, they most likely will result in Afghanistan’s returning to a state of civil war or a highly dysfunctional state.

For the U.S. military to restructure and prepare for the future it must look at large formal armies that are currently using proxies to engage in small conflicts that enforce a larger agenda.

The Eid statements demonstrate an increasing sophistication in strategic messaging and understanding of international politics.

Sequestration is a once in a generation opportunity to address the changes needed to take the US military to the next level of capability. 

As contemporary North African societies continue to re-arrange themselves , one of the enduring dilemmas that continues to rise to the fore is what has been described as “the Tuareg question."

A PME training module on chess is good for the U.S. military, provides the U.S. military workforce with diverse and transferable skill-sets.

Our doctrine overlooks the essence of war as a human enterprise.  This article explores how to rectify this within the context of supporting the evolution of the U.S. military towards Joint Force 2020.

In civil wars like Syria’s, strength is not necessarily a product of popularity; often strength actually produces popularity because compliance is more important than winning hearts and minds.

A national standard from which to identify individuals who have left these footprints and are on the path to becoming violent would be invaluable to law enforcement, especially at the local level.

Comparing the final days of the Communist Regime in Afghanistan with America’s drawdown.

Together the tribe bears the burdens of war, while the American Soldier reflects in solitude, wondering who he truly is and how he can ever belong.

Shared sacrifice often leads to innovative solutions that make operations more efficient.   This requires openness to bottom-up communication.

The outcome of the fighting in this part of the country will greatly influence the outcome of the whole conflict.

Some of the major “lessons learned” by ISAF while conducting Counterinsurgency and Stability Operations in Afghanistan

The difference between intelligence and information is analysis.

If the Joint Chiefs only learned about the withdrawal scheme a mere few hours before the State of the Union was given, then it is appropriate to question whether the state of civil-military relations is as strong as it should be.

Integrating strategic foresight tools into Joint Professional Military Education curricula will help develop an appreciation for the nonlinearity, complexity, and uncertainty of the global environment.

Twelve academics at the American University of Cairo admit that the events of 2011, now called the Arab Spring, caught them unprepared

Does “the infantryman’s half kilometer” continue to have utility in an all-purpose service rifle in modern conflict?

The Army has an unfortunate tradition of considering insurgent conflict a sideshow effort and relegating the study of insurgencies to the fringes of military science. The Philippines campaign is a prime example.

The threat exists and continues to operate. But more importantly we must understand that it is waging unconventional warfare and only using terrorism as one of the means of its strategy.

The failure to understand and appreciate the religious dimension of political action is not without consequence.

In the book’s final chapter, Kaplan warns America’s pivot to Asia may overlook its greatest foreign policy opportunity: building an enduring partnership with Mexico to safeguard our most vulnerable flank.

Enabling our partners to conduct their own IO. There is no other way to get the message across the cultural divide.

Rebuilding our special reconaissance capability.

Building a unified foreign policy establishment.

American leaders secured victory by reviewing the strategy and making corrections.  Conversely, Tripolitan leaders placed their faith in a comfortable, outdated strategy.

Cann’s book is very much a must read, especially considering the painfully limited Anglophone literature on the Portuguese Overseas War.

While not democracy in the American image, the Arab Spring has the potential to bring Islamists into conflict with jihadists.

The Battle of Chancellorsville ended 150 years ago this week. It still holds lessons for us.

Why acronyms are ruining shared military understanding.

Syria is already in crisis but the death or departure of President Bashar al-Asad is likely to intensify violence and destruction in the country, not quell it.

Combating the marijuana cartels on America’s public lands.

A Q&A with Kirk Sowell of Inside Iraqi Politics.

 

The pressures on Yemen are centrifugal rather than centripetal, by which the power of the center is weakened to the benefit of poles of regional power. These centrifugal forces could make it difficult to recreate a central state that can reach across the country

Bringing time into the assessment of counterinsurgency warfare.

This article reviews nine key insights into social banditry originally described by Eric Hobsbawm and examines their applicability regarding Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel. Because some of Mexico’s organized crime leaders aim to be viewed as social bandits, and visit Guatemala and the Mexico-Guatemala border region to evade authorities, the article focuses on particularities of those culture zones in the potential application of three primary strategies of information operations to contest a social bandit’s prestige: emphasizing distance between the social bandit and the local poor, portraying collusion of the social bandit with local authorities and opposition to federal authorities, and emphasizing closeness between federal power and the local poor. A criminal organization leader who desires the prestige of social banditry would have cause to oppose each strategy. The analysis predicts that the first two strategies are more realistic, potentially more important strategically, and are more likely to become intensely contested through Information Operations, within culture areas of Guatemala and the Mexico-Guatemala border region.

Why is this new age an age of instability—instead of an age of empires, or warring states, or even peace and prosperity?