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WASHINGTON — In December 2009, our commander in chief went to West Point and proclaimed that he would withdraw all U.S. forces from Afghanistan by 2014. Since then, he has proudly emphasized that "We are on a course to end this war responsibly." Now U.S. and NATO troops and loyal Afghan soldiers and police officers are reaping the bitter harvest of the seeds that Barack Obama planted with those words. Over the last 10 days, in five separate incidents, seven American military personnel were killed in what used to be called "green on blue attacks" — where Afghan soldiers or...

Historically speaking has any Empire won a war of counter insurgency? I'm hearing this talk about Afghanistan, and do not know the answer? I think the odds are not good when you think of the American Revolution, Vietnam, Kashmir, Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc.. and an added bonus the "rules of engagement". For the record, I am very strong President Trump supporter. Love the guy and will support him 100%. Just looking for good answers. Thanks!

US Soldiers Pose with the Bodies of Moro (Muslim) Insurgents, Philippines; circa 1906 On March 7, 1906, US troops under the command of Major General Leonard Wood massacred as many as 1,000 Filipino Muslims, known as Moros, who were taking refuge at Bud Dajo, a volcanic crater on the island of Jolo in the southern Philippines. The First Battle of Bud Dajo, also known as the Bud Dajo Massacre, was a counter insurgency action fought by the United States Army against Moros in March 1906, during the Moro Rebellion phase of the Philippine - American War. After the United States...

A remarkable book has recently been published: Wrong Turn: America’s Deadly Embrace of Counterinsurgency, by Colonel Gian Gentile, U.S. Army. Gentile, a professor at West Point, commanded a battalion in Iraq. In his fast-paced, intellectually challenging book, he argues that America’s strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan was unworkable from the start. Below are his responses to the basic questions I asked him. BING WEST: In a few sentences, describe the counterinsurgency doctrine that our grunts were supposed to employ in Iraq and Afghanistan. COLONEL GIAN GENTILE: American counterinsurgency, as codified in Marine/Army Field Manual 3-24, is armed nation building...

The letter from Colonel Harry Tunnell is making its rounds around the internet, but here are some choice and relevant excerpts. But first a shot bio of Tunnell. Tunnell had been gravely wounded in Iraq, where he led a battalion of paratroopers with the 173rd Airborne Brigade. (snip) SNIPBy the time Tunnell took over the brigade, every other infantry commander preparing to go to Iraq or Afghanistan was using Gen. Petraeus’ COIN manual as his lodestar. But not Tunnell. He told his soldiers that their approach to security operations would be drawn from an Army manual that outlined counterguerrilla operations,...

Three years ago I attended a meeting outside Washington with a NATO adviser recently returned from briefings with commanders of the war in Iraq. The question had been posed to them: If there should be a targeted massacre of Christians in Iraq (the word actually used was genocide), would the U.S. military respond? The answer from the commanders: No. It was December 2007. Gen. David Petraeus had arrived in Baghdad 10 months earlier bearing orders to carry out his new counterinsurgency strategy with a thrust of 20,000 additional troops throughout the city. Until then, U.S. forces were bogged down in...

KABUL, Afghanistan, July 29 (UPI) -- If the battle of Barg-e-Matal ever goes down in history, I am not sure if it will be treated as a victory or a defeat or a tragedy or a comedy. It does, however, illustrate a number of elements that can help explain why progress in Afghanistan can be elusive. Barg-e-Matal, in the eastern province of Nuristan bordering Pakistan, has been the scene of insurgent attacks over several years and in recent months. About two months ago the Taliban captured the district but Afghan and NATO-led international forces retook it after heavy fighting. Subsequent...

KABUL, Afghanistan, July 8 (UPI) -- I have been in-country about one week, enough time for some initial impressions. Success in Afghanistan isn't just about killing the enemy. It is about shaping the environment such that the insurgency will whither. It is not nation-building but counterinsurgency. Important components of counterinsurgency are good governance and rule of law. Establishing effective and honest governance continues to be a challenge. Far too many provincial and senior district officials are corrupt. They comprise a group of "new warlords" who impose their predatory behavior on the Afghan populace. They sow seeds of distrust and skepticism...

We're failing in Afghanistan. Con firmed yesterday as our new com mander there, Gen. David Petraeus has the unenviable task of producing something President Obama can call a success. If Petraeus can salvage the situation so that our minimum needs are met, he'll confirm his reputation as the greatest American soldier of our time. Should he falter, he'll go down as the general who sold the Pentagon a disastrous doctrine. Petraeus did not want this job. But our president didn't know to whom else to turn in the wake of last week's debacle with Gen. Stanley McChrystal. Petraeus did his...

President Obama said Wednesday that he didn't fire Gen. Stanley McChrystal over policy disagreements. Too bad. Almost every metric measuring military progress in Afghanistan has gone downhill since McChrystal took command a year ago, as an April Pentagon report detailed. More recently, a UN report revealed that incidents involving improvised-explosive devices -- the main killer of our troops -- rose 94 percent in the first four months of 2010 over a year earlier. It's notable that one of the few strong statements of support for McChrystal came from Afghanistan's most notorious crime boss -- whom McChrystal had claimed as an...

Torrents of uninteresting mail inundate members of Congress, but occasionally there are riveting communications, such as a recent e-mail from a noncommissioned officer serving in Afghanistan. He explains why the rules of engagement for US troops are "too prohibitive for coalition forces to achieve sustained tactical successes." Receiving mortar fire during an overnight mission, his unit called for a 155mm howitzer illumination round to be fired to reveal the enemy's location. The request was rejected "on the grounds that it may cause collateral damage." The NCO says the only thing that comes down from an illumination round is a canister,...

HELSINKI, Finland, March 18 (UPI) -- Last week it was reported that four-star U.S. Army Gen. Charles Campbell of Army Forces Command issued career-ending official reprimands to Capt. Matthew Myer, Lt. Col. William Ostlund and Col. Chip Preysler, company, battalion and brigade commanders who, according to the Army investigation, failed to adequately prepare their unit for the July 13, 2008, Taliban attack on a remote U.S. outpost in Wanat, Waygal Valley, Afghanistan. All the soldiers and Marines involved in this intense battle fought with exceptional valor and professionalism in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. military. This includes...

The string of high-profile bombings that followed the withdrawal of U.S. combat forces from Iraqi cities on June 30, 2009 exposed not only Iraqi security shortcomings, but also the continued effectiveness of the insurgents to carry out demanding operations. These types of operations suggest the militants are choosing high-profile terrorism as a strategy for undermining counterinsurgency efforts, targeting the confidence and trust of the population in the government as a way of ensuring a climate of uncertainty, feeble governance, and organizational survival. A new security challenge emerged when U.S. combat forces exited Iraqi cities in accordance with the Status of...

Troy Senik The Surge Comes to Salinas A plan to apply counterinsurgency doctrine to gang violence Communities beset by seemingly unbreakable cycles of violence; law enforcement overmatched to the point of essentially ceding sovereignty to an organized and heavily armed resistance; citizens so intimidated by thugs that they won’t report them to authorities, for fear of retribution. Eight years into the War on Terror, this scenario sounds familiar. But its location isn’t the Sunni Triangle in 2006 or southern Afghanistan today; it’s a farm town on California’s Central Coast. In Salinas—a predominantly Hispanic, blue-collar community best known for producing John...

Dec. 19 (UPI) -- A CBS news report filed by Kimberly Dozier states that U.S. Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, met in Kandahar with five Afghan tribal elders. Pulling out his notebook, the admiral asked the Afghans what they need. Apparently the new fashionable counterinsurgency introductory question is "What do you need?" rather than "Are you fighting on our side?" or "Are we winning?" In addition to new dams for irrigation purposes, Afghan elders made two requests, which were surprising only from the standpoint that, after eight years in Afghanistan, either request could...

November 16, 2009 Arnold Schwarzenegger visits Iraq - and aims to transfer military tactics to California Oliver August in Baghdad The governor of California trots out his most famous one-liner wherever he goes but, at the Victory military base in Baghdad today, he apparently meant it. “I’ll be back,” Arnold Schwarzenegger growled after working out with a group of American soldiers on active duty in Iraq, all with necks and trunks as thick as his. The muscleman who rose to Hollywood fame as The Terminator came to the site of America’s bloodiest war in a generation to cheer up troops,...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama is wrapping up deliberations on war strategy in Afghanistan and is considering final Pentagon options that include sending about 30,000 more troops, officials said on Saturday. A deployment of that size would be less than the 40,000-troop increase recommended by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, but more than many of Obama's Democratic allies may support. Record combat deaths have eroded U.S. public support for the war, and a decision to expand troop levels could become a political liability for the president ahead of congressional elections next...

War On Terror: Sen. John Kerry, who was so wrong about Iraq, now says our commander in Afghanistan is "reaching too far, too fast" and that a "good enough" policy should suffice. It won't. Offering his advice on how to micromanage the war against the Taliban, Kerry said Gen. Stanley McChrystal, President Obama's hand-picked general to fight what he called a "war of necessity," is wrong in saying he needs 40,000 more troops to fight and win it. Speaking before the Council on Foreign Relations on Monday, Kerry advocated a "good enough" policy designed not to achieve victory in al-Qaida's...

War On Terror: Sen. John Kerry, who was so wrong about Iraq, now says our commander in Afghanistan is "reaching too far, too fast" and that a "good enough" policy should suffice. It won't. Offering his advice on how to micromanage the war against the Taliban, Kerry said Gen. Stanley McChrystal, President Obama's hand-picked general to fight what he called a "war of necessity," is wrong in saying he needs 40,000 more troops to fight and win it. Speaking before the Council on Foreign Relations on Monday, Kerry advocated a "good enough" policy designed not to achieve victory in al-Qaida's...

War Strategy: When Bush and Petraeus proposed the surge in Iraq, Democrats demanded that the general testify before Congress. So why has the Senate blocked a similar invitation to our commander in Afghanistan? Those with memories longer than the 24-hour news cycle recall that in the dark days of the Iraq War, David Petraeus was summoned to Washington to explain the surge strategy that would eventually lead to victory in Iraq. Democrats hoped for a show trial. MoveOn.org took out a full-page ad in the New York Times labeling the commanding general of our efforts in Iraq "General Betray-us." Then...