Table Of ContentUnderstanding Counterinsurgency
This textbook offers an accessible introduction to counterinsurgency operations, a
key aspect of modern warfare.
Featuring essays by some of the world’s leading experts on unconventional
conflict, both scholars and practitioners, the book discusses how modern regular
armed forces react, and should react, to irregular warfare. The volume is divided into
three main sections:
• Doctrinal origins: analyzing the intellectual and historical roots of modern
Western theory and practice;
• Operational aspects: examining the specific role of various military services
in counterinsurgency, but also special forces, intelligence, and local security
forces;
• Challenges: looking at wider issues, such as governance, culture, ethics, civil-
military cooperation, information operations, and time.
Understanding Counterinsurgencyis the first comprehensivetextbook on counterin-
surgency, and will be essential reading for all students of small wars, counterinsurgency
and counterterrorism, strategic studies, and security studies, both in graduate and
undergraduate courses as well as in professional military schools.
Thomas Rid is a visiting scholar at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, and a non-
resident fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations in the School for Advanced
International Studies, Johns Hopkins University.
Thomas Keaney,Colonel, USAF (Retd), is associate director of strategic studies at
the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
Understanding
Counterinsurgency
Doctrine, operations, and challenges
Edited by
Thomas Rid and Thomas Keaney
First published 2010
by Routledge
2Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010.
To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.
©2010 Thomas Rid and Thomas Keaney for selection and editorial matter;
individual contributors, their contributions
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Keystroke, Tettenhall, Wolverhampton
Printed and bound in Great Britain
by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in
any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Acatalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Understanding counterinsurgency : doctrine, operations and challenges / edited by
Thomas Rid and Thomas Keaney.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Counterinsurgency. I. Rid, Thomas. II. Keaney, Thomas A.
U241.U53 2010
355.02¢18--dc22 2009044225
ISBN 0-203-85237-0 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN10: 0–415–77764–X (hbk)
ISBN10: 0–415–77765–8 (pbk)
ISBN10: 0–203–85237–0 (ebk)
ISBN13: 978–0–415–77764–3 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978–0–415–77765–0 (pbk)
ISBN13: 978–0–203–85237–8 (ebk)
Contents
Notes on contributors vii
Acknowledgments x
List of abbreviations xi
1 Understanding counterinsurgency 1
THOMAS KEANEY AND THOMAS RID
PART I
Doctrine 9
2 France 11
ETIENNE DE DURAND
3 Britain 28
ALEXANDER ALDERSON
4 Germany 46
TIMO NOETZEL
5 United States 59
CONRAD CRANE
PART II
Operational aspects 73
6 Army 75
PETER MANSOOR
7 Marine Corps 87
FRANK HOFFMAN
vi Contents
8 Airpower 100
CHARLES J. DUNLAP, JR
9 Naval support 114
MARTIN N. MURPHY
10 Special forces 128
KALEV I. SEPP
11 Intelligence 141
DAVID KILCULLEN
12 Local security forces 160
JOHN NAGL
PART III
Challenges 171
13 Governance 173
NADIA SCHADLOW
14 Culture 189
MONTGOMERY MCFATE
15 Ethics 205
SARAH SEWALL
16 Information operations 216
ANDREW EXUM
17 Civil-military integration 230
MICHELLE PARKER AND MATTHEW IRVINE
18 Time 242
AUSTIN LONG
19 Counterinsurgency in context 255
THOMAS RID AND THOMAS KEANEY
Suggested further reading 261
Index 267
Contributors
Alexander Alderson, Colonel, British Army, is director of the British Army’s Counter-
insurgency Centre. He has operational experience from Northern Ireland, the Balkans, and
Iraq, and in 2009 rewrote British COIN doctrine. He is a visiting fellow at the University
of Oxford, successfully completed a PhD in modern history, and has published widely on
counterinsurgency.
Conrad Crane is the director of the US Army Military History Institute. He has authored or
edited books and monographs on the Civil War, World War I, World War II, Korea, and
Vietnam, and has written and lectured widely on airpower and landpower issues. He was
the lead author for The Army/US Marine CorpsField Manual, Counterinsurgency,which
was released in December 2006.
Charles J. Dunlap, Jr, Major General, has served 34 years in the US Air Force. He is a
distinguished graduate of the National War College and author of the 2008 monograph
Shortchanging the Joint Fight? An Airman’s Assessment of FM 3-24 and the Case for
Developing Truly Joint Doctrine.
Etienne de Durand is director of the Security Studies Center at the Institut français
des relations internationales in Paris. He also is a professor at the Institut d’etudes
politiques de Paris and the Collège interarmées de défense, as well as the author of
numerous articles and monographs on strategy and military affairs in France and the
United States.
Andrew Exum is a fellow with the Center for a New American Security and a combat veteran
of the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq. He returned to Afghanistan to serve as a civilian
advisor to General Stanley McChrystal in 2009 and is the founder of the counterinsurgency
blog Abu Muqawama.
Frank Hoffman is research fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, Arlington,
Virginia. His professional experience includes 30 years of public service as a Marine
infantry officer and as a national security consultant to the Department of Defense, the
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Marine Corps, the Joint
Forces Command and the intelligence community. He is the author of numerous articles
and one book, Decisive Force of War(Praeger, 1996).
Matthew Irvine is a graduate of Wake Forest University with a degree in History and Middle
East and South Asia Studies. His research focuses on US defense policy, modern conflict,
and the Middle East. He is a graduate student at the American University School of
International Service.
viii Contributors
Thomas Keaney, Colonel, USAF (Retd), is associate director of strategic studies at the
Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. He has served as
chairman of the department of military strategy at the National War College, forward air
controller in Vietnam, and B-52 squadron commander. Among his recent publications is
War in Iraq: Planning and Operations (Routledge, 2007), edited with Thomas Mahnken.
David Kilcullen has served in counterinsurgencies in Southeast Asia, Iraq, Afghanistan,
Pakistan, and Africa. He was special advisor to the Secretary of State in 2007–8, senior
counterinsurgency advisor to Multi-National Force-Iraq in 2007, and chief
counterterrorism strategist at the State Department in 2005–6. He is the author of The
Accidental Guerrilla (Oxford University Press, 2009) and principal author of the US
Government Counterinsurgency Handbook (2008).
Austin Longis an assistant professor at Columbia University’s School of International and
Public Affairs. He was previously an associate political scientist at the Rand Corporation.
His work has been published in International Security,Survival,The International Journal
of Intelligence and Counterintelligence,The American Interest,The Journal of Cold War
Studies,and by the Rand Corporation.
Peter Mansoor,Colonel, US Army (Retd),is the General Raymond E. Mason, Jr Chair of
Military History at the Ohio State University. His military career included two tours in
Iraq, involving service as a brigade commander (2003–4) and as executive officer to
General David Petraeus (2007–8). He is the author of Baghdad at Sunrise: A Brigade
Commander’s War in Iraq (Yale University Press, 2008).
Montgomery McFate is currently the senior social scientist for the US Army’s Human
Terrain System. Previously, she worked at the US Navy’s Office of Naval Research and
the Rand Corporation’s Intelligence Policy Center. Dr McFate received a BA from the
University of California at Berkeley, a PhD in anthropology from Yale University, and a
JD from Harvard Law School. She was a member of the team that produced The US Army/
Marine Corps Field Manual, Counterinsurgency.
Martin N. Murphyis a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments
(CSBA) in Washington, DC, where he writes on all aspects of naval warfare. He is the
author of Small Boats, Weak States, Dirty Money: Piracy and Maritime Terrorism in the
Modern World (Columbia University Press, 2009).
John Naglis the president of the Center for a New American Security. A retired army officer
who served in both wars in Iraq, Dr Nagl is the author of Learning to Eat Soup with a
Knife(University of Chicago Press, 2005) and was on the writing team that produced The
US Army/Marine CorpsField Manual,Counterinsurgency.
Timo Noetzelis a research group leader at Konstanz University, a fellow of the Stiftung Neue
Verantwortung, Berlin, and senior policy advisor to the chairman of the Munich Security
Conference. He was poltical advisor to the ISAF Regional Commander North in 2007,
participated as an observer in COMISAF’s strategic assessment in 2009 and subsequently
served as an advisor to the Allied Joint Force Commander. He holds a BA (Hons) in
Politics from the Queen’s University of Belfast and an MPhil and a Dphil from St Antony’s
College, Oxford. His work has been published in Survival, International Affairs,
Contemporary Security Policy,and other journals.
Contributors ix
Michelle Parkeris a USAID foreign service officer on sabbatical as an international affairs
fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations. Her recent publications focus on the civilian
side of counterinsurgency operations, including Reconstruction Under Fire: Unifying Civil
and Military Counterinsurgencyfrom the Rand Corporation.
Thomas Ridis a visiting scholar at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, and a non-resident fellow
at the Center for Transatlantic Relations in the School for Advanced International Studies,
Johns Hopkins University. He has published widely on strategy and political violence. His
most recent book is War 2.0(Praeger, 2009).
Nadia Schadlowis a senior program officer in the International Security and Foreign Policy
Program of the Smith Richardson Foundation in Westport, Connecticut. She is also
afrequent guest lecturer at West Point and served on the Defense Policy Board between
September 2006 and June 2009. Dr Schadlow is author of “War and the Art of
Governance” (2003, Parameters33(3), 85–94).
Kalev I. Sepp teaches at the US Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He served
as deputy assistant secretary of defense for special operations, and as a US Army Special
Forces officer in combat in Panama and El Salvador. A graduate of Harvard University, he
wrote the 2005 Military Reviewarticle “Best Practices in Counterinsurgency” while serving
in Iraq.
Sarah Sewall teaches public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She
served as deputy assistant secretary of defense and senior foreign policy advisor to Senate
majority leader, and led the national security agency review process for the Obama
Transition. She wrote the introduction to The US Army/Marine Corps Field Manual,
Counterinsurgency.
