Future War

[vimothy]

is that the first time youve ever talked to an iranian? good for you!

No - it's not even the first time I've talked to them. Like I say, they own the take away my friend works for, they're basically all top dudes and always have the best smoke and caviar. Probably CIA stooges.

 

[vimothy]

Ha ha, you shit stirrer!

Yeah well, when are you getting me a job at the AEI, oliver? Or if not, you've got to at least have some P2 contacts.

 

[craner]

Sssh!

 

[vimothy]

Douglas Farah on Qutb:

Qutb’s works, particularly “Milestones,” are widely cited by Osama bin Laden, Zawahiri, and the jihadist camp as the theological justification and roadmap for their attacks.

One of Qutb’s breakthroughs, theologically, was the justification of the concept of “offensive jihad,” the proclamation of the right to wage jihad in conquest.

“Those who say islamic Jihad was merely for the defense of the “home land of Islam” diminish the greatness of the Islamic way of life and consider it less important than their homeland,” Qutb wrote. “However, defense (of the Islamic community) is not the ultimate objective of the Islamic movement of jihad but it is a means of establishing the Divine authority within it so that it becomes the headquarters of the movement of Islam, which is then to be carried throughout the earth to the whole of mankind.”

http://www.douglasfarah.com/article/194/qutbism-and-the-muslim-brotherhood.com

 

[vimothy]

7/7 bomb attacks were inevitable given the UK's accomodating attitude to jihadist radicals:

The morning of the London bombings a pair of prominent terrorism experts on the radio stated that if British intelligence, with all of their counter-terror experience from dealing with the IRA could not stop an attack, no city was safe. In response I wrote an article for National Review Online explaining that British authorities had been much too accepting of radical Islamist activity in Britain. I concluded, "Considering the scale of Islamist activity in Britain and its role as America's leading ally in the world, the shock is not that the attack took place — but that it had not happened much sooner."

- http://counterterrorismblog.org/2007/05/sympathy_for_the_spymasters_mi_1.php

[Make sure you check out the Semantic Web Terrorism Knowledge Base site Mannes links to - fascinating.]

 

[vimothy]

Who knew? A Tory with brains (pity the Guardian's so far from the beat):

While most in the British establishment emphasise the importance of the Middle East road map, Gove makes only the most perfunctory admission that the failure to find a solution contributes to terrorism. Don't you, I ask, accept that, while Osama bin Laden would not be bought off with an Israel-Palestine peace accord, the situation might draw anger from many Arabs tempted towards violence?

'I see the logic,' he says, which is Gove-speak for 'no'; charm is his weapon, and his deadliest tactic is to sound sympathetic while tearing your argument to shreds. 'When Islamicists talk about occupation they are not referring to the West Bank or Gaza - they object to Israel per se, and any American soldiers on any Arab lands.' A nice point, but this is not the view of many Arabs. 'Indeed, but Islamicists will say, "The West is weakening: one more heave".'

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/interviews/story/0,,1990240,00.html

 

[crackerjack]

Who knew? A Tory with brains (pity the Guardian's so far from the beat):



http://politics.guardian.co.uk/interviews/story/0,,1990240,00.html

To be fair, jasper Gerrard is an Observer writer (Sunday times til recently) and more of a diarist/witticist than a political commentator. He always seems out of his depth with anything serious.

 

[HMGovt’s Glorious Return!]

Meanwhile, in Iraq...

http://www.michaelyon-online.com/wp/rattlesnake.htm

Seems our boys are learning how to deal with bomb-layers around Basra.

 

[Mr. Tea]

I met up with some mates from school the other night whom I've not seen for 7-8 years. Apparently one of our number who joined the Royal Navy and is now flying helicopters in Basra got massively bollocked by his officers after he was interviewed by a journalist about the proposed pull-out and said "As soon as we leave the Iraqis are going to go straight back to doing what comes naturally to them: living in mud huts and howling at the moon".
It's slightly funnier if you know him. :slanted:

Edit: pffft... "Distant flashes of lightning signified that man was not the only bringer of thunder this night"

 

[crackerjack]

To be fair, jasper Gerrard is an Observer writer (Sunday times til recently) and more of a diarist/witticist than a political commentator. He always seems out of his depth with anything serious.

Proof positive: he was also a Lib Dem candidate lsat week.

 

[crackerjack]

Damn, is this what that 4GW is all about?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2075845,00.html

Time to chuck in the towel.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Time to chuck in the towel.

What, like Arafat did a few years ago?

(sorry!)

Edit: reminds me of this:

 

[Guybrush]

Damn, is this what that 4GW is all about?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2075845,00.html

Time to chuck in the towel.

That’s pretty funny, actually.

My quick advice to waging 4G warfare in the Middle East:

1. Obligatory Arabic lessons for all military personnel, and not just the lame phrase-book variety, I’m talking hardcore here. They should be able to snap up every nuance of what the locals are saying.

2. Obligatory lessons in Arabian history, customs, tribal structures—everything.

3. No video-games, playing lame-ass punk-rock while driving around in your tanks, and all that other painful taradiddle we have had to witness in Iraq. The catchword: professionalism.

Any questions?

 

[vimothy]

Yeah, agree with that, but actually think more's needed... on all levels... maybe starting with units being assigned a street, made to live there and given responsibility for security in that area. Loose mission orders, "the strategic corporal", etc. Leave the 2nd Gen stuff behind.

 

[vimothy]

Basically, although I think Guybrush's suggestions are all worthy, I'm not so sure that they are 4GW. As far as I understand, 4GW implies increasing decentralisation, "open source warfare", more autonomy to soldiers, less reliance on massive firepower. For instance, much of US tactics seems to revolve around trecking up to suspected militant positions, then calling in the air strikes and heavy artillery. They don't seem to have any light infantry (surely what fighting urban terrorists requires), and don't seem to go in for 3GW (manoeuvre warfare) at all ('cept maybe the marines). But could the USAF fight 4GW at all? Not sure. Perhaps it could do better at combating 4GW, but I don't think that democratic state owned armed forces can actually fight 4GW. In addition to the open source paradigm, 4GW includes things like asymmetry, moral wardfare, terrorism, state failure, and so on. John Robb's summary is good:
http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2004/05/4gw_fourth_gene.html

 

[JP Nut]

i have to say that trawling through this thread is pretty tedious. but there are some interesting bits in it.

from the links etc i've read, 4GW doesn't appear to be that new (guerilla tactics, militia and fighting for a cause) the writing about it seems to be an attempt by analysts to rationalise warfare and conflict into theorys on human behaviour from which formulas can then be devised that determine wether a win or loss has been achieved.

this sounds all too similiar to the use of game theory within the vietnam conflict.

there will be no winners in iraq only losers, although rest assured all sides in it will (should it end at some point) use various scenarios to depict a positive outcome for their forces.

justifiable use of force doesn't require this level of analysis.

also there was some mention in this thread of 9/11 and wether it was a retaliation for US actions elsewhere. osama bin laden certainly thinks it is >>cnn transcript<<

on a lighter note regarding who is to blame for the rise of the nazi party, john sweeneys got a program going out on monday evening (bbc) and he reckons that
"Scientologists want "the global obliteration" of psychiatrists, who they say were to blame for the rise of Nazi Germany"

so there you go nothing to do with allies, agreements or nationalism, it's those pesky brain doctors

 

[vimothy]

Mr Nutt -

4GW is not necessarily all that new. It depends on how you view its emergence, but one theorist, Hammes, describes 4GW as being about eighty years old, and wonders about the next generation. There's growing 5GW discussion on the internet. Check out:
http://www.fifthgeneration.phaticcommunion.com/archives/2007/05/colonel_hammes_enters_the_fift.php

The generational theory of warfare tries to understand war in terms of "dialectically qualitative shifts". Different types of warfare develop with changes in social, political and technological fields. 3GW - the blitzkrieg - was a reaction to allied superiority at 2GW. It is a different way of fighting. It's not about redefining winning and loosing, although 4GW does mess with that (because a strong force can't defeat a weak force and stay strong). Al Qaeda are fully aware of 4GW and have discussed it on theirn websites. According to Lind, he was informed by US soldiers that copies of his original article were found in the caves at Tora Bora. 4GW is a method. I don't fully understand the reference to game theory or modelling human behaviour, but I don't think 4GW has anything to do with either. It's about understanding how the enemy fights.

there will be no winners in iraq only losers, although rest assured all sides in it will (should it end at some point) use various scenarios to depict a positive outcome for their forces.

To be honest mate, I think you're being sentimental. Of course there will be winners, and that's the whole problem - they might not be who we would want to win, Iran, al Qaeda, the Kurdish separatists, etc. I 'm sure you can think of groups who are benefiting from the invasion of Iraq. And just because groups can project victory doesn't mean that they are fighting 4GW, nor does it mean that they have fought a successful campaign.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Vim, sorry if this seems like a lame question, but could you give me a quick rundown on what constitutes 1GW, 2GW and 3GW? I'm guessing something like tribal warfare with spears/clubs, organised mediaeval/early modern warfare and mechanised WWI/WWII-type warfare, something like that. And where in this scheme do highly organised ancient armies like the Macedonians and Romans fit?

 

[vimothy]

Yeah, no worries. The generational theory of warfare starts with the Peace of Westphalia, the start of the modern era and the monopolisation of armed force by the nation-state.

1GW represents the start of this. It used the smoothbore rifle, the column and the line, displined drilling to produce a decent rate of fire. Much of 1GW survives in todays militaries.

2GW is massed firepower without mobility. The trenches of WWI, the rifled musket, the machine gun, barbed wire, firepower replaces manpower, massive wars of attrition. Most armed forces would fall under this category.

3GW was developed by the Germans in response to the weakness of their industrial base, i.e. that knew that they could not afford to fight a prolonged war of attrition with the Allies. These tactics were pretty radical, relying on movement not firepower, attacking non linearly, using infiltration, defending in depth to set up the counterattack. The IDF were the best modern example of this, until recently.

4GW marks the end of the states monoploy on armed force. Radically decentralisaed non-state actors wage moral warfare, seeking to hit the enemy right in his political motivation, the battlefield is dispersed, civilian and soldiers collapse into one another...

 

[Mr. Tea]

Ahh, cheers for that. I didn't realise it referred only to the modern/modern-ish period.