The Marines, Counterinsurgency, and Strategic Culture

248 Chapter 9
The US military leadership recognized that gains made against insurgents
in Iraq were fragile. The strides forward in stability and normalization
of civilian life would be fleeting without an ongoing advisory and support
presence. They, alongside Sunni counterparts, advised a gradual drawdown
in Iraq in order to maintain long- term stability. Washington chose instead to
bow to the pressures of American impatience with the protracted nature of
irregular war and bring the troops home. The tumbling of Iraq back into a
bloody state occurred in fairly short order. This reversal of Marine “wins”
in Iraq threatens to devalue the lessons hard forged there. As it was after the
Vietnam War, the strong temptation will be to wash hands of an ugly and
ultimately unsuccessful enterprise. The concluding chapter of this volume
examines the lessons Marines continue to identify as worth learning from
their Iraq experience, as well as those in jeopardy of being lost.
Notes
1. Ardolino, Fallujah Awakens, 209. For frustrations on this point, see Groen and
Contributors, With the 1st Marine Division, 370–71.
2. Gen. Jim Mattis, correspondence with the author, October 5, 2016; Maj. Gen.
John R. Allen, interview in McWilliams and Wheeler, Al- Anbar Awakening,
1:232.
3. Maj. Alfred B. Connable, interview, ibid., 124.
4. Col. George P. Garrett, correspondence with the author, July 18, 2014; Maj.
Alfred B. Connable, correspondence with the author, August 25, 2014.
5. Gen. Charles C. Krulak, “Commandant’s Planning Guidance (CPG),” Marine
Corps Gazette (August 1995): A- 3. See also “The Commandant’s Warfighting
Laboratory,” Marine Corps Gazette (September 1995); Gen. Charles C. Krulak,
“Embracing Innovation,” Marine Corps Gazette (January 1996); and Maj.
Kenneth R. Bergman, “A Ticket to Ride the Dragon,” Marine Corps Gazette
(February 1996).
6. Frank Hoffman, correspondence with the author, July 17, 2014; Col. George P.
Garrett, correspondence with the author, July 18, 2014; Terriff, “Warriors and
Innovators.”
7. Gen. Charles C. Krulak, “Building a Corps for the 21st Century,” Leatherneck
(April 1998): 28.
8. Gen. Charles C. Krulak, “The Strategic Corporal: Leadership in the Three
Block War,” Marine Corps Gazette (January 1999): 21–22.
9. Brig. Gen. John F. Kelly, “Tikrit, South to Babylon,” Marine Corps Gazette
(February 2004): 18.
10. 1st Lt. Christopher S. Tsirlis, “The MAGTF Officer in Iraq,” Marine Corps
Gazette (December 2004): 16–18.
11. Ricks, Generals, 631–32.
12. Gen. Jim Mattis, correspondence with the author, October 23, 2013.