Relations between the top United States general in Iraq and Nouri al-Maliki, the country's prime minister, are so bad that the Iraqi leader made a direct appeal for his removal to President George W Bush.

Although the call was rejected, aides to both men admit that Mr Maliki and Gen David Petraeus engage in frequent stand-up shouting matches, differing particularly over the US general's moves to arm Sunni tribesmen to fight al-Qa'eda.

One Iraqi source said Mr Maliki used a video conference with Mr Bush to call for the general's signature strategy to be scrapped. "He told Bush that if Petraeus continues, he would arm Shia militias," said the official. "Bush told Maliki to calm down."

At another meeting with Gen Petraeus, Mr Maliki said: "I can't deal with you any more. I will ask for someone else to replace you."

One problem - the events as reported in the Telegraph never happened. This from COL Steve Boylan, MNF-I CG Public Affairs Officer, in an e-mail he sent earlier today to McElroy:

Gen Petraeus and the Prime Minister have never had a stand-up shouting match, and only once has Gen Petraeus even raised his voice. This is a totally fabricated story, and you should have sought a comment from me, at the least to validate the information from your so-called aides as sources.

Gen Petraeus has never stated or even hinted at a "stormy relationship." Saying that they do not pull punches is very different from stormy. That means they have very frank, open and perhaps direct conversations based on what is at stake here and what is needed and should be expected from both.

I formally request that the record be corrected! Gen Petraeus and other key staff have sat in on every video teleconference with PM Maliki and President Bush and never has this been even hinted at. In addition, PM Maliki has never said what is quoted here to Gen Petraeus.

This must be corrected immediately and if your sources are not —to go on the record has I have here, then there must be something wrong with the sources.

Update: 28 July Los Angeles Times - Baghdad, Top U.S. Commander Downplay Reported Tensions by Molly Hennessy-Fiske.

U.S. and Iraqi officials acknowledged today that differences existed between Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and the top U.S. commander but denied that the Iraqi leader wanted Gen. David H. Petraeus removed.

"They are working together, even if there are differences," said Sami Askari, one of the prime minister's aides and a member of his Shiite Dawa Party...

News reports Friday quoted a Shiite politician who is close to Maliki and affiliated with anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada Sadr as saying that Maliki had told Petraeus he couldn't work with him and wanted him replaced.

"I don't know where that is coming from," Petraeus said. "He and I have truly had frank conversations, but he has never yelled or stood up" from the table. "This is really, really hard stuff, and occasionally people agree to disagree."...

Update 2: Hat Tip PrairiePundit (Merv Benson) - Paper Backs Off Maliki-Petraeus Row

I think they are admitting that the earlier report was based on a rumor.

General Petraeus Rebuts Iraq Row Claim - London Daily Telegraph (Damien McElroy)

America's top general in Iraq yesterday quashed reports of a breakdown in his relationship with Iraq's prime minister over American support for Sunni Muslim fighters battling al-Qa'eda.

General David Petraeus poured scorn on a claim by an Iraqi politician that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki requested his dismissal after bitter rows. "I don't know where that is coming from," Gen Petraeus said. "He and I have truly had frank conversations but he has never yelled or stood up. This is really, really hard stuff, and occasionally people agree to disagree."

Col Boylan said Mr Maliki had embraced the policy but dissidents were trying to throw "sand in the gearbox" with claims the two were at loggerheads.

While exchanges between the two had been "direct," the discussions fell a long way short of Mr Maliki telling Gen Petraeus he could no longer work with him.

More:

U.S. Denies Petraeus has Poor Ties with Iraq PM - Reuters (Ross Colvin)

Heat Rises Between Iraq PM and Petraeus - AP (Steven Hurst and Qassim Abdul Zahra)

A Bogus Story (Updated) - American Thinker (John Dwyer)

"Sporty Exchanges" - Intel Dump (Phillip Carter)

Manufactured Conflict in Iraq - PrairiePundit (Merv Benson)

Waging Information War - Outside the Beltway (Dave Schuler)

What Is Truth? - The Glittering Eye (Dave Schuler)

Earlier SWJ Fiction Award Winner - Guardian Article Misrepresents the Advisers' View

Discuss at Small Wars Council

A look inside the military efforts to secure Iraq, including exclusive interviews with GEN David Petraeus, BG Joe Anderson and BG Dana Pittard. Produced by Soldiers Radio and Television.

--Lieutenant General Paul Van Riper (USMC Ret.)

Marine Corps Association Annual Dinner

As Delivered by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, Crystal Gateway Marriott Hotel, Arlington, VA, Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Thank you, General Palm, for that kind introduction. And let me express my appreciation to the Marine Corps Association for inviting me to speak at your first annual dinner. I'm honored to be in the presence of so many who have devoted their lives to the defense of this country.

Senator Warner, General Magnus, it's good to see you. I must say that Senator Warner is a special friend. He's introduced me to the Senate for confirmation four times. [Laughter] If it's not a record, it has to be close to a record. And I have to say the first time was more than 20 years ago. That dates us both, but I would have to say I think he is a special friend and a great American. So thank you for being here tonight. [Applause]

Well, I can't tell you what a pleasure it is to be back in Washington again. [Laughter] A place where, as Senator Alan Simpson used to say, "those who travel the high road of humility encounter little heavy traffic." [Laughter] Or as others would say, "where there are so many lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar territory." [Laughter] Where people say I'll double-cross that bridge when I get to it. [Laughter] The only place in the world you can see a prominent person walking down lover's lane holding his own hand. [Laughter, Applause]

They say Washington's a city of monuments. I have to say the most monumental things that I've seen in over 40 years is the egos of some of the people I've worked for, and I have to tell you the most monumental ego was the first president I worked for, Lyndon Johnson.

Johnson once had the chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, Ludwig Erhard, to the LBJ ranch, and Erhard at one point said, "Well, Mr. President, were you born in a log cabin?" And LBJ responded, "Why no, Mr. Chancellor, I was born in a manger." [Laughter, Applause]

Or the time he gave a stag dinner in the White House and Bill Moyers was there and Moyers was a White House staffer seated below the salt, where White House staffers belong. [Laughter] And Johnson asked Moyers to ask the blessing and Moyers started to pray and a few seconds into the prayer, Johnson lifted his said, looked down at Moyers and said, "Bill, I can't hear you." And Moyers, without lifting his head, looked and said to the president, "That's cause I'm not speaking to you." [Laughter]

It's also a city of monumental embarrassments. Like the first time that President Nixon met with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. He had just appointed Henry Kissinger as Secretary of State. And Golda Meir had with her her foreign minister, Abba Eban, who had a doctorate from Oxford University. And Nixon turned to Golda Meir and said "Just think, Madam Prime Minister, we now both have Jewish foreign ministers." And Golda Meir looked at him and said, "Yes, but mine speaks English." [Laughter, Applause]

But I think the most embarrassing moment during my career was when Nixon visited Italy and he met with the Pope, and Melvin Laird was along as Secretary of Defense. Kissinger and Nixon decided that Laird shouldn't be invited to the meeting with the Pope, as sort of the Minister of War.

And so, Nixon was in the next morning having his private audience with the Pope, and the rest of us were waiting outside. And who should come striding down the hall smoking an enormous cigar but Laird. He had clearly found out about the meeting, probably through good military intelligence. [Laughter]

And Kissinger was kind of beside himself, but he finally said "Well, Mel, at least extinguish the cigar." So Laird stubbed out his cigar and put it in his pocket.

The American party a few minutes later went in to their general meeting with the pope. Pope was seated at a little table in front, Americans in two rows of high-backed chairs. Back row, Kissinger on the end; Laird next to him. A couple of minutes into the Pope's remarks, Kissinger heard this little patting sound, and he looked over, and there was a wisp of smoke coming out of Laird's pocket. [Laughter] The Secretary of State thought nothing of it. A couple of other minutes went by and the secretary heard this patting sound, slapping going on, and he looked over and smoke was billowing out of Laird's pocket. The Secretary of Defense was on fire. [Laughter]

The American party heard this slapping, and thought they were being queued to applaud. And so they did. [Laughter]

And Henry later told us, "God only knows what his Holiness thought, seeing the American secretary of defense immolating himself, and the entire American party applauding the fact." [Laughter, Applause]

Well, it's hard to believe that it was only seven months ago -- to the day, as a matter of fact -- that I began my current job. And as many of you know, navigating the Pentagon can be quite a challenge.

Newsman David Brinkley used to tell the story of the early days at the Pentagon, when a woman told a Pentagon guard she was in labor and needed help quickly in getting to a hospital. The guard said, "Madam, you should not have come in here in that condition." And she answered, "I wasn't in that condition when I came in here." [Laughter]

One of the main reasons I have managed to get around -- and get by -- at the Department these past seven months, is a great officer who has the distinction of being the first Marine Corps Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This summer, General Peter Pace marked 40 extraordinary years of active service. Pete's traveling overseas this evening or he would be here tonight. In fact, he told me that I should accept the invitation to this event.

I'm sure most, if not all of you, are unhappy that Pete will not continue on for a second term as chairman. I am as well. Pete Pace has been my friend, my partner, and my mentor. I trust him completely; I value his candor; and, I enjoy his sense of humor.

I told Pete several months ago that it was my intention that we work together until I left on January 20, 2009. I can't tell you how much I regret that the current environment here in Washington did not make that possible. I am deeply grateful for Pete's 40 years of devoted service to our country, a sentiment I am confident is shared by you and by all Americans.

Last month, after visiting with U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, I had a chance to speak at Normandy on the 63rd anniversary of D-Day. It was a powerful experience to stand among those crosses -- thousands of them, row upon row -- and reflect on the magnitude of what had been accomplished on that day -- and at what cost.

The story behind how America developed the means to put men on those beaches is, I think, instructive. In the late 1930s, the Marine Corps was still grappling with how to move troops from ship to shore under hostile fire. At the time, and after the disastrous Gallipoli campaign of the First World War, such a maneuver was considered foolhardy at best, and suicidal at worst. In 1937, a Marine 1st Lieutenant, Victor Krulak, was stationed in China. And during a Japanese amphibious assault on Shanghai, Krulak borrowed a tugboat to get a better look. He saw -- and clandestinely photographed -- Japanese men and equipment coming onto the beach from a landing craft with a retractable ramp.

Lieutenant Krulak sent those photos and an accompanying report back to Washington. You can imagine what happened next. They gathered dust in a cabinet, with a note labeling them, and I quote: "the work of some nut in China."

Krulak eventually returned to Washington, and doggedly pursued his idea until a Marine general hooked him up with an eccentric New Orleans boat maker named Higgins. The result, as all of you know, was a landing craft with a retractable ramp that was introduced by the thousands and was used to carry Allied forces to liberate Europe and much of Asia.

Krulak's was, of course, a legendary career: Navy Cross; counterinsurgency advisor to the Joint Staff; commander of the Fleet Marines in the Pacific during the Vietnam War; and, father of a future Marine Commandant, Chuck Krulak, with whom I met yesterday. Victor Krulak's story and accomplishments teach us a good deal:

- About learning from the experiences and setbacks of the past;

- About being open to take ideas and inspiration from wherever they come; and

- About overcoming conventional wisdom and bureaucratic obstacles thrown in one's path.

In the years since September 11th, hundreds of thousands of our troops have done all these things and more in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere around the globe. There are the Marines who set up a daily news report over loudspeaker -- "the Voice of Ramadi" -- to counter the hostile propaganda blaring out of some of the mosques. Then there is an Army staff sergeant, a field artillery radar specialist, who was elected a sheik by Iraqi village elders for his work in their communities. He was given white robes, five sheep, and some land; he was advised to take a second wife -- a suggestion frowned upon by his spouse back in Florida. [Laughter]

But in these campaigns, the men and women wearing our nation's uniform have assumed the roles of warrior, diplomat, humanitarian, and development expert. They've done so under the unblinking, unforgiving eye of the 24-hour news cycle while confronting an agile and ruthless enemy. And they've done it serving in a military that has for decades been organized, trained, and equipped to fight the "big wars" rather than the small ones. They have shown what General Victor Krulak later wrote was the "adaptability, initiative and improvisation [that] are the true fabric of obedience, the ultimate in soldierly conduct, going further than sheer heroism."

For the next 10 minutes or so, I'd like to offer some thoughts on where our military -- and our government -- must apply the lessons that we've learned from the ongoing conflicts to build the capabilities we will need in the future. These points are clear:

- Our military must be prepared to undertake the full spectrum of operations including unconventional or irregular campaigns -- for the foreseeable future.

- The non-military instruments of America's national power need to be rebuilt, modernized, and committed to the fight.

- And third, we must think about, envision, and plan for, the world, the future -- of 2020 and beyond.

This is necessary because in the decades ahead, the free and civilized world will continue to look to the United States for leadership, despite all of the challenges today. Churchill once said that "the people of the United States cannot escape world responsibility," what he called the "price of greatness." This responsibility calls on us to prepare for threats other than those on our television screen every night, challenges that are on or beyond the horizon.

America's conventional forces -- air, land, and sea -- will continue to be called on to deter cross-border aggression, protect the sea lanes and energy supplies, and send a message of strength and resolve to friends and potential enemies -- be they nation-states or other actors. These formations must move with speed and agility to a range of potential fights, with deployment times measured in weeks or days rather than weeks and months.

Above all, it's clear the United States and our allies will continue to be threatened by violent extremists, almost always operating in countries with whom we are not at war. The ambition of these networks to acquire chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons is real, as is their desire to launch more attacks on our country and on our interests around the world. And as we saw most recently in the United Kingdom, the barrier to entry -- in resources and sophistication -- remains low when the goal is simply to disrupt or terrorize.

In recent years, America has fully joined the battle in a war that was declared on us a long time ago.

I remember vividly a day in December 1991, when as CIA Director I -- along with then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney -- attended an arrival ceremony at Andrews Air Force Base. We were there to receive the remains of two men -- two of our nation's "bravest sons" -- who had been kidnapped, tortured, and murdered by terrorists in Lebanon. One was William Buckley, CIA station chief in Beirut. The other was Marine Lieutenant Colonel William Higgins, who served with the U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon.

These two Americans were murdered by the same Hezbollah-linked extremists who killed hundreds of Americans in 1983 at the Marine barracks and U.S. embassy in Beirut. It is important to remember that until the morning of September 11, 2001, Hezbollah had been responsible for the deaths of more Americans, our countrymen, than any other terrorist group in the world.

Now we must deal with an even more deadly threat. Since Al Qaeda attacked America nearly six years ago, our armed forces have been tasked with removing hostile regimes and booting out terrorist networks in Iraq and Afghanistan; initially quick military successes that in both cases have led to protracted stability and reconstruction campaigns against brutal and adaptive insurgencies.

And though these conflicts will not last indefinitely in their current form and scale, we must expect our military to be called to other irregular campaigns in the future.

What we now call "asymmetric war" has become a mainstay of the contemporary battlefield, if not its centerpiece. Indeed, after Desert Storm and the initial military success of Operation Iraqi Freedom, it is hard to conceive any country challenging the United States using conventional military ground forces -- at least for some years to come.

However, history shows us smaller, irregular forces -- insurgents, guerrillas, terrorists -- have for centuries found ways to harass and frustrate larger, regular armies and sow chaos.

Today, the "three block war" that Commandant Chuck Krulak predicted in the 1990s -- where small units would simultaneously conduct combat, stability, and humanitarian operations in urban landscapes -- has become a daily reality for American servicemen and women. In these situations, America's traditional edge in technology, firepower, and logistics provides important tactical advantages, but not the necessary strategic success.

Direct force will no doubt need to be used against our adversaries -- ruthlessly and without mercy or apology. But it is also clear that in these kinds of operations, we are not going to kill or capture our way to victory.

Today in Iraq, General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker are implementing a strategy based on targeting Al Qaeda, co-opting some insurgents and marginalizing others, and providing basic security and an improved quality of life for the Iraqi people. It will take patience and persistence, and some level of American force and assistance, for some time.

Looking forward, tasks such as standing up and mentoring indigenous armies and police -- once the province of Special Forces -- are now a key mission for the military as a whole. The same is true for mastering foreign language and civil affairs tasks such as reviving public services and promoting good governance. They have moved from the margins to the mainstream of military thinking, planning, and personnel policies, where they must stay. But as much as the armed forces must be prepared to take on these tasks, the fact remains that much of the necessary expertise belongs in other parts of our government.

We're still struggling to overcome the legacy of the 1990s, when so many of the key non-military capabilities in the American government -- in diplomacy, strategic communications, international development, and intelligence -- were slashed or eliminated following the end of the Cold War.

During the 1990s, the State Department froze new hiring of Foreign Service officers. I was in the White House in the Carter administration after the fall of Iran, and we had a group called the political intelligence working group and we examined what had happened. And among other things, we determined that in 1979, in the embassy in Riyadh, we had two Foreign Service officers who spoke Arabic and they spent 40 percent of their time squiring around CODELs.

The United States Information Agency, which had been an enormously successful organization for communicating America's values and message around the world, was abolished in the 1990s as an independent entity and folded into the State Department -- a shadow of its former self. The Agency for International Development saw deep staff cuts -- its permanent staff dropping from a high of 15,000 to 3,000 today, becoming essentially an outsourcing and contracting agency.

Today, the total number of U.S. government civilian employees working in the Provincial Reconstruction Teams in both Iraq and Afghanistan is approximately two hundred.

So, the goal for us must be an integrated effort, a reinvigoration of all elements of national power. It will require a serious commitment of resources and priorities from the Congress and the country. I believe we have little choice if we are to secure our nation and our freedoms in the years ahead.

I've spoken tonight about what the Pentagon calls the "non-kinetic" aspects of war. It is a sad reality, however, that throughout human history, some have always thought and sought to dominate others through violence and crimes against the innocent. When all is said and done, they understand and bow not to reason or to negotiation, but only to superior force. Thus we should never lose sight of the ethos that has made the Marine Corps -- where "every Marine is a rifleman" -- one of America's cherished institutions and one of the world's most feared and respected fighting forces. [Applause]

I began my remarks this evening with a story about an extraordinary young Marine officer, Victor Krulak; I will close with another.

On one wall of my conference room there is a large, framed photo of a Marine company commander taken during the first battle of Fallujah, in April 2004. He's speaking into a radio handset while giving directions to his men as combat rages just blocks away. It's a shot that could have been taken of any number of Marines in any number of places over the last century -- at Tarawa, at Inchon, or of Lieutenant Peter Pace at Hue, in 1968.

During that Fallujah battle, Captain Douglas Zembiec and some men from his Echo Company were on a rooftop drawing rocket propelled grenades from all directions. They tried to radio a tank crew for support, but couldn't get through. Zembiec raced out onto the street through withering fire, climbed onto the tank, and directed the gunner where to shoot.

After the battle, he said that his Marines had "fought like lions," and he was soon himself dubbed "the Lion of Fallujah." [Applause] He was an unabashed and unashamed warrior, telling one reporter that "killing is not wrong if it's for a purpose, if it's to keep your nation free or to protect your buddy." Zembiec's battalion operations officer described him as someone who "goes out every day and creates menacing dilemmas for the enemy." [Laughter]

A newspaper profile at the time described him as a "balding, gregarious man who, in glasses, looks like a high school science teacher." [Laughter]

After returning from Iraq, Doug was promoted and given a desk job at the Pentagon. He chafed at the assignment, volunteered to deploy again, and was sent back to Iraq earlier this year. This time, he would not return -- to his country or to his wife Pamela and his one-year old daughter.

In May, the Lion of Fallujah was laid to rest at Arlington and memorialized at his alma mater in Annapolis. The crowd of more than 1,000 included many enlisted Marines from his beloved Echo Company. An officer there told a reporter: "your men have to follow your orders; they don't have to go to your funeral."

Every evening, I write notes to the families of young Americans like Doug Zembiec. For you, and for me, they are not names on a press release, or numbers updated on a web page. They are our country's sons and daughters. They are in a tradition of service that includes you and your forebears going back to the earliest days of the republic.

God bless you, the Marine Corps, the men and women of our armed forces, and the country we have all sworn to defend.

Thank you. [Applause]

-----

Biography

Robert M. Gates

Related Sites

Heroes in the War on Terror: Marine Maj. Douglas A. Zembiec

Related Articles

Defense Secretary Honors Marine Corps' 'Lion of Fallujah'

Lion of Fallujah is Laid to Rest

'They 'Fought Like Lions'

Winning War on Terror Requires Adaptable Warriors, Gates Says

SWC

Discuss at Small Wars Council

To some significant degree, intelligence and firepower substitute for each other. From "The Possibilities For Clean Counterinsurgency," your blogger's undergraduate thesis written in the 1982-83 academic year, when I was 21:

In war between insurgents and an authority, a small increment in intelligence affects considerably the destructive capability of either fighting force. Early in the conflict especially, the insurgency will not have firepower to take the place of intelligence; a young rebellion thus depends utterly upon good information. The counterinsurgency, on the other hand, usually enjoys a tremendous advantage in firepower, but faces great difficulty obtaining good information about the whereabouts of its enemy. It is as if the man were hiding not in one house, but in an entire village of houses, any of which might be boobytrapped.

The problem for the counterinsurgency is that excessive application of its firepower (because it is at an intelligence disadvantage) will further increase the intelligence advantage of the insurgency. I (and undoubtedly others before me) called this the coercion/intelligence dilemma. Twenty-one year old me again:

Revolutionary theorists like to claim that guerrillas are but the military arm of a population at war with the controlling power. If that were true, many of the wars of the last forty years would have been much shorter than they were. In fact, most insurgencies begin with a nucleus of determined activists, and they usually confront a government that represents but a small fraction of the population (or a demographically discrete plurality or majority). In between the two groups lie the masses of the people, who rarely want anything more than to grow their food and say their prayers.

Neither side needs the love or loyalty of the population nearly as much as its cooperation. The insurgent must have nondenunciation so that he may carry on his war against the authority from the midst of the people. The counterinsurgent needs information, so that he may determine the nature, power and membership of the insurgency. Because a credible threat of sanction (death or torture, for example) frequently outweighs love or loyalty, the side that imposes stiff penalties for noncompliance will often win the cooperation of the people away from the side that inspires merely moral support for the merits of its cause. To the extent that cooperative action and the support of opinion among the population differ, there has been effective coercion.

Much More at TigerHawk

-----

Coercion -- The Belmont Club

Tigerhawk's post is so full of insight it is hard to know where to begin. But here's a starting point. Counter-terrorist warfare is never won by merely by rising to a supreme height of moral magnificence. Sadly, war requires coercion in one form or another. But as Tigerhawk cogently argues, coercion cannot be applied indiscriminately. It is most effective when combined with a kind of justice because the smart noncombatant, can avoid arbitrary punishment by adhering to the rules of the just, or at least predictable party. The party governed by decency and law. But the real order of things can be misrepresented by lies. The consequence of habitually making wild accusations against the Coalition, such as were brought against the Haditha Marines; sensationalizing relatively events as torture, running the relatively few cases of actual torture for weeks on the front pages; sponsoring contests to concoct stories like tank drivers running over pet dogs and claiming that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been killed by aerial bombardment as "excess deaths" was to imprint the image of a mindless, brutal coalition on the Iraqi side. Thus the Leftist enablers of terror successfully portrayed the more just -- albeit imperfect side -- as being unpredictably coercive.

Only after the Iraqis discovered, by sad and bitter experience, what a crock of s..t this narrative was, by repeated atrocity at the brutal hands of al-Qaeda, did they understand they had it all wrong. It was the al-Qaeda which cut your face off with cheese wire; al-Qaeda which shot you for mixing tomatoes and cucumbers in the market bag; al-Qaeda which blew up any and every public assembly; al-Qaeda which routinely tortured innocents in slaughterhouses and had a manual to do it with; al-Qaeda which beheaded innocent children. Only after all the fake memes were repelled and was some semblance of the truth established; and only then did the tipping point start to come.

The bottom line is that in fighting bad hombres it pays to have a six gun, a white hat and to shoot straight. The problem is getting some of the papers to tell it that way.

-----

SWJ Tip: Bookmark both blogs while you're there...

Discuss at Small Wars Council

The review (requires subscription to New York Times Select) is quite long and well worth reading. Here is an excerpt concerning FM 3-24.

The book to begin with in looking for a revised 21st-century strategy is, unexpectedly, the landmark U.S. ARMY/MARINE CORPS COUNTERINSURGENCY FIELD MANUAL (University of Chicago, paper, $15). It was released as a government document in December 2006, but owing to its enormous popularity (1.5 million downloads in the first month alone), it has now been published by a university press, with a provocative, highly readable new foreword and introduction that testify to the manual's "paradigm-shattering" content.

When the terrorists struck on 9/11, the United States military was singularly unprepared to deal with them. One reflection of the Pentagon's mind-set at the time was the fact that the Army counterinsurgency manual had not been updated since 1986 and the Marine Corps guide had not been revised since 1980.

This lack of preparedness showed. In Afghanistan and Iraq, the armed forces did not have the appropriate intelligence, linguistic capabilities, weapons, equipment, force structures, civil affairs know-how or capacity to train security forces in other countries. "It is not unfair to say that in 2003 most Army officers knew more about the U.S. Civil War than they did about counterinsurgency," Lt. Col. John A. Nagl writes in the foreword to the University of Chicago edition. But while the Bush administration dug in, refusing to admit how ill-suited its premises were to the new century, American military officers revised their old doctrines on the fly.

The leading architect of the manual was David Petraeus, then a lieutenant general, who commanded the 101st Airborne Division in the initial invasion of Iraq in 2003 and took responsibility for governing Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, immediately thereafter. He is now the overall American commander in Iraq. Petraeus emphasized economic and political development and is said to have asked his soldiers, "What have you done for the people of Iraq today?" He worked with another military man who also saw that his job would have to be more than strictly military — Lt. Gen. James Mattis, who commanded the First Marine Division during the initial invasion and then in 2004 returned to help stabilize Anbar Province. His division motto was "No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy — First Do No Harm." In February 2006, while the new counterinsurgency doctrine was still being drafted, and while international criticism of American military excesses mounted, Petraeus invited journalists, human rights lawyers, academics and practitioners of counterinsurgency to Fort Leavenworth to vet a draft, initiating what participants characterized as one of the most open and productive exchanges of ideas they had ever witnessed.

The fundamental premise of the manual is that the key to successful counterinsurgency is protecting civilians. The manual notes: "An operation that kills five insurgents is counterproductive if collateral damage leads to the recruitment of 50 more insurgents." It suggests that force size be calculated in relation not to the enemy, but to inhabitants (a minimum of 20 counterinsurgents per 1,000 residents). It emphasizes the necessity of coordination with beefed-up civilian agencies, which are needed to take on reconstruction and development tasks.

The most counterintuitive, as well as the most politically difficult, premise of the manual is that the American military must assume greater risk in order to gather much-needed intelligence and, in the end, achieve greater safety. The emphasis of the 1990s on force protection is overturned by the assertion of several breathtaking paradoxes: "Sometimes, the more you protect your force, the less secure you may be."

More:

The Evolution and Importance of Army/Marine Corps Field Manual 3-24, Counterinsurgency - SWJ Blog by John Nagl

FM 3-24 Available in Hard Copy - SWJ Blog by John Nagl

Matt Bennett writes in Third Way Dispatch (The Peter Pandemic Takes Its Toll: H.R. McMaster is Passed Over) of a type of reverse Peter Principle where genuinely gifted and brilliant public servants who are kept far below the level to which they should ascend.

... There are, no doubt, scores of such talents in the federal bureaucracy, held down from their rightful rise by political calculation, petulance or oversight. But one recent and egregious example is the Pentagon's failure to promote (for a second time) Army Colonel H.R. McMaster.

Now you may be thinking, wasn't it H.R. McMaster that led the pacification of Tal Afar, an operation so successful that Bush devoted an entire speech to it just last year? Didn't I read about McMaster's brilliant strategy in a long New Yorker piece about him? Wasn't it McMaster who won a Silver Star in the Gulf War, leading troops so bravely and well that Tom Clancy wrote it up? And surely it was McMaster who's PhD dissertation became a hugely influential book, Dereliction of Duty, that the then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs made required reading for senior military types?

Well brace yourself -- the answer to all of your questions is yes. McMaster is a brilliant tactician, a decorated hero, a soldier's soldier, and a master of the very kind of war we're fighting in Iraq -- the counterinsurgency. In fact, he's back in Iraq now, helping soon-to-be-fall-guy David Petraeus try to fend off further disaster. But somehow McMaster's "superiors" -- the suits at the Pentagon who helped bring us the Fiasco that McMaster is attempting to clean up -- have decided that he isn't flag officer material...

Update: From the link (Colonel John Boyd: To Be Or To Do?) provided by Claymore in comments below:

Of all the things Boyd wrote or said, we probably get the most requests for his "To be or to do?" invitation. Although Boyd associated with many junior officers during his Air Force career, there were a few, perhaps half a dozen, that he had such respect for that he invited them to join him on his quest for change. Each one would be offered the choice: Be someone -- be recognized by the system and promoted -- or do something that would last for the Air Force and the country. It was unfortunate, and says something about the state of American's armed forces, that it was rarely possible to do both.

Boyd's biographer, Robert Coram, collected the invitation from an officer who got it and selected the "to do" option, and he confirmed its essence from several others.

"Tiger, one day you will come to a fork in the road," he said. "And you're going to have to make a decision about which direction you want to go." He raised his hand and pointed. "If you go that way you can be somebody. You will have to make compromises and you will have to turn your back on your friends. But you will be a member of the club and you will get promoted and you will get good assignments." Then Boyd raised his other hand and pointed another direction.

"Or you can go that way and you can do something -- something for your country and for your Air Force and for yourself. If you decide you want to do something, you may not get promoted and you may not get the good assignments and you certainly will not be a favorite of your superiors. But you won't have to compromise yourself. You will be true to your friends and to yourself. And your work might make a difference." He paused and stared into the officer's eyes and heart. "To be somebody or to do something. In life there is often a roll call. That's when you will have to make a decision. To be or to do. Which way will you go?

Update 2: In response to an e-mail that questioned blaming the administration and "pretending to know more than selection boards is something again" for COL McMaster's non-selection to BG - I wrote this:

Matt Bennett of Third Way Dispatch is the one who blames the administration for COL McMaster not pinning on BG...

While I agree that "pretending to know more than selection boards is something again" I submit that many expressing opinions on this matter have at least some knowledge of selection boards. They have served on selection boards and, of course, have been either promoted or passed by the same. Opinions on the merits of this recent BG board are, in my humble opinion, informed.

Moreover, this issue goes well beyond one Soldier not advancing to flag. It has a lot to do with perception and I maintain this non-selection sends the wrong signal to the Iron Majors, Captains and Lieutenants - the one-third who "get it" and another third who are trying to get it when it comes to COIN. They are the ones who are debating on whether to stay in the Army or Marine Corps or move on. I mention Marine Corps here because I have received e-mails from Marines who are as disappointed by this as their Soldier brothers-in-arms.

COL McMaster bordered on "rock star" status to many of them - they studied his works and followed his career and he provided inspiration that developed into hope that we still might turn OIF around even with the missteps of earlier years.

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H/T to Phillip Carter - Intel Dump (E-mail)

H/T to Noah Shachtman - Wired Magazine's Danger Room (Link)

Discuss at Small Wars Council - No happy campers here...

More Discussion - At World Affairs

More:

Is the Pentagon Anti-Petraeus? - Time Magazine's Swampland (Joe Klein)

H.R. McMaster Passed Over - Reverse Peter Principle? - Outside the Beltway (James Joyner)

Col. McMaster - The Washington Monthly's Political Animal (Kevin Drum)

Stunning News on a Non Promotion - PrairiePundit (Merv Benson)

Is McMaster's Non-Selection Army Seppuku? - ROFASIX (NOTR)

They're Breaking My Army - Armchair Generalist (Jason Sigger)

You, Sir, are no Vinegar Joe Stilwell - Tapped (Robert Farley)

William S. McCallister

The London Times story "Al-Qaeda faces rebellion from the ranks" provides me an opportunity to further explain the usefulness of the Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) engagement model (briefing here) and its application not only when conducting counterinsurgency in a tribal society but in the fight against al-Qaeda. It is also a tool that may explain (in social system terms) the dynamics of the alleged power-struggle within al-Qaeda and its motivating factors (in terms of cultural operating codes and coordinating messages).

Baseline Assumptions

1. Al Qaeda is "tribal".

2. Behavior of individual members governed by tribal ethos i.e., cultural operating codes and coordinating messages.

3. Micro-motives determine macro-behavior of the system as a whole. Simple rules govern play.

4. Al Qaeda network is a "living-breathing organism". It shapes and is shaped by the environment.

5. The network is NOT hierarchical. Leadership in this system, as in tribal society, is based on the "ability to attract and keep followers" vice "ability to enforce".

Cultural Operating Codes

1. Shame/Honor.

2. Segmentation of tribes.

3. Patronage.

4. Territory.

Coordinating Messages

1. "No stability without us".

2. "What have you done for me lately...what will you do for me tomorrow?"

Below is an example for the application of the model by way of comparison.

The Dulaym tribal federation in Anbar was shaped by Saddam to fit the needs of his patronage/security system. With the removal of Saddam the federation entered into a period of transition and realignment (there is opportunity in chaos). The various sub-tribes of the federation began to jockey for position as new centers of power within the federation (system) started to emerge. This competition or realignment phase is on-going as we speak and will in time reach, in Gertrude Bell's words, its own "splendid equilibrium" ("When the tribes are at their best they live in splendid equilibrium").

Dynamics of the System / Model

Power holders do not and can not hold mutual or agreed ambitions and so are in perpetual and violent competition as they test one another. A commitment to one by definition incurs opposition of an ally's rival. It is impossible in practice for a power holder to have an assortment of clients, and therefore parties fluctuate between loss and gain. All members of the system are employing the same tactics of seeking more powerful sponsors, recruiting others and countering potential challengers by all means available such as conspiracy, assassination and murder (assassination is akin to a no-confidence vote and murder an accepted mechanism to maintain a semblance of competing party membership parity). Any power holder will switch sponsorship if advantage can be gained and is vulnerable in turn by an internal challenger whom might switch sides if it benefits him. The system is self-regulating and places constraints on the incumbent and challenger alike. The moment the challenger initiates action and begins to eliminate rivals, he begins to encounter opposition. The stakes increase until failure to deal decisively with a rival becomes tantamount to one's own death sentence. The system/model is not populated with "moderate" actors and is in a constant state of flux. The various actors continuously assess their relative power position in relation to their allies and opponents. They strengthen relationships with select allies, let others lapse; and mobilize new ones to keep their networks operational. Conflict is the norm and an accepted part of the system and serves as a means to activate and evaluate relationships.

The current emphasis in the media on the Abu Risha tribal leader Sheikh Sattar as the leader of the Al Anbar "Awakening" does not take into consideration that he and his followers are members of a larger social system. In accordance with the model outlined above, he is subject to the "self-regulating" tendency of the system as a whole, in this case the Dulaym Federation and by extension the other tribal federations such as the Shammar, etc throughout Iraq. We monitor this dynamic closely in Anbar province and do not assume that he is the key component of the awakening movement in Anbar much less of the Sunni Arabs in Iraq in general. He is one of the main catalysts in the movement but remains subject to the laws of the system at large.

A similar view can be taken in regards to the rise of Zarqawi within the al Qaeda network before his death. He too was subject to the same dynamic outlined above as are the numerous "independent" leaders of the network today. The alleged power struggle within al Qaeda in my opinion therefore is part and parcel of the system as a whole and subject to the same laws and principles we are experiencing in Anbar province in our interactions with the Dulaym Federation.

What are the implications for our fight against the al Qaeda network? It may not necessarily take a network to fight a network but rather a "virus". While I do not advocate that the "network versus network" paradigm (tank against tank) should be abandoned outright, I do strongly urge the development of appropriate "viruses" to target the network within the cultural frame of reference of its individual members.

Despite the myriad and contradictory accidents that push history this way and that, there stands behind the entire confusion a meaningful pattern and progression, a deeper historical process that is constant in its action. Recognizing past patterns provides a semblance of predictability of possible future outcomes and assists in the development of indicators to measure progress towards a potential outcome while still firmly rooted in the present. Even in a historical process influenced by random chance, law-like patterns can still emerge. History and chance are fully compatible with the existence of law-like order and patterns. The challenge is to recognize the general in the particular and the eternal in the transitory.

William S. McCallister is a retired military officer. He has worked extensively in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. While on active duty, Mr. McCallister served in numerous special operations assignments specializing in civil-military, psychological and information operations. He is a published author in military affairs and tribal warfare and has guest lectured at Johns Hopkins University and presented numerous papers at academic and government sponsored conferences such as the Watson Institute, Brown University; Department of the Navy Science and Technology and DARPA; and the Central Intelligence Agency. He has also appeared as a guest on National Public Radio (NPR). Mr. McCallister is currently employed as a senior consultant for Applied Knowledge International (AKI) in Iraq. He continues to study current events in Iraq in tribal terms, including the tribal art of war and peace, tribal mediation processes, development of tribal centers of power, and tribal influence in political developments. He has applied his study of tribal culture in assessing Iraqi reconstruction efforts, as well as insurgency and counter-insurgency operations in Iraq and the Global War on Terror.

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Discuss at Small Wars Council

... From the BBC translators, an editorial by Saleh Eskandari headlined "spying squirrels," published July 10 by the Iranian newspaper Resalat.

"A few weeks ago, 14 squirrels equipped with espionage systems of foreign intelligence services were captured by [Iranian] intelligence forces along the country's borders. These trained squirrels, each of which weighed just over 700 grams, were released on the borders of the country for intelligence and espionage purposes. According to the announcement made by Iranian intelligence officials, alert police officials caught these squirrels before they could carry out any task...

News Item: Giant Man-Eating Badgers in Basra

British military officials are denying reports that they released, we kid you not, "strange man-eating bear-like" badgers to sow fear among the residents of Basra, Iraq.

"We have not released giant badgers in Basra, and nor have we been collecting eggs and releasing serpents into the Shatt al-Arab river," Maj. David Gell tells reporters, according to The Guardian...

SWJ / MountainRunner Exclusive: Project ACORN

Interesting take and worth the read - here is an excerpt:

I grew up during the Vietnam era and belong to a generation of educated liberals who came of age with a visceral dislike of the military. In the seventies and eighties, it was almost a reflex on Ivy League university campuses, where officer training was sometimes banned, to regard anyone in uniform as funny, if not sinister. At the same time, on military bases, anti-intellectualism became a badge of honor, a subscription to The New Yorker the mark of an oddball, and the words "liberal" and "academic" terms of abuse.

Here's a crude generalization: after the sixties, intellect and patriotism went separate ways, to the detriment of both. This mutual hostility made intellectuals less responsible and soldiers less thoughtful. We've come to think of this antagonism as natural and inevitable, as it is between cats and dogs, but in fact it was a product of recent political and cultural changes in American life. The estrangement was compounded by professionalization on both sides and the adoption of inward-looking and jargon-ridden specializations: the all-volunteer military and the social-theory crowd became equally isolated American subcultures.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have begun to close the divide. I think the reasons are these: first, September 11th made military service more attractive to the kind of college students who used to find it unthinkable. It's no longer unusual to have a friend whose son recently went from studying photography at the Pratt Institute to searching for weapons caches south of Baghdad. Second, the nature of these wars demands a soldier who is more than an artilleryman with an engineering degree. After the military's failure in Vietnam, it tried to turn war into a matter of firepower and technology—which is why, when the Sunni insurgency began to take off in the summer of 2003, American forces had no idea how to react and made matters far worse. By 2004, battalion commanders in Salahuddin were begging the Pentagon for information about the nature of Iraqi society. This year, the Army is actually deploying teams of social scientists with units in Baghdad and Afghanistan. The soldiers whose reputations have been made and not destroyed in Iraq—General David Petraeus, Colonel H. R. McMaster, Lieutenant Colonel John Nagl—have doctorates in the humanities. The best soldiers I met in Iraq were eager to share critical views with professors and journalists. This past spring, when McMaster led a group of officials and private citizens to Iraq to assess progress there, he picked as one member an anti-war British political-science professor who happens to know a great deal about the country. Desperate times breed desperate measures.