The lessons to be learnt from HTT’s are important and should be studied because the past decade of war demands nothing less than our best to ensure the same mistakes are not repeated.
There is a disconnect between political science research and practical policy outcomes. This will continue until there is a real movement to break the elitist nature of academic ivory towers.
Gian Gentile’s article on COIN ignores literature that weigh stability and combat operations equally. The key failure of COIN has been not understanding how to integrate the multiple levels required.
The US Army’s counterinsurgency manual calls COIN the “graduate level of war.” But, the idea that enlightened soldiers were required to win a war is hokum.
Rather than debating the ethics of social science in military operations, this article provides an inside account of the Human Terrain concept in a culturally complex area: northeast Baghdad.
With words like ‘morality’ and ‘warfare’ peppering the Human Terrain debate, it is surprising that the program hasn’t been widely discussed with reference to the Just War tradition.
Recent conflicts have highlighted how religion and identity are central to security issues. The question remains as to what extent individual conflict zones are facets of a wider, transnational war which pits the ‘West’ against al Qaeda?
Each approach has its own inherent limitations. The human terrain approach was a ‘quick-fix’. But maybe the US Air Force’s model of cross-cultural competence offers more promise.
Identimetrics adds identity to the operational and strategic context of counterinsurgency, which must be considered when operating in foreign environments and within foreign cultures.
If we insist on using our military as a tool of diplomacy then it is essential that cultural training be a core part of the military skill set.
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