Customer Reviews

Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The strength of this book is its attempt to lay out a framework for analyzing tribal-based insurgents, terrorists, and militias in layman's terms. I believe other reviewers have missed the point of the book -- it's not meant to be a description of today's threat, but a methodology for militarily analyzing how and why tribal-based groups fight. The authors recommend the following criteria as a substitute for traditional Military Capabilities Analysis: the tribe's concept of warfare; its organization and command and control; its areas of operations; the types and targets of its operations; its constraints and limitations; and the role of outside actors.

The authors make their argument by first discussing the differences between the western way of war and "primitive warfare," and then assessing the way wars have evolves since the end of the cold war. The third chapter specifically discusses tribes, clans, and groups based on lineage and kinship.

They then use the "case study" approach to test their analytical construct with chapters on Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Iraq. At the end of each chapter they analyze those conflicts based on the analytical criteria noted above. Finally, in the last chapter, they again use their analytical criteria to establish analytical lessons-learned.

All-in-all this is an excellent book for those who are interested in the analysis of tribal-based military threats. It makes the point very well that conventional analytical approaches are not suited for the analysis of tribes and clans, and recommends a different approach.

Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat (Hardcover)

4 Stars

This isn't a bad book. I rated it four stars. Why? There are a lot of reasons. The biggest reason is Robert Kaplan has covered the subjects much more in depth in his series of books on the newly emerging post Cold War era. Indeed, a typical reader of "The Atlantic Monthly" will see that authors of Schultz and Dew are mostly giving their versions of the observations that Robert Kaplan has already written. So, the typical reader is left with a choice. They can either read this book or read Kapan's book, the best of the lot is "Imperial Grunts".

Authors Schultz and Dew give a fine break down of the typical militia command structure most nations face when fighting against Muslims. However, the militia breakdown is much better covered in "Tactics of the Crescent Moon: Militant Muslim Combat Methods" by H. John Poole and Ray L. Smith. So, the results are Authors Schultz and Dew give sort of a Cliff notes version of militia structure, combat methods, weapons and equipment.

The biggest problem that the West faces is a second guessing American media that has a never ending demand for news. The fact of the matter is the USA loses over 10,000 citizens per year in traffic accidents and has another 40,000 injured. Hardly anything is written in the by-lines of the local papers. Conversely, there is much hand-wringing over approximately American 2,500 war dead since 9-11 fighting. It should be noted that the Soviet Union was engaged in a series of savage civil wars from the time of its revolution in 1917 until the early 1920s. The Soviet Union united all the various states of that social republic under an iron willed fist. Conversely, when the Russian media was permitted to act like the American media in the mid-1980s then the Soviets quickly lost Afghanistan, lost their nation, and quickly become involved in warring in Chechnya. The fact of the matter is the old steel willed Soviet Union would have quickly cut off the Muslim terrorists, taken the territory back, and executed any and all who were involved with the rebels. A way must be found to get a nation's media to realize the problem the long term problem of insurgency and support the steps against insurgency. The Soviet Union could not get their media to support a war against Afghanistan. The result is they lost the war, their nation, and are now involved in fighting on their soil.

Perhaps that is the biggest shame of this book. The West wants to have civilized meeting with the terrorists. However, terrorism is guerilla warfare. Guerilla warfare is done until conventional forces grain strength to attack using normal means. Note, in Vietnam the Viet Cong used hit and run tactics against the USA and the Army of the Republic of Vietnam during the 1960s. In 1975 the North Vietnamese Army took Saigon using normal Soviet block military tactics. The point is Guerilla war is done from weakness. Conventional war is done through strength.

"Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat" will give a causal reader a good introduction to the problems of modern insurgency warfare. I would recommend it to that type of reader. For a better US over view of the problem then read "Imperial Grunts". To learn of specific militia combat tactics then read "Militant Muslim Combat Methods".

This book does have good information and can inform the typical reader of the problems encountered with fighting modern insurgents and militias.

As a fomrer US Force Recon Marine with service in Kosovo and Sierra Leone, my unit spent a great deal of time studying various terrorist/insurgent.guerilla organizations. This book makes some very good points, but not all of it is accurate. the book (along with a recent article by Mr. Shultz) makes the claim that

Consider the British experience during the 1980's and 90's in Northern Ireland. By working hand-in-glove with the Special Branch of the local police force, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, British intelligence agents penetrated the ranks of the Irish Republican Army, eventually capturing and incarcerating a legion of its leaders and operatives.

A former top-ranking I.R.A. commander who later became an informer told us that, when he was imprisoned with higher-ranking I.R.A. officials, they lamented over and over that the British strategy was so effective and their ranks were so depleted by the end of the 1980's that "the boys can't move, can't operate, always have to be looking over their shoulders." As a result, Britain was able to negotiate a relatively successful end to hostilities and to contain most of the splinter groups that refused to abide by it. (end).

The above analysis by Mr. Shultz, is highly innacurate. Military analysts have concluded that the IRA was able to uncover and kill 60% of the informers withing their ranks. Also, the fact that the IRA launched a devestating and highly effective commercial bombing camapign against Britian from 1990-1997, refutes the idea that the IRA "was so infiltrated, it couldn't move". In fact the IRA continued to move and basically bomb and assassinate at will far into the 1990's. It is widely believed that this bombing campaign forced the British to negotiate a peace deal with Sinn Fein and the IRA. This is one of several highly speculative conclusions that makes this book a decent, but far from perfect analysis of modern "Assymetrical warfare"

The book's thrust is that in all wars you need to know your enemy and many of the US's current and likely future enemies are very different from those of the cold war. Unfortunately the text can be a little slow going: it is sometimes rather dry and repetitive. But there is also a lot of interesting material and analysis, so it is worth persevering.

The thesis is that in many traditional societies males are raised to be warriors. They are part of a culture of clans and tribes, where no man can stand alone, so solidarity with one's family and clan is essential to survival. And you demonstrate that solidarity by being willing to fight for your clan. These are cultures where fighting is regarded as a natural and manly activity and as a normal way of settling disputes. So regarding peace as a norm just strikes people as odd. But at the same time fighting is limited, and primarily comprises hit-and-run raids rather than conventional battles. There is a very strong emphasis on personal honour and on avenging insults or injuries to one's group.

(This all seems very reminiscent of Scottish clan feuding of only a few centuries ago!)

Much fighting is local, with clans squabbling over resources. But the clans unite if faced with an external threat, and at a larger scale the tribes will unite to fight a foreign oppressor. And all of Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Iraq have a history of facing foreign invaders. As the fight gets bigger and uglier, many of the traditional limits are discarded.

So at a high level, an invader such as the US may see a traditional society as militarily weak, lacking an organized army or heavy weapons. But at another level almost every male regards themselves as a warrior, who will fight in a decentralized way, using hit-and-run tactics to fight off an invader. So the country can easily mobilize in lots of small guerilla bands.

One minor weakness of the book is that it has focused on four tribal societies. It might have been interesting to include a non-tribal insurgency example, such as Malaya or Vietnam, for comparison. However, there are still many variations between the four cases studies. Iraq is more urbanized and less tribalized than Afghanistan. The Chechnyans were very successful at organizing urban guerilla warfare in Grozny. The Somalia military leadership was surprisingly sophisticated.

The book is better at analysis than at suggesting solutions. The authors freely criticize US planners for not understanding the cultures they were facing. But even knowing the cultures, it isn't clear how the US military could or should have behaved differently in Somalia.

The book rely's on four case studies. Somalia, Chechnya, Afganistan and Iraq. The thesis is that after the end of the cold war, the wars will be fight in an unconventional scenario against clan based militias. It give a useful brief history in each case looking for learn about their way of fight had been and could be, who lead them and how, help for outsiders and how this tribe, ethnic groups and clan see war. The authors critizes military planners for not avoid surprises in opeations by ignoring the history of the area and group they will face and so not given the appropriate outlook to those would face them.

As Vizzini says in _Princess Bride_, "Ha ha! You fool! You fell victim to one of the classic blunders! The most famous is never get involved in a land war in Asia." Well, America is not exactly in an Asian land war, but it's close.

Afghanistan and Iraq have ancient histories of fighting invaders. In Afghanistan's case with bloody success against the British and the Russians. The authors of ITM track the histories of Afghanistan and Iraq as well as Somalia and Chechnya up to the present battles they have waged or are waging against foreign invaders. These countries are peopled by tribes, clans, ethnic groups, and religions that all fight amongst themselves - never quite for conquest, but for the glory of a good raid. Heroics and stolen camels become the stuff of legends and vendettas. The only time all these little groups band together is when a larger group attacks them. The parable of "my tribe against the world, my clan against the tribe, my family against the clan, my brother and I against the family, me against my brother" is their motto.

As hit and run raiders, they don't present themselves in the field of battle the way a trained army would. They attack, disappear, ambush, decoy, and blend in. It doesn't take many of them to tie down a modern army. The added mixture of Islam with its eternal rewards for fallen "martyrs" and a multi-generational commitment to the battle makes fighting the ITMs facing America very difficult.

If fact, that difficulty is the main weakness of the book. The authors do not discuss the lessons of history for defeating tribes/clans/family warriors. It may be that the way to do it is far too horrible for western countries to consider, but we need to know our options.

Other than that, the book is quite good. Although, there tends to be a lot of repetition because the case study peoples are so similar, but repetition aids learning in my tired old brain. The book also lacks and sorely needs a bibliography.

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Using four case studies of conflict, Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Iraq, the authors highlight the differences between conventional warfare with clearly established front lines and unconventional warfare there the is no front and engagements are hit-and-run surprise attacks with battlefields in the streets of a cities.

Until the times of these conflicts, American and Russian troops were trained to fight along the lines established by Alexander the Great and Napoleon, where divisions fought divisions, and one battle could have a decisive result. But in these conflicts the authors point out that the attackers often numbered less than 50 and before the defenders could organize their divisions to repulse the attack, the attackers, wearing the cloths of the locals, would melt into the population. No one was there for the division to fight.

The Red Army's experiences in Chechnya are cited as an example of tribal tactics. The Chechens would allow a column of Russian tanks to penetrate deep into the narrow, winding streets of their ancient cities. They would attack and disable the lead tank with a barrage of hand held rockets and then do the same to the last tank in the column. With the column of tanks unable to move forward or backward, the Chechens would pick off the remaining tanks before the Russian air force arrived.

All together, the book provides an excellent summary of the events encountered by the superpowers when they fought in Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Iraq. But the main point of the book is, with a little study of the culture and practices of Tribes and Clans in these areas, the U.S. (and the Russians) would have anticipated how the insurgents and militants would respond to invasion - and how and where they would fight.

The authors argue that what transpired in all four cases could have be predicted and countered.

Insurgents, Terrorists, And Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat is a very useful contribution to the growing body of literature of modern conflict. While the subtitle of the book suggests a tempo-centric view of the Now, the book's purpose is really to demonstrate the value of anthropological analysis of the irregular warriors we are facing today. Unlike "modern" states who might employ irregular tactics, the authors look at the societal and cultural interactions specific in warrior societies, or "martial races" (a term indifferent to ethnicity), and their resulting organizing principles. This is done to satisfy Sun Tzu's admonition to "Know the enemy" which we do not. The absence of this knowledge, in simple terms, means we not only don't know or understand why or how the enemy fights but we don't even know how defeat or subordination, perhaps a better word, is defined by the enemy or conforms to their belief system. Afterall, both victory and defeat must be acknowledged by all sides.

In 2004, Major General Robert Scales went before the House Armed Services committee and recounted a conversation he had with a commander from the Third Infantry Division (then) recently returned from Iraq. Scales had asked about the improved situational awareness worked during the march to Baghdad. The response foretold the future, as well as described the past: "I knew where every enemy tank was dug in on the outskirts of Tallil. Only problem was my soldiers had to fight fanatics charging on foot or in pickups and firing AK 47s and RPGs. I had perfect situational awareness. What I lacked was cultural awareness. Great technical intelligence....wrong enemy." This book not only helps lay the ground work to identify the enemy, but also makes us look at their motivation from a different angle.

The authors, Richard H. Shultz and Andrea J. Dew, lay out the framework and goals of the book at the very beginning. This book is not out tactics or even strategy, but "operational art", the middle ground between Strategy (big "S") and Tactics (big "T"). Using case studies of Somali, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Iraq, the authors demonstrate their theories through both recent and historical encounters. Some of their analysis is interesting as elements of previous success were clearly not understood and led to later failures.

The authors submit the following framework, all explicitly or implicitly found in Sun Tzu's 33 paragraphs on Offensive Strategy (which includes the advice to Know the Enemy and Know Yourself), as a means of better understanding the questions how and why that are critical to success.

1. What is the concept of warfare?
2. What is the Organization and Command and Control?
3. What are the Areas of Operations?
4. What are the Types and Targets of Operations?
5. Are there any Constraints and Limitations to the use of force?
6. Do they receive support and assistance from Outside Actors? If so, who are these Actors and in what form does the help come?

These are seemingly basic questions that go unasked, let alone answered.

In addressing American operational art, the combination of time and tempo (popular example: "Shock and Awe"), the authors don't make specific prescriptives but suggest incorporating new (to us) understandings of how the enemy organizes and operates. Shultz and Dew show that OODA loops don't matter when the invaded don't see war as "organized violence" requiring "paper, forms, and documents", don't mirror our hierarchy, and have different priorities. The behavior of the enemy is far different from modern Western principles and thus has different levers and pressures points for manipulation. Our focus on whether or not the engine of insurgency is religious or socio-political may ignore the underlying realities of the why and how in specific instances. Like in the West, religion may be a Gramscian distraction and our focus on it blinds us to the levers and pressure points necessary for successful operations.

The case studies note strong martial traditions and historical features that checked internecine violence. In Somali, for example, the authors show how these mechanisms were purposely broken to intentionally foster internal conflict, leading the path to disintegration of the state. They also show how our tactics empowered our target instead of breaking his support system. The enemy in Afghanistan and elsewhere know how their people organize and exploit it while we doom ourselves by imposing our own organizing and motivating principles on them. With parallels to the motivators of modern suicide terrorism, the authors look at warrior traditions and legacies, as opposed to cultural and social structures to reframe the perception of our Other.

Modern, West-centric theories such as "Fourth Generation Warfare" look at conflict with the "Gap" countries as a new way of warfare when the reality is quite the opposite. Likewise, simplifying insurgencies as monolithic or based in religion potentially blind us from opportunities to co-op and disaggregate and even to know how to define victory.

The authors are critical of both the US intelligence services and its endemic mirroring and of the shortcomings or military analysis. A case in point on the latter is the example of the USMC case study of Chechnya that looks at Russian failures in the 1994-1996 war and the study's absence of any analysis of the Chechens themselves.

Insurgents, Terrorists, And Militias does a good job demonstrating the value of knowing the enemy and showing how we don't. More importantly, it shows that our lack of understanding is counterproductive and fuels the engine of opposition. This should be on any counterinsurgency and irregular warfare reading list, as well as readings on the Gap. Be prepared to scribble in the margins as you read.

Insurgents, Terrorists and Militias by Richard Shultz and Andrea Dew is a solid introductory text that aims to guide current Intelligence Analysts with a framework to assess current and potential adversaries to US Forces worldwide. The operational framework they propose is specifically designed to analyze unconventional and guerrilla forces rather than the traditional military assessments that were designed and created for use in a conventional war (with the Soviet Union). Six questions are used to create their framework:

1) What is their concept of warfare?
2) Organization and Command and Control?
3) What are the Areas of Operations?
4) What are the Types and Targets of Operations?
5) Constraints and Limitations to the use of force?
6) The influence of outside actors?

The authors then explore four historical and contemporary case studies on how this framework would have assisted policy makers. The case studies are Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Iraq. Over all the best case study is Iraq, due to the level of detail that the authors give- they describe the different `types' of insurgency and their historical basis, which impressed me. The worst is Afghanistan, where too much history is given too little type, and in the end we are left without much substance on the current operating environment there. I found the Chechnyan and Somali studies interesting and relevant, and the bibliography provides a guide to further and more detailed reading.

Overall, a great deal of emphasis is placed on the tribe, clan and religious structure and history of the societies. This is a relevant and worthy addition that many intelligence professionals can benefit from. Because these features are defining aspects of traditional cultures, they should hold an equivalent status in our analysis of them.

My only disappointment stems from the fact that because of their operational focus, many intelligence professionals in fields `closer to the ground' will find that their ideas, while interesting and worth keeping in mind, are not extremely helpful to the tactical level of intelligence analysis. For instance, although they explain why a Former Regime Element in Iraq has different motives for fighting than an Islamist in Iraq, this is not much use to a smaller, more specific area than say, Baghdad. To the intelligence professional concerned with the Bay'a, Al-Amel or Saydiyah Muhallahs within Baghdad, the most useful questions revolve around types and emplacement techniques of IEDs, and how these may be related to the structure and orientation of a specific insurgent group or cell; how, when, and where, do sectarian groups operate . . . These questions are of the most immediate concern, and will likely have the most substantive effect once the answers are found.

That being said, this book was a very interesting read, and a valuable one.

I was excited when I saw the title, thinking that it was a timely work on an important subject. I was sorely disappointed. I am surprised at some of the people who are listed on the back cover who recommend the book; faced with the alternative explanation, I will accept that they actually did not read the book through.

The book is tremendously redundant throughout, wasting many pages to reiterate what was said a few pages previously. There was very poor quality control throughout the book as well; many misspellings and sentences which appeared to be pasted together from disparate attempts and not word-smithed.

The authors do not achieve their own stated goal, to provide a set of principles which could be applied to conflicts transcending time and space to enable understanding of potential enemies and operational environments. They fail miserably at this. Their analyses at the end of each chapter serve only to regurgitate what was said in the rest of the chapter, sometimes less concisely. The authors also enjoy throwing around the current most popular misused term in U.S. military circles: Asymmetric Warfare. They use this frequently and in many different contexts, often contradicting their own usage of the term. They never lay out exactly what this means to them or how it is defined by any other institution. It is used by the authors as a catch all phrase to explain strategy, tactics or anything which does not include exact force parity on the battlefield.

The authors have completely ignored the massive amount of work done through the previous century on Guerrilla Warfare. This is perhaps their most egregious mistake. They seem to believe that because their subjects of discussion are from tribal societies that their "asymmetrical warfare" is somehow unique in history. They continuously demonstrate their lack of understanding of even the most basic of tactics and strategies, or even the principles of warfare.

The chapters outlining the four areas which they profess to analyze and illuminate their "principles" do provide some basic understanding of these four areas (Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, Iraq). However, even this seeming contribution is fraught with errors and popular misconceptions pulled from the press, many which are just wrong and could have been corrected in this book if a little research had been done from original sources. Their section on Iraq degenerates into a regurgitation of press reports, perpetuating myths and illuminating nothing; they do not seem to be aware of what is going on there. And in Afghanistan they claim that the Pashto were not incorporated into the campaign to eliminate the Taliban or in the government. Do they not realize that President Karzai is Pashto? It was the defection of the Pashto which made the Taliban crumble so rapidly.

Overall, this book contributes nothing to understanding, and actually confuses, the issue of how to fight non-nation state actors. The authors provide no original research and no unique understanding. The book was a miserable failure. And it could have been so good. I gave it one star because the is no zero star rating.

For a really useful tool to understand this subject read "Insurgency and Terrorism: From Revolution to Apocalypse" by Bard E. Oneill. For a very thorough and concise book on Jihadist ideology read "Knowing the Enemy: Jihadist Ideology and the War on Terror" by Mary Habeck.