Great COIN Debate

I thought the great COIN debate was whether or not we should get rid of the penny?

Perhaps the Army could take a look at the way the Navy trains.

Prior to an overseas deployment, each ship/submarine/aircraft squadron is required to be fully qualified and certified in each mission area. This remains true even if you know you are not going to use the vast majority of that training.

Case in point: ASW (Anti-submarine Warfare). How many times to the ships go out looking for bad guy subs these days? Not many, but you still have to practice this during the workups. A ship will go to the HOA and do nothing but Maritime Security Operations (MSO) for six months.

Perhaps a way could be found to incorporate periodic re-certification in things like artillery while still training to conduct MP/Infantry operations. I am sure there are other areas that are being allowed to atrophy, but should not.

When you stop training on your core areas/missions, you will not only lose those abilities, but you will lose certain non-written traditions that you never realized you had. This will have a seriously detrimental effect down the road when you need to shift back to a different war.

Note that the Marine Corps has seen that they need to get back to the deployments they have done for decades (i.e., "floats") in order to maintain and re-hone their core capability of amphibious assault.

I am not at all saying to back off from COIN, but I am saying we probably need to take a hard look at maintaining a harmonious training strategy to maintain core capabilities.

While I haven't read the report and value the opinion of guys like COL MacFarland, I'm with Charlie. In 1776, artillery was our indirect fire. Today, we use the USAF, the USN (principally aviation and missile cruisers) and Army Aviation to deliver standoff fires and conventional artillery is more directly related to the close fight. Consider how we structured our fires for Division and BDE level assaults in 2003. While I'm skeptical of the overused expression "Revolution in Military Affairs", the fact is we are transforming now and I'm not sure we fully grasp how. It strikes me that putting one of our BCTs into a close fight against an opponent's heavy org is a failure to properly synch fires during the shaping phase and a failure to maneuver unless we are confident that we can overmatch one for one on the basis of weapons system capability. To me the real risk is designing force structure to meet deployment restrictions rather than the threat. On a different note, historically, we fight 4GW and promptly forget it...from the RevWar (think Carolinas) to now. Fortunatly, we are blessed with smart, adaptive leadership. The key to it all.

I've got a couple of Army COINs.
From SF, 160th SOAR, Ranger's, etc.

Army COINs are pretty cool!

J/K...

Great minds think alike. I happened to post on this on the same day you did:

http://www.captainsjournal.com/2008/05/07/the-effects-of-the-long-war-on-military-readiness/

I don't claim to have an answer. But Ravenrock6 makes an interesting point about how we have supplanted artillery for standoff fire from aircraft. But if this is indeed the case, then we cannot then argue against providing the AF/Navy with their aircraft with the argument that they don't aid our counterinsurgency efforts.

We can't have our cake and eat it too. We supply the AF/Navy, or we train and employ artillery, but we cannot starve both and claim that we are prepared for anything like a pseudo-conventional campaign (or even standoff fire assistance to COIN).

I argue that we should properly resource the long war, and this would enhance both the hearts and skills of our warriors. They deserve nothing less.

As an Arty Officer and an ANGLICO JTAC, I get really worried when people start talking about relying on Air Support and Naval Surface Fires in place of Arty. There will never be enough Air to go around and if operating away from the coast NSF can't come into play. Arty is the only all weather indirect fire asset that can provide accurate and timely fires to battalion. (F-18 are not all weather when Al Asad is Red). Artillery is a crucial asset that we will need to rely on at great length if we go into Iran, Syria, etc.

While a lot of Marine Arty Batteries are acting as TF MP and doing Civil Affairs, once they return from deployment, they are back out in the field to fire. A lot of senior Arty Officers are very worried because a lot of junior artillery officers are only getting about one year in a firing battery (two if they luck out and end up on a MEU). It is very possible in a two to three years, you could have Battery CO's who have never been an FDO or filled the role of a traditional Battery XO. I think the Marine Arty community is taking a lot of pro-active steps to ensure that the community keeps up it core skills even if they aren't meeting the METL's in the T&R manual. I suspect the Army is doing the same thing.

The simple answer is: we have to train both. The problem is we simply don't have the time to do that. Maybe we will when we expand the army and are not deploying every other year.

Kevin

While the ideal answer is you train both, if I had to pick one or the other I'd still concentrate on traditional. Obviously, while we are in COIN operations, those fundamentals should be taught, but ultimately, no insurgency is going to truely threaten the territorial integrity of the US. An insurgency can wear at occupying American forces, but it can't consume them at the rate of a true bare knuckles conventional war. You could drop all of the casualties in OIF and OEF into one bad day off of Taiwan against China. It might take a little longer against a resurgent Russia under Putin's third term to rack those totals up but I think a divisional slugfest in Lithuania could hit that in two or three days... Summation, losing an insurgency is embarrassing, losing a proper war is much worse.

I think the real positive is that active duty officers are being allowed to voice these concerns, esepcially while actively engaging the very programs they have concerns about. That sort of active review is the real strength of ourarmed forces.

Yes, the Army is weakened, but if you want to point the finger of blame, look to Wm. Jefferson C., and my good buddy and fellow Ohioan frmr. Congressman John Kasich. The "peace dividend" of the 90's is your cause, not COIN.

As to arty, a timely reference is today's Air Combat by Remote Control in the WSJ.