The Curse Of Sykes - Picot

All the cool kids know the modern Middle East is not so modern. Wicked winners of the 1st World War split up the deader than ObL Ottoman Empire into tons of nation states and redrew demarcating demarcations over tribes, ppl and places.

The olde Sykes Picot manuever.

Arab world is breaking apart, and that what may emerge are new states defined by sect or ethnicity to replace those drawn up by the imperial powers almost a century ago

Arab states, almost by definition, have embodied the failure of integration in the Arab world. Since independence they have been dysfunctional, authoritarian, over-militarized and economically underdeveloped. Unity has been imposed from above, usually brutally, with no tolerance for dissent, whether political or cultural. Leaders who led such countries were viewed with a mixture of distaste and respect for ruthlessly managing the complex dynamics of their societies.
There is a sense among many in the West, weaned on a diet of anti-imperial historiography, that as Sykes-Picot was an imperial arrangement, its consequences must have no real legitimacy in the Arab world today. But that’s not true. The Arabs guard their imperially created boundaries jealously. Breaking up a state remains a path many hesitate to take. In Arab nationalist ideology, the political destiny of the Arabs is to join together in larger political entities, until a single Arab state is formed.

Arab nationalism is a dream of unification, not fragmentation, and it retains an intellectual hold on societies that do not wish to define themselves primarily through a sectarian prism.

Does this mean Arab states will remain unified, at least officially? Political and geographical unity often clash with the reality of sectarian or ethnic division. Arab states are destined to wrestle with this contradiction for some time to come, as a substitute for formal separation. The inheritance of Sykes-Picot may be poisoned and discredited, but it is also far from dead.

Pic - "Ultimately, democracy relies on an implicit quid pro quo among contending groups, according to which each agrees to protect the others' rights in exchange for recognition of its entitlement to govern should it win an election."

Rethinking 5th Fleet

One of several choking chokable choke points in the world's ebb and flow of maritime trade and lifelines is that Hormuz Straight thing.

And perhaps the one thing that keeps it open is Great Satan"s Fifth Fleet. Currently deploying 2 Air craft carrier battle groups - 5th Fleet has tremendous might on hand. For now. That sequestration thing is gon whittle 5th Fleet down to one carrier group for fiscal year 2014

So...time to Rethink 5th Fleet? 

Critics should take a deep breath and welcome the opportunity provided by the difficult fiscal realities to rethink America’s military presence and strategy in the Persian Gulf. It’s time to restructure America’s Navy presence in the Gulf to be stronger yet cheaper. It’s not the number of carriers that will affect U.S. plans and collective interests in the region but the strategy that America will employ in the troubled waters of the Gulf. The essence of this strategy must focus on building a Fifth Fleet that emphasizes small, agile platforms and greater military cooperation with regional allies.

The narrow Persian Gulf is one such area in which carriers are, comparatively speaking, a less than ideal choice. Therefore, the Navy’s decision last month to deploy a fleet of patrol coastal ships, or PC ships, to the Gulf should be praised

The carrier’s ill suitability in a Persian Gulf fight stems from the geographic features of the region -- particularly the Strait of Hormuz -- and Iran’s declared military strategy in the event of conflict. Iran’s strategy allegedly features layered attacks involving naval mines, fast-attack craft and anti-ship cruise missiles. Iranian forces can deploy an arsenal of over 2,000 mines to slow down U.S. naval assets operating in the Strait. This tactic facilitates the targeting of U.S. surface ships through “swarming attacks” by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)’ fleet of small, fast-attack craft, armed with torpedoes, rocket launchers and other anti-ship weaponry. IRGC forces could preposition these small craft at the hundreds of “littoral launching points” that surround the Gulf, including small islands and coves, providing cover that would enable surprise attacks at short distances.

Concurrently, Iranian forces could begin launching land-based, anti-ship cruise missiles, taking advantage of slow-moving U.S. vessels to better target ships. The most lethal of Iran’s anti-ship weaponry, the Russian-made Sunburn missiles, fly at three times the speed of sound and can cruise as low as twenty meters from the ground, performing evasive maneuvers to effectively engage its target. In the Strait of Hormuz, only 21 miles wide at its narrowest point, the Sunburn could reach any ship in minutes. Conducting counterforce strikes against these missile launchers, most of which are mobile, would be difficult and lengthy as Iran is advantaged by a mountainous shore facing the Gulf. The terrain provides easy cover and concealment of cruise-missile launching sites and ideal vantage points for targeting enemy ships.

In short, the relative narrowness of the Gulf would enable Iranian forces to overcome many of the advantages provided by the technological superiority of U.S. forces in the areas of surveillance and targeting. In these confined waters, engagements between Iranian and U.S. forces would transpire at very close ranges.

Deploying the PC ship with Griffin short-range missiles represents a fundamental change in how the U.S. would approach a Strait of Hormuz contingency strategy. Under the widely discussed Littoral Combat Ship program, Navy officials have spoken of a “plug-and-play” approach in which individual ships are outfitted with different sensors and weaponry depending on the specific threats they will confront in their operating environments. This approach represents the right strategy for a Strait of Hormuz contingency. Instead of relying on large, expensive ships to carry out all of these missions, the Navy can effectively disperse these capabilities and hence limit the costs of losses incurred during conflict.

PC ships make sense politically and promote deeper defense cooperation with U.S. allies in the region that maintain small navies dominated by comparably small ships. This would facilitate real burden sharing with partners in the region, permitting individual navies to specialize in particular missions such as anti-mining operations. They would save money, too.

Despite the advantages of the new PC fleet deployment, critics may argue that in pulling a carrier from the Strait, the U.S. would experience a marked decline in its ability to quickly deploy air power in the Gulf. To be sure, absent a carrier presence in the Strait, generating a high number of tactical sorties in a conflict with Iran would be more difficult. But a comprehensive assessment of a prospective strike against Iran indicates that forward-deployed air forces could handle the demands of the operation. Furthermore, the Navy’s ability to generate a large number of sorties should be secondary to ensuring the survivability of its most expensive platform.

The most powerful deterrent is not always the priciest or the biggest. A new U.S. naval strategy focused on lightness, agility, and closer cooperation with allied partners, will best guarantee crisis stability in the Gulf. Time will tell whether the Navy’s decision represents a true strategic shift. On the one hand, this move may simply reflect the tough choices demanded by sequestration. Senior Navy officials may find the PC sufficient for deterrence, but could enact very different deployment strategies in wartime. The reality, however, is that the PC is good for both. Policymakers should embrace these changes, regardless of what prompted them. And at a fraction of the price, the Navy can have its cake and eat it too.

Pic - "The Navy’s newest warships are hard to detect on radar, heavily armed with super-accurate guns and missiles … and gigantic."

Aegypt"s Failed State

Ikwhan!!

Is girl hating Aegypt fixing to hop into the Failed State pit?

Sho am lookit!!

Today, a democratic transition that the West sought to portray as a model that other Arab nations could emulate lies in tatters. Egypt’s economy, bruised by the outflow of foreign investment and a dearth of tourists, is on life support. Rebuilding the country will require much more than the cheering from the sidelines that Western countries have offered so far.

 

Egypt has always relied on munificent benefactors to sustain its patchy state and economy. After the military coup in 1952, the Soviets provided much of the needed aid. Their “technical” experts turned the country’s second city, Alexandria, into a Russian country club. After Egypt pivoted to the West in the wake of the 1973 war against Israel, America became its main patron.

 

But America’s ritual annual gift of roughly $1.5 billion could only dull the pain of Egypt’s problems, not resolve them. The country can no longer provide enough government stipends in the form of bureaucratic posts for college graduates. Egypt can only hope for cash infusions to offset its internal hemorrhaging.

 

By making aid conditional on economic reform and democratic transition, however, the international community risks political triage. It should instead focus on financial assistance that blunts Egyptians’ frustrations and that contributes to building the institutions that will facilitate the transition toward democracy.

 

Of the $1.56 billion that the US State Department requested for Egypt in 2013, only $250 million is earmarked for non-military programs. The US should increase funding for projects that focus on governance, civil society, and strengthening the rule of law. Such programs receive a paltry $25 million in the 2013 budget.

 

To bolster the economy, the US needs to shift its aid policies away from funding projects toward providing immediate budgetary relief. Though financing water-efficiency schemes certainly helps society, its effects are felt years after the aid is initially dispensed.

 

The US, and other Western donors, should instead help Egypt to husband its resources, which are often misspent in an effort to placate its people. Egypt is the largest wheat importer in the world, and food subsidies account for approximately 2% of GDP. To preserve its precious foreign-currency reserves, Egypt needs the US and its allies to provide foodstuffs. Such a policy was adopted in the aftermath of the 1973 war, when America offered $200 million annually for wheat procurement. Embracing such policies will give institutions and the democratic process the time and space they need to plant firm roots.

 

Beyond such questions lies the fate of democracy in one of civilization’s most ancient lands. Whoever triumphs in future elections will lack the legitimacy that only a majority can provide. Such a majority spoke last year, when it elected Morsi. To strip him of his post negates a basic pillar of democracy and sets a dangerous precedent.

 

In a country that faces so many problems, the paradox of Morsi’s removal from power and the dilemmas of democracy that occasioned it are not among them.

 

Pic - "This is unlikely to be simply a procedure like free elections. Rather, it could be a principle: separation of state and religion"

Ulchi Freedom Guardian

It's time!

Ulchi Freedom Guardian is fixing to get all crunk up on the Korean peninsula. 

Defensive drills aimed at preparing for a full-scale invasion by North Korea and are based on computer-assisted simulations, with little actual movement of personnel or equipment.

Some 30,000 U.S. troops from the U.S. Forces Korea and U.S. mainland will join 50,000 South Korean troops from several Army corps, naval fleets, and air wings.

This year's drill will also be observed by Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, New Zealand, Norway and the U.K., which were part of the UN forces during the 1950-53 Korean War.

Long shot perhaps - yet it may provide stimuli for NoKo and her Young General to act out and continue her 3 part juche habit of brinkmanship, charm offensive, and renewed provocation, thus

Providing North Korea with her latest pretext for testing the patience of Great Satan and South Korea. Certainly, the North Korean system’s seemingly inherent need for instability—and the frustrations of its current situation—provide every reason to be on guard against new provocative actions by North Korea

Pic - "The masters of the revolution and construction are the masses of the people and that they are also the motive force of the revolution and construction."

al Qaeda's Government Rules

Beleaf it of don't - al Qaeda has estabb"d rules for governing...

In what reads like a lesson plan for the less-experienced jihadist, Nasser al-Wahishi provides a step-by-step assessment of what worked and what didn't in Yemen. Yet in the rare correspondence discovered by the Associated Press, the man at the center of the latest terror threat barely mentions the extremist methods that have transformed his organization into al-Qaeda's most dangerous branch.

Instead, he urges his fellow jihadist whose fighters had just seized Mali's northern half to show compassion toward the population. He stresses the importance of providing them with potable water and electricity. And he offers tips for making garbage collection more efficient.

"Try to win them over through the conveniences of life," he writes. "It will make them sympathize with us and make them feel that their fate is tied to ours."

The letters and an accompanying report, written last summer and discovered by the AP in Mali earlier this year, provide a perhaps surprising outline of the vision of the 30-something al-Wahishi, a former secretary to Osama bin Laden, whose recently intercepted communication with al-Qaeda supreme chief Ayman al-Zawahri caused the U.S. to shutter 19 embassies and consulates. Experts who were shown the letters say the hearts-and-minds approach al-Wahishi is advocating is a sign of a broader shift within al-Qaeda, which has come to understand in the wake of its failure in Iraq that it is not enough to win territory: They must also learn to govern it if they hope to hold it.

Al-Qaida’s foray into governance in Yemen began on the morning of Feb. 28, 2011, when residents of the locality of Jaar woke up to find an ominous black flag flying over their town.

Fearing the worst, the population was mystified to discover that their extremist occupiers appeared more interested in public works projects, than in waging war.

Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula chronicled their achievements in 22 issues of an online newsletter and in propaganda films showing glowing light bulbs and whirring fans inside the homes of villagers who had never had power before. In one video, al-Qaida fighters are seen leaning ladders against power poles and triumphantly yelling “Allah Akbar,” or “God is great,” each time they connect a downed wire. They took time to write a detailed report, a kind of al-Qaida ‘case study’ on their occupation, which al-Wahashi dutifully enclosed with his letter, like a college professor giving a handout to a student.

Pic - "The Last Refuge"

WoW!!

WoW - the Watchers Council - it's the oldest, longest running cyber comte d'guere ensembe in existence - started online in 1912 by Sirs Jacky Fisher and Winston Churchill themselves - an eclective collective of cats both cruel and benign with their ability to put steel on target (figuratively - natch) on a wide variety of topictry across American, Allied, Frenemy and Enemy concerns, memes, delights and discourse.

Every week these cats hook up each other with hot hits and big phazed cookies to peruse and then vote on their individual fancy catchers.

Thusly sans further adieu (or a don"t)

Council Winners

First place with 3 1/3 votes! Joshuapundit –Ropes Of Sand – Why The Latest Round Of MidEast ‘Peace Talks’ Will End In Failure

Second place with 2 1/3 votes – Bookworm Room -Government of the people, by the people, and for the people has perished in America

Third place with 2 votes – The Right Planet-Smashing ‘The Establishment’ Meme

Fourth place with 1 2/3 votes – The Noisy Room-Waking Up To War

Fifth place with 1 1/3 votes – The Razor-What a Survey of 1,400 Sued Doctors Can Tell Us About Health Care Reform

Sixth place with 1 vote – The Political Commentator-Scandal Obama-style: A cross between the ‘Rope-a-Dope’ and the ‘Four Corners Stall Offense’!

Seventh place *t* with 2/3 vote – Simply Jews- Nothing as open as Open Zion or Ali Gharib for Hassan Rouhani

Seventh place *t* with 2/3 vote – The Colossus of Rhodey – Orson Scott Card vs. Roman Polanski

Seventh place *t* with 2/3 vote – VA Right! –Washington Post Sold to Libertarian. Will it Make a Difference?

Seventh place *t* with 2/3 vote – Nice Deb –Extortion 17: Navy SEAL’s Dad Hammers Regime: “THEY SET UP MY SON TO BE EXECUTED” (Audio)

Eighth place *t* with 1/3 vote –Rhymes With Right – How Long Until This Sort Of Gay Marriage Litigation Comes To America?

Eighth place *t* with 1/3 vote – Liberty’s Spirit – The Israeli-Palestinian Peace push Ignores Reality

Non-Council Winners

• First place with 2 2/3 votes! – Michael Gurfinkiel/Mosaic Magazine -You Only Live Twice. Is there a future for Jewish communities in Europe? submitted by Liberty’s Spirit
• Second place *t* with 2 1/3 votes – Villainous Company –Racism, Conversations, and the Sound of One Hand Clapping submitted by Joshuapundit
• Second place *t* with 2 1/3 votes – The Chronicle Of Higher Education –When Hollywood Held Hands With Hitler submitted by The Colossus Of Rhodey
• Third place with 1 2/3 votes -War Is Boring -The Navy’s New Stealth Battleships submitted by GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD
• Fourth place *t* with 1 vote Caroline Glick -Bibi and the true believer submitted by The Noisy Room
• Fourth place *t* with 1 vote - Abu Muqawama –Banquo in Bandit Country submitted by The Glittering Eye
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote - CIF Watch – CiF asks Palestinian supporter of ‘armed resistance’ her views on the peace process submitted by Simply Jews
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Doug Ross @ Journal –BOMBSHELL REPORT: Valerie Jarrett Gave the Orders on 9/11/2012 and Blocked Rescue in Benghazi submitted by VA Right!
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Seraphic Secret –The New-Old Jew-Haters of the European Union submitted by The Watcher
• Fifth place *t* with 2/3 vote -Victor Davis Hanson –Obama’s Watergates submitted by The Watcher
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Elbert Guillory –Elbert Guillory Announces the Free at Last PAC submitted by Bookworm Room
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Lame Cherry – Is Obama Sunni or Shia Muslim? submitted by The Right Planet
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Alan Colmes Liberaland – How Liberals Have It Wrong About Rush And Sean submitted by Rhymes With Right
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote -White House Dossier – Obama is at Two Dozen Scandals and Counting submitted by Nice Deb
• Sixth place *t* with 1/3 vote -Amil Imani –The Challenge of Racism submitted by The Mellow Jihadi

See you next week! And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter

Wrong Turn

From GsGF's Vertical Envelopement and COIN adviser, the one and only Army Major Crispin Burke via War on the Rocks:

Swan songs for counterinsurgency have been making their rounds for nearly two years, as commentators reflect on two unfulfilling wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the most anticipated of these works has been Colonel Gian Gentile’s Wrong Turn: America’s Deadly Embrace of Counterinsurgency.

Col. Gentile, a West Point history professor and longtime critic of modern counterinsurgency thought, does an admirable job of breaking down the dominant narrative of the evolution of COIN (perhaps best and most recently elucidated in Fred Kaplan’s The Insurgents). But that debate is now played out, and the book does not advance far beyond it. As such, Col. Gentile misses an opportunity to push the conversation forward—in other words, he succeeds at being deconstructive, but not on being constructive.

Those familiar with Col. Gentile’s extensive writing on the topic will no doubt be familiar with his argument about a “popular narrative” adopted shortly after violence subsided in Iraq in 2007. That narrative holds that violence subsided as a direct result of the arrival of General David Petraeus, armed with a new counterinsurgency doctrine. To deconstruct this narrative, Col. Gentile breaks down the “leader-centric” or “hero” view of counterinsurgency, not only in Iraq, but in also popular retellings of the Malayan Emergency and the Vietnam War—which he cites as strong influences on US counterinsurgency doctrine. Dismantling these two historical narratives takes up 50 pages of a 142-page book.

These chapters are interesting, but one suspects that Col. Gentile only chose them because they were the case studies in Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife, a book written by Col. Gentile’s bête noir, John Nagl. Numerous other historical cases have also influenced on the US military’s counterinsurgency manual—among them Northern Ireland, the Arab Revolt of 1916, the Napoleonic Wars, Algeria (via David Galula), and most importantly, numerous recent case studies from Iraq and Afghanistan (which form the bulk of the vignettes in the Army’s field manual). Spending over 1/3^rd of the book on what seems to be little more than a refutation of his old rhetorical sparring partner’s arguments hardly adds anything new to the debate.

Col. Gentile also rails against the way that counterinsurgency doctrine has been applied. Yet, it’s important to note that military doctrine is an attempt to take written guidance and codify it into a method of action—meaning that, just as a single religious text can give rise to any number of interpretations, so too did the the U.S. military’s counterinsurgency manual (known as FM 3-24) .Therefore, much of Col. Gentile’s criticism of counterinsurgency isn’t directed at FM 3-24 per se, but rather at the manual’s romanticized cousin, which we’ll hereafter call “hearts and minds,” or rather just “population-centric counterinsurgency.”

FM 3-24—the first revision of U.S. counterinsurgency doctrine in nearly twenty years—debuted to both acclaim and criticism. Shortly after the manual’s release, Col. Gentile, who had recently returned from a successful battalion command in one of the most restless areas of the Sunni Triangle in Iraq, penned a nuanced op-ed in Armed Forces Journal offering both praise and caution.
Then-Lt. Col. Gentile referred to FM 3-24 as a “superb piece of doctrinal writing”, and felt that its middle chapters were particularly useful for commanders in Iraq. However, he heaped scorn upon a section of the book involving “paradoxes” of counterinsurgency, a concern he reiterates in his 2013 book. Chief among his complaints was—and still is—that FM 3-24 downplays the use of force. He scoffs at FM 3-24’s maxims that “tactical success guarantees nothing” and that “some of the best weapons don’t shoot.”

A closer evaluation, however, shows that FM 3-24 is a far different book than its critics make it out to be. Paradoxes are a poor addition to the book, not because they are inaccurate, but because they tend to be comically over-simplified, and are replete with qualifiers and exceptions. Nevertheless, FM 3-24 does clarify its assertion that “tactical success guarantees nothing” by noting that tactical actions are “important…in achieving security,” though not in and of themselves the only means of success. Indeed, Col. Gentile’s analysis of FM 3-24’s “paradox” section places him in the awkward position of castigating the maxim that “some of the best weapons don’t shoot” (the manual specifically mentions using “money as ammunition”) on the same page on which he regrets not being able to financially compensate an Iraqi woman for her injuries at the hands of American security contractors. Presumably, he would agree that such a situation mandated the use of some of the very same non-tactical tools he dismisses.

In fact, FM 3-24 contains many passages advocating offensive action. It cites the 1st Marine Division’s actions (under the command of General James Mattis) in Iraq in 2003 as a model example of counterinsurgency, perfectly blending civil administration with actions to “neutralize” (read, “use overwhelming firepower to kill, defeat and destroy”) the most recalcitrant insurgents. The same goes for an extended passage involving then-Colonel H.R. McMaster’s 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Tal’Afar, which included building an eight-foot high berm around the city, moving civilians “out of contentious areas,” and using precision fire from artillery and aircraft.

Finally, any discussion of FM 3-24 should also take into consideration the publication of its 300-page supplement, “Tactics in Counterinsurgency” (FM 3-24.2), which is filled with various methods of killing and capturing insurgents on the battlefield.

As for the concept of “hearts and minds,” which is heavily criticized by Col. Gentile, FM 3-24 uses the phrase once, and even then, only with a sense of cold utilitarianism. From paragraph A-26:

This is the true meaning of the phrase “hearts and minds,” which comprises two separate components. “Hearts” means persuading people that their best interests are served by COIN success. “Minds” means convincing them that the force can protect them and that resisting it is pointless. Note that neither concerns whether people like Soldiers and Marines. Calculated self-interest, not emotion, is what counts. Over time, successful trusted networks grow like roots into the populace. They displace enemy networks, which forces enemies into the open, letting military forces seize the initiative and destroy the insurgents. [Emphasis added]

Col. Gentile’s arguments are not entirely about merit. There are those who believed that FM 3-24 offered the promise of a gentler, more just war. Books such as Three Cups of Tea, a feel-good tale (and notorious fraud) appeared on many of the U.S. military’s professional reading lists. Rules of engagement were severely curtailed in Afghanistan, and some even considered a “courageous restraint” medal to commend those who held their fire while under enemy contact. Most importantly, in both Iraq and Afghanistan, billions of dollars were allocated towards humanitarian projects that did nothing to stem the root causes of instability.

The book’s real strength is its thorough research into four historical COIN cases: Malaysia, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Yet Gentile spends more time debunking the leader-centric concept of counterinsurgency than he does examining successful methods for defeating insurgency.
Of course, he wouldn’t have to debunk the leader-centric models of counterinsurgency if legions of writers hadn’t lionized it (most notably, a book from Mark Moyar, which was met with derision from many COIN analysts). Col. Gentile’s research, drawing heavily on journals, notebooks, and other primary sources, does much to dispel the “hero” narrative.

The hero narrative was especially powerful in Iraq not only because General Petraeus was the architect of F.M. 324, but also because he took command in Iraq just as the violence was beginning to subside—leading many to conclude that General Petraeus was the sole cause of the turning point in the Iraq War.

Col. Gentile challenges this hero narrative on two fronts. First, he argues that the reduction in violence was more the product of indigenous factors rather than the result of the Surge. Second, Gentile notes that tactical units performed much the same both before and after General Petraeus took command in Iraq.

As far as the first point, the reasons for the decrease in violence in Iraq remain the subject of much debate. Gentile suggests that it was due to a combination of factors—not the least of which were the Anbar Awakening and the conclusion of the Civil War in Baghdad in 2007, culminating in the stand-down of the Mahdi Army, a Baghdad-based Shia militia. Col. Gentile is not the only one to make this argument. It is echoed in Bob Woodward’s 2008 book, The War Within, written in the concluding days of the Surge. And despite the disagreement that exists between Col. Gentile and Thomas Ricks, both credit the Sunni Awakening for the reduction in violence, and both believe that the events of 2006-2007 may have produced temporary security gains without resolving the underlying causes of instability within Iraq.

Col. Gentile’s second line of attack on the hero narrative is that U.S. units were practicing counterinsurgency before the arrival of General Petraeus. Certainly, COIN did not arrive in Iraq with General Petraeus—the U.S. Army adopted COIN in an evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, manner. An interim COIN manual was published in 2004, and a COIN academy was established in Iraq in 2005. Moreover, several units in Iraq had begun to adopt COIN tactics before the publication of FM 3-24—most notably, General Mattis, Colonel McMaster, and Colonel Sean McFarland (And, of course, Col. Gentile himself, as he mentions four times in Wrong Turn).

Beyond debunking the “hero” narrative—which consumes the bulk of Col. Gentile’s book — Wrong Turn offers little else. A case in point is Col. Gentile’s take on the Vietnam War. For him, the lesson of Vietnam is that leaders must have “clear-headed thinking about policy and strategy that aligns ways, means, and ends relative to national interests and the potential of our enemies”. This is a frequent mantra from Col. Gentile, but he rarely offers specifics as to which ends, ways, and means. As such, this view of strategy describes everything, yet at the same time, nothing. On the rare occasions on which Col. Gentile enters the realm of strategy, we get platitudes like the US Army must have a “discussion on strategy” – failing to realize that the Army, by its lonesome, does not formulate strategy. That, of course, is a question for the entire US government (which, it should be noted, cannot even pass a balanced budget nor acknowledge that global warming exists.)

If anything, Wrong Turn’s takeaway for leaders is in the final three pages, in which Col. Gentile advises leaders against armed nation-building. Sound advice for future foreign policy endeavors, for certain, but will institutional memory keep these lessons? Thirty years after the fall of Saigon, American forces were battling insurgents in two countries, with no end in sight. Political leaders will ignore this sage advice and our military needs to be prepared to carry out these missions, even if they are unwise.

Wrong Turn is a mixed bag. The bulk of the book features meticulous research, though it belabors the point—most readers don’t need eighty pages to be convinced that the “hero” narrative is flawed. Much ink is spent chasing historical ghosts, with little effort to tie it in to our current lessons. Col. Gentile’s thorough historical research wavers at times, sometimes glossing over facts in favor of a simpler narrative. For instance, Col. Gentile’s assertion that two-thirds of the active Army BCTs consist of “light infantry” is highly dubious, unless one counts Stryker infantry as light. Still, it does stick to a narrative Col. Gentile has been has been harking for the last few years.

Nevertheless, despite the book’s flaws, Col. Gentile’s voice is a powerful one in the national debate, and it serves as a decent counterweight to previous, more optimistic writings on counterinsurgency. Everything happens in cycles, and perhaps the US Army is entering the early 1980s once again, with an emphasis on decisive battle rather than on armed nation building. Yet, few predicted that US forces would be involved in such nation building in Iraq and Afghanistan—the United States has an unprecedented ability to find itself overwhelmed by events. Try as we might to heed Col. Gentile’s warning about not being involved in armed nation building, we will need some guiding principles in the event that we are sucked into this predicament once again. This is the debate we should be having.

Pic - "Always thought K2C was pretty cool"