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| The Doctrine of Asymmetrical War | ||
| 2006-11-13 | ||
EFL - read the whole thing, it's excellent. This guy really gets it.
2. You win by killing the enemy. Wrong, wrong, wrong. In this kind of war the enemy wants you to kill a lot of people. A lot of irregular warfare groups start their campaigns with a suicide raid, where they expect to be slaughtered. 3. Hi-tech beats lo-tech. Not lately it doesn't. Here again it's a matter of you hardware freaks facing hard facts. If we take Iraq 2003 as a familiar and painful example, you saw a classic outcome: our hi-tech beat their wanna-be hi-tech in the conventional battles. Then we started getting picked off by low-tech ambushes where the insurgents used homemade IEDs in combination with old, rugged Soviet weapons like the RPG-7 and Kalashnikov. 4. "Overwhelming force! Hit the insurgents hard enough, and they'll quit." Wrong. Americans are pretty well anti-death, but lots of other tribes are in love with the idea of the martyrdom thing. 5. People want democracy and peace and all that kind of stuff. No. In fact, HELL no! Look around the world and you'll see that people are divided into ethnic gangs, like the planet's one big San Quentin. All they want is for their gang to win. Half the population of Mogadishu turned on our guys who were trying to provide aid for the starving. They didn't want peace, democracy or any of that shit. They wanted their clan to win and the other clans to lose. And if stopping the aid convoys from getting food to those enemy clans was the only way to win, they were ready to make it happen. It's worth giving a moment to let that sink in: these people fought to the death against overwhelmingly superior US forces, because they wanted their clan to win by starving rival clans to death. | ||
| Posted by:gromky |
| #27 wait till you see these mullahs ganking eachother to get hold of the cash box and power structures of these mosques and madrassas. I'm just about salivating at the prospect. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-11-13 22:41 |
| #26 You got it. Thank you, OldSpook, coming from you, that means a lot. Out of fairness, I need to include .com and Frank G, who have both steadfastly maintained the importance of this policy as well. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-11-13 22:39 |
| #25 Hey OldSpook, let me rephrase the author "You don't defeat Arabs by beating them in battle, cause people been beating them in battles for 4000 years." In fact, you cannot defeat them at all---it's like dealing with ants in your house, you just have to fumigate periodically. |
| Posted by: gromgoru 2006-11-13 22:20 |
| #24 Exactly. And if you think infighting amongst Dems is harsh, wait till you see these mullahs ganking eachother to get hold of the cash box and power structures of these mosques and madrassas. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2006-11-13 21:31 |
| #23 "Just snuffing this dozen jihadist clerics would put a huge dent in terrorism." Just so. Particularly in light of the shame culture that pervades Islam. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2006-11-13 21:00 |
| #22 You got it. In this war, snipers are far more useful than nukes. Especialy on some turbans in madrassas, and pin-stripe suited types that supply them with money to get explosives, weaponry etc. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2006-11-13 19:57 |
| #21 The one area where I could peripherally agree is that we need to involve their leadership and financiers. That means wet work in some places away from the battlefield. They need to have as much on the line as do thier stooges. If there is going to be one cost-effective solution in the War on Terror, this is it. "Hearts & minds" most definitely does not work. "Short & curlies" is the only way to go. Wet work hunter-killer teams must begin the summary execution of Islam's major players. Saudi financiers, Pakistan's madrassah heads and a whole roster of jihadist clerics: Bashir, Bakri, Krekar, Qaradawi, Laban, Nasrallah, Omar, bin Laden, Hamza, Ahmadinejad, Khatami, Sadr. Just snuffing this dozen jihadist clerics would put a huge dent in terrorism. These are the connected ones. They are the eloquent and persuasive speakers. They have the credibility. They have the command structure. Strip out these key operatives and you've crippled a lot of the major impetus of terrorism. An obvious side-benefit of this is that all other players would suddenly become a lot more circumspect about mouthing off. Especially so if we could arrange for these takedowns to be in front of huge crowds. This would cause a significant demoralizing effect when thousands of Muslims see their leadership rendered both highly vulnerable and exceedingly dead. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2006-11-13 16:13 |
| #20 Although there are many battles in Iraq, the enemy is not trying to defeat us head on, they believe they don't have to. They looked at our history and understand or believe they just need to make the price of victory so high our government will not be willing to pay, just like Viet-Nam. Take note their joy of the Dems elected into office. They are fighting to fight, not to win on the battlefield. In the end they believe victory will come not from battle but from our lack of will. This is straight up insurgent war. Nothing new in history and the only thing really Asymmetrical is our, read MSM and political, misunderstanding as a nation of COGs both enemy and friendly. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2006-11-13 15:02 |
| #19 If side A exists and side B goes extinct, then side A has won. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2006-11-13 14:55 |
| #18 My take is that the US electorate will never figure this out, even if some of them are nuked. They will only get concerned when their electricity is off, there's no gasoline available at any price, and food deliveries to their area have been cut off. Then they will blame whoever's in charge at the time. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2006-11-13 14:46 |
| #17 OS: I agree with you that given a specific situation I would prefer to be on the US side of things. But at the end of the day, if the US backs down, I would whole-heartedly support the idea that the US lost and the terrorists won. They'll go about their business without interference, rearm, subjugate the population, and brainwash them into developing nukes for use on US soil. Which is what I think this guy is getting at. The ME terrorists are farther-sighted and are after the will of the shortest-sighted 51% of the American people, and are willing to sacrifice as many of their own human shields as it takes as long as those shields don't turn on them. Tribal thugs are shorter-sighted and are willing to accept hideous losses as long as in the end everyone around them is beaten down and they end up on top of the remaining pile of $hit. They aren't a problem after that except they are now fertile for extremism. Which could be a problem for the US further down the road. The US didn't get what they wanted, the thugs did, and the extremists can now move in. I would call this conflict a loss, too. Unless the US actually grows a pair and goes after these guys big-time. Which I am beginning to doubt. So I guess it really boils down to this: Is the US going to figure this out and deal with it before nukes proliferate? Will the US start employing the hard tactics that it will take to do this before it gets out of hand? Or will we wuss-out like this author is warning against, buying short-term quiet and long-term dark ages? |
| Posted by: gorb 2006-11-13 14:29 |
| #16 And, all the while we are fighting the war as OldSpook points out, we could have our own teams planting IEDs around town to copy their tactics. The problem with this tribal lunacy is that it may well be a lose/lose situation, after we break free of PC warfare. |
| Posted by: wxjames 2006-11-13 14:09 |
| #15 The one area where I could peripherally agree is that we need to involve their leadership and financiers. That means wet work in some places away from the battlefield. They need to have as much on the line as do thier stooges. Once thats the policy, the terrorism will drop to a lower intensity fairly quickly. Finance and leadership are hard to replace. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2006-11-13 13:14 |
| #14 He's actually dead wrong on this in many ways. I've been there and seen it. This guy obviopusly is armchair material. Major battles ARE part of war. I challenge him to look at Fallujah and tell me it wasnt a battle, what an idiot. Simialr things have been done in fixed piece battles in many small towns along the rat-lines by the Marines, but they havent made the press nor have the penetrated this poor ignorant soul's head. Hi-tech does beat low tech. Ask the bomb makers who have been ferreted out by electronic Intel, the bomb layers who have been demolished by night vision and predators, etc. Their reverting to a "string" to detonate the IEDs gets them killed, quickly. And thats if they can even get away with laying it. Locals are tipping off traps liek that, and obervation drones have been picking up them laying the traps. Recall the 3 guys trying to lay an IED that got introduced to a 500lb bomb here in viedo just a few days ago. US casualties went up in October, but the muj took HUGE losses. And the RPG in an ambush as not been successful at all (what a stupid point to use)- our high tech guys analyzed it, produced a solution to it, then got that into production and distribution very quickly for the Strykers and other vulnerable vehicles. You do win by killing the enemy. The author has this confused with killing everyone around the enemy, what a moron. Again, the IEDs are having less and less of an effect on US forces because we have managed to hunt down and kill the bomb makers faster than they can train good ones. That's why you are seeing an uptick in suicide bombs aimed at Iraqis instead of US forces. THEY are the ones killing indiscriminately and that will cause them to lose the locals who will turn them over. Happened again and again in Iraq already. And they cannot sustain that sort of thing. Look to Malaysia and the Brits way of handling it for similar situations. Overwhelming force DOES work. Every time US has upped our troop levels, violence goes DOWN. EVERY TIME. Look at Fallujah - we went in there and kicked the crap out of them. After that it was very peaceful. We left, and it gets nasty. Same for Ramadi, etc. Sooner or later the tribes run out of martyrs when they see its futile. Sheesh how much of an idiot can that author be? The only place he is anywhere near the mark is #5. Democracy needs to be developed in countries where it has never had roots. You have to break the clans, and that's not easy, but its doable. That guy and his backers are so dead wrong - stop with the blood lust and engage your brains. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2006-11-13 13:12 |
| #13 Procopius, you're misunderstanding the point of the piece. That bit you quoted isn't talking about the US (or Israeli) military, but rather the jihadis the terror masters. They're not interested in a military victory; a loss followed by chaos they can pump with random violence serves them just as well. And it's easier. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2006-11-13 12:33 |
| #12 This is the hardest thing for Americans to understand: armies that don't aim at victory Wrong. Politicians who direct armies do not aim for victory. Armies do in fact know how to break and kill things. It is the leash in the hands of their civilian leaders that restrains them. You think that for all those decades with the missiles on standby that most of the boys wouldn't push the button if the command came down? Someone want to point out a Carthaginian to the dude? |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2006-11-13 12:05 |
| #11 Look around the world and you'll see that people are divided into ethnic gangs, like the planet's one big San Quentin. This is an excellent analogy. I have been watching The Wire; possibly the best introduction to insurgency/counter-insurgency tactics since The Battle for Algiers. |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2006-11-13 11:32 |
| #10 If we were to totally flame one bunch of troublesome bastards, others might think twice about giving us a hard time. As it is, all you have to do is spout a bunch of big talk on CNN and play a waiting game. When we get tired and walk away, they claim they won and drove us out. We need to start doing things a little differently. |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2006-11-13 11:10 |
| #9 wxj: also known as wash, rinse, repeat as necessary. Blow them to hell and tell the survivors them "We're leaving now. Don't make us come back." |
| Posted by: AlanC 2006-11-13 11:01 |
| #8 He did not cover the result of scorched earth, where the following generations no longer have the will to fight (Europe). So, if we are having problems with Paki tribes, we pound them senseless, and their desire for war melts away. No victory, no occupation, no followup relief, just breaking things ad nauseum, and assuring that everyone loses at least 3 friends, lovers, or kin. In Europe's case, that cycle was repeated 25 years later to a greater degree. Now, they desire peace at any cost. Asymmetrical Peace. |
| Posted by: wxjames 2006-11-13 10:55 |
| #7 Americans are pretty well anti-death, but lots of other tribes are in love with the idea of the martyrdom thing. Why not just give them more and more of what they crave? |
| Posted by: eLarson 2006-11-13 10:00 |
| #6 that was enlightening to me. I bookmarked it. Nothing I didn't already know, but certainly made the picture clear in a way it wasn't before. KISS - simple and dead on. I still maintain that Christianity combined with Roman "Democracy" tempered the tribal aspect of human nature into what makes our society so peaceful today. For at least the last 1000 years, the concepts of tolerance and forgiveness were drilled into our Western heads at least once a week and allowed us to see the mutual benefits of tempering that gung-ho, to hell with them, tribal nature which non-Christians can think of as counting to 10 before we act and "letting it go". |
| Posted by: anon 2006-11-13 09:48 |
| #5 (Can somebody give me an example of where "hearts and minds" worked?) I believe Vlad the Impaler had a pretty good "hearts and minds" strategy. He'd rip out hearts and drive spikes through minds. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2006-11-13 09:37 |
| #4 Not me - assuming we're talking about real war - where at least one of the sides will not give up, no matter what. That "implacable" thingy... inherent in Islam... |
| Posted by: .com 2006-11-13 09:22 |
| #3 It's War Nerd at www.exile.ru. He doesn't get into the hard part - what a winning strategy is. Other than "hearts and minds", which I'm not sure I've ever believed. (Can somebody give me an example of where "hearts and minds" worked?) |
| Posted by: fmr mil contractor 2006-11-13 09:13 |
| #2 This guys gets it in spades. He's either preaching surrender or total all-out genocidal scorched-earth war. I think I know which... Terrible, isn't it? Just terrible. What about our souls? What about our values? What about our sense of self and community - and all that rot that makes us special, makes us "us"? Well, only the folks with our life experiences and influences have a clue to what we're babbling on about - they have their own set of "holies" to get hinky about... effectively, then, they're all moot and, gulp, pointless as negotiating positions. I empathize with those who freak out about this - and simply refuse to surrender their comfortable world-view - indeed, it's about as ugly as it gets. Anyone who knows how the island-hopping campaign in the Pacific was actually won - understands that point, for example. Terrible? Indeed it is. Just like Sherman said. But better than the alternative, methinks. |
| Posted by: .com 2006-11-13 09:13 |
| #1 Try this |
| Posted by: Bobby 2006-11-13 08:40 |