Revisiting COIN Strategies in Vietnam by Chris Mill, Cicero Magazine
That “Generals are always fighting the last war” may be true, but this is often because they are fighting a different war from their opponent. According to Clausewitz, it is key to military strategy to find the “center of gravity” in any war. If one does not, or focuses on the wrong ‘center’, the battles and ultimately the war will be lost. In Vietnam, the United States did not come to recognize the people of Indochina as the center of gravity and focused on them too little and too late. Many post-mortems on the Vietnam War have recognized this fact. Yet in recent conflicts such as Afghanistan and Iraq—despite the battle cry of “hearts and minds”—America still believed it could win through “thunder runs”, “economy of force”, “dynamic manoeuvre warfare”, and remote or walled combat fortresses. Arguably, these tactics won battles, but they have not won the wars…
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"Yet in recent conflicts such as Afghanistan and Iraq — despite the battle cry of “hearts and minds” — America still believed it could win through "thunder," “economy of force”, “dynamic maneuver warfare”, and remote or walled combat fortresses. Arguably, these tactics won battles, but they have not won the wars."
This is not what I believe we should be looking at.
Rather, I offer the following for consideration:
Could the central problem re: Vietnam be -- much as is the case, I would suggest, with Afghanistan and Iraq -- the fact that:
The United States believed that populations, offered (by us) our way of life and our way of governance would, quickly, easily and mostly on their own:
a. Discard/reject other way-of-life/way-of-governance traditions/offers and, in the place of these,
b. Adopt/embrace modern western ways.
It was/is on this basis, I suggest, that we "bet the farm" in both Vietnam and in Iraq/Afghanistan.
Never in our ethnocentric dreams -- then as now -- did we believe there would be such little enthusiasm for this generous offer.
Thus, ever-increasing force having to be applied -- in each instance -- to substitute/compensate for
a. The lack of appeal of modern western ways and
b. The significance of appeal of other way of life and other way of governance models/offers.
Herein, the end of the Cold War, and the birth of such (erroneous) concepts as "universal values" and the "end of history," causing us to step off smartly -- and into the same deep kimchi -- once again.
The center of gravity (COG) of the communists in Vietnam was the NVA. As long as ~ nine NVA divisions were threatening the south there could be no political settlement disadvantageous to the North.
Since fear of war with China precluded an invasion of the North designed to destroy the NVA the war was unwinnable for the US. This was recognized by some in the administration as early as 1965.
The COG in the latest Afghan War might be Pakistani Intelligence but there may not be a single point that if neutralized causes the enemy to disintegrate. COG is probably a more realistic concept in terms of a battle than a war. Certainly capturing the "hearts and minds" of the population is beyond the capacity of a foreign occupier supporting a corrupt and inefficient local government.
True enough, the conflict emanated from north of the 17th parallel where the policy in Hanoi was reunification. However, keep in mind that in the early phase of U.S. involvement in S. Viet-Nam the North also understood it needed the support of the southern population, understanding that w/o it, more conventional intervention would be necessary at greater cost.
Conversely I might add, the U.S. failed to recognize that its own CoG was the political will of the American people in support of the war . . .