The Ex-lax reaction? Satisfaction...
Posted on 06/08/2008 8:40:43 PM PDT by neverdem
Beyond the Unconventional.
The Pentagon has decided on a name for the kind of war we have to be prepared to fight in decades to come.
Unconventional? No. A couple of generations ago, the clash of national armies following the rules of the Hague and Geneva Conventions was called conventional war, as against a more terrifying unconventional war, which meant “nuclear” for a time; then that meaning changed to denote “special operations.” Any terminology now rooted in convention would be confusing.
Asymmetrical? The meaning of that adjective is “unbalanced,” which carries the wrong connotation; besides, the term has been taken over by the fashion industry to describe dresses with one side of the hem barely covering the hip and the other side offering a flash of ankle. Not the right word for warriors.
Counterinsurgent? Although this word contains surge, now a popular syllable, it is too narrowly focused on a specific opponent bent on overthrowing a local government. As a Pentagon briefer put it last month: “We’ve had counterinsurgency for a long time, but to be able to have irregular warfare, something that the entire department is concerned about, is something that we’re still in the learning process of.” (He meant “we’re still learning.”)
That’s the ticket: irregular has become the Defense Department’s adjective of choice to modify the current style of warfare. It has caught on at West Point: “The irregular-warfare-specialty track,” announces the academy on its Web site, “has rapidly become the most popular choice among cadets” seeking a degree in the military arts.
Students elsewhere may be into I.T. (information technology) or I.M. (instant messaging), but the hot course eagerly pursued by future military officers is I.W. (irregular warfare). This relatively unremarked development in our defense doctrine was reported in April by the veteran national-security reporter Walter...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Note: The following text is a quote:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=50130
Interagency Task Force Targets ‘Violent Actors,’ General Says
By Navy Lt. Jennifer Cragg
Special to American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, June 6, 2008 – U.S. Central Command is part of an Interagency Task Force for Irregular Warfare, a CentCom operations section initiative that recently stood up to track and target “violent and extreme actors” in the command’s area of operations, the Air Force general who’s spearheading the effort said yesterday.
“Regionally, we look at influences of extreme actors that are malign that would provide, from within their borders, exporting either violence or activities that would be disruptive to their neighbors,” Air Force Brig. Gen. Robert H. Holmes, CentCom’s deputy director of operations, said to online journalists and bloggers during a teleconference from the command’s headquarters at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla.
He added that the objectives of the Interagency Task Force for Irregular Warfare for the near term include disrupting some specific elements of terror networks.
“If you find bad stuff in the wrong places, you have to call it like you see it. We continue to see that and continue to watch it,” Holmes said. “Our business is looking at this malign influence and then figuring out what we can do to counter it … in a holistic manner, not necessarily just force on force.”
He added that to counter, combat and, ultimately, defeat these kinds of networked activities, it will take more than just military force over the long term.
Holmes said the Interagency Task Force for Irregular Warfare, which includes other federal partners and nongovernmental agencies, has been observing an “adversarial information operation,” or communications tactic, with regard to reporting of civilian casualties. He said that both the Taliban in Afghanistan and terrorists in Iraq have both adopted this type of tactic.
“[There is a] discrepancy in what we see in open-source reporting with regard to civilian casualties and then what is actually in our operational reporting,” Holmes said. “I believe that the enemy uses this tactic to try to dissuade a civilian populace from the things that are actually going on there.”
The interagency task force also is looking into the networks of the Taliban and al-Qaida. Holmes said both terrorist organizations have specialists who are savvy in manipulating the media.
“There is a malign actor there that, in my mind, would have the purpose in an information operation campaign, and that is clearly a piece of terrain for our adversary, that they are going to use this to their advantage,” Holmes said.
And that advantage can be significant in the court of world opinion, the general noted, because organizations with nefarious intentions will put out whatever information suits their motives.
“We’re bound to tell the truth, and in most cases our adversary is not,” Holmes noted.
Once information is put into the dynamic information environment, misleading perceptions are easily created.
“Often, truth is no longer important; it’s just out there,” he explained. “If I was my opponent, and I wanted to do something against someone I knew was grounded in truthful principles, … then I would use that to my advantage.”
Another trend the interagency task force is watching and trying to weigh out is the use of female suicide bombers. Though it’s not a significant trend at this point, young or mentally disabled women being used as suicide bombers is a departure in enemy tactics.
“It’s too early to say that this may be a sign of desperation,” Holmes said. “We watched the recruitment and flow of young males that have been recruited to be suicide bombers. We have been trying to target that network to disrupt that flow.”
(Navy Lt. Jennifer Cragg works in the New Media directorate of the Defense Media Activity.)
"The interagency task force also is looking into the networks of the Taliban and al-Qaida. Holmes said both terrorist organizations have specialists who are savvy in manipulating the media."
Try CNN, CBS, NBC and ABC. I hope that helps!
Thanks for the feedback Grizzled Bear.
OPINION: The jihadis attempt to influence the media of a variety of formats primarily through the use of the internet.
Review Irregular Warfare (IW) Roadmap herein referred to as the IW. roadmap. ..... Irregular Warfare” as a Tier 2 JCA under “Joint Special Operations & ...
www.nps.edu/Academics/Centers/CTIW/index.html
Established in 1998, The Center on Terrorism and Irregular Warfare produces ... In studying terrorism and irregular warfare, the Center focuses the research ...
www.au.af.mil/au/aul/bibs/irregular.htm
Irregular Warfare: Counterinsurgency Challenges in Perspectives: Final Report. Fort Leavenworth, KS, U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Center, 2006. ...
I think future terrorism aimed towards the US will be economic warfare, disruption of key supplies like a nuclear strike at the Saudi oil fields and sending the price of gas, diesel and heating fuel to astronomical levels.
Even rumors of tainted foods will create a panic. We are way too fragile here in the US to panic introduced by the MSM, I can think of lots of ways to create fear and panic but why add ideas? Its happened and our enemies know how to conduct unconventional warfare so I truly expect bad things to happen.
Makes you wish for a little more plain-spoken sort of soldier.
“Your job is not to die for your country, your job is to make the other dumb son of a bitch die for his.” --General George S. Patton
.......and they say soldiers are dumb and can’t do any other job. I’m thinking the General might make a great Senator.
I read this book a long time ago and basically explains what these clowns at the Times are trying to describe.
I'd just laugh if the Times and it's reporters and staff had to live through a real insurgency and counter-insurgency warfare here in this country.
It gets a bit "froggy" when you don't know who is on your side and who isn't...... but then that would take all the fun out of it, now wouldn't it?
You see the operative word..."fight"... is involved and that's the nut of the problem. Fighting sucks, but you have to fight unless you want to fade away like the Romans and the other civilizations that just petered out as they became fat and happy....
Yes.
Too many of us are allowing linguistic activism to turn us toward more liberalism. It’s “guerrilla” or “irregular” warfare. Irregular is not a new term. It’s general nature and tactics haven’t changed, but most of the people of our Nation have.
Fourth Generation warfare.
The author used to work with Pat Buchanon, IIRC. They were both speechwriters for Tricky Dick. He wrote an OpEd Column for the NY Times for years as its only conservative. After he "retired" he still kept his weekly magazine column "On Language."
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