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DarkCrawler posted:Counterinsurgency seems to cost a great deal of money. U.S. has spent tons of money in Afghanistan and Iraq. What I don't understand is why this money isn't spent on the hearts and minds part - just bribe people. Why would anyone support guerillas if they get free money from the nice Americans? Making people happy and telling them to "play nice" is only half of the responsibility of the counter insurgent. The counter insurgent must also provide security of the people it seeks to gain influence over against the insurgents. If the insurgents knock on a civilian's house after the counter insurgents have left and say "Join us or we will kill you" they have the options of holding a bunch of money in their hand as they die or join up with the insurgents. There are further complications to bribery or distributing of aid/funds: the recipient of the funds may just pocket the money, or if the funds are given to someone who is viewed as corrupt or not the appropriate elder you might result in a prominent leader being slighted. This creates a grievance that provides an opportunity for Taliban to step in and resolve the situation by killing US stooge. The different forces of the ISAF have come up with remedies to deal with these kind of issues. Here is just one example which I cannot recall specifics of: The Canadian forces ran program where after establishing conditions of security in the area, they reached out to tribal elders and told them to select local able bodied men and boys to work on construction programs that were supervised by carefully vetted Afghan foremen which meant materials weren't swindled. Their pay was directly deposited to the worker's bank accounts so it could not be subverted. The pace of the constructions themselves were almost irrelevant because the objective was to keep men who could otherwise be fighting busy, employed and paid. The key to this and all successful counter insurgency programs is effectively engaging the local population. The best people to do this are the local population themselves. By compelling the tribal elders to select local men they are burdened with the responsibility of the actions of the chosen workers which engenders them to not hire Talibs or face the social consequences of being a leader of ill repute. The only ISAF presence was paymaste. It is difficult for an insurgent to say that the construction workers are stooges when they are local Afghans working for Afghans to better their own areas. Counter insurgencies are often long, protracted type of conflicts that require a significant amount of political determination to beat and the willingness to change laws to accomodate. The Malayan insurgency crisis ended in the 1960's yet elements persisted till the 1980's. Rhodesia fought an insurgency for almost 15 years that despite a seemingly ubreakable political resolve and amazingly effective tactical success was ultimately a defeat because they were never in a position to marginalize the insurgent parties and bring them to a negotiating table. I postulate that militaries with sophisticated weapons are often at an initial strategic disadvantage because of the perception both within the military establishment and the general population that the 'bad guys' can simply be routed or destroyed with those million dollar tanks or multi million dollar jet bombers. Counter insurgencies do take a lot of money because they require a lot of man power, a lot of time and a lot of political maneuvering to resolve grievances.
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Mar 13, 2011 05:45
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Bagheera posted:Of course, Castro couldn't dictate to the Soviets what the USSR would do with its own missiles. But look at how he manipulated the Soviet Union and fended off the US. I think you're underselling Vietnam here. Cuba's greatest gains were in low-political value Sub-Saharan Africa where they primarily fought against mercenaries with mixed-success, anti-Communist groups and later South Africa to a stalemate. Vietnam won the American war, defeated the Khmer Rouge and fought back China long enough for both sides to declare victory. I wouldn't rave about receiving economic and military assistance from the Soviet Union; as late as 1984 North Korea was receiving Mig29s from the Soviet Union despite happily bubbling along with its retarded Juche. I don't think Cuba punched above its weight but acted like hawkish Cold War nation with guaranteed territorial sovereignty much like Australia pre-1973. Certainly Cuba's sovereignty was protected from an invasion by the US as a result of the Crisis and their expeditionary escapades reflect their high confidence in their Soviet guarantee. When a nation isn't landlocked and they have a nuclear superpower supporting their actions they are much freer to act than those who could potentially have hundreds of tanks rolling through their streets within hours.
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Aug 14, 2011 19:30
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GyverMac posted:What about tactical nukes? Or dirty bombs? Without wanting to devolve this into a D&D style argument, Iran gaining access to nuclear weapons technology isn't as cataclysmic as Right Wing think tanks would have you believe. Iran isn't likely to directly or indirectly attack Israel with nuclear (or similar, such as 'dirty bombs') weapons because of the catastrophic consequences for them. We can look at India and Pakistan as two nuclear armed nations who pose existential threats against each other, have actively supported terrorist and insurgent bands to fight the other, and have both endured incredible political acts that are extremely destabilising to their governments that pales to the comparatively rock-solid regimes of Tehran. Iranian possession of nuclear weapons is essentially a guarantee of Iranian sovereignty against major or regional powers such as the US, Russia and Israel. Despite what fears many in the West may have about Iran, it is a rational actor that doesn't want to invite its own destruction. The complexities of American politics render Iran as an evil nation that precludes constructive approaches to the Iranian nuclear issue. Corruption, high unemployment and suppression of opposition are fairly common characteristic of nations, including nuclear armed nations such as South Africa, the USSR/Russia, Kazakhstan, etc. quote:EDIT: Count Ignatiev fucked around with this message at 19:02 on Sep 14, 2011 |
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Sep 14, 2011 18:13
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:How well did tanks even work in Vietnam? Not exactly ideal geography for armored warfare. Australian Centurions were used to great effect in supporting infantry operations. After removing the side skirts and replacing track guards with steel plate they could move through the jungle where possible. At the battles of Coral - Balmoral they were used defensively initially but then offensive alongside infantry, destroying bunkers and providing significant firepower as infantry detected the enemy and removed mines. http://www.awm.gov.au/units/unit_13757vietnam.asp http://vietnam-war.commemoration.gov.au/armour/
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Jan 9, 2013 09:20
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Vulture posted:Were any lessons from the Soviet-Afghan war taken in mind with the current war in Afghanistan? Different circumstances for both wars, but nonetheless I assume past Soviet mistakes were taken into account somehow. There are lots of things observed and lessons learnt from that particular conflict, but four things that come to my mind are:
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Jan 10, 2013 03:51
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Alekanderu posted:This was pretty Soviet specific though, wasn't it? Their airborne and naval infantry (marine) units were of much higher quality than the regular infantry in that they received more training, better equipment, better living conditions etc. I'm sure the quality disparity between different combat arms was much smaller in the relatively lean and slimmed down American armed forces of 2002, compared to that within the vast Red Army of 1979. Broadly, yes. For the American forces there is no comparable gulf in competency or equipment between a rifle company and an airborne company like there was for the Soviets. For nations that contribute[d] to ISAF they could could look at the Soviet experiences with their special forces and elite troops in deciding what to contribute. For a nation that wants to contribute meaningfully without possessing expeditionary logistics capability it 'makes sense' to do so. New Zealand followed this approach by deploying NZSAS instead of a rifle company because they can achieve similar outcomes as infantry if required but are also suited to high mobility operations. A lot of military 'lessons learnt' appear painfully obvious when viewed in retrospect. The footwear and pack issues I mentioned earlier are a good example: if the troops are going to be hiking and climbing hilly or mountainous areas why not give them light packs and hiking boots? It's dumbfounding that Soviet cooks weren't ordered to wash their hands after going to the bathroom or preparing meals. Scattering mines across the country isn't going to break the will of the population who lives there. You could look at the US soldiers in Iraq wearing woodland camo vest as a lesson to be learnt too. The US military had already looked at the Soviet experiences in Afghanistan and had applied the lessons by the time the first Gulf War came around. Millions of litres of bottled water being on hand to prevent dehydration? That's one of them.
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Jan 10, 2013 10:35
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