Air Power, Insurgency and the “War on Terror” - Prof. Joel Hayward's ...

Chapter 12
The kind of intelligence that you need to underst<strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> insurgent social context <strong>and</strong> to
underst<strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> insurgent organization is human intelligence. Again, this goes against <strong>the</strong>
US <strong>and</strong> western military bias of a high-technology approach to war. High-technology
intelligence does have its place. Space surveillance <strong>and</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r reconnaissance assets can give
you great data. High-technology surveillance can tell you that <strong>the</strong> people are all leaving a
particular village. Yet it does not tell you WHY <strong>the</strong>y are leaving. You need really competent
analysts to answer questions like that.
The kind of intelligence analysis that you need in counter-insurgency is essentially
a foreign area officer, someone who speaks <strong>the</strong> language fluently, has studied <strong>the</strong>
country <strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> region in depth, <strong>and</strong> who underst<strong>and</strong>s <strong>the</strong> societal context of official
<strong>and</strong> unofficial networks. In fighting insurgents, a mature, competent specialist
intelligence officer is far more useful than a B-2 bomber. The good news is that a human
intelligence specialist is a lot cheaper than a B-2 bomber. The bad news is that it takes
about as long to develop a competent country <strong>and</strong> regional expert as it does to develop
<strong>the</strong> B-2 bomber.
One of <strong>the</strong> primary problems that our forces in Iraq <strong>and</strong> Afghanistan face is <strong>the</strong> lack
of fully qualified human intelligence specialists. Unlike logistics, which requires some
general skills, you cannot easily contract out for such people when you need <strong>the</strong>m. If you
are going to have adequate human intelligence support in a conflict, you need to build
up your human intelligence capabilities long in advance. Unfortunately, at <strong>the</strong> end of <strong>the</strong>
Cold War <strong>the</strong> US largely gutted <strong>the</strong> human intelligence specialist force <strong>and</strong> we are paying
for <strong>the</strong> consequences of that now.
Leadership in Counter-insurgency
One of <strong>the</strong> most important issues in counter-insurgency, especially for <strong>the</strong> military forces,
is to underst<strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> unique requirements of leadership. As with o<strong>the</strong>r issues we have
examined, <strong>the</strong> requirements for effective leadership in counter-insurgency operations are
very different from <strong>the</strong> requirements of conventional war. To start with, to be an effective
officer in counter-insurgency one must know <strong>the</strong> basics of <strong>the</strong> military profession <strong>and</strong>
be a competent leader in conventional operations. Yet that is not enough for counterinsurgency.
This is a fundamentally different kind of warfare, <strong>and</strong> it requires a considerable
amount of underst<strong>and</strong>ing of essentially civilian issues, to include such factors as social
<strong>and</strong> political relationships. Moreover, <strong>the</strong> radically different context of counter-insurgency
requires a high degree of mental flexibility, not necessarily a common trait of military
leaders. An officer can be a great soldier or airman in a conventional war, <strong>and</strong> fail badly
in counter-insurgency.
<strong>Air</strong> <strong>Power</strong>, <strong>Insurgency</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> “War on Terror” 211