Innovation, Transformation, and War: Counterinsurgency Operations in Anbar and Ninewa, Iraq, 2005-2007 (Stanford Security Studies) - Softcover

Russell, James

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0804773106 ISBN 13: 9780804773102

Verlag: STANFORD SECURITY STUDIES, 2010

Inhaltsangabe

Within a year of President George W. Bush announcing the end of major combat operations in Iraq in May 2003, dozens of attacks by insurgents had claimed hundreds of civilian and military lives. Through 2004 and 2005, accounts from returning veterans presaged an unfolding strategic debacle—potentially made worse by U.S. tactics being focused on extending conventionally oriented military operations rather than on adapting to the insurgency.

By 2007, however, a sea change had taken place, and some U.S. units were integrating counterinsurgency tactics and full-spectrum operations to great effect. In the main, the government and the media cited three factors for having turned the tide on the battlefield: the promulgation of a new joint counterinsurgency doctrine, the "surge" in troop numbers, and the appointment of General David Petraeus as senior military commander.

James Russell, however, contends that local security had already improved greatly in Anbar and Ninewah between 2005 and 2007 thanks to the innovative actions of brigade and company commanders—evidenced most notably in the turning of tribal leaders against Al Qaeda. In Innovation, Transformation, and War, he goes behind the headlines to reveal—through extensive field research and face-to-face interviews with military and civilian personnel of all ranks—how a group of Army and Marine Corps units successfully innovated in an unprecedented way: from the bottom up as well as from the top down. In the process they transformed themselves from organizations structured and trained for conventional military operations into ones with a unique array of capabilities for a full spectrum of combat operations. As well as telling an inspiring story, this book will be an invaluable reference for anyone tasked with driving innovation in any kind of complex organization.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

James A. Russell is an Associate Professor in the Department of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey. He previously spent 13 years in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, working on Persian Gulf-related strategy and security policy.

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INNOVATION, TRANSFORMATION, AND WAR

Counterinsurgency operations in Anbar and Ninewa, Iraq, 2005–2007By JAMES A. RUSSELL

Stanford University Press

Copyright © 2011 Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8047-7310-2

Contents

Acknowledgments.........................................................................................................................vii1 Introduction..........................................................................................................................12 Theories of Military Innovation.......................................................................................................233 Wartime Innovation in Western Anbar: Fall 2005–Summer 2006......................................................................544 Wartime Innovation in Anbar: The Battle for Ramadi, July 2005–March 2007........................................................945 Wartime Innovation in Ninewa Province: COIN Operations in Mosul and Northern Iraq, September 2005–July 2006.....................1346 Conclusion............................................................................................................................191Notes...................................................................................................................................213Appendix................................................................................................................................253Index...................................................................................................................................255

Chapter One

INTRODUCTION

The United States stormed into Iraq in March 2003 boasting the world's best-trained and -equipped military. Using a host of technologies and new weapons that had been integrated into its force structure over the preceding decade, the invasion force made quick work of its adversary in a march on Baghdad that took only three weeks. The invasion unveiled a "Shock and Awe" campaign of rapid dominance packaged under the ostensibly new paradigm of "effects based operations." The invasion framed the impressive application of combined arms conventional military power that routed Saddam's armies and delivered U.S. forces into downtown Baghdad in three weeks. The invasion force applied a new generation of sensors, standoff munitions, and digitized command and control systems to great effect during the invasion against a marginally competent enemy. The invasion seemed to confirm to many the primacy of U.S. global military power.

As is now widely known, however, the actual invasion of Iraq represented only the opening phase of the war. Unfolding events gradually drained away the initial sense of optimism over the removal of Saddam and the defeat of his army as the security environment inside Iraq deteriorated over the summer of 2003. By the winter of 2003–4 it became clear that, while Saddam's army had been defeated, armed resistance to the invading and occupying force had only just begun. While the U.S. political leadership tried to discount and marginalize the initial appearance of Iraqi resistance groups in the summer and fall of 2003,5 the American military gradually became aware that it was immersed in a full-blown insurgency—a kind of warfare for which it had failed to prepare. The American military slowly came to the inescapable conclusion that the methods and equipment for defeating Saddam's Army wouldn't work against increasingly well organized and adaptive insurgent groups. The U.S. military either had to adjust or face defeat.

This book addresses a discrete, but arguably vital, part of the U.S. war in Iraq in Anbar and Ninewa Provinces during 2005 through early 2007—a period when the United States clearly faced the prospect of battlefield defeat and strategic disaster. It focuses on counterinsurgency, or COIN, operations by a series of Army and Marine Corps battalions operating in a variety of environments during this period. The book seeks to answer one central question: how did the units examined in the pages that follow adapt to the growth of the insurgency during this period? The book presents evidence suggesting that the units successfully innovated in war—a process that drew upon a complex series of forces that enabled the units to transition successfully from organizations structured and trained for conventional military operations to organizations that developed an array of new organizational capacities for full-spectrum combat operations.

The research for this book adds an interesting dimension to the established popular narrative of America's counterinsurgency campaign in Iraq. That narrative contains several elements. The first is that military success magically materialized after President Bush sent an additional 20,000 troops to Iraq (the so-called surge) in the spring of 2007. The second is that military success materialized only after General David Petraeus decisively reoriented American battlefield tactics toward COIN, once he assumed command of U.S. forces in Iraq during the same period. The third is that improved battlefield performance directly followed the promulgation of new counterinsurgency doctrine in December of 2006.7 While each of these narratives is correct in an overall sense, they are also incomplete and present only part of the story of how America's ground force decisively reoriented itself toward irregular warfare in Iraq. Evidence presented in this book suggests that by the time President Bush announced the "surge" and Petraeus was named to "rescue" the COIN campaign in the spring of 2007, the units in the following case studies had already built successful COIN competencies and were experiencing battlefield successes—most dramatically in Anbar Province in the fall of 2006. Importantly, in Anbar, at least, these were not ad hoc unit innovations made to no strategic effect. In Anbar, it is clear that the wartime innovation process did produce strategic effect and proved instrumental in the defeat of the Sunni insurgency, as will be addressed in Chapter 4. The units examined in this book showed an ability to adapt and innovate in the field dating from late 2005 with little direction from higher military and civilian authorities. None of the units examined herein received what could be considered command-level guidance from the headquarters level on how to structure their counterinsurgency operations.

It is clear that the commitment of additional troops in 2007 proved instrumental in improving the security situation throughout Iraq and most particularly in Baghdad, just as it is clear that the appointment of Petraeus—a leader committed to COIN—represented an important signal of America's commitment to the new methods of fighting the insurgents. It is equally clear that the promulgation of new doctrine helped to systematically enhance the preparation of incoming units to conduct counterinsurgency, just at it is clear that the manual for the first time provided senior military leadership at Multi-National Forces Iraq, or MNF-I, with a template around which to structure and direct a national-level counterinsurgency campaign. While the promulgation of new joint COIN doctrine in December 2006 unquestionably helped to better train and prepare incoming units that subsequently arrived as part of the surge in the spring of 2007, it does not explain the improved battlefield performance of the units studied here in the eighteen preceding months. This book...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: STANFORD SECURITY STUDIES
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2010
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0804773106
• ISBN 13: 9780804773102
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 270
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Buchpark GmbH; gpsr@buchpark.de; ; Krügerweg 1; Trebbin; Brandenburg; 14959; Deutschland