COIN, IW, and Development - technical fixes to wicked problems?

Benjamin Friedman makes an important point about mistaking lessons-learned from Iraq and Afghanistan for a science of stabilization and development. We still haven't fully grasped the inherently political component in these operations, at least not in Afghanistan.

Thought experiment: If Israel were to occupy Gaza for another 10 years following all the rules in FM 3-24, would the Palestinians become reconciled to a loss of political identity, or even the loss of Jerusalem?

This isn't to say that lessons can't be learned, but rather that reality can be intractable. In any COIN or stability operation, and many development challenges, there is an irreducible political core that can't be addressed merely by force or dollars. There are windows of opportunity for negotiation, and sometimes they close.

Careful conflict assessment is necessary to determine whether an intervention can possibly be undertaken successfully. And of course you might end up wrong.

I'm reminded of a psychological study from the early 80's. A variety of people were asked to play something similar to Atari's Pong (remember the sliding bars and the bouncing ball?). Afterward they were asked to what degree they could control the direction the ball would bounce off the bar. Type "A" personalities thought 70%, most people thought around 50% [I get why that's funny, really]. Only the clinically depressed were able to accurately able to gauge their degree of control - zero.

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Biddle and Friedman on Hezbollah's 2006 Campaign

Steven Biddle of CFR and Jeffrey Friedman of Harvard's Kennedy School put out this great study of Hezbollah's 2006 campaign through the Army's SSI. As noted in the report, a lot of folks have been looking at that campaign for lessons learned about the future of conflict. Non-state actors performing successfully in conflicts in an increasingly conventional (read maneuver and combined arms) manner.

The issue of the future of conflict is relevant to this sight in so far as here we presuppose that many of the threats to U.S. security (terrorism, pandemics, etc.) in the 21st century will emerge out of fragile and failed states, driving the argument for irregular warfare capabilities, and building partner state governance capacity through a variety of foreign assistance programs.

I'm not certain I'm sold by their argument that we should expect this to be a trend. The conventional elements of Hezbollah's tactics and operational art were driven by a logic in many ways unique to the fact their enemy's civilian population was within striking distance of their short and intermediate range rockets. Obviously Hezbollah also has an extraordinary number of characteristics in common with a state, and access to a patron's resources few other groups enjoy. Not at all clear than any other nonstate actors in places the US might contemplate invading would be driven by a similar strategic logic. Here's a good counter to my argument from the Taliban. Exception that proves the rule?

Another interesting research question might be gained by looking at it from the other direction- what state actors might pursue similar tactical and operational techniques in the face of a U.S. intervention?

Thought experiment:
Aside from the much discussed swarming tactics to choke of the flow of oil in the Persian Gulf, if the U.S. were to actually invade would Iran's military pursue fully conventional combined arms set of Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs)? Or would they draw lessons from Hezbollah, striking at Israel to create incentives for a ceasefire (implausible w/ US). Perhaps with conventional rockets in order to avoid completely alienating international opinion. Separately they might conduct what Biddle calls the "modern" style of war, as exemplified by Hezbollah's 2006 campaign, intermediate between insurgency and combined arms, as a delaying tactic to maintain political control long enough for international and domestic political pressure to build up to force the US to accept a ceasefire. Again, the US hasn't historically accepted negotiated peace readily, so it's tough to imagine Iran reading the situation in such a way that these "intermediate" TTPs would be very attractive, but it's worth thinking about. I suppose if I were Iran I would have some difficulty imagining an attractive way of dealing with a US invasion.

This is of course in no way advocating an invasion of Iran. On this point I'm a libtard favoring negotiations with Iran "without preconditions" for all the reasons Obama and Kissinger have discussed.

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