Engaging or withdrawing, winning or losing? The contradictions of counterinsurgerncy plociy in Afghanistan and Iraq

Third World Quarterly

Volumn 28, Issue 2, 2007, Pages 245-260

  Lopez, Andrea M ^a  

^a SUSQUEHANNA UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

GEOPOLITICS; MILITARY INTERVENTION; POLICY ANALYSIS; WAR;

AFGHANISTAN; ASIA; EURASIA; IRAQ; MIDDLE EAST; NORTH AMERICA; SOUTH ASIA; UNITED STATES;

EID: 33847370234     PISSN: 01436597     EISSN: 13602241     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/01436590601153630     Document Type: Article

References (79)

1. US Department of Defense, 'DoD news briefing - Mr Di Rita and Gen Abizaid', 16 July 2003, at http://defenselink.mil/trancripts/2003/ tr20030716-0401.html.
2. See, for example, S Biddle, 'Afghanistan and the future of warfare', Foreign Afairs, March/April 2003
3. M Williamson & R Scales, Jr, The Iraq War: A Military History, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003; and
4. AH Cordesman, The Iraq War: Strategy, Tactics, and Military Lessons, Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies Press, 2003.
5. LP Goodson, 'Afghanistan in 2003', Asian Survey, 44 (1), 2004, p 15.
6. A programme run by the Afghan Transitional Authority, with ISAF and the United Nations, the Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) of the Afghan Militia Forces had demobilised 8850 former combatants as of early June 2004. NATO, NATO in Afghanistan, 2004, at http://www.nato.int/issues/afghanistan, accessed 4 August 2004. However, it unctioned largely on a voluntary basis and warlords were accused of using the programme as a front: Appearing to disarm to appeal to the good graces of ISAF and the USA while keeping modern weapons out of sight.
7. GlobalSecurity.org, 'Military operations', at http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/index.html.
8. C Recknagel, 'Iraq: US seeks ways to improve security situation', Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 10 November 2003, at http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/news/iraq/2003/11/ iraq-031110-rferl-165831html. While the move towards PRTs is fairly widespread in Afghanistan, the withdrawal from cities in Iraq and the more aggressive US polices there were more limited. Different units are conducting vastly dissimilar actions around the country.
9. See, for example, M Gordon, 'Leathernecks plan to use a velvet glove in Iraq', New York Times, 12 December 2003, A26.
10. C Soloway, 'I yelled at them to stop', Newsweek, 7 October 2002, p 37.
11. MJ McNerney, 'Stabilization and reconstruction in Afghanistan: Are PRTs a model or a muddle?', Parameters, Winter 2005-06, p 38.
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13. Ware, 'Where's Bin Laden?'.
14. Ibid, p 31.
15. Goodson, 'Afghanistan in 2003', p 16
16. and M Coorey, 'Scattered teams of troops bring mixed results in Afghanistan', Agence France Presse, 22 June 2004, accessed at Lexis Nexis at http://www.lexisnexis.com.
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19. American-led PRTs tend to have between 60 and 150 personnel. A German-led PRT in Kunduz numbers 450 persons. Goodson, 'Afghanistan in 2003', p 16.
20. See also US Department of State, 'Fact Sheet: Provincial Reconstruction Teams', 31 January 2006, at http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2006/ 60085.htm; and
21. NATO, 'NATO in Afghanistan: Factsheet', 21 February 2005, at http://www.nato.int/issues/afghanistan/040628-factsheet.htm.
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23. D Filkins, 'A US general speeds the shift in an Iraqi city', New York Times, 18 November 2003, A1; and
24. F Zakaria, 'Our last real chance', Newsweek, 19 April 2004, p 47. American and British forces had previously pulled out of cities that were dominated by groups more accepting of the occupation and that did not have much opposition.
25. Filkins 'Tough new tactics'.
26. Goodson, 'Afghanistan in 2003', p 15; and
27. Filkins, 'A US general speeds the shift in an Iraqi city', A1.
28. Soloway, 'I yelled at them to stop', pp 36-38; and
29. AA Jalali, 'Afghanistan in 2002', Asian Survey, 43 (1), 2003, pp 174-185.
30. C von Clausewitz, On War, ed and trans Michael Howard & Peter Paret, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1976, pp 595-596; and
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32. Manwaring, Internal Wars, p 10.
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35. USMC, Small Wars (Draft), 2004, available at http://www.smallwars.quantico.usmc.mil/2003SmallWars.asp, p 39
36. US Army, FM 3-07, Stability Operations and Support Operations, February 2003, pp 2-7.
37. B Hoffman, Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Iraq, Rand National Security Research Division, June 2004, p 15.
38. Krepinevich, The Army and Vietnam, pp 10-15; and
39. DS Blaufarb, The Counterinsurgency Era, New York: Free Press, 1977, p 308.
40. Mazzetti, 'Speak softly, carry a big gun'.
41. C Maechling, Jr, 'Counterinsurgency: The first ordeal by fire', in MT Klare & P Kornbluh (eds), Low Intensity Warfare: Counterinsurgency, Proinsurgency, and Antiterrorism in the Eighties, New York: Pantheon Books, 1988, pp 39-40.
42. Quoted in Cahlink, 'Teamwork helps rebuild Afghanistan'. See also CT Cobane, 'Provincial reconstruction teams and security assistance: comments on an evolving concept', DISAM Journal, Summer 2005, pp 91-97.
43. RM Cassidy, 'Back to the street without joy: Counterinsurgency lessons from Vietnam and other small wars', Parameters, Summer 2004, pp 73-83.
44. KJ Costa, 'Interagency team touts benefits of predeployment training for PRTs', Inside the Pentagon, 8 June 2006, at http://www.lexis-nexis.com.
45. For critiques of interagency co-operation, see also McNerney, 'Stabilization and reconstruction in Afghanistan', pp 36, 44-45; and
46. R Perito, 'Hearts & minds model?', Armed Forces Journal, December 2005, pp 44-45.
47. Cahlink, 'Teamwork helps rebuild Afghanistan'.
48. See also Goodson, 'Afghanistan in 2003', p16.
49. Quoted in N Bristol, 'Military incursions into aid work anger humanitarian groups', Lancet, 267, 4 February 2006, p 385.
50. Coorey, 'Scattered teams of troops bring mixed results in Afghanistan'.
51. Quoted in USMC, Small Wars, pp 43-44.
52. JT Quinlivan, 'Burden of victory: The painful arithmetic of stability operations', Rand Review, Summer 2003, pp 28-29.
53. R Thompson, No Exit From Vietnam, New York: David McKay Company, 1969, p 53; and
54. USMC, Small Wars, p 41.
55. OF Desjarlais, Jr, 'The ABCs of PRT', Department of Defense, US Air Force Releases, 23 June 2006, at http://www.lexis-nexis.com.
56. Recknagel, 'Iraq'.
57. USMC, Small Wars, p 42.
58. J McGreary, 'Which way is the exit?', Time, 15 March 2004, pp 36-43, at http://www.ebscohost.com.
59. Ibid.
60. Filkins, 'A US general speeds the shift in an Iraqi city'.
61. Zakaria, 'Our last real chance', p 47.
62. McGreary, 'Which way is the exit?, p 40.
63. Blaufarb, The Counterinsurgency Era, p 308.
64. USCM, Small Wars, pp 36, 40, emphasis in the original.
65. See also FM 3-07, Stability Operations and Support Operations, pp 3-6.
66. USMC, Small Wars, p 42.
67. USMC, Small Wars Manual, Manhattan, KS: Sun.ower University Press, 1940, pp 1-9, 15-16.
68. The Brookings Institution, 'The state of Iraq: An update', 16 May 2004, at http://www.brookings.org/views/op-ed/ohanlon/20040516.pdf
69. and 'A model of diplomacy', The Daily Item (Sunbury, PA), 20 June 2004, 11A.
70. McGreary, 'Which way is the exit?', pp 39-40.
71. 'A model of diplomacy', 11A.
72. R Nordland, 'Iraq's repairman', Newsweek, 5 July 2004, pp 22-30.
73. ME O'Hanlon & N Kamp, 'Iraq index: Tracking variables of reconstruction and security in post-Saddam Iraq', Brookings Institution, 31 August 2006.
74. E Schmitt & D Rohde, 'Taliban fighters increase attacks', New York Times, 1 August 2004, A1.
75. JS Landay, 'Five years into Afghanistan, US confronts Taliban's comeback', McClatchy Newspapers, 26 September 2006, at http://www.KansasCity.com.
76. See also D Rohde, 'An Afghan symbol for change, then failure', New York Times, 5 September 2006.
77. TG Mahnken, 'The American way of war in the twenty-first century', Review of International Afairs, 2-3, 2003, pp 73-84; and
78. CS Gray, 'Irregular enemies and the essence of strategy: Can the American way of war adapt?', Strategic Studies Institute, March 2006.
79. See also HS Rothstein, Afghanistan & the Troubled Future of Unconventional Warfare, Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006.