SEEING THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN: PROBLEMATIZATION OF " OUR " COUNTERINSURGENCY (COIN) EFFORTS IN AFGHANISTAN (original) (raw)

Insurgency is first and foremost political: warfare is what we see, but politics is what win

warfare is what we see, but politics is what win Insurgency is certainly not a new phenomenon in the world -just think of the French Revolution, the communist revolutions and the Irish Republican Army to mention a few. However, the form of insurgencies has changed over time, and is still changing today. But if insurgencies are dynamic movements, how do we then define such phenomena? Exploring that question is the aim of this essay, working towards defining characteristics of insurgency from prehistory to ca. 1975.

Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Modern War

2015

Having grown up in the war-torn Balkans during the 1990s, he developed a particular curiosity for understanding political events. His thematic areas of expertise are geopolitics and foreign policy, especially security. By geographical coverage, he has focused mostly on the former Soviet Union, the Balkans, and occasionally the Middle East and North America. His dissertation focuses on asymmetric warfare, specifically on understanding why states and state-like entities choose to militarily challenge much more powerful opponents. He earned an MSc in international relations and diplomacy from Leiden University (Netherlands) and a BA in political science from Simon Fraser University (Canada). Bobić has worked for Citizenship and Immigration Canada, several nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and as a contributing analyst for a private consulting firm. He has published one book, Words or Swords: Russia's Strategies in Handling Its Territorial Disputes (2013), and written several short articles for sources such as the Atlantic Sentinel and the Geopolitical Monitor. He may be contacted at marinko.bobic.unitn.it.

Counterinsurgency after Afghanistan: A Concept in Crisis

Six years have passed since the publication of Field Manual (FM) 3−24, Counterinsurgency. Embraced by sections of the military and civilian defense community seeking a fresh approach to the conflict in Iraq, the new field manual gained a political significance and profile unlike previous doctrinal publications. When General David Petraeus was able to incorporate some of the manual's core precepts into the new U.S. strategy for Iraq, and casualties and instability in Iraq declined over the following few years, both counterinsurgency doctrine and the people associated with it gained unprecedented influence. Since then, the buzz that counterinsurgency acquired has worn off—for several reasons. Most fundamentally, there is widespread frustration over the attempt to use counterinsurgency doctrine to stabilize Afghanistan. Second, there are now several counternarratives to the popular notion that U.S. counterinsurgency theory pulled Iraq back from the brink: key here is that local factors, not U.S. inputs, explain what happened during the period that Americans like to call the surge. Third, large-scale and protracted military operations to build nations, unify states, and establish legitimate and competent governments are undertakings that, even if workable, run counter to the fiscal realities facing the West today. In the end, the critics pile on, counterinsurgency is naïve in its assumptions, unworkable in its requirements, and arrogant in its unfounded claims of prior success. Based on the rise and decline of counterinsurgency over the past few years, this article seeks to assess the utility of this concept and its future as a defense priority and area of research. It concludes that the discussion of counterinsurgency is marred by the polarizing effects of the term itself, which have encouraged a bandwagon effect, both in favor of and now in opposition to the term. Lost in this heated and overly personalized polemic is a necessary and more careful analysis of what can and cannot be expected from this concept and its associated doctrine. By teasing out its contribution to military thinking , its limitations, and its proper use, this article seeks to identify those aspects of counterinsurgency theory that should be retained even if the term itself is once again cast aside. This conceptual discussion has more than mere academic import, as it will shape the way recent counterinsurgency campaigns are remembered and the likelihood of past mistakes being repeated.

Questioning the Counter-insurgency Doctrine in Afghanistan

2016

The framing and rewriting of the counter-insurgency (COIN) manual by the United States (US) post 9/11 was put into practice in Afghanistan in 2001. The counter-insurgent theorists postulated a rhetorical population-centered approach and narrative of “winning hearts and minds” of the indigenous population to achieve legitimacy and effectiveness of this asymmetric warfare. This paper sheds light on the doctrine of “securing populations” through social work parallel to the military campaign as a tactical device in the war-ravaged Afghanistan. This is presented as one of the facets of a “populationcentric” strategy for the interests of the Afghan civilians. This is a critical analysis of the claims of a humane approach in devising this strategy. The humane aspect was engineered to alleviate the civilian grievances and casualties. However, the paper argues that re-framing of the doctrine couched in a rhetoric expression and empathetic language was a strategic choice to win over the indig...

Strategy in Counterinsurgency: A Distilled Approach

How does an established state authority respond to an insurgency? How does such an authority plan and carry out its struggle to counter an armed non-state actor and why? The issue of strategy in counterinsurgency (COIN) remains a rather contentious subject and several practitioners and theorists on COIN have prescribed various remedies to the same problem. This article offers a re-evaluation of the concept of strategy in COIN and outlines the practices and mentalities that counterinsurgents should adopt (and avoid) to successfully counter an insurgency.

Counterinsurgency in the Age of Globalism

Journal of Conflict Studies, 2007

The first, the supreme, the most far-reaching act of judgment that the statesman and commander have to make is to establish . . . the kind of war on which they are embarking; neither mistaking it for, nor trying to turn it into, something that is alien to its nature. This is the first of all strategic questions and the most comprehensive. 1

Insurgency and Counterinsurgency

1991

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