In 2001, I sat in a conf room at NATO HQ in Sarajevo. My boss was trying to convince the Serbs of the joys and benefits of joining the Bosnian Army. His tool was a power point presentation. This presentation was a work of art. It had motion, colors, arrows, timelines, phases. The logic was flawless and it was delivered with passion. The senior Serbian officer in the room let my boss rant, then in a bored voice said, "Colonel, you have made a nice presentation here. The colors are very pretty. But, we will never do this." My boss was struck dumb. He could not believe this. His logic and power point went over like a lead balloon. What he had failed to realize is that war is a complex human activity that by it's vary nature defies normal logic. The Serbs would not work with Croats and Muslims because they hated them. That was the only logic that mattered.

A few weeks ago, I was sent a power point presentation on the "Dynamic Planning for COIN in Afghanistan". I looked at it briefly, but thought that it was some kind of joke; so, I flushed it immediately. However, I received it from another source. So, it appears the joke is on me...

Read the rest at the COIN Center blog.

You may wonder how Thomas Gukeisen made it to lieutenant colonel, and by age 39 at that. He breaks Army rules and operates by his own rendition of counterinsurgency warfare whose arsenal includes Afghan poetry, chaos theory and the thoughts of a 17th-century English philosopher. A towering, rough-and-ready 205-pounder (man weighing 92-kilograms), the officer from Carthage, New York, peppers his sentences with unprintables and reads Karl von Clausewitz's classic on war in the original German. The high-ups seem to like what they see. Gen. David H. Petraeus, who commands U.S. forces in both Afghanistan and Iraq, has visited his sector, as have Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and U.S. Ambassador Karl W. Eikenberry. Substantial resources have flowed into Gukeisen's hands, including $850,000 in small bills for such jobs as building schools and putting carpets in the mosques of Afghans who turn against the Taliban.

Col. David B. Haight, Gukeisen's superior, calls him one of the brightest officers he has met. Gukeisen wages his war across 620 restive, rugged square miles (1,000 kilometers) of Logar, a strategically important province bordering Kabul where he has implemented what he calls an "extreme makeover." Rather than rigidly applying the current mantra "Clear, Hold, Build" he has held back from trying to clear large, Taliban-influenced swaths of territory, focusing instead on areas he believes are ripe for change, and then injecting aid where it counts most. Combat, he says, is driven by reliable intelligence and limited to eradicating Taliban fighters...

More at The Taiwan News.

As President Obama and his advisers planned their new approach to the Afghan war, the quality of Afghanistan's security forces received unprecedented scrutiny, and rightly so. Far less attention, however, has been paid to the quality of American troops there. Of course, American forces don't demand bribes from civilians at gunpoint or go absent for days, as Afghans have often done. But they face serious issues of their own, demanding prompt action. The American corporals and privates who traverse the Afghan countryside today are not at issue. They risk life and limb every day, with little self-pity. Despite the strains of successive combat deployments, they keep re-enlisting at high rates. The problems lie, rather, in the leadership ranks.

Although many Army and Marine officers in Afghanistan are performing well, a significant portion are not demonstrating the vital leadership attributes of creativity, flexibility and initiative. In 2008, to better pinpoint these deficits, I surveyed 131 Army and Marine officers who had served in counterinsurgency operations in Iraq or Afghanistan or both, asking them each 42 questions about leadership in their services. The results were striking. Many respondents said that field commanders relied too much on methods that worked in another place at another time but often did not work well now. Officers at higher levels are stifling the initiative of junior officers through micromanagement and policies to reduce risk...

More at The New York Times.

Adm. Mike Mullen, the personification of American military power, is walking the streets of this dusty village in Paktika province when the deferential deputy governor, Qadir Gul Zadran, tells him: "We hope you stay here forever." Sorry, responds the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but that's not going to happen. America is sending more troops to help boost security in places such as this Pashtun village south of Kabul, but they will begin leaving in 18 months. Asked later whether he had any worries about the new Afghanistan strategy, Mullen answers: "It's just the clock. Can we move as fast as we need to move?"

That ticking clock was Mullen's consistent companion as he traveled across Afghanistan last week to review implementation of President Obama's decision to send 30,000 more troops. He visited a half-dozen military outposts and at each stop repeated the same message: The new strategy can work, but the challenge is huge and the time is short. Traveling with Mullen, I had a chance to see up close the opportunities and pitfalls of Obama's decision for a short-term escalation. The strongest impression was that the administration's plan to begin transferring responsibility to the Afghan army and police in July 2011 is overly optimistic. If all goes well, the Afghan security forces will be stronger by then, but they will still need a lot of American help...

More at The Washington Post.

Volume I - American Perspectives, edited by Chief Warrant Officer-4 Timothy S. McWilliams and Lieutenant Colonel Kurtis P. Wheeler.

Volume II: Iraqi Perspectives, edited by Colonel Gary W. Montgomery and Chief Warrant Officer-4 Timothy S. McWilliams.

Topics include:

1) When the counterinsurgent becomes the insurgent,

2) Is it still worth selling weapons to Taiwan?

When the counterinsurgent becomes the insurgent

Last week I wondered whether U.S. and Afghan forces would mount an organized campaign targeting the Taliban's "shadow government" inside Afghanistan. According to a Dec. 16 Los Angeles Times article, the answer is "yes." The article reports that U.S. special operations teams conducted 90 direct action raids in Afghanistan in November compared to 20 raids in May. General Stanley McChrystal is clearly not waiting for 30,000 additional U.S. soldiers to arrive to begin the U.S. counterattack against the Taliban.

Before he was selected to command in Afghanistan, McChrystal spent many years commanding the secretive Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), the U.S. military unit that specializes in the most challenging direct action raids. McChrystal personally directed JSOC operations in Iraq. While it remains a subject of debate, many credit McChrystal's teams with a significant portion of the reduction of violence in Iraq.

It appears that McChrystal is directing a similar campaign in Afghanistan, at least while he waits for the reinforcements required to protect some of Afghanistan's cities. According to the Times article, the Taliban's mid-ranking leadership is the target of McChrystal's raiders. The intent is to leave the bottom-rung Taliban foot soldiers leaderless and susceptible to offers of reintegration.

Many analysts have noted the irony of the U.S. government's long involvement in Afghanistan. During the Soviet occupation in the 1980s, Michael Vickers, then a young CIA operations officer, helped design and implement a classic unconventional warfare campaign, assisting indigenous Afghan forces to resist the Soviet army and overthrow the Moscow-backed government in Kabul. Today Vickers is assistant secretary of defense for special operation/low intensity conflict implementing a massive security assistance program to build up Afghanistan's forces -- the mirror image of his duties two decades ago.

The current situation actually requires more than just counterinsurgency and assistance for Afghanistan's security forces. Today there are two governments in Afghanistan; the Karzai government, deemed to be the legitimate power, and the Taliban shadow government, deemed to be illegitimate. U.S. and Afghan forces must simultaneously conduct a security assistance effort supporting the Karzai government and an unconventional warfare campaign attacking the Taliban shadow government.

McChrystal seems to be kicking off his campaign with some plays out of the JSOC playbook he used in Iraq. But the game in Afghanistan will be tougher. The Taliban can always fall back on its sanctuary in Pakistan, and its top-ranking leaders in Quetta and North Waziristan remain untouchable. It also has a well-demonstrated ability to replace its losses, even in its leadership ranks. Vickers's war in the 1980s and McChrystal's battles on the streets of Iraq were not easy. But when compared to today's multi-level war in Afghanistan, they seem simple.

Is it still worth selling weapons to Taiwan?

On Dec. 15 the New York Times reported that the U.S. government will proceed with a weapon sales deal to Taiwan. Neither government has yet disclosed which weapon systems will be in the transaction. Many of the systems in the deal are from a list approved in April 2001 but not delivered due to long-running political disputes inside Taiwan. Among the most contentious items is the Taiwan government's request for 66 late-model F-16 fighter jets. In 2008 the U.S. government cancelled this request after the Chinese government strongly objected.

If the U.S. and Taiwanese governments are still working off a 2001 shopping list, they should rip up that list and rethink Taiwan's defense requirements based on more current assessments. China's surface-to-surface ballistic missile inventory has expanded dramatically this decade and has completely changed Taiwan's defense calculus. Eight years ago Taiwan's defense planners were contemplating a conventional force-on-force defense against a hypothetical Chinese attack. Today, China's ability to use its superiority in missiles and air power to overwhelm Taiwan's air force and air defenses means that Taiwan must fashion a new doctrine to avoid China's advantages.

Earlier this year the RAND Corp. released a report on the Taiwan-China military balance, concluding that China's missile forces would be able to close Taiwan's air bases and cripple its air defense systems. Taiwan's remaining air power would then be vulnerable to destruction before U.S. military forces could intervene in the conflict. In the RAND study, Taiwan's ground and naval forces, devoid of air support, would then have to cope as best as they could with a possible Chinese amphibious assault on the island.

RAND's research indicates two courses of action for Taiwan. The first course is a very expensive upgrade in its missile and air defense systems. Without such defenses, conventional aircraft such as the F-16 would not survive the opening of a conflict and would thus have little utility to Taiwan. The second course is for Taiwan to adopt a dispersed and relatively low-technology irregular warfare strategy to defend the island. With this course, F-16s would play no part. Whether Taiwanese society is ready for a "guerrilla" defense of the island remains open for debate.

Given the inexorable growth of Chinese military power directed at Taiwan and the growing importance of the U.S.-China relationship, shouldn't the U.S. simply abandon arms sales to Taiwan? Taiwan unification is a supremely important issue to China and U.S. arms sales to Taiwan are guaranteed to fracture the U.S.-China relationship. Shouldn't United States policy put the priority on its relationship with Beijing?

The U.S.-China relationship has likely become the most important bilateral relationship in the world, and its importance will only grow in the years ahead. However, the United States maintains a strong interest in Taiwan's defense. The establishment of Chinese air and naval bases on Taiwan -- and the corresponding ability to project military power deep into the western Pacific --- would be a severe geostrategic setback for the U.S. and its allies in the region. China is very likely to establish this position eventually. But the U.S. should try to resist it for as long as possible. Thus arms sales to Taiwan -- that avoid China's strengths -- should continue.

Our many thanks to Routledge's Taylor and Francis Group for providing free access to our Small Wars Journal community of interest and practice.

Lieutenant Commander Benjamin "BJ" Armstrong, a dear SWJ friend, is a Naval Aviator who has served as an Amphibious Search and Rescue and Special Warfare Pilot and an Advanced Helicopter Flight Instructor. He holds a MA in Military History from Norwich University and has written on air power and naval history. His articles and reviews have appeared in numerous journals including The Journal of Military History, Strategic Insights, Small Wars Journal and Air and Space Power Journal's Chronicles Online.

Here is an excerpt:

Over the past century, the strategic implications of aviation have played an important role in themodernization ofmilitary strategy.Development of strategic air planning has

accelerated with the constant improvement in technology and weapon systems. However, the majority of that development has been in search of the best way to fight the next big war, a conflict between nation-states, each having a certain level of technological capability. As Western militaries continue to search for old and new ways of countering insurgent forces and conducting small war operations, all aspects of the armed forces are being addressed. There has been a great deal of debate in military aviation over the proper role that air power can play in small wars and counter-terrorist operations.These debates have generally centered on the role of high technology, fixedwing aircraft in an attempt to use the bombers and fighters designed to fight the "big war" to help win "small wars".

This focus loses sight of an aircraft type that has served as a central player in the conduct of small wars and counter-insurgency since nearly its first flight -- the helicopter. Using modern technology and adaptive tactics, the helicopter provides a platform able to conduct strategic strike missions on the smaller scale that is required in small wars.After the success of the GulfWar air campaign, the principles of "effectsbased targeting" began to be applied beyond the realm of high-performance bomber and ground attack aircraft. Leadership targeting developed as an outgrowth of these ideas. Such missions required several key elements to be successful. These include: proper intelligence, proper strategic planning and the use of the proper weapon system. The helicopter can fulfill two of the three pillars required for successful engagement of strategic targets from the air by providing organic, real-time intelligence and targeting information and a precision strike capability. All this is achieved with a smaller infrastructure footprint than strategic bombers and reduced chances of collateral damage...

Precision Approaches: Leadership Targeting and the Helicopter as a Strategic Strike Asset in Small Wars.

Defying all expectations, the United States has avoided another serious domestic terrorist attack since 2001. Part of the credit for this success may be due to good cooperation between the FBI and Muslim community organizations inside the U.S. But a recent string of "self-radicalization" terror cases has put pressure on these relationships. FBI field agents and managers are under pressure to prevent another attack. According to the New York Times article there is a debate within the FBI about how it should manage its relationships with the U.S. Muslim community:

It also attests to differing views within the bureau about the effectiveness of community outreach, said Michael Rolince, a former director of counterterrorism in the F.B.I.'s Washington field office. Some factions within the agency, he said, have always been leery of Islamic and Arab-American organizations, considering their loyalties to be divided ... But by most accounts, the unraveling of ties between the F.B.I. and Muslim-Americans began two years ago, with the F.B.I.'s decision to stop sharing information with the nation's most prominent Muslim civil rights organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The F.B.I. said it was motivated by council executives' failure to answer questions about links with the Palestinian militant group Hamas. The executives denied any such connection, and accused the F.B.I. of staining the council's reputation without due process.

The FBI is caught in a vise. It will get the blame if there is another spectacular attack and is responding by putting more pressure on its contacts with U.S. Muslim groups. Those groups increasingly don't like the pressure and are pushing back.

In the second story, the game of spy-versus-spy is back, this time on the U.S.-Mexican border. The U.S. Customs Service attempts to infiltrate Mexico's drug cartels. But the drug cartels have their own spies embedded inside U.S. law enforcement agencies:

James Tomsheck, the assistant commissioner for internal affairs at Customs and Border Protection, and other investigators said they had seen many signs that the drug organizations were making a concerted effort to infiltrate the ranks.

"We are very concerned," Mr. Tomsheck said. "There have been verifiable instances where people were directed to C.B.P. to apply for positions only for the purpose of enhancing the goals of criminal organizations. They had been selected because they had no criminal record; a background investigation would not develop derogatory information."

I recommend reading both articles.

The legislation authorizing post-Sept. 11 intelligence reform -- the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 -- was signed into law five years ago this week. We are often asked whether the new organizations, authorities and additional resources have made a difference. The answer is yes.

To be clear, the task of reinventing our intelligence structure and integrating the capabilities, cultures and information technologies of 16 diverse intelligence agencies is massive, and it is incomplete. Problems persist in our technologies, business practices and mind-sets. I have no illusions about how challenging they will be to overcome. But there is an ocean of difference between difficult and impossible.

While many successes must remain classified, there are things the public can and should know about changes that have been made and how we are directing our efforts and America's resources...

More at The Washington Post.

Dennis C. Blair is the third and current Director of National Intelligence and a retired United States Navy four-star admiral.

The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) released today two important working papers as part of its ongoing work on the future of the U.S. military, which focuses on improving capabilities to confront future threats to our national security.

Contractors in Conflicts: Adapting to a New Reality, authored by CNAS President John Nagl and Senior Fellow Richard Fontaine, examines the problems exposed by the increasing reliance on private contractors in theater - including insufficient oversight, inadequate integration into operational planning, and ambiguous legal status - and its implications for successful military operations. In order for the United States to adapt to the key role that contractors will play in future hostilities -- the authors note -- the government must establish new policies and rules of the road.

This working paper is part of an ongoing CNAS project on Contracting in Conflicts and will culminate in a major capstone report released next year.

Time for Action: Redefining SOF Missions and Activities, authored by CNAS contributor Michele Malvesti, is derived from a larger study that will be published in spring 2010. In Time for Action, Malvesti - who served more than five years on the National Security Council staff, most recently as the Senior Director for Combating Terrorism Strategy - explores current organizational issues facing U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) and offers recommendations for how to optimize SOF for success.

"By integrating and synchronizing activities as a united whole, the Special Operations community will be better positioned to disrupt and defeat threats and shape and enable environments in a world where SOF are increasingly relevant and in high demand," writes Malvesti.