The paradox of counterinsurgency ops
The U.S. military's struggle to adapt to the Iraq insurgency has yielded a set of new aphorisms, and a new field manual.
The field manual on counterinsurgency (COIN) operations is expected to be published in October, though drafts are publicly available now.
The 214-page book, an update 25 years in the making, is meant not as a proscriptive "how to" but rather a guide to help military personnel develop a "nuanced understanding" of the complexity of COIN operations, said Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.
"It doesn't have the answers for the Iraq or Afghanistan, but it will help people ask the right questions," Petraeus told an audience at the at the Brookings Institution in Washington Thursday, outlining how military training has been changed to take into account lessons learned in the Afghan and Iraq wars.
One main lesson is that COIN operations present a host of paradoxes, he said:
The best weapons for COIN do not shoot.
If a tactic works this week it might not next week, or in the next province.
Sometimes doing nothing is the best reaction.
More force protection makes your forces less secure.
The more force protection you use the less effective you are.
The more successful you are the less effective force you can use.
The most important decisions are not made by generals.