Posted on 10/04/2004 11:38:41 PM PDT by neverdem
GUEST OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
Washington
The assault on Samarra by coalition forces over the weekend was probably the first step in a broader offensive intended to quell insurgent hot spots before the Iraqi elections in January. It was a promising start, as American and Iraqi forces quickly swept through the city, in the Sunni triangle north of Baghdad. Now comes the difficult part: establishing an effective government to prevent the return of the insurgents.
Yet even before the initial sweep of Samarra was completed, some officials, military commentators and pundits called for stepping up the wider offensive to "clean out" other insurgent strongholds, like Falluja, Najaf and the Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad. This line of thinking holds that only rapid, decisive actions against all havens for guerrillas will break them and destroy their center of gravity. It's a tempting idea, but a bad one: the problem is, insurgencies don't have a physical center of gravity.
Insurgencies are first and foremost political struggles, not military ones. The only way to defeat them is to gain the widespread support of the people. So the real goal of any broader offensive in Iraq must be less to wipe out the rebel fighters than to give legitimacy to the government in Baghdad.
While a widespread offensive to clean out the strongholds might provide breathing room to conduct the elections, if done too hastily it would undoubtedly result in a major strategic gain for the insurgents. Aggressive offensives usually result in high civilian casualties and, in a country as large as Iraq, would badly overstretch the American military and Iraqi security forces. The combination of civilian deaths and an inability to provide real safety in the cities would be a severe blow to the legitimacy of the government.
Insurgencies are long struggles, measured in decades, not months. The Soviets "cleaned out" the Panjshir Valley north of Kabul at least seven times during their occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980's. Each time the goal was to destroy the network of ethnic tribes called the Northern Alliance; each time the Soviets killed hundreds if not thousands of rebel soldiers and many more civilians.
Yet the Soviets could not turn tactical success into strategic progress. They could not establish a permanent government in the valley. Each time they thought they had destroyed the heart of the Northern Alliance resistance. Today, of course, many members of that alliance hold leading positions in the Afghan government.
While we cannot allow the Iraqi insurgents to have sanctuaries indefinitely, a rapid sweep of guerrilla-controlled cities and towns would do no good unless they can subsequently be secured by Iraqi troops and police forces. Let's face it, until the local government achieved some level of effectiveness and acceptance by the locals, Iraqi security forces would have to cut off the liberated city from the outside insurgent influence. And, from schools to waste disposal to compensation for wrecked homes, the Iraqi government would have to bring in, swiftly, the people and resources to deal with all aspects of governance.
Isolating, searching and controlling a city take a great deal of manpower. These tasks require well-trained, disciplined troops, or the result will be further alienation of the population. A few police officers isolated in their stations are not enough. There must be enough policemen backed by strong military forces to provide a continuous Iraqi government presence throughout the city.
This is why the coalition's focus over the last year on rebuilding the Iraqi security forces and establishing effective Iraqi ministries is essential. It is also why we cannot take the chance of seizing all the insurgent strongholds simultaneously. The Iraqi security forces simply do not have the numbers and experience to take responsibility for both security and effective governance of large new areas.
A vital rule of counterinsurgency is that once control has been established, the government must never withdraw. A city can be governed only with the active cooperation of a solid percentage of its residents. The good news is that many Iraqis in the more peaceful areas of the country have shown the courage to come forward and work with their local governments. But if these governments lose control to the insurgents, it would be a death penalty for those who had cooperated.
While all this may sound daunting, the extended nature of insurgencies can also help the counterinsurgent. One of the best examples came in 1948, when the Malayan Communist Party started a guerrilla war to overthrow the British colonial government. Caught off balance, short of troops and without a coherent strategy, the British were forced onto the defensive.
Then in 1950, Sir Harold Briggs, a retired general serving as the British director of operations in Malaya, devised a plan based on the idea that the war was really "a competition in government" that would be won by the side that best protected the people while leaving them free to pursue their lives.
To unify the British efforts, Briggs organized "war committees" in each state and district. While these were officially made up of the state or district governor, his information officer, the police commander, the police intelligence officer and the area's military commander, each committee also had at least one unofficial member from each of the ethnic communities - Chinese, Malay and Indian. Since the governor and the commanders all had to attend each meeting, options could be discussed with advice from all parties, decisions reached and tasks assigned.
With this single innovation, Briggs ensured both unity of effort and consideration of all aspects of society. In keeping with the political nature of the war, all final decisions were made by the senior political leader. It was also important that the military was subordinated to civilian control. Most often the military would provide support to police operations. In addition, all intelligence, even the military operation, was put under the Special Branch, the intelligence agency of the police department.
Such unity of command was vital, and allowed the British to adjust even after the assassination of one high commissioner (the highest-ranking civilian official) and the sudden retirement of Briggs because of illness. Eventually, the top military and civilian posts were consolidated in one man, Gen. Sir Gerald Templer, who methodically and totally cleared each state of insurgents before moving onto the next one.
This well-conceived, well-executed civil-military plan is often referred to as the model for counterinsurgencies. Yet it is worth bearing in mind that, in a situation far less complex than that in Iraq today, it took a decade before the new Malayan government could declare the emergency over.
The incursion into Samarra showed that American and Iraqi forces can work together to cleanse cities of insurgents. But the fight for Iraq will not be resolved by a military offensive lasting a few weeks. While aggressive operations may give the impression of progress, the real issue is providing and sustaining security. Military action can only support the political effort.
The fledgling Iraqi security forces have shown promise in the last week, but they still need time to master the long-term security operations essential to counterinsurgency. We should not push them to take over before they are ready. Americans should be prepared for a lengthy, methodical campaign that clears the insurgents out and establishes Iraqi security and a functioning Iraqi government area by area. Only then should our forces come home.
Thomas X. Hammes, a Marine colonel, is a fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies of the National Defense University and the author of "The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century."
But the struggle is definitely political by definition - we're trying to set up an alternate, legitimate government. Alternate is easy, legitimate is not.
It has been obvious from the start that we would need to emulate the British Malysian operation. But one of the biggest problems will be preventing all kinds of kickback systems from plaguing both the governance and the logistics.
I'm not sure about the influx of arms part. I keep reading about open air ammo dumps, numbering about 600, all over the place that's not yet secured because they don't have the live bodies to guard it. It sounds like they can get nearly all the high explosives they need to rig as Improvized Explosive Devices(IED) or car bombs, not to mention supplies for mortar and rocket attacks.
The good news is we've made progress. The bad news is it may take a long time to contain and defeat the insurgency. Iraq is one of those places where the mess can't be solved with a quick fix. Unfortunately, the Democrats and a considerable part of the American mindset is habituated to the idea of a quick fix. Thus, to secure the permanence of a free Iraqi government and long term American interests in the country and in the Middle East will require a prolonged military presence. We're not going to be leaving Iraq in the near future. When the Iraqi government has developed the military and police capable of securing its national territory, perhaps then we will able to finally say "mission accomplished." If only the Democrats were as committed to American success in Iraq as Republicans are the job our troops face in that country would be a lot easier and the odds they face in securing that country for liberty would be a lot brighter.
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