Abu Muqawama links a stinging report in the Telegraph.  Writing in the British Army Review, an official MoD publication, Major SN Miller, stated: “Lets not kid ourselves. To date Operation Herrick [the British codename for the War in Afghanistan] has been a failure”. (Editorial comment: Can professional journalists not learn the basic rule of quotation marks belonging outside the period?).

The reader should spend the time to study this Telegraph report in its entirety.  Noteworthy is that AM reflexively goes into a discussion of the fact that a number of British officers he knows have taken to reading FM 3-24 because the UK hasn’t given the right training to their own officers.

But note also that there is little if any of this in the discussion in the Telegraph.  What you do find is that:

Maj Miller, who has served in Afghanistan, also attacks the Department For International Development (DFID) for pumping millions of pounds of taxpayers money into a government where he claimed “corruption, inefficiency and incompetence” are “endemic” …

“Self-protection has become the main tactic, reinforced by air strikes that can backfire and undermine the campaign.

“Even as the Army renders itself more and more immobile with heavier vehicles and infantrymen weighing as much as a medieval knight, still the fantasy of the “manoeuvrist approach is peddled in staff courses.

“There is nothing manoeuvrist about weeks of petty, attritional fire fights within a few kilometres radius of a Forward Operating Base. The reason for all this is clear – zero casualties has become the tacit assumption behind operations.

“The Taliban are not being “coerced”, “deterred”, or “destabilised”. They simply disperse, knowing that the British cannot sustain pressure, and they return like the tide when the British troops withdraw, after a short period, back to their bases” …

“Until the government properly resources the war in Afghanistan, our strategy will fail.

The picture is not one of not knowing how to do it.  It’s one of under-resourcing, FOB-centric, casualty-averse operations, and corruption within Afghanistan itself (ironically, we covered CNAS’s own contribution to under-resourcing in CNAS Releases Afghanistan Study).

To be sure, FM 3-24 touches on much of this, but most of it is common sense.  Skirmishes with Taliban fighters (versus what the U.S. Marines are doing in Now Zad) is wasteful of time, money, resources, and the good will of the Afghans.

The issue is not publishing the UK version of FM 3-24.  The issue is will and fortitude.  And by the way, while we have hit on the UK hard for their failure in Basra (due in part to their ROE and belief in the applicability of their experience in Northern Ireland to anywhere else on earth), we have also noted the brave UK warriors under duress.  The problem is no more in the enlisted ranks than it is the lack of a field manual (publishing the UK version of FM 3-24 won’t solve the world’s problems, nor the problems of the UK Army).  The problem is in the politics and the officer corps.

See also British Hated Because of Musa Qala (and associated links provided).

We have been fairly diligent to propose (and keep proposing) that the high value target campaign in Afghanistan be stopped, Special Operations Forces (SOF) be reattached to infantry, and SOF participate in the softer side of counterinsurgency while infantry also participates in the raids and other kinetics involved in supporting the campaign.

Boss Mongo at Mongo’s Montreaux (I know, cool pseudonym, great name for a web site, I wish I had thought of it first) disagreed.

Let’s talk basics. Conventional Forces, represented here by the Infantry, are regimented, hierarchical, and inflexible. SOF operations and culture–where merit, competence and aptitude often win out over rank–is anathema to CF. As for “no special privileges” like greater authoritiy than CF to call in indirect and air support: those “special privileges” are generated because the force receives special training and has special capabilities. What do you think the S in SOF is for? Is the argument that a 26-year old squad leader should have the same access to the wide array of US effects as a 44-year old, specially trained operator?

If, in our current COIN fights, SOF/GPF integration is so all-fired important, let’s turn the paradigm around: let’s attach infantry companies (commanded by captains) to SF companies (commanded by majors). Better yet, let’s attach infantry battalions to SF Groups and SEAL Teams. That would ensure that the forces are integrated. Of course, the infantry guys would be ruined forever (from thier commander’s point of view) because they’d learn to think for themselves, would prioritize mission accomplishment over placating the command, and would go to the gym and do PT in any clothes they wanted (the horror, the horror).

Starbuck pointed out the case of a sergeant major who admitted to using a multi-million dollar unmanned aerial vehicle to covertly inspect the uniforms of Soldiers at remote combat outposts. Yeah, the organization that promoted that guy and put him in a position of such responsibility and authority could properly utilize SOF.

Well, first of all, let’s distinguish between what I’m suggesting and what I’m not (since it’s impossible to lay out every recommendation and every caveat in a single article).  I’ve never understood the heavy land use of SEALs, and it seems to me that they should stay primarily in the water.  I don’t deny that there needs to be covert operations, and certainly a relatively small unit of commando-style soldiers needs to be maintained (with robust qualifications – HALO jumps, sniper qualifications, etc.).  I do not see the need for Rangers, since airborne qualifications are not unique to them, and air field seizure can be trained at the 82nd and 101st level (my father served in the 82nd).  My opinion is that women shouldn’t be allowed to have combat billets, so that problem would be dealt with under my scenario.

Now, to what I have proposed.  Much of SOF (not all, and certainly not SF with language skills) can be and should be reattached to infantry.  It is in the best interests of a robust military forces for kinetics not to be relegated to certain units, like Thomas P.M. Barnett has proposed with his Leviathan v. Sysadmin.

Boss Mongo gives good reason to question the institutional and bureaucratic makeup and reticence of the U.S. Army, but that’s just an organizational issue, one that can and should be corrected.  It works to have force recon and scout sniper attached to Marine infantry.  Change is hard, but regardless of what position one takes, it should be recognized what the debate is about.  It’s about a division of labor and qualifications into Leviathan and Sysadmin, whether one admits it up front or not.  It’s happening, and it has already happened to some extent.  The question is whether to reverse it or continue down this path.

Next, Boss Mongo gives us a good rundown on why we must entrust the battle against the insurgency to the ISF.  The point is granted, but I still have great reservations in the ISF, and even deeper reservations in the political structure, probably because I am so opposed to Maliki (who has failed to deliver on promises to incorporate the Sons of Iraq into the security apparatus).

But here is one for you.  While I cannot attest to this first hand (since I wasn’t there), I interviewed dozens of Marines coming back from Fallujah in 2007 (when my son was deployed).  They implicitly trusted the Sons of Iraq and worked with them as IPs.  No problems, slept with them, worked with them, ate with them, fought with them (initially against them, and then alongside them against AQ).

The ISF was the problem.  Their ranks were filled with lazy ne’er-do-wells and scurrilous, treacherous scumbags.  The Marines would only sleep in their vicinity with another armed Marine on watch and separated by concertina wire.  There’s the ISF for you.

Finally, Boss takes a shot at Iraqslogger.  TCJ agrees and was down on them long ago.  After all, what do you expect when someone like Eason Jordan leads the outfit?

TCJ says that Boss Mongo should keep up the good work, keep up the writing, and watch his six.

NOW ZAD, Helmand Province, Islamic Republic of Afghanistan – U.S. Marines maneuver through a wall to conduct site exploitation after a precision aerial attack during a combat operation in the abandoned village of Now Zad, Helmand Province, Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, April 3, 2009.

The residents of Now Zad were forced to abandon their homes nearly three years ago out of fear for their lives due to the strong presence of insurgents. By conducting combat operations here, Marines are bringing Now Zad closer to the reintroduction of Afghan-led governance.

The Marines of Company L, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment (Reinforced), the ground combat element of Special Purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force – Afghanistan, have served in Now Zad since November 2008.

Now Zad, Afghanistan is in the news.

The 2nd Battalion of the 7th Marine Regiment had deployed to Afghanistan last spring to train Afghan police. But when Karell’s platoon arrived in Now Zad, the largest town in a remote northern district of Helmand province, they’d rolled into a ghost town.

The Afghans who used to live here, more than 10,000, had been gone for several years, their abandoned mud-brick homes slowly melting into the dusty valley. Insurgents were using the place for R&R. At night, all you heard were the jackals, ululating like veiled, grieving women. The fact that Now Zad had no civilian residents, much less any police, had somehow escaped the notice of the coalition planners who had given the Marines their mission.

“They saw what they wanted to achieve but didn’t realize fully what it would take,” Task Force 2/7′s commander, Lt. Col. Richard Hall, said at the time. “There were no intel pictures where we are now because there were few or no coalition forces in the areas where we operate. They didn’t know what was out there. It was an innocent mistake.”

So, with no police to train or civilians to protect, the Marines in Now Zad were left with the job of evicting the insurgents who had taken over the town.

Joshua Foust has an interesting take on this kind of narrative.

I think we’re starting to reach the point at which you can only tell the same story so many times: U.S. military comes to town, finds out things are worse than they realized, learns their training sucks, and must adapt. Cue gunfire, the agonizing death of comrades, and the realization that you finally get it, and the guys who come to replace you in a few months will be better off as a result. Rinse, repeat.

Well, perhaps intelligence missed it.  Perhaps it would have been better to have known what Now Zad was like before deploying.  But Marines are generally trained at the range (iron sights at 500 yards), close and hand to hand combat in MCMAP, room clearing, language, culture, checkpoints and traffic control, squad rushes, fast roping, and other infantry tactics.  It’s unlikely that they will face anything in Now Zad for which they cannot adapt.

The Captain’s Journal has a different take on things.  Notice the tip of the hat to population-centric counterinsurgency with the horrible notion that there were no civilians to protect.  We have been as strong an advocate as possible of the idea of protecting the population from the Taliban.  But recall that in the context of the Army’s presence at the Korengal Valley we also discussed enemy separation from the population – and targeting the enemy – as another line of operation.

But it will not always be this clear.  The enemy is who we are after, but to get to them at times requires focusing on the population.  Every situation is unique, and thus rather than finding a center of gravity, it is best to see the campaign as employing lines of effort.  In spite of the lack of adequate troops, the campaign will not be an either-or decision, focusing on the enemy or the population.  It will be both-and.

At times this will be extremely difficult, with the insurgency embedding with the population, shielding themselves with women and children, and hiding from U.S. forces.  Counterinsurgency thus proves to be a difficult mix of direct action military engagements, streetside conversations, visits to homes, learning the population and culture, and rebuilding the infrastructure.  There will be enough of this to go around for everyone in the campaign.

But just occasionally, the insurgents will separate themselves from the population, attempt to mass on a location, and go into conventional military formation.  When this happens and when U.S. forces can find it, it pays to kill them on the spot whether they are a direct threat or not.

Why are U.S. forces present in the Korangal valley?  The obvious answer is to kill the enemy.  It’s the perfect circumstances, crafted by the insurgents themselves.  No women, no children, no surrounding infrastructure to be destroyed, only the enemy and U.S. troops.  We dread the difficulty of population-centric counterinsurgency and pray for such engagements.

Intelligence failure or not, Lt. Col. Hall shouldn’t be apologizing for the fact that there are no civilians in Now Zad to protect.  This exigency should be the occasion for celebration.  It happened for the Marines in Garmser, and it’s happening again in Now Zad.  God must love the Marines.

In counterinsurgency, rarely does the opportunity present itself to have an unhindered killing field to defeat an enemy militarily.  This is it.  Several hundred hard core Taliban fighters have garrisoned themselves in Now Zad without any civilian inhabitants whatsoever.  This question was asked earlier and answered by us in Major Combat Operations in Now Zad Afghanistan.  Why are the Marines there?  Answer: Because the Taliban are.

But in this marvelous AP report, we learn – again – that there aren’t enough troops to clear and hold.  More are needed, and this is General McChrystal’s job.  Finally, when population-centric counterinsurgency doctrine makes us question why Marines are killing the enemy, as Col. Gian Gentile would point out, the doctrine is no longer our friend.  We must allow the forces to discover the center of gravity.  In this case, we don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

Prior Featured Article: Taliban Tactics: Massing of Troops

Now Zad Video

From the WSJ:

Mullah Omar, supreme leader of the Taliban, is reasserting direct control over the militant group’s loose-knit insurgency in Afghanistan, ordering attacks and shuffling field commanders in preparation for the arrival of thousands of additional U.S. troops, according to U.S. officials and insurgents in Afghanistan.

Until recently, the ground-level conduct of the Taliban’s war against the U.S.-led coalition has been left to local commanders acting on their own. Mr. Omar, who heads a Taliban leadership council called the Quetta “shura” — named after the city in southeast Pakistan where it is believed to be based — has typically focused on choosing Taliban leaders and funneling money, religious guidance and strategic advice to fighters.

But since the start of the year, Mr. Omar, through his direct lieutenants, has ordered a spate of suicide bombings and assassinations in southern and eastern Afghanistan that presage a bloody phase to come in the Afghan war, according to U.S. officials and Afghan insurgents …

In another unusual attack in mid-May, nearly a dozen suicide bombers struck targets in the provincial capital of Khost in eastern Afghanistan, leaving 12 people dead, not including the bombers. U.S. officials say the attack was ordered by the Quetta shura …

Mr. Omar’s push to centralize command has irked some rank-and-file Taliban, insurgents say, potentially leaving them more amenable to U.S. and Afghan outreach efforts. Drawing on a tactic first used in Iraq, the U.S. has been reaching out to moderate Taliban fighters in the hopes of reconciling them into Afghanistan’s political process.

However, Mr. Omar’s re-emergence could also lead to a more centralized and coordinated — and violent — insurgency that would pose an even greater threat, U.S. officials and insurgents say.

We have previously discussed the disaggregation of the Taliban into drug runners, petty thieves, local warlords, and distributed operations of small units of Taliban fighters.  We said that this would make battling the Taliban more difficult.

There is a flip side to this coin.  Despite romantic (maybe pedantic?) notions of swarm theory on the evolution of insurgencies (viz. John Robb at Global Guerrillas), every insurgency is different, from religious devotion to criminality, from (foreign) state sponsorship to complete independence from government influence or largesse, from responsibility being pushed downward to lower- and mid-tier commanders to (in this case) re-centralization of authority and power.

Apparently, Mullah Omar believes that reassuming tactical control over his fighters is in his and the Taliban’s best interest.  If he is successful, this might mean more difficulty in battling the Taliban in the South.  The claim that some insurgents would be more amenable to outreach efforts due to this re-centralization of power appears to be wishful thinking.  The Captain’s Journal simply doesn’t believe it.

Commenter and loyal reader TSAlfabet and TCJ are in a debate over what democracy in Iran might bring.  It’s the same debate that Michael Totten is having with himself at Commentary Magazine.  On the one hand, we should all support democracy programs in Iran, and Mir Hossein Mousavi seems light years better than Ahmadinejad.  But Michael Totten doesn’t trust him, although he does point out that Michael Ledeen believes that there has been a transformation in his views.  Either way, the disposition of the current upheaval in Iran likely doesn’t change anything regarding the push for a nuclear weapon.

But democracy is a good first step in Iran’s evolution towards being a viable twenty first century state.  Fox News recently reported (James Rosen) that Washington was abuzz with talks about how the Iran analysts and foreign policy experts had missed how Iran had transitioned from the Islamic revolution to a fascist, repressive state.  This hidden revolution was recently discussed in the New York Times, no doubt leading to the current debate over the expert analysts entirely missing it.

Just after Iran’s rigged elections last week, with hundreds of thousands of protesters taking to the streets, it looked as if a new revolution was in the offing. Five days later, the uprising is little more than a symbolic protest, crushed by the elite Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. Meanwhile, the real revolution has gone unnoticed: the guard has effected a silent coup d’état.

The seeds of this coup were planted four years ago with the election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And while he has since disappointed his public, failing to deliver on promised economic and political reforms, his allies now control the country. In the most dramatic turnabout since the 1979 revolution, Iran has evolved from theocratic state to military dictatorship.

Disenchantment with clerical rule has been growing for years. To the urban youths who make up Iran’s most active political class, the mullahs represent the crude rigidity of Islamic law. To the rural poor, they epitomize the corruption that has meant unbuilt schools, unpaved roads and unfulfilled promises of development.

The problem with the Fox News report is that not everyone missed it.  In 2004 Michael Ledeen said that we shouldn’t dismiss the prospects of democratic revolution in Iran.  In 2008 he clearly linked them with fascist dictatorships, and in 2007 he said concerning Iran, “the economy – insofar as it has to do with the daily lives of most people – is a disaster, the rulers are hated, the population is young, and there is a long tradition of self government” (page 208 of The Iranian Time Bomb; as a fellow Marine father, my copy is signed “From a fellow-suffering dad to another – Michael”).

Finally, writing for Pajamas Media, Michael said early in 2009:

… despite all their efforts to crush any sign of internal rebellion, many Iranians continue to publicly oppose the mullahs.  A few weeks ago, students at universities all over the country demonstrated in significant numbers, and as one Iranian now living in Europe put it to me, “they were surprised that the regime was unable to stop the protests, even though everyone knew they were planned.”   This is the background for the new wave of repression, accompanied by an intensification of jamming on the Internet, and an ongoing reshuffle of the instruments of repression;  Khamanei and Ahmadinejad have no confidence in the efficacy or blind loyalty of the army or of large segments of the Revolutionary Guards.  Most public actions are carried out by the Basij, who are judged more reliable, and repression is less in the hands of the traditional ministries than in new groups freshly minted in the Supreme Leader’s office.

In short, we are dealing with a regime that is very concerned about its future, and is not very comfortable with its friends, allies, and proxies.  The mullahs know that most Iranians would like to see their leaders treated the same way as the nine executed on Christmas Eve, and, like all tyrants, the Iranian despots are trying to demonstrate that they dominate both Iran and the region.

These are just a very few of the quotes cobbled together over ten minutes or so of research.  The debate that commenter TSAlfabet and TCJ are having and Michael Totten is having with himself is several steps above the current panic among so-called “experts” in Washington who wonder why they missed it so badly.  We’re further ahead in our discussion because we didn’t miss it.  Neither did Michael Ledeen.  So why is this administration listening to “experts” who miss major events like the next Iranian revolution?

Meanwhile, the revolution isn’t over quite yet, no matter what the NYT commentary asserts.