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Abstract
The US Army has two approaches to counterinsurgency operations in Afghanistan. One is hard, or combat-focused, and the other is soft, or development-focused. This study examines two US Army task forces deployed to Panjwai District, Afghanistan from 2012 to 2013. CTF 4-9 and 1-38 offer a meaningful comparison because they pursued these contrasting approaches among the same population and against the same enemy at the same time and place. The study compares each unit’s approach and finds that neither approach was successful absent the other. The article concludes by recommending further research into combining the approaches at the operational level.
Notes
1. McChrystal, ‘Commanders Initial Assessment’.
2. For a recent characterization of this debate, see Porch, Counterinsurgency. See also Gentile, Wrong Turn.
3. Woodward, Obama’s War, 282.
4. CNAS, ‘Frontline: Kill or Capture’, 11 May 2011.
5. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013; such brazen behavior was epitomized by the daytime emplacement and arming of IEDs.
6. Saikal, ‘A State in Limbo’, 23.
7. MAJ Paul Lushenko was deployed to Panjwai District from 2012–2013 where he served as the Intelligence Officer for CTF 4-9.
8. Maley, ‘Statebuilding in Afghanistan’.
9. Marten, ‘The Same Old Mistake’. See also Kilcullen, Counterinsurgency, 53, 62.
10. US Department of the Army, FM 3-24, paras 1-6 – 1-11.
11. As America’s occupational force, the US Army provides ‘landpower’ – the ability to gain, sustain, and exploit control over land, resources, or people – beyond the capability of others. See, US Department of the Army, ADRP 1.0.
12. As defined by this article, a SIGACT represents an enemy initiated attack or ambush using a variety of indirect (artillery) and direct (improvised explosive devices) means as well as other security incidents directly attributable to enemy activity (enemy mines inadvertently activated by civilians or the enemy itself).
13. Springer, Stabilizing the Debate.
14. US Department of the Army, FM 3-24, para 1-3.
15. Ucko, The New Counterinsurgency Era, 9–10.
16. Saikal and Cheng, ‘Conclusion’, 198.
17. Gentile, ‘A Strategy of Tactics’, 7. See also Gentile, Wrong Turn and Wilson III, ‘Beyond COIN’.
18. Blanken and Overbaugh, ‘Looking for Intel?’, 561. See also Chauduri and Farrell, ‘Campaign Disconnect’.
19. US Department of the Army, FM 3-24, para. 1-4.
20. Ucko, The New Counterinsurgency Era, 175.
21. Kaplan, The Insurgents, 4. According to Kaplan, COINdinistas represents ‘a wordplay that combined the abbreviation for counterinsurgency (COIN) with the name of the leftist insurgency that seized power in Nicaragua in the late 1970s (Sandinistas)’.
22. Ucko, ‘Counterinsurgency and Its Discontents’, 10.
23. Nagl, Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife. See also Broadwell, All In; Kagan, The Surge; Ricks, The Gamble; and, Robinson, Tell Me How This Ends.
24. Biddle, ‘Afghanistan’s Legacy’, 82.
25. Owen, ‘Killing Your Way to Control’, 34–7.
26. Tunnell, ‘Memorandum for the Honorable John McHuge’’.
27. Galula, Counterinsurgency Warfare.
28. Kilcullen, Counterinsurgency, 9–10.
29. Race, War Comes to Long An, 157.
30. Nagl, Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife. See also Summers, On Strategy. Of course, it is important to note that authorities ranging from Nagl to Summers draw starkly different conclusions for what the Vietnam War represented for the future of the US Army’s institutional culture and attendant war-fighting doctrine.
31. Boyle, ‘Do Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency Go Together?’
32. Owen, ‘Killing Your Way to Control’, 36.
33. Meyer, ‘Flipping the Switch’, 245.
34. Owen, ‘Killing Your Way to Control’, 36.
35. US Department of the Army, FM 3-60.
36. Noah, ‘Birth of a Washington Word’. Kinetic operations include but are not limited to lethal strikes and direct-action raids.
37. Tan, ‘Report Blames Lapses’.
38. Hardy and Lushenko, ‘The High Value of Targeting’.
39. Ibid. See also BBC, ‘Afghanistan Haqqani Militant Haji Mali Khan Capture’.
40. Neumann, Evans, and Pantucci, ‘Locating Al Qaeda’s Center of Gravity’.
41. Boyle, ‘Do Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency Go Together?’, 343.
42. McChrystal, ‘ISAF Commander’s Counterinsurgency Guidance’.
43. Bair, ‘Challenges with Counterinsurgency Doctrine in Afghanistan’.
44. On Karzai’s kleptocracy, see Tellis, Reconciling with the Taliban. On the ISI, see Waldman, ‘The Sun in the Sky’.
45. Collins, ‘The End of the War on Terror’, 8.
46. Aylwin-Foster, ‘Changing the Army for Counterinsurgency Operations’, 5.
47. Upshur, Roginksi, and Kilcullen, ‘Recognizing Systems in Afghanistan’, 90.
48. Oliker, Building Afghanistan’s Security Forces. See also Roggio and Lundquist, ‘Green-on-Blue Attacks in Afghanistan’.
49. Saikal, ‘A State in Limbo’, 15.
50. The validity and usefulness of the US Army’s approach to ‘learning’ doctrinal lessons from its COIN campaigns is a subject of significant debate. See Rich, ‘A Historical Overview of US Counter-Insurgency’, 12–13, 24–5.
51. Maley, The Afghanistan Wars, 246–7.
52. Zaeef, My Life with the Taliban, Chapters 7–8.
53. Maley, ‘Talibanisation and Pakistan’, 68.
54. Saikal, ‘A State in Limbo’, 21. See also Peters, Seeds of Terror.
55. Malkasian, War Comes to Garmser. See also Chandrasekaran, Little America.
56. Horn, No Lack of Courage. See also Maloney, Fighting for Afghanistan; Finlayson, ‘Operation Baaz Tsuka’; and Finlayson and Meyer, ‘Operation Medusa’.
57. Malkasian, War Comes to Garmser. See also Chandrasekaran, Little America.
58. Smith, ‘What Kandahar’s Taliban Say’, 191–210.
59. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. This data includes notes from interviews with locals at various villages in Panjwai District throughout the deployment.
60. Kilcullen, Counterinsurgency, 25.
61. Kilcullen, ‘Measuring Progress in Afghanistan’.
62. Hardy and Lushenko, ‘The High Value of Targeting’, 425–6.
63. Connable, Embracing the Fog of War, 165.
64. Smith, ‘What Kandahar’s Taliban Say’, 192.
65. Kilcullen, The Accidental Guerrilla, 48.
66. Saikal, ‘A State in Limbo’, 22.
67. Ardolino, ‘Foreign Support to the Insurgency in Kandahar’.
68. Biddle, Friedman, and Shapiro, ‘Testing the Surge’, 38.
69. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen at the Panjwai District Center, 30 March 2013.
70. Morselli, Giguere, and Petit, ‘The Efficiency/Security Trade-Off’.
71. Hardy and Lushenko, ‘The High Value of Targeting’, 422.
72. Ardolino, ‘US Special Operations Forces Kill Panjwai Shadow Governor’.
73. Gall, ‘Afghan Villagers Take On Taliban in Their Heartland’.
74. Zucchino, ‘One Man’s Defiance’.
75. Ardolino, ‘Panjwai District Chief of Police’.
76. Zucchino, ‘One Man’s Defiance’.
77. Allen, Flournoy, and O’Hanlon, Towards a Successful Outcome in Afghanistan, 8–9.
78. Ardolino, ‘Panjwai District Chief of Police’.
79. Stohl and Stohl, ‘Secret Agencies’.
80. Nordland, ‘Afghan Forces Struggle’.
81. Ardolino, ‘Missing Context’.
82. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen at the Panjwai District Center, 18 April 2013.
83. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Conversation with a Regional Command-South Official in November 2012.
84. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen in Sperwan Village, 15 April 2013.
85. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen at the Panjwai District Center, 15 April 2013.
86. Chandrasekaran, Little America, 201.
87. Center for Army Lessons Learned, Handbook – Commander’s Guide to Money as a Weapons System, 13.
88. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen in Sperwan Village, 13 May 2013.
89. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen at the Panjwai District Center, 23 April 2013.
90. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen at the Panjwai District Center, 7 May 2013.
91. MAJ Paul Lushenko’s Panjwai Field Notes from 2012–2013. Interview with an Afghan citizen at the Panjwai District Center, 7 May 2013.
92. Afghanistan in Transition, 7.
93. Hackbarth, ‘Operation Rising Sun III’.
94. Standifer, ‘Navigating a Web of Power’.
95. Conversation with CPT Chad R. Lorenz, US Army Intelligence Officer, on 8 October 2014.
96. Berman, Shapiro, and Felter, ‘Can Hearts and Minds Be Bought?’, 787.
97. Ardolino, ‘The Taliban Are Worried about the Uprising Happening Here’.
98. Ardolino, ‘The Taliban Are “Still Dreaming” of a Return to Power’.
99. US Department of the Army, FM 2-01.3, C-6.
100. Manea, ‘Reflections on the “Counterinsurgency Decade”’.
101. Stedman, ‘Spoiler Problems in the Peace Process’, 5.
102. Ardolino, ‘The Taliban Are Worried about the Uprising Happening Here’.
103. Meyer, ‘Flipping the Switch’, 226.
104. Ibid., 225.
105. Wilson III, ‘Beyond COIN’.
106. Simons, ‘How Critical Should Critical Thinking Be?’, 235–6.
107. US Department of the Army, FM 3-24, para. 1-38.
108. Weighly, The American Way of War. Popularized by Weighly, the ‘American way of war’ refers to the US military’s historical preference for attrition warfare.