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Posted (edited)

Some Military Trends in the Anglo Saxon world, which I hope are not in dispute, but where do they lead us?

 

1. The cost of personnel will continue to rise as demographics diminish the population base, benefits increase and general expectation rise.

 

2. The overall cost of military force will continue to rise as military inflation far exceeds that of any other technology category.

 

3. The military threat to vital interests, possibly even survival (WMD), will be more diverse, more opaque, more hidden and require a more infantry based approach. i.e. the very category that the Western nations have the least advantage on the battlefield, in technology and deployable manpower.

 

4. The capacity of the public to support long term wars of medium and long duration continues to be shown as shallow even after such as events as 9/11. Embassy and warship destruction seem not to have entered public consciousness.

 

5. Military operations tend not to gain political capital for a head of government in either the US or Europe.

 

6. Secondary and tertiary nations will continue to spend less on defense and therefore participate less due to a perceived "irrelevant".

 

7. The public seems to demanding a far more legalistic basis for the use of force in the very environment where unlawful combatants defy legal categorization either by their existance or their actions.

 

 

These trends point to some kind of crisis in the next 10-15 years unless either the security paradigm or the security enforcement paradigm is altered.

Edited by Cromwell
Posted

Simply put, whatever the general trend is, if it's leading us to a crisis, then the crisis will come, and we'll have the solution thereafter, probably in a very violent and not wholly savory manner. That's how Western democracies fight wars. It's a feature (1) of the system architecture.

 

1. And I don't mean "feature" in the sense of a euphamism for a bug nobody wants to take the time to fix; it's a fundamental property of democracies that they can't get anything decisive done unless under a lot of pressure, usually of their own making.

Posted
Some Military Trends in the Anglo Saxon world, which I hope are not in dispute…

 

How long you been posting on TankNet??? :)

 

1. The cost of personnel will continue to rise as demographics diminish the population base, benefits increase and general expectation rise.

 

2. The overall cost of military force will continue to rise as military inflation far exceeds that of any other technology category.

 

3. The military threat to vital interests, possibly even survival (WMD), will be more diverse, more opaque, more hidden and require a more infantry based approach. i.e. the very category that the Western nations have the least advantage on the battlefield, in technology and deployable manpower.

 

6. Secondary and tertiary nations will continue to spend less on defense and therefore participate less due to a perceived "irrelevant".

 

Yes on all these, BUT

 

4. The capacity of the public to support long term wars of medium and long duration continues to be shown as shallow even after such as events as 9/11. Embassy and warship destruction seem not to have entered public consciousness.

 

NATO is still making an effort in Afghanistan, close to 6 years after the invasion. They are also still involved in the Balkans (albeit it’s winding down). Imagine the staying power in a situation where we actually had a vital interest at stake…

 

I think recent history shows that the concept that Westerners won’t fight long and won’t take casualties is a sweeping generalization.

 

5. Military operations tend not to gain political capital for a head of government in either the US or Europe.

 

I, and many political scientists more expert than me, would argue that Bush’s second term was won on the tax cuts and the perception (then) of being a strong ‘war’ president. The Falklands was a lifeline for the survival of the Thatcher government. I think a well-led campaign/war conducted for reasons the people understand/share can tremendously enhance popularity, The reverse also holds.

 

7. The public seems to demanding a far more legalistic basis for the use of force in the very environment …

 

While I agree that this is a major problem, I think “the public” should be substituted with “weaselly NGOs, compassion/grief merchants and professional bleeding hearts.

 

Furthermore, while I see lots of excesses, insofar as the wars you describe are ‘hearts and minds’ wars, restraint and moral superiority, when not taken to ridiculous lengths, can actually be assets.

Posted

Getting an MA at Georgetown's Security Studies Program taught me to despise theory when it comes to studying war (counterintuitively, since IR grad school is all about theory), but this article by Edward Luttwak really convinced me: http://www.harpers.org/archive/2007/02/0081384.

 

Basically, the article is a much more nuanced version of TankNet's "GO ROMAN!!!" philosophy -- defeating an insurgency is pretty easy, just kill a lot of people, many of whom are going to be totally innocent. And doing it without killing a lot of people is well-nigh impossible. It worked for the Romans, worked for the Nazis (the extent and effectiveness of the Resistance in Europe has been vastly overstated), etc. Which sounds savage, but is undisputably true (and honestly, it's not a lot more savage than saying that the way to win a war is to kill a lot of people, many of whom are going to be totally innocent). The bigger question, though, is when is doing that worth it, especially nowadays? I don't think it's worth it in Iraq -- if not for moral reasons, than in terms of PR, cost-effectiveness, etc.

Posted
Getting an MA at Georgetown's Security Studies Program taught me to despise theory when it comes to studying war (counterintuitively, since IR grad school is all about theory), but this article by Edward Luttwak really convinced me: http://www.harpers.org/archive/2007/02/0081384.

 

Basically, the article is a much more nuanced version of TankNet's "GO ROMAN!!!" philosophy -- defeating an insurgency is pretty easy, just kill a lot of people, many of whom are going to be totally innocent. And doing it without killing a lot of people is well-nigh impossible. It worked for the Romans, worked for the Nazis (the extent and effectiveness of the Resistance in Europe has been vastly overstated), etc. Which sounds savage, but is undisputably true (and honestly, it's not a lot more savage than saying that the way to win a war is to kill a lot of people, many of whom are going to be totally innocent). The bigger question, though, is when is doing that worth it, especially nowadays? I don't think it's worth it in Iraq -- if not for moral reasons, than in terms of PR, cost-effectiveness, etc.

 

It's most certainly not worth it. American primacy in the world is more seduction than coercion. Seduction meaning we get what we want because others see us as a positive influence. Sure you can quell insurgency with genocide, but that will cost us the seductive power of the United States which in my opinon is more valuable and harder to build than military power. Should we lose it we'll have to rely on coercion alone, which will further alienate allies and encourage alliances to form against the American interest. People are going to say, well there's only so much you can get done without force. That's definatly true, but also irrelevant. American power is not unlimited, foreign policy initiatives should accordingly be more prudent. They only "crisis" is the recent realization in some circles that not all problems have a military solution. This "crisis" universally afflicts all countries in the world from time immortal.

Posted

8. Significant segments of the population, disproportionately from the opinion-forming elites in academia, the media and entertainment, will instinctively sympathize with the enemy, any enemy.

 

Some Military Trends in the Anglo Saxon world, which I hope are not in dispute, but where do they lead us?
Posted

It is certainly questionable if this remains true for the post-nationalist West.

 

Simply put, whatever the general trend is, if it's leading us to a crisis, then the crisis will come, and we'll have the solution thereafter, probably in a very violent and not wholly savory manner. That's how Western democracies fight wars. It's a feature (1) of the system architecture.

 

1. And I don't mean "feature" in the sense of a euphamism for a bug nobody wants to take the time to fix; it's a fundamental property of democracies that they can't get anything decisive done unless under a lot of pressure, usually of their own making.

Posted
8. Significant segments of the population, disproportionately from the opinion-forming elites in academia, the media and entertainment, will instinctively sympathize with the enemy, any enemy.

That is because the elites have the Marxist view of morality where ethics are determined by status.

Posted
[…] Edward Luttwak […] Basically, the article is a much more nuanced version of TankNet's "GO ROMAN!!!" philosophy -- defeating an insurgency is pretty easy, just kill a lot of people, many of whom are going to be totally innocent. […] The bigger question, though, is when is doing that worth it, especially nowadays? I don't think it's worth it in Iraq -- if not for moral reasons, than in terms of PR, cost-effectiveness, etc.

 

I’ve read a fair amount of work by Luttwak (including On logistics and the essay you linked to) and I’ve always found his opinions exceedingly empiricist (if all history and knowledge is a collection of unrelated vignettes with not common thread at all, then no study or knowledge of it has any use beyond glib curiosity) and his articulation of arguments unconvincing.

 

The most obvious problem with “Roman” (terribilist) prescriptions in COIN campaigns is that they pervert the very cause that underlies the desire for ‘victory’ abs initial. This you essentially point out in the posting above.

 

Luttwak and co are either stupid or dishonest I they think that, say, Petraeus doesn’t know he could subdue Iraq by carpet bombing half its population to death. What would be the point?

 

The least analysis, among military people and lots of military commentators, including here on TankNet, is that the least discussed issue is always: is ti absolutely vital that we fight? If not, basically, don’t. Or if you do, do so with a firm cost-benefit calculus in mind that dictates, among other things, that if the cost ism not longer worth the benefit you ‘give up’ without a lot of posturing about “cut and run”.

If it is vital, then it goes without saying that you are talking about total war. Notwithstanding the nonsense he acceded to before OIF, Powell was dead right on the Powell Doctrine.

Posted

I've had the same problems with Luttwak in the past but now I think that he's less pro-empire and more complex than I used to. I think he's saying basically what I said in that first post -- that you really can't defeat insurgencies with nice stuff like nation-building any more than you can win a war without killing lots of people -- but you have to then take a step back and decide whether that's worth the moral/financial/other cost. I don't think he's advocating we adopt WWII-era German partisan tactics, so much as saying that if you're not willing to adopt such tactics, you should get out of the country instead of thinking that you'll win by building schools and the like. Notice the last paragraphs (italics are mine):

 

>>>>>>>>

By contrast, the capacity of American armed forces to inflict collective punishments does not extend much beyond curfews and other such restrictions, inconvenient to be sure and perhaps sufficient to impose real hardship, but obviously insufficient to out-terrorize insurgents. Needless to say, this is not a political limitation that Americans would ever want their armed forces to overcome, but it does leave the insurgents in control of the population, the real “terrain” of any insurgency. Of course, the ordinary administrative functions of government can also be employed against the insurgents, less compellingly perhaps but without need of violence. Insurgents everywhere seek to prohibit any form of collaboration or contact with the authorities, but they cannot normally prevent civilians from entering government offices to apply for obligatory licenses, permits, travel documents, and such. That provides venues for intelligence officers on site to ask applicants to provide information on the insurgents, in exchange for the approval of their requests and perhaps other rewards. This effective and straightforward method has been widely used, and there is no ethical or legal reason why it should not be used by the armed forces of the United States as well. But it does require the apparatus of military government, complete with administrative services for civilians. During and after the Second World War, after very detailed preparations, the U.S. Army and Navy governed the American zone of Germany, all of Japan, and parts of Italy. Initially, U.S. officers were themselves the administrators, with such assistance from local officials they chose to re-employ. Since then, however, the United States has preferred both in Vietnam long ago and now in Iraq to leave government to the locals.

 

That decision reflects another kind of politics, manifest in the ambivalence of a United States government that is willing to fight wars, that is willing to start wars because of future threats, that is willing to conquer territory or even entire countries, and yet is unwilling to govern what it conquers, even for a few years. Consequently, for all the real talent manifest in the writing of FM 3-24 DRAFT, its prescriptions are in the end of little or no use and amount to a kind of malpractice. All its best methods, all its clever tactics, all the treasure and blood that the United States has been willing to expend, cannot overcome the crippling ambivalence of occupiers who refuse to govern, and their principled and inevitable refusal to out-terrorize the insurgents, the necessary and sufficient condition of a tranquil occupation.

Posted
NATO is still making an effort in Afghanistan, close to 6 years after the invasion. They are also still involved in the Balkans (albeit it’s winding down). Imagine the staying power in a situation where we actually had a vital interest at stake…

Some NATO countries are getting quite sick of Afghanistan, especially those doing the actual fighting. Canada, for instance, has been on the sharp end for three years now and has got the third highest casualty numbers of any of the US led NATO forces, only eight fewer than the British. We're tired of some (not all) of the Europeans all but hiding in their barracks while our guys are dying in Panjwaii.

 

Our combat troops will be gone in February 2009 unless the current minority Conservative governments wins a parliamentary majority by then, and perhaps still gone even then.

 

The other problem here is that ordinary folk, like those in most places, don;t pay close attention to foreign affair4s so they tend to adopt the memes that the media and political elites feed them. We've been weaned on Canada as Peacekeepers not warriors, and told that this is George Bush's War. We expect that from the socialist left, but the Liberals who dominate the media have their own partisan agenda, even though they're the ones who sent our troops to Kandahar.

Posted
It is certainly questionable if this remains true for the post-nationalist West.

 

The "post-nationalist" (1) West hasn't yet been faced with a serious existential threat. Even the terrorist attacks of the last couple of decades only signal an existential threat to those who extrapolate a dark future of continued terrorist suasions, growing in frequency and scope. That's not enough to move a democracy beyond measured responses (Afghanistan) and seemingly quick-fix limited instrumental wars (Iraq). It will take years, perhaps decades, of much more serious challenges and much more pain before the fundamental democratic response -- kill 'em all -- is unleashed.

 

1. I would have said "post-imperial".

Posted (edited)
I don't think he's advocating we adopt WWII-era German partisan tactics, so much as saying that if you're not willing to adopt such tactics, you should get out of the country instead of thinking that you'll win by building schools and the like.

 

But in stating the problem in such terms, he's inviting that a choice be made, and implying that if what one wants can only be achieved through frightfulness, then one had better get over one's squeamishness about the exercise, all of his disclaimers to the contrary notwithstanding. It's a very genteel expression of the thinking behind the "will to power". The funny thing -- in an ironic, not humorous, sense -- is that we have always embraced the will to power in wholesale lots (strategic bombing, unrestricted submarine warfare, nuclear deterrence), but find moral and ethical reasons why we can't embrace it on a retail basis in COIN ops.

Edited by aevans
Posted
The funny thing -- in an ironic, not humorous, sense -- is that we have always embraced the will to power in wholesale lots (strategic bombing, unrestricted submarine warfare, nuclear deterrence), but find moral and ethical reasons why we can't embrace it on a retail basis in COIN ops.

 

I think that it's because Americans (and I'd assume most Western countries) don't have much of a problem with our armies killing civilians as long as they weren't specifically targeted (although in total war the gloves tend to come off). It's this naive sense that intent really matters, although "sorry, we didn't mean to do it" is small consolation for the people who get killed. If we could somehow end the insurgency in Iraq by lining up 500 innocent Iraqis against a wall and shooting them in the head, Lord knows we wouldn't do it, even if not doing so will cost the lives of a hell of a lot more than 500 Iraqis.

Posted (edited)

I I would argue that we are already using the "go Roman" approach, but in a much more sneaky manner. First, not at all on the COIN level, but on the nation state level as deterrence.

 

Screw with us and we will do the following:

1. Invade and conquer your country with no plans for occupation and no attempt to implement order (anarchy, looting, mass civilian suffering from crime)

2. Ignore parts your country until they make the news, and then smash them (mass refugees / human displacement, civilian causalities, mass property damage)

3. Ignore parts of your country as they descend into anarchy and start to resemble civil war (mass causalities in your nation state as your citizen’s turn on each other combined with other horrors)

4. Utterly smash your economy for sometime to come. (Flat tax implements, incompetent governance)

5. Loot your nation’s resources (last unapproved Iraq oil deal where our companies suck up the oil and give the Iraqis a portion of the profits)

3. Arm your sectarian factions so they can kill each other better (under the guise of the national police)

 

The best part is, we will spin the issue to make us look like the "good guys", or at least not the "bad guys"

1. Install a Vichy government of the people that is incompetent, and blame your civil problems on them

2. Go in under the guise of liberating your people, and then confess we had no idea what we were getting into

 

 

We may not be using it as an intentional plan, but the end result takes the whole go Roman approach to a whole new level of destruction, death, and torture and we even get plausible deniability out of it.

 

The final touch will come as we pull out, and ethic cleansing / genocide occur as the three factions fight it out.

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------

 

The final effect is very effective, as the rest of the countrys in the region look on in horror. It is on a certain level, and excellent example of Nixon style realpolitik.

Edited by Bluelight
Posted
[…] Luttwak […] I think he's saying basically […] that you really can't defeat insurgencies with nice stuff like nation-building any more than you can win a war without killing lots of people -- but you have to then take a step back and decide whether that's worth the moral/financial/other cost. I don't think he's advocating we adopt WWII-era German partisan tactics, so much as saying that if you're not willing to adopt such tactics, you should get out of the country instead of thinking that you'll win by building schools and the like.

 

What Luttwak does not address at any level is that insurgency is a response to a political/military imposition. It does not always co-exist with widespread internal strife/civil war but those, too, have roots in some unsettled grievance. His thesis is that insurgency can only be beaten through brutality and therefore, non-brutal peoples must not get involved in COIN. I think history shows that insurgency can be solved through political legitimacy of rule and limited force/repression applied with quasi-law enforcement standards to the irreducible/violence-loving minority of nutters. Under those conditions, material help/’nation building’ are not only effective, they become part of the legitimacy-building process.

 

In the case of a civil war mingled with an insurgency against a foreign occupier, achieving political legitimacy seems exceedingly difficult and in most cases would require partition/structural sea-change in the political structure of the place in question.

 

In Iraq, as far as I can tell, the US is facing a local resistance to occupation, an ethnic/sectarian civil war and, dulcis in fundo, ideologically-motivated subversion not entirely conflatable with either the insurgency or civil war, though linked to and enabled by it. I think the term for that is a BIG CAN OF WORMS.

 

I agree with Luttwak that the US polity is particularly unequipped to deal with it. I think this is due to a number of factors:

1) predilection for an engineering-oriented, quantitative approach to problem solving that is unsuited to what are essentially political processes.

2) a peculiar mix of short-term compassion/sentimentalism and long-term indifference/ennui with international issues.

3) considerable medium- to long-term accountability of policy makers to domestic opinion which limits staying power and the amount of force usable.

4) the naïve misapprehension that very high civil society achievement at home precludes skulduggery and duplicity on the part of policy-makers when those decisions are aimed at non-voters (foreigners).

5) the refusal to accept that heinous damage wrought with well-meaning or at least non-malicious intentions will not generate enduring hatred at the receiving end.

6) the Manichean need to try to establish, in most conflicts, a set of ‘good’ allies and ‘bad’ enemies, not recognizing that sometimes everybody in the room is bastard.

Posted
I agree with Luttwak that the US polity is particularly unequipped to deal with it. I think this is due to a number of factors:

 

 

4) the naïve misapprehension that very high civil society achievement at home precludes skulduggery and duplicity on the part of policy-makers when those decisions are aimed at non-voters (foreigners).

5) the refusal to accept that heinous damage wrought with well-meaning or at least non-malicious intentions will not generate enduring hatred at the receiving end.

 

Apologies in advance, Ariete, if it seems I am quoting you out of context. I find these two points particularly cogent to the whole problem.

 

As to 4): I have always regarded as bizarre the assumption that say a pluralist democracy (like ours) would be necessarilly more trustworthy in the international arena than say a totalitarian dictatorship and/or a religious theocracy. Because the interaction of states are governed by no higher enforcement mechanism than those very states or groups themselves, the main gauge of trust/dependability would seem, if one were hard-nosed and unsentimental enough, to be the actual behavior of those states abroad, not their behavior at home, however reprehensible or laudable.

 

Or to express it in a sort of imperfect analogy:

 

Your household would feel less threatened by the family which beat its children and killed its dogs, but which limited its behavior to its property, than by the loving, family-oriented household, just the picture of perfection at home, but whose members have been known to break into other houses and beat and kill the families therein. The first family is disgusting, but no threat outside in the public areas, while the second is admirable but might prompt you to arm your own family, because you would be foolish to trust them based on their past record outside their home.

 

As to 5): I think you might have misplaced a "not" in this statement. For heinous damage wrought with even the best of intentions will generate LASTING hatred, especially as there seems to be a fundamental and unbridgeable gap between what one side sees itself as doing, and what the other side sees as being done to it.

 

Or:

 

Side A: "We are the family who have done what we must to protect ourselves, as your parents in this household were plotting to kill us." vis-a-vis

 

Side B: "You are the family who have killed the only parents we had, when they had not yet moved against you. They were lousy parents, but who are you?"

Posted

I agree with a lot of your trends.

 

My friend John Robb has written a lot about what you have stated. His blog is here: http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/

 

His latest article on Mexico is excellent, key points are:

 

Most conflicts are now fought while in a peacetime posture. The nation-state isn't mobilized and the environment is business as usual. This radically limits what the nation-state can accomplish/do. Citizens will not accept pain or sacrifice and assume the government will continue to deliver growth and prosperity. Any deviation will be punished at the ballot box. (my note - only if there is an existantial threat, or if in a democracy)

 

The global economic environment is viciously competitive. Weakness, brought on by disruption, will be punished quickly and a loss in wealth can be substantial. For example: the recent attacks in Mexico have generated over $2 billion in damage to corporations currently based in the country. This is 10-20% of Mexico's entire foreign direct investment (FDI) flow. If more attacks occur, that FDI could quickly reverse and quickly put Mexico's economy into deep trouble. (My note: OBL and AQ's entire strategy is to bleed the US economically, low cost attacks for large economic loss are going to become more common by savvy terror groups)

 

It can put nation-states onto a path of financial ruin. Global competition is forcing nation-states to run increasingly lean/efficient budgets. Increases in tax rates can force companies and individuals to flee (movement in a globalized world is quick). Given this situation, nation-states can quickly find that open-ended defense expenditures (to compensate for disruptions) a path to financial ruin. For example: Despite the fact that 40% of Mexico's federal budget is funded by oil revenues that are in a steep decline (due to past peak drop offs in its oil fields), the country has increased defense spending by 24% to fight narco-guerrillas and other internal foes. (Actually, discretionary spending within government budgets is the key - many of the Western European countries do not have a lot of latitude, and with aging populations, the old people have to be taken care of. Japan is going to be in real trouble in the next couple of decades)

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