Civilians in the Clear Phase of a Counterinsurgency

These two articles already posted have offered some useful TTPs for those who must deal with the realities of insurgencies. Especially in the area of intelligence collection and connecting them with MOEs

There is no doubt that civilians should play a greater role in the tactical application of whatever counter-insurgency plan one is executing.

However this article begs the question, whose civilians?

I would argue that the presence of a foreign army in one's country is insulting enough, but the presence of civilian apparatchiks is even more demeaning.

My experience in both Kosovo and Afghanistan has illustrated the point that as much as I was distrusted by the local population, at least I was not as hated as the foreign provisional civilian governments and their civilian representatives. Although maybe my perception is wrong and they told the civilians how much they hated the soldiers when I wasnt around. Thats a funny thing about a foreign population, all smiles when you are around, but then... ..

There are numerous historical examples where this was the case and our own Civil War is a great illustration. Certainly the Union Troops were not held in the highest regard at times but the presence of civil officials received the majority of the Souths wrath, as we now have a small lexicon of terms such as carpetbagger and scalawag to show for it.

If the goal of our current operations is instilling legitimacy for our allies, then we do it in a very peculiar fashion.

I also find this notion of "fence sitters" to be problematic. In politics there are either players or non-players. Players are either highly wedded to their ideology or may be a fence sitter in that they are looking for the best opportunity. We act as if there is this great mass of undecided people who just have not heard the gospel. Most of the non-players are for the most part irrelevant to political struggles. Sure they may be useful as informants or in other capacities like photo-ops, but to see them as the center of gravity or even as essential in a counter-insurgency strategy seems naïve at best.

Im looking forward to the conclusion on how we made an Iraqi farmer whose son was injured and daughter brain damaged by US military actions like us again with much anticipation.

Major A. Louis Exnicios
Student, CGSC
Fort Belvoir, VA

"The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government."

I think your paper touches on that issue; that the information must be pushed between all these disparate organizations that are often seeking the same goals. Im sure this was an issue in Iraq, and I know it was in Afghanistan.

I know that the PRTs in Afghanistan are trying to provide a certain "baseline" to measure their effectiveness. DOS monitors this by asking 8 standard questions that attempt to measure relative security, services, and other aspects of provincial life. Unfortunately, this information is not often shared beyond internal DOS use.

There are also multiple (probably in the cost of millions) contracts in Afghanistan with private organizations that run a myriad of important and worthwhile surveys that people could benefit from. These too are not shared. In some instances, the contracts are "burning under" because they are not being tasked by their CORs, who may not understand the critical nature of these surveys.

If there was some way to gather all of the information already out there, I suspect that one could determine a good baseline assessment of a "ground truth" for service, quality of life, effectiveness of DOS/USAID and RT programs... but if we havent been able to get it together in 10 years... Im unclear as to what might serve as the impetus for change now.