Hello Maurice, On ... <<the fly-paper theory is working>> and adding to my my response here ... Message 20991655
... the flies are multiplying, fast, and learning furiously, and I figure the likely consequences are not priced in. What do you think?
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The Iraqi Insurgency and the Lessons of War
Jan 28, 2005
Summary
In the years to come, the lessons learned from the U.S. military's inability to quickly quell Iraqi insurgents will be studied by governments and guerrilla movements the world over. Many regimes -- especially those with most reason to fear Washington -- will prepare for drawn-out guerrilla campaigns. This will force a re-evaluation of battle strategies and also open the door for indigenous militant groups to exploit ready-made insurgent infrastructure to target unpopular regimes. Other than war with a strong military power, such as China or Russia, U.S. forces can expect their main military threat to come from Iraqi-style insurgencies rather than from Islamist militant attacks.
Analysis
Although nearly two years have passed since U.S.-led forces toppled the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq, the insurgency continues to disrupt efforts to stabilize the country. Iraqi nationalist guerrillas -- rather than foreign-led jihadists -- have had the largest impact on U.S. forces in Iraq, and have caused most of the U.S. casualties. Fifty-one U.S. military personnel have been killed in car bombings -- a tactic more commonly used by jihadists than by nationalists -- while 386 soldiers have died as a result of hostile small-arms fire.
Given the relative success of the guerrillas in Iraq, insurgent, rebel and militia movements -- as well as governments worldwide that fear a potential U.S. attack -- likely will adapt the lessons learned from the insurgency to fight their own battles. This is not surprising, as tactics perfected in one conflict usually are adapted for another. Not since President Richard Nixon was in the White House, however, has a guerrilla movement successfully tested the full weight of the most advanced force in the world. Its survival has reaffirmed the merits of adding guerrilla warfare to tactical arsenals, especially for an outmatched military. As a result of the Iraqi's successful experiment, it appears that U.S. forces in key regions, such as the Middle East, will face deadlier threats over the next decade from Iraqi-style guerrilla campaigns than from militants.
A main reason for this, perhaps, is that an incessant guerrilla war that constantly chips away at U.S. resources is proving to be more effective than militant-style attacks that create a big stir, but do little to change the situation on the ground.
The nearly simultaneous elements that helped to foster the post-Hussein Iraqi insurgency -- the collapse of a previously robust military state, popular support for insurgent activity and an undermanned foreign occupation force -- will not easily fall into place again. Moreover, given that the United States likely is learning lessons of its own from the war, it is doubtful that future military or civilian planners would underestimate the potential for popular insurgency. Nevertheless, the Iraq insurgency likely can be reproduced -- at least to some extent -- outside the country.
States near Iraq that fear Washington's intentions toward them -- Iran and Syria, for example -- could be the first to give rise to such a campaign. By launching extensive guerrilla training and pre-positioning weapons caches, the regimes would be setting the stage to either augment their conventional forces with guerrilla warfare or to have a "ready made" insurgency to fall back on in case the first line of resistance is exhausted.
Iraq, of course, is not writing the manual, but simply adding a chapter to the book on guerrilla warfare. Lessons learned from the Fidel Castro-led guerrilla campaign against pro-U.S. dictator Fulgencio Batista (1956-59), from the French-Algerian war (1954-1962) and from the Vietnam War (1961-1975) were adapted in insurgencies around the world. In particular, Cubans used their own experiences and the lessons learned from Vietnamese guerrillas to train local insurgents and government-backed guerrillas in places such as Angola, Mozambique and Guinea Bissau. Additionally, sources in Namibia and Zimbabwe say their own communist-style insurgencies learned many lessons from the guerrillas in Algeria and Vietnam.
Ideally, by engaging in a guerrilla war, an outmatched country would at least be able to draw out the conflict long enough to settle on more advantageous terms. The drawback to this strategy, of course, is that the insurgent force could turn on the very regime that created and trained it. The risk that this would occur is particularly high in countries where the regime is either unpopular or does not represent the majority.
A minority Allawite group, for example, controls Syria, though sources in Syria say many soldiers and some junior- and mid-rank officers in the Syrian armed forces belong to Sunni clans that suffered severe repression when Damascus crushed the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1980s. Furthermore, a couple of attempted Islamist attacks in Syria in 2004 indicate that militant opposition to the regime is resurging.
This risk apparently has not stopped some governments from preparing their armed and paramilitary forces for an Iraqi-style guerrilla war. The Iranian government has paid utmost attention to how Iraqi insurgents are confronting U.S. troops, and apparently has decided that such a campaign could be a strategic pillar in its response to any U.S. aggression. Tehran's thinking is that its guerrilla war would be fought both in Iran, once American ground forces roll in, as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan, where Iranian-trained guerrillas likely would find support from local anti-U.S. forces that already are fighting U.S. troops. In fact, military exercises conducted by Iran in 2004 focused on training against the potential invasion of Iran by Western forces. This training incorporated traditional conventional military tactics, but also had a heavy dose of guerrilla training.
Non-state actors also will take cues from the Iraqi insurgency, trying in particular to replicate the diffuse nature of the insurgency's command and control structure, which has contributed to U.S. inability to disrupt its operations. This, however, will be easier said than done. The huge logistics caches found in Iraq after the conventional phase of the war -- plenty of weapons and ammunition -- allow for cells to operate autonomously and for leadership nodes to focus on operations rather than on gathering supplies. Traditionally, logistics flow is one of the key pillars of a successful insurgent movement -- but Iraq seems to have turned that on its head. Many guerrilla campaigns have relied heavily on the influx of foreign logistics support. Iraqi guerrillas, on the other hand, have an internal support system that allows for the bare minimum of coordination, a diffuse command and control structure and an emphasis on improvised explosives.
Despite the difficulties they likely will encounter in their own campaigns, governments and non-state forces in the Middle East and perhaps elsewhere will apply Iraq's guerrilla war lessons to better prepare to battle U.S. troops and their allies.
This suggests the main threat to U.S. forces and Washington's positions in key regions where military intervention is launched in the coming decade will likely come not from isolated jihadist attacks, but from Iraq-style insurgencies conducted by state and non-state actors. The U.S. military is of course not the only potential target for Iraqi-style insurgencies, as non-state actors might use the lessons for their own operations against their particular enemy regime.
Although the Middle East likely will see the first wave of Iraq-adapted guerrilla warfare, countries far beyond the Middle East are learning, too. In preparation for a potential U.S. invasion of North Korea, Pyongyang is preparing its armed forces -- indeed, the whole nation -- to wage guerrilla war. In addition to government ground forces and people's militias, its 100,000-strong special forces are engaged in full-time training on what amounts to guerrilla warfare -- to be conducted both in and outside North Korea.
Like North Korea, many nations have been preparing guerrilla campaigns for decades. However, without a real war to fight, it is difficult to know what works and what does not against state-of-the art tactics employed by the most highly trained and best-equipped military force in the world. The Iraq war is providing the answers.
Copyright 2004 Strategic Forecasting Inc. All rights reserved.
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