Special WarfareThe Professional Bulletin of the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School

PB 80–02–4 December 2002 Vol. 15, No. 4

As the United States military attempts totransform its forces into the most effectiveorganization possible for the future, theObjective Force, no soldiers offer more tothat force than Army special-operationsforces, or ARSOF.

On future battlefields, ARSOF will pro-vide Army and joint-force commanders aforce capable of performing full-spectrumunconventional operations. By workingwith and through indigenous or surrogateforces, ARSOF can wage unconventionalwarfare to shape the operational environ-ment or to compel adversaries to diverttheir forces from the primary area of oper-ations. Special Forces, or SF, provide train-ing, from the individual level through thebattalion level, that can assist foreign mili-taries and indigenous groups in developingtheir war-fighting capabilities.

When the U.S. Army assists friendlynations’ efforts in internal defense and devel-opment, or IDAD, ARSOF can function as aninvaluable combat multiplier. Soldiers in SF;Civil Affairs, or CA; and Psychological Oper-ations, or PSYOP, can integrate their opera-tions with the operations of other elements ofthe U.S. government, of foreign governments,of nongovernment organizations and privatevolunteer organizations, and of host-nationnational systems.

During the 2002 Army Transformationwar game, Vigilant Warrior, which includeda major regional contingency and severalsmaller-scale contingencies, ARSOF partici-pated in all scenarios. From the evalua-tions of the scenarios, one common lessonemerged: ARSOF are a key component ofthe Objective Force. It is more importantnow than ever before that ARSOF be betterintegrated into both joint and Army war-fighting doctrine. Furthermore, ARSOFmust continue to integrate evolving doc-trine, tactics and techniques, and new tech-nologies into ARSOF training programs.

ARSOF must also continue to train adap-

tive, mature and intelligent soldiers. Leaderdevelopment and specialized trainingremain key in maintaining a quality forcethat is capable of meeting the challenges offuture war-fighting.

While language skills and culturalawareness are important to ARSOF, theability to effectively teach warrior skills isparamount. ARSOF are capable of buildingother nations’ armies because they havemastered basic and advanced warriorskills and because they are able to teachthose skills to others. Skills in basic marks-manship, patrolling, raids, ambushes,movements to contact, and offensive anddefensive operations are also critical to SF.Furthermore, much of the training that SFwill provide in foreign environments willfocus on operations in urban terrain. TheSpecial Forces Advanced Urban CombatCourse, or SFAUCC, is designed to enhancethe survival skills of SF teams. SFAUCCwill continue to progress, and in the future,SF soldiers will integrate SFAUCC into thetraining they provide to foreign armies.

Major General William G. Boykin

From the CommandantDecember 2002 Special Warfare Vol. 15, No. 4

Features2 Transformation: Roles and Missions for ARSOF

by Lieutenant Colonel Adrian Erckenbrack

9 The Special Forces Training Pipeline: Responding to Operational Challenges

12 Operational Net Assessment: Implications and Opportunities for SOFby Lieutenant Colonel William Fleser, U.S. Army (ret.)

18 Effects of Operations: Psychological Determinants of Blitzkrieg Successby Major Angela Maria Lungu

25 As I Remember It: The SF/Golf Ball Analogyby Major General Sidney Shachnow, U.S. Army (ret.)

28 Civil-Military Marriage Counseling: Can This Union Be Saved?by Adam B. Siegel

35 Kachin Rangers: Allied Guerrillas in World War II Burmaby Dr. C.H. Briscoe

Departments44 2002 Index

46 Enlisted Career Notes

47 Officer Career Notes

49 Foreign SOF

50 Update

52 Book Reviews

PB 80–02–4 ContentsDecember 2002 Special Warfare Vol. 15, No. 4

Commander & CommandantMajor General William G. Boykin

EditorJerry D. Steelman

Associate EditorSylvia W. McCarley

Graphics & DesignBruce S. Barfield

Automation ClerkGloria H. Sawyer

Special Warfare is an authorized, official quarterly of theUnited States Army John F. Kennedy Special WarfareCenter and School, Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Its missionis to promote the professional development of special-operations forces by providing a forum for the examinationof established doctrine and new ideas.

Views expressed herein are those of the authors and donot necessarily reflect official Army position. Thispublication does not supersede any information presentedin other official Army publications.

Articles, photos, artwork and letters are invited andshould be addressed to Editor, Special Warfare,USAJFKSWCS, Fort Bragg, NC 28310. Telephone: DSN239-5703, commercial (910) 432-5703, fax -3147. SpecialWarfare reserves the right to edit all material.

Published works may be reprinted, except wherecopyrighted, provided credit is given to Special Warfareand the authors.

Official distribution is limited to active and reservespecial-operations units. Individuals desiring privatesubscriptions should forward their requests to:Superintendent of Documents, U.S. GovernmentPrinting Office, Washington, D.C. 20402. SpecialWarfare is also available on the USASOC internal web(https:asociweb.soc.mil/swcs/dotd/sw-mag/sw-mag.htm).

V E R I T A S

STREBIL

A

E T

By Order of the Secretary of the Army:Eric K. ShinsekiGeneral, United States ArmyChief of Staff

Official:

Joel B. HudsonAdministrative Assistant to theSecretary of the Army

0230205

Headquarters, Department of the Army

Since the end of the Cold War, policy-makers, military strategists and his-torians have struggled to predict the

future roles and missions of the UnitedStates military.

Every four years, in the QuadrennialDefense Review, or QDR, the Departmentof Defense, or DoD, attempts to peer intothe future and to describe the threats andscenarios that lie ahead. One particularparagraph of the 2001 QDR should beemphasized as a result of the events of theSept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World TradeCenter and the Pentagon. After noting a“changed security environment,” the QDRstates, “An assessment of the global securi-ty environment involves a great deal ofuncertainty about the potential sources ofmilitary threats, the conduct of war in thefuture, and the form that threats and

attacks against the nation will take.”1

Although the uncertainty remains, thereis an emerging consensus among militarystrategists that the attacks of Sept. 11served notice to DoD that the asymmetricwarfare predicted for the future hasarrived. More importantly, the attackshighlight the fact that even as DoD wasdeveloping a comprehensive description ofthe missions that the U.S. military willhave to perform in countering the asym-metric threat, the nature of warfare waschanging rapidly.

Despite the flux and the uncertainty ofpredicting and preparing for future threats,certainties do exist. One of those is that inorder to remain relevant, special-operationsforces, or SOF, must base any decisionsregarding their future roles and missionson a clear understanding of SOF’s organi-zational nature. SOF must also under-stand the way that SOF organizations maybest leverage their critical strengths ofadaptability, competency and maturity in aglobal environment that appears to bebecoming more and more asymmetrical.

Whether SOF remain the premier fight-ing force and retain their relevance in thefuture environment will depend in largepart on how accurately the SOF leadershipenvisions the future and identifies the rolesand missions for which SOF should prepare.This article will seek to describe future eco-nomic, social and military factors that willaffect the global security environment. It

2 Special Warfare

Transformation: Roles and Missionsfor ARSOF

by Lieutenant Colonel Adrian Erckenbrack

The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, served notice that asym-metric warfare is no longer a problem of the future.

Photo by Gerry J. Gilmore

will also suggest ways of leveraging SOF’scharacteristics in that environment. It is theauthor’s hope that this article will stimulatethinking about the role that SOF must playif they are to remain relevant.

Vision of the future Future warfare may involve waging war

against entities that have no army and nodefined geographic borders but which arenevertheless capable of inflicting a greatloss of human life. Terrorist organizationsrepresent only one example of such enti-ties. Combating these kinds of entities willrequire a different mindset and, in somecases, either different means or differentways of applying existing means. SOFmust understand that many aspects of thesecurity environment are changing, andthat many of the changes have militaryimplications.

DefinitionsAmong the changes that have military

implications are changes in definitions. On thesurface, definitions may seem insignificant,but they are of paramount importance inunderstanding SOF’s role in increasinglyasymmetric military activities.

• The U.S. definition of an “act of war” willbe revised to include activities heretoforedefined as “criminal.” The revised definitionwill be significant, because terrorism andother asymmetric threats are now considered

crimes, not acts of war, and our legal systemaccords rights and privileges to criminalsthat it does not accord to our enemies at war.

Defining terrorism and other asymmet-ric threats as acts of war will allow us touse the full spectrum of DoD activities,including psychological operations anddeception, to counter asymmetric threats.Deploying an armor or infantry brigade tosearch for a terrorist organization embed-ded in an urban area might not be as effec-tive as employing psychological and cultur-al “weapons.” Through the application ofthose weapons, units of infantry, armor orArmy special-operations forces, or ARSOF,may be able to identify and destroy theenemy. In such cases, the timing and thesynchronization of the psychological andcultural weapons will be crucial in achiev-ing success.

• The conventional definition of aweapon of mass destruction, or WMD, iscurrently limited to chemical, biological,radiological, nuclear and explosive agents.Ultimately, the U.S. will expand its defini-tion of WMD. Weapons will be identified asWMDs based upon their effect, not upontheir method, and WMDs will includeeffects-based weapons, such as cyberthreats and psychological threats.

The psychological impact of using com-mercial airliners in the Sept. 11 terroristattack (which is estimated to have causedbillions of dollars in damages) exceeded thepsychological impact that would have been

December 2002 3

File photo

Military police escort adetainee at the Guan-tanamo Bay naval station.Revising the definition ofan “act of war” will affectthe legal rights and privi-leges that the U.S. willaccord to terrorists.

produced had the terrorists used conven-tional weapons of an equally destructivecapability. Is a cyber attack truly less dam-aging than one that employs large explosivedevices? Even if a cyber attack produced noloss of life or physical destruction, it couldultimately cause the collapse of a segmentof our economy, one of our critical strengthsif not our strategic center of gravity.

It seems clear that cyber and psycholog-ical weapons, if measured by their effects,and not by the body count that they pro-duce, have the potential of producing wide-spread destruction and should be identi-fied as WMD. To counter the resulting

expansion of the WMD threat, the U.S. mil-itary will need to reorganize some part ofits infrastructure to perform asymmetricattack.

• We must expect the U.S. to maintain itsdominance as a global economic, militaryand political superpower. Because of thatdominance, the U.S. will become the light-ning rod for the resentment of many disaf-fected or disenfranchised nation-states,organizations and people who perceivethat they are being denied their fair shareof prosperity, resources and influence. Asglobal economic, environmental and politi-cal stresses increase, the population of theworld’s disaffected and disenfranchisedwill increase by multitudes. The U.S. canexpect a corresponding increase in thenumber and in the types of military opera-

tions that will be required to counter theactivities of a growing number of disaffect-ed nation-states and non-state entities.

• The nation-state will lose its monopolyon waging war. The loss of that monopolywill be of paramount importance: Ournational-security capabilities are designedfor operations within a nation-state frame-work, and we have great difficulty exercis-ing those capabilities outside that frame-work. If DoD is to ensure our national secu-rity, we will have to bolster our capabilityto counter terrorism, transnationalthreats, asymmetric threats, and otherforms of influence and coercion directed atvarious U.S. critical weaknesses. With thepossible exception of the Marine Corps andSOF, American military forces are still notoptimally organized to take full advantageof new geopolitical realities and advancesin information technology.2

• Asymmetric threats to U.S. economic,military and political viability will attainequal status with conventional threats. Insome cases, the effects of asymmetric attackswill exceed the effects of conventionalweapons. The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks had adisproportionate effect on the economic andpsychological well-being of the U.S. Theexplosions of the hijacked airliners achieveda far greater impact than the terrorists couldhave achieved had they used a conventionalweapon of equal destructive capability.

• Advances in technology will acceleratethe proliferation of conventional WMDs,and WMD technology will evolve at a fasterrate than will the ability of the U.S. militarybureaucracy to control access to it. We mustexpect that entities that would do the U.S.harm will have access to WMD technologyand to WMD information, and that they willtranslate that information into the knowl-edge needed to produce conventionalWMDs. We must develop appropriate coun-termeasures, including a range of pre-emp-tive counterproliferation activities andforces.

• Technology will give the U.S. anunprecedented ability to employ relativelysmall numbers of personnel and equip-ment in the surveillance, tracking, rapidengagement and destruction of enemyforces on the conventional battlefield. With

4 Special Warfare

Photo by Scott Reed

Advances in technologymake it possible for theU.S. to employ smallnumbers of personnel intracking and targetingthe enemy.

further refinements, technology will allowselected personnel to track and identifytargets by fusing imagery, signals intelli-gence, and input from other sensors. Fus-ing the information between sensors,instead of assembling it at a central com-mand-and-control location, will significant-ly increase the speed at which targets canbe identified, targeted and destroyed. Thiscapability will become “real” when a criti-cal mass of sensors is networked.

Ultimately, the U.S. will develop a systemthat will allow sensor-to-sensor fusion andcommunication; that will select targets anddestruction platforms based upon variablessuch as priority, weather, terrain and thelikelihood of successful attack; and that willprovide options to the precision-engagementteams located throughout the battlespace.One implication of our advancing technolo-gy is that a small number of personnel,located far from the intended target andprotected by a number of personal and col-lective systems, will be able to bring a dis-proportionately large amount of destructionto the battlefield. Another implication isthat future adversaries will seek alternativemethods and means of engaging the U.S., inthe hope of finding an environment in whichour sensors, targeting means and munitionswill be placed at a disadvantage.

• Finally, SOF, because of their adapt-ability, ingenuity, maturity and organiza-tional size (smaller organizations are morecapable of rapid change), will remain the

force of choice in a future environmentcharacterized by a diffuse enemy, anambiguous enemy command-and-controlprocess, and an expanded array of enemycapabilities and methods of employment.

Implications for ARSOFEven as the environment is changing,

the first imperative, from the DoD perspec-tive, is that ARSOF remain a relevant forcein any future conflict environment. Toremain relevant, ARSOF must assess thefuture environment and then develop theplans and doctrinal structure necessary sothat the force can acquire the requisiteskills for that environment.

By analyzing descriptions of the poten-tial operating environment and by apply-ing the SOF imperatives — understand theenvironment, engage the threat discrimi-nately, apply capabilities indirectly, devel-op multiple options, and anticipate andcontrol psychological effects — we canbegin to identify potential ARSOF rolesand missions that may be relevant in thefuture. Potential ARSOF missions includeurban operations, asymmetric attack, pre-cision engagement, sustained direct actionand unconventional warfare.

Urban operationsIn a paradoxical way, U.S. advantages in

technology may improve our potential ene-mies’ ability to survive. By 2015, more than

December 2002 5

U.S. Army file photo

SOF will need to developtactics, techniques andprocedures for identifying,tracking and destroyingenemy forces in urbanenvironments.

half the world’s population will be living incities.3 The ability of U.S. forces to identifytargets, track them and destroy them withprecision munitions, in all weather condi-tions, may drive many of our future adver-saries into urban areas where they will besurrounded by thousands of noncombatantsand by religious and health-care structures.In such a situation, the U.S. would not tar-get enemy combatants using traditionalmeans. ARSOF will have to counter theenemy’s ability to hide by developing tactics,techniques and procedures (either unilater-ally or in concert with other interagencyassets), for identifying, tracking anddestroying enemy personnel and equipmentin urban environments.

Asymmetric attackAsymmetric attack offers ARSOF the

greatest challenge as well as the greatestpotential reward. Asymmetric attack pre-sents the greatest challenge because it ismost unlike the warrior ethos — whichemphasizes putting men and bullets ontarget. Asymmetric attack offers the great-est potential benefit through an insightfulapplication of “soft skills.” Those skills willallow ARSOF to identify the enemy even inwhat will often be an ambiguous operatingenvironment. Applying soft skills andasymmetric techniques at the beginning ofan engagement will not only help ARSOFidentify potential enemy targets, it will

also help ARSOF limit collateral damagein an urban environment. Potential meth-ods of asymmetric attack include:

• Exploiting informational, organiza-tional, philosophical and religious vulnera-bilities in order to force enemy targetseither to expose themselves or to masstogether. Once exposed or massed, theenemy can be targeted and destroyed.

• Exploiting informational, organization-al, philosophical and religious vulnerabili-ties in order to hinder the enemy’s ability toreact in a timely, accurate and effectivemanner. The effect can either defeat theenemy before he gets to the battlefield or, atthe very least, it can allow SOF to completethe mission with far fewer casualties.

Precision engagementA critically important revolution in mili-

tary affairs is one that forms a “system ofsystems,” in which many systems are linkedtogether. Retired Admiral William A. Owensstates, “The near future holds the prospectof viewing a large battlefield 24 hours a day,in real time, through all weather, with greatclarity.”4 As we mentioned earlier, the U.S.will ultimately develop a system that willallow sensor-to-sensor fusion and communi-cation; that will select targets and destruc-tion platforms based upon variables such aspriority, weather, terrain and likelihood ofsuccessful attack; and that will provideoptions to precision-engagement teamslocated throughout the battlespace.

The concept of sensor fusion breaks withthe traditional concept of sensor-systemintegration because it does not link multi-tudes of sensors to multiple human “infor-mation choke points.” Instead, the sensorsare linked to the weapons systems. Asfuture precision-engagement teams identi-fy targets, they will feed the target charac-teristics into the system, and the systemwill provide attack alternatives.

While many may assume that future oper-ations will enjoy perfect access to perfectinformation, we should remember that it isthe nature of war to inject uncertainty andconfusion. At best, transformation willimprove the timeliness and the detail ofintelligence, but a state of perfect intelligence

6 Special Warfare

Even though transforma-tion will improve the time-liness and the detail ofintelligence, humans willstill be needed to identifytargets and certify theirdestruction.

File photo

will likely never exist. The human compo-nent will still be required to participate inthe identification of targets and in the certifi-cation of target destruction. That need hasbeen repeatedly verified in Bosnia, in Kosovoand, more recently, in Afghanistan.

ARSOF, because of their training andtheir experience in high-risk environments,are ideally suited to serve as the humancomponent of precision-engagement opera-tions. They must remain a crucial element,if not the lead element, in the system of sys-tems. To be effectively integrated into theprecision-engagement concept, ARSOFshould be working now with the Informa-tion Exploitation Office of the DefenseAdvanced Research Projects Agency5 andwith the Assistant Secretary of Defense forCommand, Control, Communications andIntelligence, which has oversight of conceptdevelopment for intelligence, surveillanceand reconnaissance, or ISR. If ARSOF are tobe active participants in the mission anddoctrine that eventually evolve, ARSOF rep-resentatives must be involved with theseDoD agencies and civilian companies thatare developing the ISR concept.

Precision sensor placement, a subset ofprecision engagement, will offer the U.S. ameans of exploiting its technologicaladvantage. Through the precision place-ment of acoustic and optic sensors, ARSOFwill be able to deny enemies sanctuary byproviding a persistent means of surveil-

lance and tracking. In addition to offeringa potential counter to the enemy’s urbanbattlefield, the sensor technology will alsobe useful in other environments, such asjungles and dense forests, that providecover to enemy movement.

Sustained direct actionARSOF’s emphasis in sustained direct

action should be on conducting self-support-ed SOF operations that are designed for thecounterproliferation of WMDs in a hostileenvironment. Counterproliferation opera-tions will need to focus on ballistic andcruise missiles and on conventional WMDs.To accomplish these operations, ARSOFmust have the ability to conduct unaided,deep operations for extended periods oftime. To perform these missions, ARSOFwill likely work in close coordination withother interagency assets. The ARSOF lan-guage program will be a critical enabler ofsustained direct action. The Army has mademuch effort to improve the ARSOF lan-guage program, but it must do more.

Unconventional warfareUnconventional warfare, or UW, supports

the ARSOF role of global scouts, throughwhich ARSOF provide ground truth to thecommander of the joint task force. Globalscouts may be more effectively leveraged inthe future to defeat improved enemy means

December 2002 7

The use of U.S. SpecialForces to train indige-nous forces will proba-bly receive increasedemphasis in the future.

File photo

and methods of anti-access and anti-denial.Because it will be used to defeat enemyanti-access and anti-denial activities, UW, alegacy mission for U.S. Army Special Forces,will likely receive increased emphasis in thefuture. In Afghanistan, the accomplish-ments of an indigenous force, assisted byU.S. ARSOF and U.S. technology, havereduced the number of American forces thatare required for operations there.

During a period of uncertainty and rapidchange, such as the one we are experiencingtoday, field exercises can be especially bene-ficial.6 ARSOF field exercises could be effec-tive whether conducted unilaterally or incombination with current Army Transfor-mation exercises. ARSOF should also beintegrated into transformational experi-ments, war gaming and simulations at thejoint, service and regional-command levels.ARSOF should also consider integratingwar gaming and simulations with Armyefforts that are associated with the InterimBrigade Combat Teams.

ConclusionPresident George W. Bush recently said,

“Moments of national opportunity are eitherseized or lost, and the consequences reachacross the decades. Now comes the time oftesting. Our measure is taken not only bywhat we have and use, but also by what webuild and leave behind, and nothing thisgeneration could ever build will mattermore than the means to defend our nationand extend our freedom and peace.”7

DoD has chosen transformation as themeans by which to fashion the military ofthe future. SOF transformation initiativesmust include more than just the successfulfielding of the CV-22 and the AdvancedSeal Delivery System. SOF must also focuson developing transformational conceptsthat will enable them to remain on theleading edge of relevance and capability.SOF must lead the way to a revolution inwarfare. Secretary of Defense Donald H.Rumsfeld stated it best: “A revolution inmilitary affairs is about more than build-ing new high-tech weapons — althoughthis is certainly part of it. It is also aboutnew ways of thinking and new ways of

fighting.”8 The consequences of a lack ofSOF vision or innovative thinking regard-ing transformational concepts are foretoldin a SOF truth: “Competent [and relevant]special-operations forces cannot be createdafter emergencies occur.”

Lieutenant Colonel Adrian Erckenbrackis serving as a special assistant to the Sec-retary of Defense in legislative affairs. Hisprevious assignments include congression-al fellow; senior plans officer for J-34,Deputy Directorate for Operations, Combat-ing Terrorism; company commander, Com-pany A, 1st Battalion, 3rd SF Group; chiefof the SF Branch, Enlisted Personnel Man-agement Directorate, Total Army PersonnelCommand; detachment commander withthe 5th SF Group; and company command-er (provincial) with the Syrian 9th ArmoredDivision during Operation Desert Storm.Lieutenant Colonel Erckenbrack holdsbachelor’s degrees in biology and chemistryfrom Eastern Washington University inCheney, Wash. He is a 1997 CGSC graduateof the Naval War College, where he receiveda master’s degree in strategic studies. Whileattending the Naval War College, he alsoserved as a White House intern. LieutenantColonel Erckenbrack was the U.S. ArmySpecial Operations Command 1992 recipi-ent of the MacArthur Leadership Award.

Notes:1 Department of Defense, Quadrennial Defense

Review, 30 September 2001, 3.2 Foreign Policy Research Institute, e-notes: “The

coming transformation of the U.S. military,” MichaelP. Noonan, 4 February 2002.

3 “Global Trends 2015”: A dialogue with nongovern-mental experts about the future growth in megacities, December 2000.

4 Admiral William A. Owens, comments during theAmerican Enterprise Institute for Public PolicyResearch Conference, March 1996.

5 John Markoff, “Chief takes over new agency to thwartattacks on US,” New York Times, 13 February 2002, A27.

6 Testimony by Andrew Krepinevich, executive direc-tor for the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assess-ments, before the Senate Armed Services Committee,9 April 2002.

7 Remarks by President George W. Bush at TheCitadel, 11 December 2001.

8 Secretary of Defense, Donald H. Rumsfeld, ForeignAffairs, May/June 2002, 21.

8 Special Warfare

Necessity is the mother of inven-tion, and the current operationstempo and demand for more Spe-

cial Forces, or SF, soldiers to fill the oper-ational force has required the JFK Spe-cial Warfare Center and School, or SWCS,the proponent for SF training, to modifythe SF training pipeline to meet thedemand.

Even though SWCS trainers wereeager to retain the training events andphilosophies of the Special ForcesQualification Course, or SFQC, thathad succeeded in the past, they faced achallenge. As a result of OperationEnduring Freedom and other currentoperations, SWCS must train more SFsoldiers to the same high standard asbefore. To meet the challenge, SWCShas developed a more aggressiveaccession program and a more finelytuned training process.

The SF training pipeline is taught insix phases: Phase 1 is Special ForcesAssessment and Selection, or SFAS;Phase 2 is the small-unit training por-tion; Phase 3 is the SF MOS training por-tion; Phase 4 is the collective trainingportion (centered around the Robin Sagefield exercise); Phase 5 is language train-ing; and Phase 6 is the Survival, Eva-sion, Resistance and Escape Course. The1st Special Warfare Training Group’s 1stBattalion is responsible for Phases 1, 2, 4and 6; the 4th Battalion is responsible

for Phase 3; and the 3rd Battalion isresponsible for Phase 5.

Initial accessionsIn order to meet the challenge of recruit-

ing more enlisted soldiers for SF, SWCS hasbegun implementing the initial accessionsprogram, or IAP, after approximately 18months of discussion, design and testing.IAP allows the Army to recruit individuals“off the street” for eventual assignment asSF NCOs. These young men, classified as18Xs, will receive at least 24 months of con-tinuous training designed to prepare themas either SF weapons sergeants (18B) or SFengineer sergeants (18C).

The qualifications for IAP recruitmentare intimidating. The requirements thatthe IAP recruit must meet are higher thanthose required of an in-service enlisted SFapplicant. The prospective 18X soldiermust:• Enlist for 60 months as an 18X and attend

Infantry one-station unit training, or OSUT.• Be male and under the age of 30 at the

time of enlistment.• Be a high-school graduate or possess a

GED certificate.• Attain a general-technical, or GT, score

of at least 110.• Score at least 85 on the Defense Lan-

guage Aptitude Battery, or DLAB, orreceive a rating of 1/1 on the DefenseLanguage Proficiency Test.

December 2002 9

The Special Forces Training Pipeline: Responding to Operational Challenges

• Score at least 229 on the Army PhysicalFitness Test.To date, the typical IAP recruit fits the

following profile:• Average age: 21.8 years.• Average GT score: 121.5.• Average DLAB score: 103.• Average education level: 13 years (19

percent are college graduates).The goals of IAP recruitment are aggres-

sive — 600 contracts per year. Each recruitis eligible for a $10,000 or $12,000 bonus,depending upon whether he signs a five- orsix-year contract. The bonus is payableupon the 18X’s completion of SFAS. If the18X doesn’t complete the SFQC, he will notretain the bonus and will be reassigned as

an infantryman (although the currentbonus for an 11B infantryman is the sameas for an 18X). If the current rate of 18Xrecruitment continues, SF should meet itsfiscal year 2003 goal by the end of the sec-ond quarter.

The 18X training pipeline begins with 14weeks of Infantry OSUT, followed by air-borne school. The soldier then makes a per-manent-change-of-station move to FortBragg for the first phase of the Special Oper-ations Preparation Course, or SOPC 1.SOPC 1 is one of the most emotionally drain-ing phases of the new recruit’s training. Thefour-week course concentrates on the 18X’scharacter development, regimental indoctri-nation and academic preparation for thefirst phase of SFQC: the 24-day SFAS. SOPC1 also prepares the recruit for the rigoroustraining in physical fitness and land naviga-tion that he will receive during SFAS.

After he completes SOPC 1, the recruitbegins his formal SF pipeline training byattending SFAS. If, at the end of SFAS, the18X is selected for further SF training, he

will attend the Primary Leadership Devel-opment Course/Basic NCO Course taughtby the SWCS NCO Academy. Conducted atCamp Mackall, N.C. (approximately 40miles west of Fort Bragg), to put thetrainee in a “live-in” environment, the 23-day curriculum uses classroom instructionto teach Army-common tasks at skill levels2 and 3. Those tasks are not taught at anyother point in the SF training pipeline.

Following the PLDC training, the 18Xattends SOPC 2, a two-week course that pre-pares him for the training in small-unit tac-tics that he will receive during Phase 2 of theSFQC. The 18X who completes the PLDCtraining and Phase 2 of the SFQC will be rec-ognized as a PLDC graduate. Then the 18Xwill advance to Phase 3 of the SFQC.

So far, IAP has been successful: IAP stu-dents are succeeding in SFAS and in Phase2 of the SFQC at a rate equal to or higherthan the rate of in-service SF recruits. Butfor IAP to be successful in the long run, SFmust retain the IAP soldiers beyond theirinitial enlistment obligation. The SFgroups must prepare for the challenge ofretaining the first-term enlistees who par-ticipate in the IAP.

SFQC revisionsIn refining the training process, SWCS

has maintained its focus on providing thehighest-quality training possible for futureSF soldiers. Although the revised trainingprocess of the SFQC is structurally similarto the pipeline known to many SF veter-ans, it does include small, critical adjust-ments to some of the training events, espe-cially in Phases 2 and 4.

Phase 2, also conducted at Camp Mackall,consists of 46 days of training in basic combatpatrolling techniques and light-infantry tac-tics. To maintain Phase 2’s focus on small-unit tactics, the 1st Special Warfare TrainingGroup has moved the land-navigation exer-cise (and its culmination, the STAR exam) toPhase 1. A few of the days saved in Phase 2by moving the land-navigation training havebeen shifted to Phase 4 and will be used toprovide SFQC students with an introductionto close-air support. But the majority of thetime saved will remain in Phase 2 and will be

10 Special Warfare

Although the revised training process of theSFQC is structurally similar to the pipelineknown to many SF veterans, it does includesmall, critical adjustments to some of thetraining events, especially in Phases 2 and 4.

devoted to teaching the basic skills — shoot,move and communicate — that are critical tothe success and the survival of SF warriors.

Marksmanship and live-fire trainingremain integral to Phase 2. They areunwaiverable prerequisites for continuationin the SF training pipeline. During Phase 2,soldiers perform live-fire and maneuver atboth the squad and the platoon level,receive training in military operations onurbanized terrain, and must qualify withthe M-9 pistol and the M-4 carbine.

In Phase 3 of the SFQC, SWCS has madea variety of revisions. After much thoughtand discussion, SWCS removed AdvancedInternational Morse Code from the pro-gram of instruction for the SF communica-tions sergeant (18E). Because the world,especially our culture, is becoming moredependent on advanced technology, SFtrainers were eager to find training timeduring which they could implementinstruction on computer applications.

Future adaptations in the Phase 3 curric-ula will include the addition of instructionon the construction of SF base camps for theSF engineer sergeant (18C). SWCS alsoplans to change the requirement that SFmedical-sergeant students (18D) earn theirparamedic certification from the NationalRegistry. Training for 18D will continue tocertify students as paramedics, but SWCSwill broaden its acceptance of certifyingauthorities to include state registries andthe U.S. Special Operations Command, aswell as the National Registry.

Phase 4, the collective-training segment ofthe SFQC, continues to be centered on thefield exercise that has remained a constantthrough time — Robin Sage. Today’s Phase 4students gain an advantage over their pred-ecessors by participating in a four-day uncon-ventional-warfare practical exercise immedi-ately prior to Robin Sage. The practical exer-cise, conducted at Camp Mackall, replacesthe previous direct-action-mission planningexercise and includes classes in negotiationsand in cross-cultural communication. Thenew exercise provides students with anopportunity to practice adaptive thinkingbefore they deploy with their first SF A-detachment into “Pineland” for Robin Sage.

SWCS has modified the scenario of Robin

Sage to make the exercise more compatiblewith both today’s operational environmentand current threats. Major changes havealso been made in the scenario orders andthe training products that students receiveduring the SFQC. Students now beginreceiving information about Pineland, itspeople, its politics and its problems duringPhase 2. They continue to receive intelli-gence reports, news clips and videotapedupdates throughout Phase 3 and during theinitial stages of Phase 4. The revised prod-ucts focus students on the long-termdynamics of unconventional warfare.

The innovations are expected to encour-age the flow of information and intelligenceand to prevent the “fire hose” effect — theinformation overload that occurred duringthe first two weeks of the earlier Phase 4.The changes represent an attempt to ensurebetter comprehension and more effectivemission planning during the Robin Sage iso-lation segment as well as during the subse-quent execution segment of Robin Sage,which takes place in Pineland.

Because of the United States’ war on ter-rorism, SWCS’s challenge to increase theproductivity and the effectiveness of theSF training pipeline has become even moreurgent. The leaders and trainers of the 1stSpecial Warfare Training Group haveresponded to the challenge with a compre-hensive approach to training. The SF train-ing pipeline, while maintaining the histor-ical SF models and ideology, has evolvedinto a streamlined and focused programthat will train experienced and novice sol-diers alike to the same high standard. Therevisions to the SF training pipeline havebeen developed in response to the nationalneed. They represent a reaction to theoperational demands that have shepherd-ed SWCS training philosophies into the21st century.

This article was prepared by members ofthe JFK Special Warfare Center andSchool’s 1st Special Warfare TrainingGroup and by members of the TrainingDevelopment Division of SWCS’s Direc-torate of Training and Doctrine.

December 2002 11

Few soldiers in special-operationsforces, or SOF, look forward to becom-ing staff officers. But sooner or later,

almost every A-team leader, SEAL-teamleader, or special-operations pilot ends upbeing one, and many will work as staff offi-cers at the unified-command level. The jointenvironment, which is always dynamic, ischanging every day because of the currentpush toward the hard-to-define goal of mili-tary transformation.

Transformation, directed by the Secretaryof Defense of the United States, is the U.S. mil-itary’s self-analysis and resulting correctivemeasures designed to ensure that our militaryforces will be prepared to conduct what theDepartment of Defense, or DoD, calls “rapiddecisive operations,” or RDO, by 2015.

DoD foresees that in the operationalenvironment of 2015, the conventionalforces of all the services will be more “SOF-like” (lighter, faster, more precise, coher-ently joint, and politically astute).Although SOF-like is not a term that con-ventional forces would likely choose, it nev-ertheless seems to be an accurate descrip-tion. The well-prepared staff officer whounderstands the operating concepts andthe forces available will have an advantagein the competitive environment of thefuture.

Tomorrow’s SOF staff officer will face thetask of integrating and planning SOF oper-ations in that environment. This article isintended to help alleviate some of the chal-

lenges of SOF integration by introducingfuture special-operations staff officers toone of the transformational concepts of theU.S. Joint Forces Command, or USJFCOM:operational net assessment, or ONA. Thisarticle will define ONA and demonstrate itspotential for optimizing the employment ofSOF across the conflict spectrum.

ONA can be part of the answer to the dif-ficult question: How can DoD transformand improve the overall U.S. military capa-bility?1 Understanding that ONA is both aprocess and a product is central to under-standing two other concepts, RDO andeffects-based operations, or EBO.

Although this is not an article abouttransformation, some discussion of the con-cepts for future joint operations is neces-sary in order to provide context. To under-stand where ONA “fits,” we will need todefine RDO and EBO, with the qualifica-tion that both concepts are still underdevelopment and refinement by USJF-COM. Knowing how to use ONA will helpfuture SOF planners allocate the right mixof forces, capabilities and assets for achiev-ing full-spectrum dominance.

RDO (as opposed to today’s linear,sequential operations) is the integratingconcept behind DoD’s vision of future oper-ations, Joint Vision 2020. RDO is a meansby which the U.S. can achieve rapid victoryby attacking an enemy’s coherence and hisability to fight. RDO refers to the synchro-nous application of the full range of our

12 Special Warfare

Operational Net Assessment: Implicationsand Opportunities for SOF

by Lieutenant Colonel William Fleser, U.S. Army (ret.)

national capabilities in timely and effects-based operations. RDO employs the jointforce’s asymmetric advantages in knowl-edge, precision and mobility against criti-cal enemy functions to create maximumshock, defeating not only the enemy’s abil-ity to fight but also his will to fight.2

Integral to RDO is the concept of EBO.EBO focus on achieving specific effects onan adversary’s key nodes and vulnerabili-ties.3 Like RDO, EBO focus not on thedestruction of specific targets, but on theeffects that military (and other) operationshave on the adversary. In essence, EBO areeffects-centric, vs. target-centric.

It is often easier to explain the EBO con-cept by providing negative examples: Dur-ing Operation Allied Force, the air campaignagainst Serbia in 1999, one of the missionswas to destroy the bridges over the Danubein downtown Belgrade. When the bridgeswere destroyed, the mission’s measure ofperformance (accuracy of the weapons) was100 percent; however, the mission’s measureof effectiveness was, at best, questionable.

Destroying the Danube bridges con-tributed little or nothing to achieving thestated objective of the air campaign: deter-ring Serbian ethnic cleansing in Kosovo.But the destruction of the bridges didharden the will of the Serbian peopleagainst NATO. One can make the argu-ment that Serbian Premier Slobodan Milo-sevic’s center of gravity was the support ofthe Serbian people — the fact that his

downfall resulted from a grass-roots upris-ing bears this argument out. But if popularsupport was Milosevic’s center of gravity,then bombing the bridges was in fact coun-terproductive, because it alienated the Ser-bian people from NATO and made achiev-ing the strategic objective that much moredifficult. EBO, which make use of ONA fortheir analyses, seek to avoid unintendedand unproductive consequences such asthose above by focusing military and otherelements of national power on the achieve-ment of a discrete set of desired effects.

ONA is also a decision-making tool for theregional combatant commander, or RCC,and it has direct application to the joint-force commander, or JFC, and his support-ing components. ONA is unique because it isnot an intelligence product. Although itbegins with intelligence and information-gathering, ONA will, in the end, provide theJFC with a menu of effects and their proba-ble outcomes, along with a parallel analysesof the strategic, operational and tacticalactions and assets that will be required forthe achievement of those effects.

The ONA process is summarized in Fig-ure 1.4 ONA is a continuous process ofanalysis that begins before a crisis occursand continues through crisis and conflict toresolution. ONA is a system-of-systemsanalysis that focuses on a probable adver-sary’s war-making capability in terms ofthe adversary’s political, military, econom-ic, social, infrastructure and information

December 2002 13

capabilities, or PMESI2.Anyone who has attended the Special

Forces Qualification Course can recall thetarget system analysis that is conductedduring the demolitions phase. Studentsanalyze a respective node on the basis ofcriticality, accessibility, recoverability, vul-nerability, effect and recognizability, orCARVER. ONA does for operational analy-sis what CARVER does for target analysis.ONA is the CARVER thought processapplied to a bigger problem, such as acountry, a region or an international entity(e.g., an transnational terrorist group).ONA looks at the potential adversary as asystem of systems and identifies criticalnodes within those systems. For instance,influencing or interdicting one key playercould disrupt an adversary’s decision-mak-ing capability. By linking leadership nodesto economic, political, military and othersystems, ONA can refine its analysis toidentify not only who the target is but alsothe best method of influencing them.

Consider a real-world example: In thesummer of 2000, the U.S. decided that itshould make some form of response to theongoing insurgency in Sierra Leone.

Because there was no direct U.S. nationalinterest in that region, the U.S. began atrain-and-equip program, Operation FocusRelief, to improve the military capability ofselected African nations to conduct coun-terinsurgency operations. Nigeria was thefirst nation selected for the program.

Focus Relief, sanctioned and directed bythe Clinton administration, required thedeployment of mobile training teams, orMTTs, from the 3rd Special Forces Group.The first MTTs deployed in August 2000.Almost from the outset, certain Nigerian mil-itary leaders were strongly opposed to FocusRelief. Throughout the initial operation, theMTTs encountered numerous distracters,including direct opposition from some mem-bers of the Nigerian high command and aninformation-operations campaign that wasdesigned to discredit Focus Relief in the eyesof not only the Nigerian people but also theNigerian military. Although the operationcontinued and finally succeeded, the outcomeof the initial operation was often in doubtbecause of organized opposition within theNigerian high command.5

While Nigeria has never been assessedas an “adversary,” the U.S. European Com-

14 Special Warfare

mand, or EUCOM, nevertheless has estab-lished contingency plans for dealing withnumerous crises in Nigeria — from non-combatant-evacuation operations tohumanitarian disaster relief. Had an ONAbeen developed in support of OperationFocus Relief, the analysis would have iden-tified the key members of the Nigerian mil-itary who would probably oppose a U.S.action, particularly a unilateral action. Infact, the survey teams that EUCOM andthe 3rd SF Group had sent in early to layout the plan identified military memberswho were likely to oppose the operation.The survey teams also projected theimpact that the opposition could have onthe operation.

But no one ever asked what the U.S. coulddo about the opponents, or what diplomatic,informational, military or economic assetswere available for mitigating the effects ofthe opposition. That is the ONA’s function:to identify key nodes; to give the command-er a list of political, informational, militaryand economic options for attacking, destroy-ing, degrading or neutralizing a particularnode; and to assess the possible effect ofeach of those options. In the case of FocusRelief, mitigation came not from militaryactions, but from steady pressure on theNigerian political leadership to effect achange in the military leadership.6

The Focus Relief example illustratesthree points that may be obvious to the SOFplanner but which are difficult for many

other military planners to understand.First, effects are often achievable by indi-rect, asymmetric means. Second, the appli-cation of resources and assets for achievingthe desired effects will often require coordi-nation with other government agencies andmultinational partners. Third, the most rel-evant knowledge for dealing with a regionalproblem comes from people who have beento the region. SOF’s contributions to the-ater-engagement programs (now called the-ater-security cooperation) are well-known.In the future, SOF engagement activitieswill have greater relevance if they arefocused on specific information require-ments and on preparation of the battlespacefor potential crises. One tool that can helpfocus SOF engagement is ONA.

In current engagement planning, plan-ners often find that a high percentage ofthe information relevant to a given countryor project has been filed away in an after-action review or in the Special OperationsDebriefing and Retrieval System. In con-trast, ONA will provide an immediatesource of information; SOF planners at theRCC level will be able to factor engage-ment information directly into their opera-tional planning.

The ONA can add immediate, lasting rel-evance to SOF peacetime-engagementactivities. There is often no substitute forputting boots on the ground, and futureoperations similar to Focus Relief will beable to use SOF engagement for collecting

December 2002 15

information that will be critical to thedevelopment of ONAs.

Such specific design and targeting willrequire a higher level of focus in engage-ment planning, and SOF teams willinevitably be tasked to conduct missions ingeographic areas (and with host-nationunits) that they would not normally seekout for training purposes. Events like joint-combined exchange training, or JCETs,would take on new relevance if developingan ONA were part of the engagement plan,but unless we want to completely rewritethe rules on JCETs, the SOF mission-essential task list should remain the pri-mary focus of the training.

With the foregoing discussion in mind,let’s re-examine precrisis ONA develop-ment with an eye toward the role that SOFcould play (Figure 2).

• Step 1: In planning for a crisis, the RCC,in collaboration with the interagency commu-nity and with the military components, devel-ops the commander’s intent and a list ofpotential PMESI2 effects. In this step, SOF’srole would be limited to planning: SOF plan-ners would provide input on the effects ofunconventional and asymmetrical operations.

• Step 2: During the second step, intelli-gence planners and operational plannersperform a system-of-systems analysis toidentify the adversary’s key vulnerabili-ties. The analysis identifies critical nodeswithin separate PMESI2 systems. It isimportant to note that the nodal analysis

does not assign actions against the criticalnodes. SOF’s role would remain limited toplanning; however, planners would factorSOF engagement activities into the analy-sis, and they might propose additional,focused engagement events.

• Step 3: Once the nodal analysis is“mature” (ONA is never complete — it is adynamic process that continues after hos-tilities begin), the ONA begins to incorpo-rate actions directed at specific key nodes.ONA is an operational product, because itgoes beyond joint intelligence preparationof the battlespace, or JIPB, to identify theactions that will be required in order toachieve the desired effects. The ONA prod-uct is intended to become a menu or a play-book that the RCC can use for crisis reso-lution. Step 3 links PMESI2 effects withdiplomatic, informational, military or eco-nomic actions. Further development of theONA will refine the analysis to includespecific assets for employment (Figure 3).

Opportunities for SOF plannersONA’s potential impact on SOF planning

is subtle but significant. By analyzing apotential adversary’s key nodes and link-ages before a crisis occurs, ONA can giveSOF planners an early opportunity to inte-grate SOF capabilities into the plans forjoint operations. Early integration of SOFplanning through ONA will necessitatefocused engagement to shape the battle-

16 Special Warfare

space and will make it possible to applySOF assets asymmetrically. ONA willafford SOF planners the opportunity todevelop SOF-supported courses of actionthat use SOF-unique capabilities toachieve desired effects. When a joint forceis formed to provide a military response toa crisis, SOF will no longer be restricted tomerely supporting the requirements of theother components of the joint force. ONA’sfocus on outcomes rather than on target-destruction is one reason why the ONAconcept should be studied and adopted bythe SOF community. The ONA process canoptimize the employment of high-demand,low-density assets such as SOF.

To the SOF planner, ONA offers a processand a product that will focus the allocationof low-density SOF assets and that willfinally allow critical SOF assets to be allo-cated only to the missions most critical tothe RCC. ONA will give renewed relevanceto SOF engagement, because ONA requirescurrent information and insight that, inmost cases, only SOF boots-on-the-groundengagement can accomplish. And ONA is aprocess through which asymmetrical andunconventional military options can beexplored, analyzed and, if necessary, imple-mented by the future joint-force commander.

ONA is not a cure for all the problems ofintegrating SOF into joint warfare. In fact,ONA is not yet ready for prime time, andUSJFCOM will continue to develop andrefine ONA through its joint-experimenta-tion program. But ONA is a step in theright direction. Other planning processtools, such as intelligence preparation ofthe battlefield and the military decision-making process, were developed andrefined during the Cold War to provide aframework for analysis and decision-mak-ing on what was essentially a linear, indus-trial-age battlefield. ONA, with its CARV-ER-like analysis of the adversary, can pro-vide future SOF planners with a means ofdemonstrating how the application of theright SOF asset, at the right time andplace, can achieve the right effect on thenon-contiguous battlefield of thefuture.

Lieutenant Colonel William Fleser, U.S.Army (ret.), is the deputy director for theJoint Concept Development and Experimen-tation for Special Operations Command,U.S. Joint Forces Command, Norfolk, Va.Now a career civil-service employee, Fleserhas worked in joint experimentation andconcept development at JFCOM since March2001, when he retired from the Special Oper-ations Command-Europe, or SOCEUR. Heserved in JFCOM’s two major joint experi-ments focusing on operational net assess-ment, Unified Vision 2001 and MilleniumChallenge 2002. He also served asSOCEUR’s deputy J3 and as director of thejoint operations center throughout theKosovo conflict, during Balkan peacekeep-ing operations and during numerous otherjoint operations and exercises. His SpecialForces experience includes service in the10th SF Group as a detachment command-er, as a company commander, as a battalionoperations officer, and as the assistantgroup S3. A former professor of military sci-ence, Fleser has published other works,including the USSOCOM history of Opera-tion Silver Anvil, the May 1992 noncombat-ant evacuation operation performed by the1st Battalion, 10th SF Group, in SierraLeone, West Africa.

Notes:1 DoD news briefing, “Special briefing on Defense

transformation,” by retired General James P.McCarthy, U.S. Air Force, 12 June 2001.

2 USCINCJFCOM command brief, June 2001.3 USJFCOM J9 concept paper, “JFHQ Structure and

Process,” par. 5.1, 3 July 2001.4 “Operational Net Assessment,” briefing to CINC,

USJFCOM, by Tom Schmidt, 18 June 2001.5 Andrew Maykuth, “Nigerian Army Balks at U.S.

Military Training,” The Philadelphia Inquirer, 15November 2000.

6 “What’s Behind Nigeria’s Military Shakeup?”STRATFOR.com, 2 May 2001.

December 2002 17

In 1940, the German army’s swift offen-sive, the blitzkrieg, toppled France inslightly more than a week. Yet when the

Germans employed the blitzkrieg againstthe Russians one year later, they weredefeated. Why did the same strategy workso well in one situation and so disastrouslyin another? The answer may provide insightfor battles and wars yet to come.

Napoleon once remarked, “There areonly two powers in the world ... the swordand the spirit. In the long run, the sword isalways defeated by the spirit.”1 Severalpolitical and military factors that appearto have influenced both the success and thefailure of the blitzkrieg rest upon a psycho-logical foundation: the spirit vs. the sword.

Specifically, three determinants can be iso-lated as primary reasons for the differentoutcomes: (1) popular will, (2) unity of lead-ership, and (3) German bias and arrogance.From these determinants follow the causesof the blitzkrieg’s success in France and itsfailure in the Soviet Union.

Popular willThe first determinant, popular will, origi-

nates mainly in the people of a nation. Lowpopular support in France for continued warcontrasted sharply with the high level ofpopular support for war in the Soviet Union.The reason for the contrast may have beenthe difference in the peoples’ perceptions of

Effects of Operations: Psychological Determinants of Blitzkrieg Success

by Major Angela Maria Lungu

National Archives

An elderly French couplevisit their former homefollowing the withdrawalof German forces duringWorld War I. France’ssuffering during the warleft the French peoplereluctant to enter intoanother conflict.

18 Special Warfare

the value of the war’s objective compared tothe costs involved in achieving it.

Prior to the war, France, like England,relied on appeasement to curb Germanaggressiveness. But France was drawnunwillingly into war as a result of its secu-rity guarantees to Poland. Germany, for itspart, went to war with France because ofterritorial aspirations — Germany desiredAlsace-Lorraine and French colonies.

On the other hand, Germany sought towin an ideological victory over the SovietUnion by eliminating the communist statefrom the European scene. Early during thewar, Hitler said, “Basically, it is a questionof cutting the giant cake [the Soviet Union]in such a way that we can first conquer it;second rule it; and third exploit it.”2

Achievement of Germany’s goal wouldrequire the extermination and enslave-ment of the Slavic people in order to create“lebensraum,” or living space, for the Ger-man people. Thus, Russia’s very survivalwas threatened by Germany, and becausethe Russians had far more at risk than theFrench, France and Russia had quite dif-ferent objectives.

But the difference in objective does notfully explain the difference in the twocountries’ popular will. Understanding theunderlying social and economic conditionscan help clarify the reasons for the gap.When World War I ended in 1918, theFrench were left with 1.5 million dead. Apoll taken in France soon after World WarI noted a “decided lack of enthusiasm inrallying to the flag” and a “bewilderednational mind.”3 Twenty-two years later,that war-weariness remained, creating aFrench popular and political (but not mili-tary) reluctance either to enter into a con-flict or to continue a conflict once it hadbegun. Finally, German treatment ofFrench citizens (excepting Jews and Gyp-sies) in 1940 did not incite hatred amongthe French or popular support for Franceto continue the war against Germany.

Conditions in the Soviet Union were adifferent matter. Throughout history, Rus-sia has doggedly persevered when fightinga war that threatens the existence of theRussian state — for example, during Peterthe Great’s wars against Sweden and dur-

ing Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812.Additionally, although the Russian econo-my suffered from the same interwardepression as the French economy, theSoviets did not experience the pre-warresistance to rearmament. The Soviets rec-ognized that they would have to modernizetheir military equipment before they coulddefend Russia against a potential adver-sary. But by their own estimate, they wouldnot have been able to match the Germanwar economy until 1943.

An important aspect of the difference inpopular will was the impact of Nazi Ger-many’s race policies on Slavic society. TheGermans viewed the Slavs as an inferiorrace tainted by Bolshevik and Jewish blood.The Germans’ subsequent brutal treatmentof all Soviet nationalities squandered anyopportunity that the Germans might havehad to exploit one of the most critical struc-tural flaws of the Soviet Union: its signifi-cant ethnic fragmentation.4

In fact, “to the astonishment of the Ger-mans themselves,”5 they were initiallyregarded as liberators and potential alliesby the inhabitants of many of the non-Rus-sian territories. During Germany’s initialadvance, for example, reports indicatedthat more than 90 percent of Ukrainiansexhibited “a friendly disposition and hope-

December 2002 19

A Sudeten woman reluc-tantly salutes as Germanforces occupy the Sude-tenland in October 1938.Britain and France, hop-ing to appease Germany,agreed to allow Germanyto take the Sudetenlandfrom Czechoslovakia.

National Archives

ful expectations”6 because of repressiveSoviet measures designed to erase Ukrain-ian nationalist feelings and identity. Butthe harsh treatment of the Ukrainians bythe German forces ensured that this Rus-sian political vulnerability could not besuccessfully exploited. The unifying powerof a common enemy who was determined toexterminate or enslave the society was acritical factor influencing popular will.

“The outcome of such [German] treat-ment was predictable. The initial good willof the population turned into resentment,and the willingness for cooperationchanged into open hostility or, at best,indifference. … As German abuses becamemore widespread and well known, theopportunities for practical collaborationwith the occupation force by native auxil-iaries and local militia waned. … The par-tisan movement, both pro-Soviet andnationalist, intensified and exerted a majordisruptive influence on the war effort andadministration. A less obvious but no lesssignificant consequence … was the mea-surable stiffening of the Red Army’s com-bat morale as German abuses were clever-ly exploited by Soviet propaganda.”7

The unchecked “clearing” actions of theGerman police units and SS Einsatzgrup-

pen, during which they executed manyRussians as communists or Jews, eventhough there was no proof that the victimshad either Communist Party affiliation orJewish blood, hurt the German causeimmensely. Continued pilfering and illegalrequisitioning by German troops (especial-ly the security units) did nothing toimprove the situation.8

Together, the Russian societal/economicconditions and the German practices pro-vided the fuel necessary to raise popularsupport for the war effort, both within theRed Army and within the Soviet Union, toa much higher level than was evident inFrance. In fact, Russian popular supportfor the war was a critical factor in Ger-many’s failure on the eastern front.

Unity of leadershipThe second determinant was the level of

the unity of leadership within both Franceand the Soviet Union. In France, a lack ofclose alignment between the governmentand the military caused significant Frenchpolitical and military errors that allowedthe blitzkrieg to succeed. In the SovietUnion, a close alignment of the governmentand the military prevented German success.

20 Special Warfare

National Archives

Heinrich Himmler (wear-ing eyeglasses), theleader of the German SS,visits a German POWcamp in Russia. Clearingactions of the SS Einsatz-gruppen units helped turnthe Russian populaceagainst the Germans.

Several political and military factors con-tributed to the crisis of French leadership.There was significant conflict between theFrench military and the French administra-tion regarding appeasement policies towardGermany. There was also a political civilwar in France at the time that blindedFrench government leaders to all but inter-nal developments. The main focus of theFrench conservatives was to elicit militarycontributions from France’s allies at a mini-mal cost to France, and to diligently pursuea Franco-German alignment that wouldavoid war. The French socialists, on theother hand, were intent on stirring up revo-lutionary agitation.

As a result of the devastating losses ofWorld War I, there was a reactionary men-tality among both the conservatives andthe socialists. The French Parliament thusblocked or slowed the military’s attemptsto rearm, to modernize, or to increase thedefense budget, thereby crippling many ofthe military’s attempts to develop an effec-tive defense against a German aggressor.

Moreover, despite the aggressive andambitious Nazi party’s accession to powerin Germany and growing evidence of a

clandestine German military buildup, theFrench military entities responsible for thedefense of France were busy fightingamong themselves. As a result, the Frenchdid not have a military leader or a bodyspecifically responsible with coordinatingmilitary activities for national defenseuntil just before World War II began,9 andnone of the key French defense organiza-tions was convened until after the signingof the German-Soviet nonaggressionpact.10 Thus, the French governmentlacked coherent political ambition as wellas an ability to unite its turbulent society.

In sharp contrast to France, the SovietUnion possessed a strong and authoritari-an leadership that was able to unite themilitary and political goals. Because ofStalin’s leadership style and his purges ofthe generals (1936-38), which had effec-tively decimated the Soviet professionalmilitary leadership, the government washighly centralized and coercive, minimiz-ing any threat of civil-military conflictsand ensuring a unity of leadership. Aggres-sively maintaining control of the military,the government levied stiff sentences fortreason against military leaders whoseforces were captured or defeated.11

Another aspect of the centralized Sovietleadership was the role of partisan warfarein defeating the blitzkrieg. Because theGerman army was thinly spread across theoverwhelming expanse of the easternfront, the German advance bypassed agreat number of Red Army units. Theseelements, still armed and still retainingsome semblance of their military organiza-tion, contained Red Army officers andpolitical commissars, “who were often partor the entire staff of units that had beenordered to set up partisan organizationswhen cut off.”12

By mid-July 1941, the Soviets hadattempted to set up and sustain a centrallydirected irregular movement, and the headof the armed forces’ political system hadissued strict orders to intensify political agi-tation and propaganda that would exploitGerman brutality.13 By Aug. 3, 1941, Sovietpartisans had won control of almost theentire area behind the German FourthPanzer Group by carrying out sabotage on

December 2002 21

Soviet Foreign Minister V.M. Molotov (seated at desk) signsthe German-Soviet nonaggression pact Aug. 23, 1939.

National Archives

the rail net, slowing German advances andforcing German commanders to recognizethat they were facing stronger resistancethan they had initially thought.14 Russiansuccesses were carefully integrated into theSoviet propaganda strategy, providing sup-port to Red Army units.

The Soviets also prevented the exploita-tion of the occupied territories through“raids on economic installations and per-sonnel and through a general terror cam-paign waged among the natives.” Commu-nist party agitators were directed to workwith the partisans “to drive a wedgebetween the people and the enemy, under-mine the enemy’s control, and shorten hisstay on Russian soil.”15

The difference between the French resist-ance and the Soviets’ centrally coordinatedand controlled use of partisans is stark. Thisexample also underlines the importance ofpopular support and of a united governmentthat is free of civil-military problems. Ofnote, too, is the Soviet use of terror to inducepopular support, although its use forced thepopulace to choose the lesser of two evils. Asa former Soviet official captured by the Ger-mans noted:

“We have badly mistreated our people; infact, so bad that it was almost impossibleto treat them worse. You Germans havemanaged to do that. In the long term, thepeople will choose between two tyrants theone who speaks their own language. There-fore, we will win the war.”16

An examination of German leadershipduring the operations in France and inRussia also reveals a telling difference inthe levels of unity. During the attack onFrance, Hitler and the German generalstaff enjoyed a good civil-military relation-ship, resulting in a military strategy thatsupported government policies. This wasnot the situation by the winter of 1941-42,however, when Hitler had strained thecivil-military balance to its limits. Assum-ing control of the armed forces, Hitlerplanned each operation personally, notonly usurping the role of his general staff,but also disregarding his general staff ’sadvice, and he placed his ideological poli-cies outside any cohesive military strategythat might have supported them. Thus, theimportance of unity of leadership and ofbalanced civil-military relations on allsides was a critical determinant.

German bias, arroganceThe third and final determinant was Ger-

man bias and arrogance, which led to othermilitary and political causes of German suc-cess and failure. The great expanse of theeastern front and the relatively small Ger-man force (proportionately smaller than theforce the Germans had used to attackFrance), the lack of adequate troop replace-ments and supplies, and the reductions inmilitary materiél all led to Germany’s fail-ure in the Soviet Union. Better German tac-

22 Special Warfare

National Archives

German troops battleRussian forces in 1941.German commandersfaced stronger resistancefrom the Russians thanthey had anticipated.

tics and strategy, ready resources, and acooperative enemy had been largely respon-sible for Germany’s success in France. Manyof the differences between the success inFrance and the failure in Russia were theresult of German assessments that werebased on biases and arrogance.

In France, the Germans viewed theirenemy as civilized Europeans. While theGermans were not kind to the defeatedFrench, neither were they as harsh as theywere toward the Russians. Ignoring theopportunity to exploit the ethnic vulnera-bilities in the Soviet Union, the Germansregarded Soviet citizens of all ethnicgroups (with some exceptions), as unter-menschen (subhumans) who needed to beexterminated or enslaved. That bias affect-ed the Germans’ opinion of Russian combatcapabilities and critically influenced Ger-man military planning.

In France, the Germans, given their rel-atively high estimate of the French mili-tary capability, allocated appropriate forcesand ensured that ready reserves wereavailable from the Rhineland. On the east-ern front, estimates of the Russians’ inferi-or military capabilities led the Germans touse a fraction of the forces that they hadused in France, despite their need to covera greater amount of territory.

After Germany’s success in France,Hitler boasted that a Russian campaignwould be like “a child’s game in a sand-box.”17 Moreover, the overconfident Ger-mans estimated that it would take no morethan three months to defeat the Russianforces.18 That arrogance led the Germansto make fatal miscalculations regardingthe need for supplies and reserves. Becauseof subsequent reductions in Germany’sproduction of materiél, those miscalcula-tions proved to be insurmountable. Hadthey not fallen victim to overconfidence,the Germans might have better allocatedtheir forces and planned for a longer cam-paign, and they might have started thecampaign four weeks earlier.19

Most importantly, the Germans missed acritical opportunity to exploit anti-Sovietsentiments in the non-Russian sectors of thecountry. The substantial resources thatwould have been available to the Germans

in the Ukraine, for example, might well haveallowed them to establish a defensive linefarther east and then wait for the Soviets tocome to them. It is interesting to note thatinitially, more than one million non-RussianSoviet citizens provided almost one-fourth ofthe German manpower along the easternfront, and their numbers allowed the Ger-mans to succeed as long as they did.20

ConclusionsThree determinants — popular will, unity

of leadership, and German bias and arro-gance — formed a psychological foundationthat influenced the outcome of theblitzkrieg both in France and in the SovietUnion. The lack of French popular support;fragmented French leadership and poorFrench civil-military relations; and a lowerlevel of German arrogance toward Francecontributed to Germany’s success inFrance. Strong Russian popular support;comprehensive and centralized Sovietleadership; and German arrogance that ledto critical miscalculations made it impossi-ble for the Germans to succeed in Russia.

Hitler, by disregarding the advice of hisgeneral staff, by supplanting his generalstaff’s planning and advisory role, and byinsisting on his own political and economicobjectives, caused a breakdown in Germany’scivil-military relations. That breakdown,combined with the other factors listed above,ensured the failure of the blitzkrieg on theeastern front. Thus, the three determinantsprovide a framework for explaining the twovery different outcomes of blitzkrieg, and acomparison of the two campaigns demon-strates the relative importance of whatNapoleon called the “spirit” in achieving vic-tory over the sword.

Major Angela Maria Lunguis director of public works forthe 293rd Base Support Bat-talion in Mannheim, Ger-many. An Engineer officer,she has served as a platoonleader, as a company execu-tive officer and as a battalion adjutant inthe 20th Engineer Brigade; as the group

December 2002 23

construction officer and as the group opera-tions officer for the 555th Combat EngineerGroup; and as a company commander inthe 14th Combat Engineer Battalion. MajorLungu has served as a company executiveofficer and as a psychological-operationsteam chief in the 1st Psychological Opera-tions Battalion, 4th PSYOP Group. As amember of the 1st PSYOP Battalion, sheworked with the U.S. Southern Command,serving in Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay,Paraguay, Guatemala and Venezuela.Assigned to the JFK Special Warfare Cen-ter and School’s Psychological OperationsDirectorate, she was the primary author ofUSAJFKSWCS Publication 525-15,PSYOP Capabilities and Organization; FM33-1, Psychological Operations; and a mul-timedia reference CD for psychologicaloperations. Major Lungu holds a bachelor’sdegree in geography from the U.S. MilitaryAcademy, a master’s degree in defenseanalysis from the Naval PostgraduateSchool, a master’s degree in businessadministration from Webster University,and a master’s degree in national affairsand security studies from the Naval WarCollege. Her other published articlesinclude “The Big Safari Hunt: A Relook atStrategic Bombing and the RMA,” AirChronicles Journal, Winter 2000; “IrregularWarfare and the Internet: The Case of theZapatistas,” Strategic Review, Spring2001; and “War.com: Psychological Opera-tions and the Internet,” Joint Forces Quar-terly, Volume 28 (October 2002).

Notes:1 Alistair Horne, To Lose a Battle: France, 1940 (Lon-

don: Penguin Books, 1988), 74.2 “Trial of the Major War Criminals before the Inter-

national Military Tribunal,” Nuremberg, 1949, Docu-ment 221 (Bormann protocol of 16 July 1941, confer-ence between Hitler and top German officials on thefuture of the occupied Eastern territories), 86-94, asquoted in Alex Alexiev, Soviet Nationalities in GermanWartime Strategy, 1941-1945 (Santa Monica, Calif.:RAND, 1982), 3.

3 Samuel M. Osgood, The Fall of France, 1940: Caus-es and Responsibilities (Lexington, Mass.: D.C. Heathand Company, 1972), vii.

4 Alexiev, 34.5 General Wladyslaw Anders, Hitler’s Defeat in Rus-

sia (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1953), 205.6 Alexiev, 10.7 Alexiev, 17.

8 Wi Stab Sued Bericht, 16.X.4 1, as quoted in EdgarM. Howell, The Soviet Partisan Movement, 1941-1944(Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office,1956), 72.

9 Except for a brief period in 1932, they had no min-ister of national defense until 1936, nor did they cre-ate a chief of the general staff of national defenseuntil 1938. Robert Allan Doughty, The Seeds of Disas-ter (Hamdon, Conn.: Archon Books, 1985), 114-15.10 Paul Reynaud, as contained in Osgood, 43.11 In fact, Stalin himself, fearing arrest and thinkingonly of France’s recent defeat, disappeared to hisdacha for several days at the beginning of the Ger-man attack, and returned to his headquarters onlyafter Politburo members came to request his leader-ship and presence. According to Sergei Khruschev, hisfather (Nikita) told him that Stalin was in a moroseand pessimistic mood for days afterward, and wasoften found sitting on his bed, dejected. Stalin alsoavoided signing military orders until 1943, leaving itto his subordinates so that he might avoid being heldpersonally liable for issuing an order that might haveresulted in the loss of the Motherland (personal con-versation between author and Sergei Khruschev, 21September 2000).12 “Halder’s Journal,” op. cit., VI, p. 208; PugatslovInterrogation Meldung 23, Einsatzgruppe B, 12.VII.41. 62/4, as quoted in Howell, 43.13 Order 81,15 July 1941 (signed by Mechlis) in Anl.11a, 29.VII.41. KTB, AOK 18, 13787/20, as quoted inHowell, 46.14 Streckenzustandskarte, Stand vom 22. VI.-16.IX.41. H 14/570; Lage Ost, 3 August 1941, as quot-ed in Howell, 50-51, 67.15 Howell, 82.16 Alexiev, 17.17 As quoted in Prof. Thomas G. Mahnken, “Europe:Innovation and War” (Newport, R.I.: Lecture, U.S.Naval War College, 21 September 2000).18 Jeremy Noakes and Geoffrey Pridbam, eds., Docu-ments on Nazism, 1919-1945 (New York: The VikingPress, 1974), 595.19 Noakes, 594-95.20 Alexiev, 33.

24 Special Warfare

Out of sheer curiosity, I once cut opena golf ball to see how it was con-structed. It was made up of three

components: a rubber-ball core; a rubberstring wound around the core; and a thin,dimpled, white outside cover. Several dayslater, I used the composition of the golf ballas an analogy in explaining the training ofSpecial Forces soldiers. A number of “oldtimers” still remember the golf-ball story,although it is now a dozen years old.

Rubber ballThe first component, the rubber ball,

symbolizes the Special Forces volunteer.Traditionally, he is a seasoned, responsiblesoldier who is highly qualified in a particu-lar skill. He is healthy, is in excellent phys-ical condition, and has already demon-strated a capacity to learn — after all, weare talking about an NCO or a captain.

The officer, as a rule, has graduatedfrom college, has completed his basic andadvanced courses, and has establishedhimself in his branch. Many volunteersare already airborne-qualified and haveattended Ranger School.

During Special Forces Assessment andSelection, or SFAS, the cadre of the JFKSpecial Warfare Center and School, orSWCS, assisted by technical personnel,will assess the volunteer to determinewhether he has the proper motivation,character and temperament for serving on

an SF operational detachment.Surprisingly, many volunteers are not

selected to continue SF training. Thatdoes not mean that they are poor soldiers;it means that through a subjective evalu-ation, the SF proponent has determinedthat they are not the right people to servein this unique unit. The volunteer who isselected during SFAS is an SF candidate,but he is not yet SF.

Rubber-string windingThe second component, the rubber-string

winding, is analogous to the Special ForcesQualification Course, or SFQC. Theemphasis of SFQC is on the five SF MOSs.The course also further develops the sol-dier’s warrior traits and prepares him forassignment to an SF operational detach-ment. After what seems to them like anendless period of time, the candidates whocomplete the SFQC attend the RegimentalSupper, don their coveted berets in a mem-orable but simple ceremony, listen to aspeaker who frequently qualifies as a curefor insomnia, and consume a reasonablemeal. The next day, during the graduationceremony, each SFQC graduate walksacross the stage, receives a diploma, andlistens to another speaker (several hourslater, no one can remember what thespeaker said).

At this point, are the soldiers SF-qualified?My response, regarding the vast majority of

December 2002 25

As I Remember It: The SF/Golf Ball Analogy

by Major General Sidney Shachnow, U.S. Army (ret.)

those soldiers, is “not yet.”The reason for thatresponse is that their training still has notadequately addressed the critical skills thatdistinguish SF-qualified individuals fromother outstanding soldiers (such as Rangersand members of the airborne divisions). Yes,all of the graduates are tactically and techni-cally proficient, but most of them still lacksome critical SF ingredients.

Outside coverThe 336 dimples in the surface of the

outside cover of a golf ball impart a back-spin that permits the ball to stay airbornetwice as long as a smooth ball hit with thesame force. The cover distinguishes the golf

ball from all other balls. So it is with thethird component of SF training — oncearmed with it, soldiers are truly SF. Thethird component has three elements:regional orientation, language proficiencyand interpersonal skills. All three elementsare critical to SF qualification, to SF’s abil-ity to serve as a force multiplier, and toSF’s ability to work effectively with andthrough indigenous forces. A workingknowledge of these elements will allow usto paint the landscape of our operationalarea.

• Regional orientation. Because each SFunit is focused on a specific region of theworld, the soldiers who are about to join anSF unit must have some knowledge abouttheir unit’s region. Their regional knowl-edge should include geography — notmerely the knowledge of place names, buta working knowledge of the region’s cli-mate, topography, drainage, natural vege-

tation, soils and minerals.But regional knowledge is not limited to

a region’s physical foundations. SF soldiersmust also develop an appreciation for theregion’s culture and society. In some areasof the world, religion is so pervasive that itpractically is the culture. In such areas,government, law, food restrictions, familylife, art and economic activity all fall underthe prescription of religious teaching. Aswe have seen in recent times, cultures thatare in the process of expanding are fre-quently stronger than those cultures withwhich they come into contact. Typically, theweaker cultures change substantially as aresult of that contact. Perhaps the mostwidespread example of that process is the“Westernizing” of certain areas of theworld, and Islam’s resistance to thechange. SF soldiers should also understandthe political dynamics affecting the peoplewho live in the region.

• Language. Since SF’s inception, therehas been an appreciation for the impor-tance of language training in the SF com-munity. Language training consumes aconsiderable amount of time and money.Language proficiency is a perishable skillthat requires constant maintenance.

Simply put, a fully qualified SF soldier isbilingual. There can be no compromise onthe language requirement. It is ironic thatwe have always provided incentive pay fora host of skills that are not mission-critical,but we have neglected language incentivesuntil recently, and we are now applyingthose incentives inadequately. Maintaininglanguage proficiency is a responsibilitythat must be shared by the institution, theunit and the individual.

• Interpersonal skills. The SF soldier’smastery of interpersonal skills is critical tothe achievement of effective SF operations.Unfortunately, the meaning of “interper-sonal skills” is not always clear. Simplyput, they are “people skills,” such as empa-thy, graciousness and the ability to read asocial situation. We enhance relationshipsby understanding our feelings, empathiz-ing with the feelings of others, and control-ling our emotions. Interpersonal skills alsoinclude negotiation, the back-and-forthcommunication designed for reaching an

26 Special Warfare

A fully qualified SF soldier is bilingual. Therecan be no compromise on the languagerequirement. It is ironic that we have alwaysprovided incentive pay for a host of skills thatare not mission-critical, but we have neglectedlanguage incentives until recently, and we arenow applying those incentives inadequately.

agreement when two sides have someopposing interests. Principled negotiationis an all-purpose strategy that SF soldiersmust learn. Understanding negotiationtechniques and developing negotiationskills are critical to the success of one’scareer and personal life.

SF soldiers must also have the abilities topersuade and to teach. SF uses those skillsfrequently — more frequently, in fact, thanwe use our weapons. Finally, it has beenestimated that as much as 70 percent of allcommunication is nonverbal. When there isa conflict between what one says and whatone’s body language reveals, the nonverbalcommunication is more accurate. However,there are cultural nuances in nonverbalcommunication, and the person unschooledin those nuances often misinterprets whathe sees. It is therefore crucial that SF sol-diers study and recognize cultural andenvironmental differences.

Only when the soldier has a thoroughknowledge of the third component can hebe called SF-qualified. FM 3-05.20 (FM 31-20), Special Forces Operational Techniques,essentially states that in Chapter 1. How-ever, despite the fact that that requirementhas been established in doctrine, it stillrequires implementation and sustainment.

A legitimate question is, “Who is respon-sible for ensuring that SF training isaccomplished? The SF proponent, SWCS, isresponsible for stating clearly what SFcandidates must learn and for providingthe training-support materials necessaryto accomplish that end. The proponent alsoidentifies the skills that SF soldiers mustmaster through operational assignments,individual self-study or self-development.

In meeting those responsibilities, theproponent defines the life-cycle modelthat will be followed. Major factors thatinfluence the effectiveness and the suc-cess of institutional training are the pro-ponent’s accuracy in determining theduties required for a particular career andthe proponent’s effectiveness in settingthe corresponding training standards.Our performance in institutional traininghas been spotty; although there are goodexplanations why, there is no excuse.

The contemporary conflict, at whatever

level, is essentially a “social conflict.” Theemphasis has shifted toward social, politi-cal and psychological factors, rather thanmilitary factors. This does not mean thatmilitary violence is being discarded, butrather that the use of violence will be com-plementary rather than controlling. Strik-ing a proper balance of all three compo-nents will allow SF soldiers to operateeffectively and to understand and mastertheir complex environment. The balance ofthe three components is ultimately whatmakes SF unique.

Major General SidneyShachnow’s commissionedservice spanned more than30 years, during which heserved as either a command-er or a staff officer withInfantry, Mechanized Infan-try, airmobile, airborne, and Special Forcesunits. He served as commanding general ofthe JFK Special Warfare Center and School,of the Army Special Forces Command, andof U.S. Army-Berlin. Shachnow holds abachelor’s degree from the University ofNebraska and a master’s degree from Ship-pensburg University, Shippensburg, Pa. Heretired from the Army in August 1994.

December 2002 27

Since the early 1990s, a plethora ofinternational interventions — fromSomalia to East Timor to

Afghanistan — have forced civilian andmilitary actors to unite in what haveproved to be unhappy marriages. Cross-cultural misunderstandings and tensionswithin these civil-military shotgun mar-riages have led many on both sides to longfor a divorce. Unfortunately, because civil-military operations are today’s — and like-ly tomorrow’s — reality, the internationalcommunity isn’t a no-fault state!

As in many difficult marriages, each sideof the civil-military union has wanted (ifnot sought to force) the other side to con-form to its desires and expectations. Insome ways, lessons-learned processes andmultiorganizational conferences representmarriage-counseling sessions for civil-mili-tary peace operations. These counselingsessions, like those for a committed, buttroubled, marriage, continue seeminglywithout end, with the same issues reap-pearing time after time, unchanged.

Unlike marriage counseling, the civil-military sessions do not always involve thesame actors, nor, perhaps more important-ly, do they involve a counselor who can helpeach side hear the other and translate theactors’ meanings. Perhaps because of thesedifferences, fundamental misunderstand-ings still dominate perceptions and atti-tudes on both sides of the civil-militaryunion. Those misunderstandings (or fail-

ure to reach broad understandings) oftenundermine relations on the ground, mak-ing effective cooperation and coordinationall the more difficult.

On the civilian side, it is not uncommon tohear humanitarian workers comment, withsurprise, on the decency of the military per-sonnel whom they encounter. Some civiliansexpress seeming disbelief that military offi-cers could be loving spouses and parents.(Some Civil Affairs officers carry packs oftheir family photos on deployments in orderto build relationships with other workers.)

This article will focus on the militaryaspect of the relationship to show severalcommonly held military views of civilianorganizations that can undermine coopera-tion in the operational environment. Thefollowing are some commonly held — ifstrongly stated — views that the authorhas heard expressed in operations fromHaiti to Bosnia to Albania, in multiple con-ferences and from many nations’ militarypersonnel:• The military is organized and struc-

tured; civilian organizations are not.• Military personnel are dedicated and

hard-working; civilians put in officehours.

• The military is resource-poor; civilianorganizations are resource-rich.

• Military personnel cost less; civiliansare expensive.As with many stereotypes, each of the

four views has some grounding in truth,

28 Special Warfare

Civil-Military Marriage Counseling: Can This Union Be Saved?

by Adam B. Siegel

but none of them will stand close scrutiny.In addition, if we are proud of our ownorganization, we have a natural tendencyto assume a superiority over other organi-zations — i.e., to emphasize our ownstrengths while exaggerating others’ weak-nesses. This tendency contributes to thecultural misunderstandings that dog civil-military operations.

The following discussions will examinethe four stereotypes through real-worldexamples drawn mainly from the opera-tions of NATO’s Implementation Force, orIFOR, and Stabilization Force, or SFOR, inBosnia and Herzegovina, or BiH, in 1996and 1997. Each discussion will show themisunderstanding and suggest ways of fos-tering better relations and, perhaps, betterresults from civil-military partnerships.

OrganizationOne common complaint from military

personnel about civilian organizations isthat civilians are disorganized, making itnearly impossible to work with them. Mil-itary personnel believe that the civilianshave no one in charge, and they contrastthe perceived civilian dysfunctionalorganization to the clear military chain ofcommand.

During NATO’s first year of operationsin BiH, this stereotype did not reflect thereality of military operations. Consider thefollowing characteristics of military opera-

tions at that point:• IFOR contained military forces from

more than 30 nations (the forces spokemany primary languages).

• Many of those nations had multiple ser-vices involved.

• The divisions, brigades and battalionsacross the force employed differentorganizations, procedures and opera-tional approaches.

• The personnel and units of those com-mands rotated frequently, in differentpatterns and across national lines.

• Many military forces on the groundwere not part of the NATO force. Thoseforces included national support ele-ments, a legacy U.N. force, and Swissmilitary forces who were working withthe Organization for Security and Coop-eration in Europe.While military personnel may have man-

aged to navigate this maze, civilian per-sonnel (even those who could distinguish asergeant from a general) had reason to beconfused.

Emergency evacuations represented per-haps the most significant potential mili-tary support to civilian organizations. Onthe ground, however, NATO did not estab-lish a standard operating procedure forsuch an evacuation until well into 1997 —more than 18 months after NATO opera-tions had begun in BiH. Until that time,every unit had used a different set of pro-cedures for conducting an evacuation.

December 2002 29

Photo by Adam B. Siegel

A U.S. Air Force colonelassigned to Joint TaskForce Shining Hope givesa briefing on helicopterdelivery of relief supplies.Military rank, organiza-tion and uniforms areoften confusing to civil-ian agencies.

The Italian Brigade in Sarajevo, forexample, wanted to have detailed informa-tion — such as a list showing which cars(with license-plate numbers) would be car-rying which people (with passport informa-tion) in the event of an evacuation. TheSpanish Brigade’s staff viewed the situa-tion differently: “We know which interna-tional civilians are working here. Onlythose whom we don’t know will have to bescreened.” A civilian who might have dri-ven throughout BiH — passing throughthe sectors of several divisions andbrigades in a single day — would have hada very difficult time navigating the differ-ing rules on the evacuation issue.

As another example, civil-military coop-eration centers, or CIMICs, existed at thebrigade, division, corps and IFOR levels.Civilian organizations were often confusedas to which level they should consult aboutdifferent issues.

In addition, more than one officer hassuggested that multinational peace opera-tions do not operate by “command and con-trol,” but by “coordination and consulta-tion.” The lieutenant general who com-manded the ACE Rapid Reaction Corpsreportedly described the situation as fol-lows: “I thought I knew all types of com-mand and control that existed (OPCOM,OPCON, TACON, etc.), but my divisioncommanders have managed to teach methree that I did not know. When I want myFrench division commander to do some-thing that he disagrees with, he has thetendency to remind me that he is under‘OP NON.’ My American division com-

mander is a bit more blunt and asserts, ‘OPNOWAY.’ My fellow Brit is the height ofcourtesy and simply tells me ‘OP YOURS!’ ”Thus, in Bosnia, military C2, rather thanrepresenting the traditional “commandand control,” might have been betterdefined as “convince and cajole.”

Truth be told, military structures are —by definition — more organized than thestructures of the large number of civilianagencies that work in post-conflict envi-ronments. Most military structures devel-op organizational charts, and those chartsprovide important information — at leastto those who have been initiated into mil-itary culture.

But no organizational chart can easilydescribe the complex interrelationshipsbetween hundreds of civilian agenciesregarding a myriad of issues — from psy-chological counseling to vote monitoring tore-establishing sewer services. There is no“one” person in charge. Thus, there is a rea-son why military personnel find it confus-ing to seek structure analogous to militarycommand among civilian agencies — thatstructure simply doesn’t exist. In Bosniaand elsewhere, however, the military clari-ty of command may have existed only onpaper. At any rate, for those outside theNATO military organization who attempt-ed to learn how to work with the military,the process was confusing.

DedicationIn mid-December 1996, the new NATO

command staff met with members of a U.N.office in Sarajevo. The meeting led to amutually-agreed-upon plan of action. Atthe end of the meeting, the head of the U.N.agency said that the action plan could notstart until after the New Year, because hewould be taking a two-week vacation to gofishing in Florida. After the meeting, aNATO general who was leaving the roomremarked to a staff officer, “How dare he goon vacation, the lazy bastard! We’re readyto do this now, and it shouldn’t have towait.” It wasn’t exactly a subdued remark,and, as intended, the U.N. agency headheard it.

Evidently lost to the general was the

30 Special Warfare

No organizational chart can easily describethe complex interrelationships between hun-dreds of civilian agencies regarding a myriadof issues. … There is no ‘one’ person incharge.Thus, … military personnel find it con-fusing to seek structure analogous to militarycommand among civilian agencies — thatstructure simply doesn’t exist.

basic difference between the nature of hisdeployment and the nature of the civilian’scareer. The general had just arrived — anx-ious to achieve great things — for a six-month tour (during which he would be eli-gible for weeks of leave). The U.N. agencyhead had also recently arrived — not froma home base where he had a nice house inwhich his wife was waiting at the end ofeach day, but from another post-conflictenvironment. In fact, during the previousseven years, the U.N. agency head had seenhis wife less than two months out of eachyear, as he moved about between such“soft” duty sites as Afghanistan, Angolaand Mozambique.

The military view that civilians are lazybecause they go out to dinner, go away forthe weekend or take a vacation is one thatemerges almost without exception in post-conflict operations. The perception is evi-dence of a failure to understand that mili-tary personnel deploy for a limited period asindividuals, while civilians might remain ina post-conflict environment indefinitely — itbecomes, in essence, their home.

Most military deployments are of limitedduration — a year is typically viewed as anextremely long period. For most forces in

BiH, tours ran between four and sixmonths. Civilians, however, typically signup for a longer duration. Civilian employ-ees, with the exception of emergencyteams, typically consider a year to be theminimum commitment. In addition, manycareerists, like the U.N. agency chief dis-cussed above, move from one crisis toanother — and they may take their vaca-tions at times that their military col-leagues consider inappropriate. Thus,while military personnel deploy far fromtheir families and work crisis hours, civil-ians in theater frequently are at their“home base”; therefore, they may performtheir work during “home-base” hours.

ResourcesIn the post-conflict operational environ-

ment, military elements often look withenvy at the wealth of resources that lie atthe disposal of civilian organizations. Mil-itary staffs hear about billions of dollarsof civilian aid money and dream of howthey could spend that money more effec-tively. Soldiers look longingly at brand-new Range Rovers and compare them totheir beaten-up “old” vehicles.

December 2002 31

The camp of U.S. Marineswho were providing secu-rity for Camp Hope insouthern Albania. Civilianorganizations do not havethe tents, weapons, vehi-cles and aircraft thatallow military forces todeploy rapidly and pro-vide security.

Photo by Adam B. Siegel

Sarajevo in the spring of 1997 provides adifferent perspective. The SFOR headquar-ters at that time numbered between 800and 1,400 people (depending on one’scounting style). With the exception of theInternational Police Task Force, or IPTF,which is a paramilitary force, the SFORheadquarters alone employed more person-nel than any other international organiza-tion in theater. In fact, again with theexception of the IPTF, the SFOR headquar-ters (let alone the more than 30,000-strongtotal SFOR force) was about 10 times larg-er than the next largest international con-tingent in BiH. Not surprisingly, the SFORheadquarters personnel worked longhours, and quite a few positions werestaffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week.In terms of personnel — perhaps the mostvaluable asset — SFOR swamped the otherinternational organizations.

In terms of the assets and infrastructureneeded for providing communications,transportation, engineering, medical treat-ment and other support, SFOR had a simi-larly lopsided advantage over other inter-national organizations. While a new RangeRover might look great and, from our per-sonal perspective, might seem to be a trueluxury, a Range Rover costs far less thanthe typical military armored vehicle, heli-copter or airplane — all of which the mili-tary force typically possesses in somequantity (along with the mechanics tomaintain them).

In fact, each side of the civil-military rela-tionship tends to see the other as more for-tunate. From the civilian standpoint, themilitary seems quite resource-rich, with itshelicopters, large numbers of vehicles, trans-port aircraft, robust communications andcomputing equipment. From the militaryperspective, civilian agencies seem resource-rich because they have aid money to dis-perse — and, after all, dispensing money isthe role of many civilian organizations.

When an imbalance favors the military,many military personnel fail to notice it.When the imbalance lies in numbers of per-sonnel, it contributes even further to theperception that civilians are not hard work-ers. Few civilian organizations have theability to man positions in a headquartersaround the clock. Thus, when someone froman NGO has to travel (for whatever reason)or goes to dinner on a Friday night, theremight not be anyone in the office to answerthe phone. Too often, military staff membersfail to understand that there may be a validreason why there is no one to answer theoffice phone in a civilian aid agency late ona Friday evening.

CostMilitary personnel are often shocked —

and express jealousy — about the salariespaid to personnel of international organi-zations. In Bosnia, military personnel ofalmost all nations involved made envious

32 Special Warfare

An Austrian Army heli-copter loaded with U.S.MREs for delivery toK o s o v a r - A l b a n i a nrefugees in 1999. Whilethe military may envy theluxury of Range Rovers,civilians envy helicoptersand transport aircraft.

Photo by Adam B. Siegel

and sarcastic comments about the tax-free$80,000 (U.S.) salaries of the members ofthe IPTF. Military critics also noted thatthe per diem paid to IPTF personnel —$100 (U.S.) — was far more than wasrequired for a more-than-reasonable life inBiH, where the average income is close to$10 (U.S.) a day. For more than 99 percentof the world’s population, $100 a day is anenviable income.

When military personnel express envyover the cost of civilian personnel, they doso, almost without exception, before plac-ing that cost into a wider context than indi-vidual income. The problem lies in assess-ing cost: Should we consider salary only, orshould we consider total remuneration?Should we figure the cost of the individual,or should we consider the cost of the sys-tem? Who is paying the costs that we aretrying to assess?

If one pursues the concept of “total-costaccounting” (trying to capture the cost ofthe entire system), then the cost of militarypersonnel skyrockets. Total-cost account-ing would include the cost of training andeducation, recruiting, retirement and allother expenses that are associated withgetting a soldier to the front. At itsextreme, the accounting would also includeall equipment costs — from the cost of arifle to the cost of the military transportaircraft used to deploy the soldier to thecost of the national technical means of pro-viding intelligence support. Those costsadd up.

With salary and per diem, each IPTFofficer was paid about $120,000 per year,and each provided his own housing, foodand other upkeep. In order to get a fullyear of on-the-ground policing from anIPTF officer, the international communitymight have paid for 15 months (countingleave, training and turnover time) of theofficer’s time, or $150,000. That price camewith no residual costs such as retirement.If we estimate that the support, recruit-ment, supplies, travel and administrationcosts for each officer was approximately$100,000 each year, then the IPTF officercost roughly $250,000 per year.

In computing the costs of military person-nel in the same situation, it might be appro-

priate to consider an individual with rough-ly the same amount of experience as thatgenerally required for a policeman in apeace operation: a minimum of seven to 10years of service. That individual would bean NCO earning about $2,500 per month. Ifwe add that NCO’s housing, retirement,medical care and other benefits, the costcould easily double — to $5,000 per month,or $60,000 per year. In comparison to the$120,000 to $250,000 annual cost for police,$60,000 still looks cheap.

At a minimum, however, the U.S. militaryrequires three soldiers to maintain one sol-dier on the ground — another $180,000 peryear. In actuality, the 3:1 ratio is quite con-servative. Some calculate that the U.S. tail-to-tooth ratio is 11:1 (including training,

recruitment, administrative costs, supply,etc.). If we calculate the amount using the11:1 ratio, the cost of a soldier rises from$60,000 to $600,000-$700,000 — or morethan twice the total cost of the IPTF police-man, even without considering the fargreater costs of equipping and supplyingmilitary personnel. Furthermore, while mil-itary per diem is minimal, the military pro-vides the serviceman with food, housing,laundry, post, and many other services — allof which cost real money and real resources.

Returning to the challenge of assessingcost, the salaries of the IPTF and other civil-ian workers look great in comparison to amilitary paycheck, but for those who have topay the check, the military’s costs don’t com-pare so favorably. For the American taxpay-er, the cost of international personnel is cut-

December 2002 33

If one pursues the concept of ‘total-costaccounting’ (trying to capture the cost of theentire system), then the cost of military per-sonnel skyrockets. Total-cost accountingwould include the cost of training and educa-tion, recruiting, retirement and all otherexpenses that are associated with getting asoldier to the front. … Those costs add up.

rate compared to the deployment of U.S.military personnel. If an IPTF policeman onthe ground costs about $250,000 a year,then the U.S. taxpayer will pay about$65,000 of that cost. Putting one U.S. servicemember on the ground next to that police-man might cost $1 million or more. For theAmerican taxpayer, the policeman begins tolook like a real bargain.

Cost is clearly not the sole or even theprincipal determinant of value, but mili-tary members who look longingly at IPTFsalaries and think they are outrageous failto view those salaries in the context ofwhat it would cost a nation to deploy mili-tary personnel on a peace operation. Inthat context, civilian salaries seem far lessoutrageous.

ConclusionNot all military personnel believe the

stereotypes of civilians discussed in thisarticle — far from it. However, enough ofthem do view civilian agencies throughthose prisms to create tension in the for-mation of civil-military partnerships.

Again, stereotypes often do have abasis — however tenuous — in reality.When it comes to the four perceptions dis-cussed herein, the author has personallyencountered civilians who were more inter-ested in their bottles of champagne than intheir mission; who were more concernedwith paperwork and turf battles than theywere in achieving objectives; who workedseven-hour days while the military person-nel alongside them worked 15+ hours aday; and who spent money seemingly with-out considering whether their programswould produce a positive impact.

Alongside these experiences, the authorcan place encounters with military person-nel who had no initiative; who lackedknowledge about their responsibilities;who were more concerned with countingbureaucratic coup than with finding themost effective multiorganizational ap-proach; who scheduled trips into combatzones in order to maximize their tax-freebenefits; and who were more interested intheir per-diem reimbursements than intheir mission accomplishment. But on both

sides, such nightmares are the exception.As a rule, international people — militaryand civilian — who enter post-conflictzones are dedicated and are making per-sonal sacrifices to be there.

In post-conflict peace operations, cultur-al sensitivity matters. Cultural sensitivityrelates not only to the local population, butalso to our partner agencies. Civil-militarypartnerships will work better in peaceoperations if civilians make an effort tobetter understand military culture andorganization. They will also work better ifmilitary personnel from all services andfrom all involved nations make an effort tobetter understand the culture and thenature of their civilian partners. To date,all too often the actors on both sides havefailed to make those efforts.

Amid the tensions and the pressures ofcomplex international operations, suchefforts are difficult to make. But withoutan understanding of their companion’snature, each partner in the civil-militarymarriage may chafe under the yoke andlong for an end of the union. Unfortu-nately, that union cannot be terminatedwithout seriously undermining the poten-tial for success in future internationalinterventions.

Adam B. Siegel is a senioranalyst in the NorthropGrumman Analysis Center.He has spent much of hiscareer working operations-other-than-war issues. Siegelserved a year with NATO’sJoint Analysis Team, analyzing lessonslearned in Bosnia. During that time, hefocused on issues of civil-military coopera-tion, or CIMIC. He directed CIMIC analysisduring the first four months of the opera-tions of the Stabilization Force. Siegel wrotethis article prior to his employment withNorthrup Grumman.

34 Special Warfare

Early in 1942, the outlook for theAllies was grim in the China-Burma-India theater, or CBI. The

Japanese navy had driven the British navyfrom the Java Sea, Singapore had fallen inFebruary, and the Japanese were simulta-neously attacking the Dutch East Indies(to seize the oil refineries and rubber plan-tations) and Burma (to block the Britishland connection to China).

Because the Burma Road was the onlyAllied land bridge to China, General Chi-ang Kai-shek had sent the Chinese Expe-ditionary Force to Burma in mid-January1942 to help Great Britain stop the Japan-ese offensive there. United States Secre-tary of War Henry L. Stimson chose Lieu-tenant General Joseph W. Stilwell to headU.S. forces in the CBI theater and to keepthe Chinese fighting.

However, by the time Stilwell arrived inBurma in March 1942, the Japanese hadalready captured Rangoon and wereadvancing north along the railway towardMandalay and Myitkyina. An unexpectedJapanese flank attack out of Thailandcrushed the 1st Burmese Division atYenangyuang and permitted the Japaneseto concentrate their forces. They destroyedthe 55th Chinese Division at Loilemis andblocked any attempts by Allied forces toescape to China via the Burma Road.

Having only two options — walking outof Burma and into India, or becoming aprisoner of war — the newly-arrived Amer-

ican commander concentrated on savinghis U.S. military staff and a group of Amer-ican, British, Chinese, and Indian civiliansand Burmese nurses — about 100 people.The 60-year-old Stilwell spent the first 19days of May 1942 leading his entouragesome 200 milesfrom Wuntho toImphal, India, fol-lowing dirt roads,rafting rivers, andclimbing the foresttrails across theeastern razorbackmountains of India.

Although Stil-well escaped theJapanese, the criti-cal Burma link inthe Allied theaterhad been lost. Indiawas Great Britain’slast bastion inAsia. Ramgarh inIndia’s Bihar prov-ince became themajor trainingground for Alliedforces in the CBItheater. Anxious toget back into thefight, but facing ademoralized British army and the awe-some task of building another Chineseforce, Stilwell prepared for the future by

December 2002 35

Kachin Rangers: Allied Guerrillas in World War II Burma

by Dr. C.H. Briscoe

General Joseph W. Stilwell and General Sun Li-Jen,commander of the Chinese 38th Division.

USASOC Archive

building a supply road to Ledo to supportan invasion of Burma.

Newly formed Chinese infantry divisionswere flown across “the Hump” to be trainedat Ramgarh by an American cadre for serv-ice with the British 14th Army. The British

provided barracks, food and silver rupeesto pay the Chinese troops, while the Amer-icans furnished radios, rifles and machineguns, artillery, tanks, trucks and instruc-tors. In addition to teaching infantry, tank,and artillery tactics, the American soldierschanged truck tires and loaded pack mules.

During the Chinese train-up and theBritish reconstitution of forces, hill tribesin northern Burma who refused to be sub-jugated — predominantly the Kachins, butalso the Karens, the Chins, the Kukis and

the Nagas — had been fighting a guerrillawar against the Japanese occupationforces. Other Burmese tribes, the Burmeseand the Shans, welcomed the Japanese andopenly collaborated with the Japanesesecret police (Kempei) against the minorityhill tribes. The Allies supported the guer-rillas from Fort Hertz, the only remainingAllied base in Burma that had an airfield.The three regiments of guerrillas — theKaren Rifles, the Kachin Rifles, and theKachin Levies — were natural jungle-fighting units, but they lacked the tacticaltraining and the modern equipment thatwere needed to effectively battle Japan’smechanized infantry and armor.

It took Major General Orde Wingate toshow that the Japanese army could bebeaten and to rekindle an offensive spiritamong the Allies in India. Wingate had leda force of 80 British soldiers and 1,000Ethiopians and Sudanese across 600 milesof desert to restore Emperor Haile Selassieto his throne in Addis Ababa in 1941. InApril 1942, Wingate arrived in India toorganize guerrilla levies against theJapanese in Burma. But rather than usethe Kachin resistance, Wingate chose tolead a long-range penetration group, com-posed of British regulars and colonialunits, behind Japanese lines to exploit thevulnerabilities of the occupation force withunconventional warfare.

Wingate’s force, the 77th Indian InfantryBrigade, the “Chindits,” was formed fromthe 13th Battalion, King’s Liverpool Regi-ment; the 3rd Battalion, 2nd GhurkaRifles; the 2nd Battalion, Burma Rifles;and the 142nd Commando. After extensivetraining at Ramgarh, the 3,000 Chinditsmoved more than 200 miles behind Japan-ese lines in Burma. Relying solely on airassets for resupply and medical evacua-tion, the Chindits ambushed Japanesepatrols, attacked outposts and supplydepots, destroyed bridges and repeatedlycut the Myitkyina railroad for more thanthree months. Afterward, they dispersedinto small groups that either returned toIndia or escaped to China.

Fewer than half the raiders returned —malnutrition, combat fatigue, disease, deathand wounds had thinned their ranks. Lieu-

36 Special Warfare

A convoy drives over the Burma Road. The Burma Road, 750 miles long, ran fromLashio, Burma, to Kunming, China — a distance of 300 miles by air.

USASOC Archive

tenant General William J. Slim, commanderof the British 14th Army, criticizedWingate’s effort as an expensive failure, butWinston Churchill praised Wingate’s geniusand brought him to the Quebec Conferencein August of 1943. There, Wingate proposeda second, larger Chindit expedition and sug-gested that the U.S. Office of Strategic Ser-vices, or OSS, expand its guerrilla-warfareactivities into Burma.

The existing resistance of the Kachinsand other hill tribes dovetailed perfectlywith the British plan to support smallunits operating behind Japanese lines (theplan was called “Guerrilla Forces — PlanV”). In August 1943, a British V-Force teamflew to Fort Hertz to reconstitute theKachin Levies. Stilwell also diverted toFort Hertz eight officers and 40 sergeants(radiomen, cryptographers and medics)from the American soldiers who had beenassigned to train the Chinese infantry divi-sions. From that remote outpost, they wereto expand the partisan war in Burma byadvising and supporting the Kachins inconducting guerrilla warfare behindJapanese lines.

The V-Force recruited the hill tribesmenand trained them to collect intelligence; toprovide early warnings of air attacks; torecover downed Allied aircrews; to conductambushes, reconnaissance and flankpatrols; and to scout for conventionalforces. To complement their experience asinfantrymen, the V-Force advisers had

acquired skills in language, medicine,demolition, radio and cryptology. Theytransmitted coded messages to relay theirdaily intelligence reports and to request airresupply and medical evacuation. Britishunits operated from Ledo north to FortHertz, from Kohima to Chindwin, and inthe mountains west of Imphal. Americanteams worked south to Myitkyina, sendingtheir reports to Ledo and to Tagap-Ga,their forward logistics base.

The successes of the V-Force KachinRangers and the Kachin Levies, as well asStilwell’s failure to garner support fromthe Chinese and from the British army fora conventional offensive against Burma,led Stilwell to expand his guerrilla opera-tions. He directed OSS Detachment 101 toestablish its headquarters in Assam, innortheastern India. Det 101’s assignmentwas to plan and conduct operations againstthe roads and the railroad into Myitkyina,in order to deny the Japanese the use ofthe Myitkyina airfield. Det 101 would coor-dinate its operations directly with theBritish. Det 101’s Lieutenant Colonel CarlEifler was given a free hand in directingsabotage and guerrilla operations. All Stil-well wanted to hear was “booms from theBurmese jungle.” By November 1943, at hisbase in the Naga Hills of northern Assam,Eifler was preparing the first group ofAllied agents for Burma.

By the end of 1943, Det 101 had estab-lished six Kachin operating bases behind

December 2002 37

American soldiers super-vise the issuing of riflesand ammunition to newKachin recruits.

USASOC Archive

the lines in northern Burma: three east ofthe Irrawaddy River and three west of it.Each base commander recruited andtrained small Kachin elements for his per-sonal protection, for internal defense, andfor conducting limited operations — princi-pally sabotage and small ambushes. Theguerrilla forces were uniformed andequipped with air-supplied M-2 .30-cal.carbines, submachine guns (.45-cal.Thompson and 9 mm Marlin), .30-cal. lightmachine guns, ammunition and demoli-tions. Japanese arms and equipment innorthern Burma were a decade behind thetimes, and the superior firepower of theguerrilla units was key to their success.Each Kachin camp had an intelligence offi-cer, usually an American officer, whoseprincipal duties were to interrogate cap-tured enemy soldiers or agents, debriefguerrilla patrols, and direct operations ofthe better-educated Kachins (thoseschooled by Christian missionaries), whoacted as low-level intelligence agentsreporting information by runners or viabamboo-container message drops.

Det 101 recruited potential agents fromthe Kachin and Karen guerrillas. The can-didates slipped through Japanese lines toreach the airfield at Fort Hertz, from whichthey were flown to Assam for three to fivemonths of intensive intelligence and com-

munications training. The Kachins provedto be particularly adept at continuous-wave radio communications — most wereable to send and receive 25-45 words perminute. While most returned to their for-mer bases, a few parachuted into newareas to organize independent operationsand to collect and report weather data tothe 10th AF Weather Service. This datawas critical to air resupply and daily “overthe Hump” C-46 and C-47 transport mis-sions to China.

Despite reports of successful guerrillaoperations and the volume of intelligencecoming from the field, Stilwell remainedskeptical about Det 101’s effectiveness untilDet 101’s Major Ray Peers flew two Kachinleaders to Stilwell’s headquarters. When theKachins told Stilwell how many Japanesethey had killed in various ambushes andraids, he asked for proof, thinking that 200miles behind enemy lines, they could havespent little time counting Japanese deadand wounded. The two Kachin leaders wereunperturbed. They unhooked bamboo tubesfrom their belts and dumped the contents ofthe tubes on Stilwell’s field desk. Whenasked what the contents were, the Kachinsreplied: “Japanese ears. Divide by two andthat is how many we have killed.” In theBurmese hill tribes, ears taken in combatdenoted a warrior’s courage. It was suffi-

38 Special Warfare

USASOC Archive

Kachin radio operators atwork. The Kachins provedto be adept at continuous-wave radio communica-tions — most of the oper-ators could send andreceive 25-45 words perminute.

cient proof for Stilwell. But after theKachins departed, Peers received a lectureon the Rules of Land Warfare. It tookmonths to convince the Kachins that bodycounts would suffice.

Stilwell’s opinion of special operationsrose. He had to admire Det 101 and theKachins, because unlike the British andChinese forces, they were fighting theJapanese and providing valuable intelli-gence. In the late summer of 1943, Stilwellapproved plans for the fall-winter offensiveof 1943-44, a three-pronged drive intoBurma.

Stilwell would launch the first prong, thenorth Burma campaign, in late December,in an attempt to seize the airfield and therail terminus at Myitkyina before thespring monsoons. Success would seal thewinter campaign with a victory, put Stil-well halfway to China, and break theJapanese blockade. Stilwell would lead the22nd and 38th Chinese Divisions, two ofthe three Chinese divisions training atRamgarh. The Chinese divisions would besupported by Merrill’s Marauders and theBritish and American Kachin elements. Byabandoning fixed supply lines and makinghis force dependent on air resupply, Stil-well hoped to eliminate the possibility ofretreat by the untested Chinese troops.Stilwell planned to push the force 200miles through jungle, through swamp andover mountains to conquer an entrenched,desperate enemy. Fearing that the Chinesemight falter without an American van-guard, Stilwell put Merrill’s Marauders inthe lead.

The second prong would be a second divi-sion-sized Chindit expedition led by Wingatein central Burma, far to the south of Stil-well’s force. The Chindits, with the support ofthe 1st Air Commando, led by Colonels PhilipCochran and Robert Allison, were to launch aglider-borne assault into three landing zones.The third prong would consist of a drive bythe 14th British Army into central Burmabehind the Chindits.

On the map, the Allied campaign fornorthern Burma wriggled tortuously fromone unpronounceable name to another, buton the ground, the soldiers faced rain, heat,mud, sickness, snakes, snipers and

ambushes. In February, the Marauderswheeled about on the eastern flank of themain Chinese advance, moving throughthe jungle to attack each Japanese defen-sive position from the rear. The KachinLevies at Fort Hertz guarded the rear ofthe advance as Stilwell’s main forcedescended southward. Some 3,000 KachinRangers of Det 101 assisted the Marauderbattalions.

Lieutenant James L. Tilly’s detachment

of Kachin Rangers scouted for the 1stMarauder Battalion and provided its flankguard. Captain Vincent Curl’s 300 KachinRangers scouted for the 2nd and 3rdMarauder battalions, guarded their east-ern flanks, ambushed Japanese patrolsand destroyed retreating Japanese forces.During the march, the Kachin Rangersalso rescued two downed pilots from the1st Air Commando.

The presence of native jungle fightersinstilled confidence among the Marauders.Lieutenant Charlton Ogburn Jr. declared,“Often we had a Kachin patrol with us, andwe never, if possible, moved withoutKachin guides. The Kachin Rangers notonly knew the country and the trails, butthey also knew better than anyone, exceptthe enemy, where the Japanese outpostswere located. Waylaying Japanese in theirartful ambushes, they made us think of aRobin Hood version of the Boy Scouts, clad(when in uniform) in green shirts and

December 2002 39

Americans and Kachinsunpack supplies droppednear Tagap-Ga, Burma, inAugust 1943.

USASOC Archive

shorts. Some of the warriors could not havebeen more than 12 years old. While mostcarried the highly lethal burp guns(Thompson and Marlin submachine guns)slung around their necks, some carriedancient muzzle-loading, fowling pieces.” Allthe Kachins also carried their traditionalmachete-like short swords, called dahs.

In April, when his Chinese division com-manders stalled (blaming their failure todestroy the Japanese 18th Division on badweather and combat delays), Stilwell tooka desperate risk. On April 21, keeping thetwo Chinese divisions directed toward theMogaung Valley to assault Kamaing, Stil-well launched a separate strike force of1,400 Americans, 4,000 Chinese, and 600Kachins across the Kumon mountains toseize the Myitkyina airstrip in a lightningpush.

On April 25, the 5307th split into threeassault columns: the 1st Marauder Battal-ion with Kachin Rangers leading the Chi-nese 150th Infantry Regiment; the 3rdMarauder Battalion with Kachin Rangersleading the Chinese 88th Infantry Regi-ment; and a smaller third force, composedof the 2nd Marauder Battalion (which wasat 50-percent strength), 300 KachinRangers, and a battery of 75 mm pack how-itzers. The force was to preserve radiosilence until it was within a 48-hour march

of Myitkyina. Then, it was to radio a codeword to alert the 10th USAAF to fly rein-forcements into the secure airstrip.

The Kachins believed that the steepKumon mountain range could not becrossed by pack animals in wet weather,but Stilwell was determined that the strikeforce would try. At Arang, one of the Kachinguides suggested that they follow an old,unused track over the mountains. Greasedwith mud, the trail proved all but impass-able. The soldiers of the Myitkyina strikeforce pulled clambering mules and, attimes, crawled upward on their hands andknees, covering only 4-5 miles a day.

The force lost half its pack animals. Witheach lost mule went 200 pounds of supplies.Colonel Henry L. Kinnison Jr., commanderof the 3rd Marauder Battalion, and severalof his men died of mite typhus. When the2nd and 3rd battalions stopped to wait forrations, Colonel Charles N. Hunter’s 1stBattalion team forged ahead, with theKachins leading. When the only scout whoknew the trail was bitten by a poisonousviper, the medics applied a tourniquet closeto the bite and sucked most of the poisonfrom the wound. Strapped aboard Hunter’shorse, the Kachin managed to guide theMarauder task force behind the Japaneselines undetected.

On May 14, Hunter sent the 48-hour

40 Special Warfare

A British Army officerand Kachin guides marchwith members of the5307th in Burma.

USASOC Archive

alert code to Stilwell. The Kachin scoutshad slipped into Myitkyina, discovered noevidence that the Japanese were onincreased alert, and reported that theairstrip was lightly guarded. The 1stMarauder Battalion attacked the ferry ter-minal on the Irawaddy River as the 150thChinese Regiment seized the airfield toopen the way for air-landed reinforce-ments. General Lord Mountbatten attrib-uted the undetected crossing of the Kumonmountain range to Stilwell’s bold leader-ship; he attributed the capture of theMyitkyina airstrip to the courage andendurance of the American, Chinese andKachin troops.

The next day, however, the Chinese madea double envelopment of Myitkyina thatturned into a debacle. During the attack,the two Chinese regiments inflicted suchheavy casualties on each other that theyhad to be withdrawn. The setback gave theJapanese time to reinforce the town’sdefenses. As the monsoons descended inearnest on northern Burma (bringing 175inches of rain), the lightly-held airfield washit by heavy Japanese counterattacks andartillery barrages almost daily. The battlefor the town of Myitkyina dragged on, con-suming June and July before it finallyended in early August 1944.

By then, Det 101 had shifted most of itselements 100 miles south. There Det 101was directing more than 100 intelligenceoperations and had more than 350 agentsin the field. As the 14th British Armybegan its drive into central Burma (thethird prong of the attack), Det 101 unitswere attacking Japanese lines of communi-cation as far south as Toungoo.

However, between the Myitkyina-Man-dalay-Rangoon railway and the 14thBritish Army lay a 250-mile gap that con-tained a series of parallel north-south cor-ridors. Those corridors provided naturalapproaches to the Ledo Road. The KachinRangers protected the gap, fending off sev-eral major Japanese probes there. Orderscalled for the Kachin Rangers to withdrawand inactivate once the 14th British Armyhad captured Lashio and Mandalay, butheavy fighting in southern China endedthose plans. The bulk of the Chinese and

American forces in Burma were flown toChina.

Lieutenant General Dan Sultan, Stil-well’s successor, directed Detachment 101to use the Kachin Rangers to mop up thesouthern Shan States and to seize theTaunggyi-Kengtung road, a Japaneseescape route to Thailand. The Kachinswere tired and a long way from home, but1,500 of them volunteered for the mission;the remainder were given transportationhome. Using the Kachin Rangers as anucleus, Det 101 organized a 3,000-manguerrilla force of Kachin, Karen, Ghurka,Shan, Chinese, and Burmese forces intofour line battalions.

The Japanese were not ready to be“mopped-up” by four battalions of guerril-las who were trying to fight conventionallybehind the lines. As a result, some of thebloodiest fighting for the Kachins tookplace during those final months. Althoughthe Det 101 guerrillas killed more than1,200 Japanese, they suffered more casual-

December 2002 41

Pack mules could carry200 pounds of supplies.Soldiers in the Myitkyinatask force at times had topull the mules up hills.

USASOC Archive

ties (including 300 killed in action) duringthose final months than during any otherperiod in the war.

Before the mission in the Shan States,some of the Kachin Rangers had alreadybeen reassigned to support the newestlong-range penetration force, the 5332ndProvisional Brigade, known as the MarsTask Force. When Merrill’s Marauderswere deactivated Aug. 10, 1944, seven daysafter the capture of Myitkyina, the MarsTask Force, commanded by Brigadier Gen-eral John P. Miley, assumed its mission forlong-range penetration operations inBurma. The Kachin Rangers fought withthe task force at Bhamo and Lashio, theterminus of the Burma Road.

Before OSS Detachment 101 was inacti-vated July 12, 1945, Lieutenant ColonelRay Peers conducted a formal “musteringout” of the Kachin Rangers during theirvictory celebration in Simlumkaba. Blue-ribboned CMA medals (Citation for Mili-tary Assistance) and silver bars with Det101’s lightning logo and “Burma Cam-paign” engraved on them were presented toall Kachin Rangers. Those Kachins whohad “endured the cruelest tests of battle”were awarded captured Japanese samuraiswords and sniper rifles.

An excerpt from Detachment 101’s Pres-idential Unit Citation, awarded for theunit’s capture of strategic Japanese strongpoints of Lawsawk, Pangtara and Loilemin Burma’s Central Shan States from May8 to June 15, 1945, characterizes the war-rior ethos of the Kachin Rangers: “Ameri-can officers and men recruited, organized,and trained 3,200 Burmese natives entire-ly within enemy territory. They successful-ly conducted a coordinated four-battalionoffensive against important strategic objec-tives defended by more than 10,000 battle-seasoned Japanese troops. Locally knownas ‘Kachin Rangers,’ Detachment 101 andits Kachin troops became a ruthless strik-ing force, continually on the offensiveagainst the veteran Japanese 18th and56th divisions. Throughout the offensive,Kachin Rangers were equipped with noth-ing heavier than mortars. They relied onlyon air-dropped supplies and by alternatingfrontal attacks with guerrilla tactics, the

Kachin Rangers maintained constant con-tact with the enemy and persistently cuthim down and demoralized him.”

Although they were cited officially onlyby the Americans, the Kachins were heavi-ly involved in the heterogenous China-Burma-India theater. They fought as levieswith the British from Fort Hertz; support-ed Wingate’s two Chindit expeditions;fought, collected intelligence, reportedweather and rescued downed Allied air-crews for OSS Detachment 101; foughtwith Merrill’s Marauders and the Chinese,and fought with the Mars Task Force.

Recent Army special-operations lessonslearned from Afghanistan reveal somecommonalities with lessons learned by theKachin Rangers:

• The relationships established by ethnicKachins with missionaries and withBritish officials in the colonial administra-tion were similar to those built by govern-ment agencies with exiled minority groupleaders in Afghanistan.

• Air resupply, critical for equipping andresupplying guerrilla forces in enemy terri-tory in the mid-1940s, was equally impor-tant in Afghanistan in 2002.

42 Special Warfare

A Kachin Ranger proudly displays the CMA medal hereceived for his service against the Japanese.

USASOC Archive

• Technical training of indigenous troopscontinues to be extremely difficult in areasin which illiteracy is high. Almost allKachin and Karen radio operators whoachieved a send-and-receive rate of 25-45words per minute in 1943 had receivedsome education from missionaries.

• Advising and training guerrilla forcescontinues to be a valuable mission. Indige-nous peoples are the best sources of localintelligence and information; and if proper-ly trained, they can assist with the rescueof downed aviators.

• In 1943, language was as much anobstacle to communicating with and train-ing indigenous groups as it is today.

• Respect of culture, customs and socialstructure were as critical in Burma duringWorld War II as they are in Afghanistantoday.

• The Western world’s Law of Land War-fare continues to be difficult to explain topartisans from other cultures.

• Guerrilla elements operate best inareas with which they are most familiar;Kachins tasked to fight Japanese in thesouthern Shan States faced the same prob-lems that Allied conventional forcesencountered — uncooperative and suspi-cious locals, a lack of familiarity with theterrain, traditional ethnic hostilitybetween groups, different languages anddifferent customs.

• Ethnic-group boundaries, while notmarked on maps, are recognized by the dif-ferent groups, whether in Afghanistantoday or in Burma in 1944.

• The American cause is not necessarilythe guerrilla cause, nor is it the reason thatethnic groups band together against a com-mon enemy.

• Finally, an OSS Washington staff offi-cer reported that the Kachin Rangers werethe “most trigger happy group of armedmen I have ever seen, [but] we still keptthem loaded down with all the extraammunition we could find because theywere fighting.”

Dr. C.H. Briscoe is the command histori-an for the U.S. Army Special OperationsCommand.

Sources:British Air Ministry. Wings of the Phoenix: The Offi-

cial Story of the Air War in Burma (London: HisMajesty’s Stationery Office, 1949).

Dunlop, Richard. Behind Japanese Lines: With theOSS in Burma (New York: Rand McNally, 1972).

Fletcher, James A. “Kachin Rangers: Fighting withBurma’s Guerrilla Warriors,” in Special Warfare(July 1988), Secret War in Burma (Atlanta: 1997),and interview by Dr. C.H. Briscoe, Austell, Ga., 18September 2002.

Hilsman, Roger. American Guerrilla: My War BehindJapanese Lines (New York: Brasseys, 1990).

Hogan, David W. Jr. “MacArthur, Stilwell, and SpecialOperations in the War Against Japan,” in Parame-ters (Spring 1995).

Ogburn, Charlton Jr. The Marauders (New York:Harper & Brothers, 1956).

Peers, William R. “Guerrilla Operations in NorthernBurma,” in Military Review (June 1948), “Intelli-gence Operations of OSS Detachment 101,” inStudies in Intelligence 4:3 (1960) reprinted in aspecial OSS 60th Anniversary Edition (June 2002);Peers and Dean Brelis. Behind the Burma Road:The Story of America’s Most Successful GuerrillaForce (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1963), andPeers, “Guerrilla Operations in Burma,” in MilitaryReview (October 1964).

Romanus, Charles F., and Riley Sunderland. UnitedStates Army in World War II: China-Burma-IndiaTheater: Time Runs Out in CBI. Washington, D.C.:Office of the Chief of Military History, U.S. Army,1959.

Smith, R. Harris. OSS: The Secret History of America’sFirst Central Intelligence Agency (Berkeley, Calif.:University of California Press, 1972).

Stilwell, Joseph W., and Theodore W. White. The Stil-well Papers (New York: Schocken Books, 1972).

Taylor, Thomas. Born of War (New York: McGraw-Hill,1988).

Tuchman, Barbara W. Stilwell and the AmericanExperience in China, 1911-45 (New York: Macmil-lan, 1971).

U.S. War Department. Assistant Chief of Staff, G-2,Army Ground Forces. Report of Combat Experi-ences with OSS (25 September 1943), by Lieu-tenant Colonel Jack R. Shannon.

December 2002 43

44 Special Warfare

2002 IndexSpecial Warfare

Articles

“Exercise Balance Magic: 19th SF Group Practices Medicine in the Heart of Asia”; June, 31-33.“Operation Focus Relief: 3rd SF Group Builds Relations in Western Africa”; June, 28-30.“The 20th SF Group in Flintlock 2001”; June, 60-61.“The History of the 1st SF Group in the Republic of the Philippines: 1957-2002”; June, 14-15.“The Liberation of Mazar-e Sharif: 5th SF Group Conducts UW in Afghanistan”; June, 34-41.“The Special Forces Training Pipeline: Responding to Operational Challenges”; December, 9-11.Boykin, MG William G.; “Vigilant Warrior 2002: War Game Demonstrates ARSOF’s Value to the Objective

Force”; September, 53-55.Briscoe, Dr. C.H.; “Coalition Humanitarian Liaison Cells and PSYOP Teams in Afghanistan”; September, 36-38.Briscoe, Dr. C.H.; “Kachin Rangers: Allied Guerrillas in World War II Burma”; December, 35-43.Briscoe, Dr. C.H.; “The 281st Aviation Company: The Roots of Army Special Operations Aviation”; June, 56-59.Burton, LTC Paul S. and CPT Robert Lee Wilson; “7th SF Group Provides Two Decades of Excellence in Latin

America”; June, 42-47.Celeski, COL Joseph D.; “A History of SF Operations in Somalia: 1992-1995”; June, 16-27.Clark, MAJ Joel, MAJ Mike Skinner and MAJ Gerry Tertychny; “The SFQC Metamorphosis: Changes in the SF

Training Pipeline”; Winter, 2-7.Erckenbrack, LTC Adrian; “Transformation: Roles and Missions for ARSOF”; December, 2-8.Finlayson, Dr. Kenn; “Historical Vignette: The First Special Service Force at Villeneuve-Loubet”; Winter, 36-37.Finlayson, Dr. Kenn; “Operation White Star: Prelude to Vietnam”; June, 48-51.Fleser, LTC William, U.S. Army (ret.); “Operational Net Assessment: Implications and Opportunities for SOF”;

December, 12-17.Franco, MAJ George; “Implementing Plan Colombia: Assessing the Security Forces Campaign”; Winter. 28-37.Greene, COL Vernon E. , U.S. Army (ret.); “As I Saw It: The Eyewitness Report of a Soldier Who Fought During

World War II and Survived”; September, 56-61.Jilson, SFC Jeffrey D. and SFC Colin R. Jorsch; “SF Selection and Assessment: A Continuous Process”; Winter,

8-12.Kilgore, COL Joe E.; “SWCS Reorganization 2001: Transitioning into the 21st Century”; Winter, 13-15.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “An Army for Afghanistan: The 1st Battalion, 3rd SF Group, and the Afghan Army”;

September, 42-43.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “Caves and Graves: The 19th SF Group”; September, 30-31.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “ ‘Find Those Responsible’: The Beginnings of Operation Enduring Freedom”;

September, 3-5.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “Into the Dark: The 3/75th Ranger Regiment”; September, 6-7.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “ ‘Of Vital Importance’: The 4th PSYOP Group”; September, 19-21.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “To Educate and to Motivate: The 345th PSYOP Company”; September, 32-33.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “ ‘We Don’t Fail’: The 112th Special Operations Signal Battalion”; September, 8-9.Kiper, Dr. Richard L.; “ ‘We Support to the Utmost’: The 528th Special Operations Support Battalion”;

September, 13-15.Lungu, MAJ Angela Maria; “Effects of Operations: Psychological Determinants of Blitzkrieg Success”;

December, 18-24.Schaefer, CPT Robert W. and CPT M. Davis; “The 10th SF Group Keeps Kosovo Stable”; June, 52-55.Schroder, James A.; “Ambush at 80 Knots: Company B, 3/160th SOAR”; September, 39-41.Schroder, James A.; “Forty-Five Seconds on a Hot LZ: The 2/160th SOAR”; September, 46-49.Schroder, James A.; “ ‘Have Tools, Will Travel’: Company D, 109th Aviation Battalion”; September, 22-23.

December 2002 45

Schroder, James A.; “Observations: ARSOF in Afghanistan”; September, 50-52.Sepp, Dr. Kalev I.; “Armed Convoy to Kabul: The 3/20th SF Group”; September, 34-35.Sepp, Dr. Kalev I.; “Change of Mission: ODA 394”; September, 27-29.Sepp, Dr. Kalev I.; “ ‘Deminimus Activities’ at the Bagram Clinic: CA Team A-41”; September, 44-45.Sepp, Dr. Kalev I.; “Meeting the ‘G-Chief ’: ODA 595”; September, 10-12.Sepp, Dr. Kalev I.; “The Campaign in Transition: From Conventional to Unconventional War”; September, 24-26.Sepp, Dr. Kalev I.; “Uprising at Qala-i Jangi: The Staff of the 3/5th SF Group”; September, 16-18.Shachnow, MG Sidney, U.S. Army (ret.); “As I Remember It: The SF/Golf Ball Analogy”; December, 25-27.Siegel, Adam B.; “Civil-Military Marriage Counseling: Can This Union Be Saved?”; December, 28-34.Skinner, MAJ Michael; “The Renaissance of Unconventional Warfare as an SF Mission”; Winter, 16-21.Sutherland, Ian; “The OSS Operational Groups: Origin of Army Special Forces”; June, 2-13.Thompson, John “Jat,” Dr. Mark A. Wilson and Dr. Michael G. Sanders; “Feedback from the Field: The SF Field

Performance Project”; Winter, 22-27.

Books

Clausewitz and Chaos: Friction in War and Military Policy; by Stephen J. Cimbala; reviewed by LTC Robert B.Adolph Jr., U.S. Army (ret.); Winter, 48-49.

Green Berets in the Vanguard: Inside Special Forces 1953-1963; by Chalmers Archer Jr.; reviewed by MAJ FredT. Krawchuk; June, 68.

In Athena’s Camp: Preparing For Conflict in the Information Age; edited by John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt;reviewed by MAJ Bill Gormley; September, 69.

Palace Walk; by Naguib Mahfouz; reviewed by MAJ Clarke V. Simmons; December, 53.Phantom Soldier: The Enemy’s Answer to U.S. Firepower; by H. John Poole; reviewed by COL Joe E. Kilgore;

Winter, 49.The Last Battle: The Mayaguez Incident and the End of the Vietnam War; by Ralph Wetterhahn; reviewed by

BG Richard Comer; September, 68-69.U.S. Army Special Warfare: Its Origins (Revised Edition); by Alfred H. Paddock Jr.; reviewed by COL J.H. Crerar,

U.S. Army (ret.); June, 68-69.Vietnam and American Doctrine for Small Wars; by Wray R. Johnson; reviewed by Dr. David Bradford;

December, 52-53.

46 Special Warfare

Enlisted Career NotesSpecial Warfare

The Fiscal Year 2002 ARSOF Functional Review yielded several victoriesfor ARSOF. The most notable victory for Psychological Operations (37F)was the approval of special-duty-assignment pay, or SDAP, level 2 for Tac-tical PSYOP Detachment (Ranger) 940, effective Oct. 1, 2002. Eligibilityfor SDAP is determined by a soldier’s position and his qualifications. Allenlisted PSYOP positions approved for SDAP are NCO positions (E5 andabove) that are coded “V” (airborne Ranger). Currently, SDAP level 2 is$110 per month; it is scheduled to increase to $150 at the beginning of fis-cal year 2004. For more information regarding SDAP payment procedures,soldiers should refer to MILPER Message 02-249, Part Two.

The JFK Special Warfare Center and School conducted the pilot course for thenewly revamped 13-week Special Forces Intelligence Sergeant Course Sept. 9-Dec. 13, 2002. In the future, SWCS will conduct three classes of the courseeach year, with 40 students in each class. Active- and reserve-component SFenlisted personnel may attend the course if they hold the rank of staffsergeant or higher, have a validated need for the training, and have been nom-inated by their chain of command. SF warrant-officer candidates must alsoattend the course before they attend the SF Warrant Officer Basic Course.The new course is designed to produce a competent SF intelligence sergeant,MOS 18F. It is different from the previous Assistant Operations SergeantCourse. The assistant-operations-sergeant function was an integral part ofthe previous 18F duty description. SF soldiers who complete the new coursewill automatically be reclassified as 18F. Soldiers who completed the SFAdvanced NCO Course, or SF ANCOC, prior to Sept. 9, 2002, and who areeligible to reclassify to 18F may reclassify until further notice. Soldiers whoattend SF ANCOC after Sept. 9, even though they will still receive opera-tions-and-intelligence training in SF ANCOC, will not be eligible to reclassi-fy to 18F until they have completed the SF Intelligence Sergeant Course. SFANCOC is not a prerequisite for the new 18F course. Allowing SF soldiers toattend the 18F course earlier in their careers will bring more stability to theintelligence position on SF detachments. SF ANCOC will be considered addi-tional skill-level-4 institutional training for the 18F MOS.The revamped 18F course includes training in airborne operations; collec-tion and processing of conventional and unconventional intelligence;advanced special-operations techniques; force protection (Level II); targetanalysis; analytical skills and emerging analytical techniques; the intelli-gence cycle; evasion and recovery; intelligence preparation of the battle-field (conventional and unconventional); interagency operations; finger-printing; intelligence architecture; photography; digital intelligence sys-tems; biometric identification systems; and a rural field-training exercise.

SWCS conducting new SF intel sergeant course

SDAP level 2 approved for PSYOP detachment

December 2002 47

Officer Career NotesSpecial Warfare

The JFK Special Warfare Center and School’s Special Operations Propo-nency Office, the U.S. Army Special Operations Command and the Depart-ment of the Army continue to pursue initiatives to assist in the recruitingand retention of Special Forces warrant officers.Short-term

• NCOs who become SF warrant officers will be able to retain their spe-cial-duty assignment pay as a part of “save pay.” This action is expectedto be approved soon.

• SOPO has requested that DA allow SF sergeants first class who become SF war-rant officers to be promoted to CWO 2 when they complete the SF Warrant Offi-cer Basic Course.This initiative, if approved, is anticipated to last until FY 2005.

Long-term

• SOPO has requested that DA revise the warrant-officer pay scales sothat an NCO who becomes a warrant officer will not have to rely on savepay. DA is not expected to take action on this initiative until FY 2005.

• SOPO has requested that DA approve a warrant-officer accession bonus forNCOs who become SF warrant officers. DA is considering the proposal andis expected to approve it for implementation in FY 2004.

• SOPO has requested a critical-skills retention bonus for CWO 3s and CWO 4s inMOS 180A. DA has requested more data to support SOPO’s projected losses.

• SOPO has requested that designated SF warrant officers below the rankof CWO 5 be allowed to serve 24 years of warrant-officer service. The War-rant Officer Management Act requires that warrant officers below thegrade of CWO 5 retire when they reach 24 years of warrant-officer serv-ice or 30 years of active federal service, whichever occurs first. DA oppos-es this initiative, even though 451 warrant officers will be affected by thecurrent policy between FYs 2003 and 2013.

• The overall 2002 FA 39 selection rate for promotion to major was satis-factory. FA 39’s above-the-zone and below-the-zone selection rates werehigher than those of the operations career field, or OPCF. FA 39’s promo-tion-zone selection rate was only slightly lower than that of OPCF.

• The 2002 FA 39 selection rate for senior service college was comparableto that of the operations career field, or OPCF. OPCF’s average was 7.8percent, and FA 39’s average was 7.1.

• Twenty-six officers career-field designated, or CFD’d, into FA 39 in fiscalyear 2002, an increase over the number for FY 2001. Of the 26 officers,eight are FA 39Bs, nine are FA 39Cs, and nine are FA 39Xs. An FA 39Xofficer is one who has CFD’d into FA 39 without having acquired any FA39 training or utilization. Of the nine FA 39Xs, six have earned a master’sdegree or have demonstrated a foreign-language capability.

FA 39 promotions, SSCselection, CFDs favorable

SWCS, USASOC, DA pursueSF warrant-officer initiatives

48 Special Warfare

The results from recent career-field designation, or CFD, boards have con-firmed that it is important for Special Forces officers to submit career-field-preference statements. SF officers who do not submit a preference statementare not likely to be retained in CF 18. SF officers are in high demand forfunctional-area assignments, and those who request a functional area willprobably receive their first choice. In any given SF officer year group,between 52 and 55 officers will be retained in the operations career field, orOPCF. SF officers who are approaching CFD selection and wish to remain inArmy special-operations forces, even if they are not retained in the OPCF,are strongly advised to fill out a CFD preference statement for the SFBranch. ARSOF is seeking greater representation in the operations-support,information-operations and institutional-support career fields.

The commander of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School has approvedthe transition plan and the timelines for phasing out the Civil Affairs Offi-cer Advanced Course, or CAOAC. The CAOAC will be phased out during FY2003 and replaced by the Civil Affairs Qualification Course, or CAQC. Thecutoff date for enrollment in Phase I (nonresident) of the CAOAC was Sept.30, 2002. SWCS will offer three classes of the CAOAC Phase II (resident)during FY 2003; they are intended for USAR officers who need to completean advanced course.The first class of CAQC will begin in January 2003. There are two comple-tion options for the CAQC:• Phase I (nonresident), followed by the two-week Phase II (resident). Stu-

dents must complete both phases within one year.• Four-week resident attendance (all active-component/active-guard-and-

reserve officers and selected NCOs will attend this option).Army Reserve officers who attend the CAQC will not receive credit for anadvanced course. Officers must be graduates of their basic branch’sadvanced course or captain’s career course before they can attend the CAQC.Beginning in FY 2004, the CAQC will be the only branch- or FA-producingschool for active- and reserve-component Civil Affairs officers.CAQC is designed for:• Active-component officers who are FA-designated to Civil Affairs.• Active-component NCOs who are assigned to the 96th CA Battalion. The

NCOs will receive the skill-qualification identifier “D” when they com-plete the CAQC.

• Army Reserve officers who are assigned to a Civil Affairs unit or position.These officers will be awarded Branch 38A when they complete the CAQC.

• Active-guard-and-reserve officers who are assigned to a Civil Affairsposition.

• Select Army Reserve NCOs. They must be graduates of their MOS’sANCOC, not simply the MOS-producing school.

For more information, telephone Major Chuck Munguia, Special OperationsProponency Office, at DSN 239-6406 or commercial (910) 432-6406; or MajorScott Webber, Directorate of Training and Doctrine, at DSN 236-2518 orcommercial (910) 396-2518.

SWCS phasing out CA Officer Advanced Course

SF officers should submitCFD preference statement

December 2002 49

Foreign SOFSpecial Warfare

The Paris Prosecutor’s Office plans to make major changes to its current counter-terrorism program during 2003 to better adapt to current terrorist activity andorganization. The existing program was formulated in 1986 when widespreadbombings were the principal threat. Citing a profound change in the threat, Parislaw-enforcement officials say that there are new areas that require emphasis.These areas include the need to attack crime associated with terrorism, such asdrug trafficking and other forms of organized crime. The new counterterrorismprogram will more directly target the financial and logistical base of terroristgroups and take into account the prominent role of mobile, distributed Islamicextremist groups that are not associated with specific states. Although the fullextent of the program’s changes has not been revealed, changes will include per-sonnel increases, new approaches to the sharing of information by participatingoffices, and the examination of ways to address the problem of inadequate legisla-tion. Police and gendarmerie components, as well as investigative judges, areamong those who will be affected by the changes.

While the Mexican guerrilla group EZLN is not itself expected to be a source ofmuch guerrilla violence, Mexican specialists remain concerned about the Revolu-tionary People’s Army, the Revolutionary Army of the Insurgent People, and a fewother groups that have remained active not only in southern states such as Guer-rero and Oaxaca, but in a number of other states as well.The groups are financedthrough criminal activity — predominantly kidnapings and robberies — and theymay be in the process of reorganizing.

The Basque terrorist group Fatherland and Liberty Party, whose name in Basqueis abbreviated ETA, continues to maintain cells and activities far beyond the bor-ders of Spain and France. ETA has reportedly made efforts to strengthen its “com-mando” groupings in several areas of Spain. According to recent European esti-mates, there are approximately 500 ETA members worldwide. Despite its smallnumbers, the ETA has carried out a substantial number of terrorist actions inSpain and France. It is estimated that more than 150 ETA members reside inLatin America. About 100 of these are in Mexico; several dozen are in Venezuela;there are handfuls in Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Uruguay and Argentina; and morethan a dozen are believed to be in Cuba.Activities abroad seem mainly focused onraising money for ETA operations and for recruiting. In most of the Latin Ameri-can countries where they have a presence,the ETA members conduct money-laun-dering operations and collect “revolutionary taxes” from the Basque residentsthere. By one report, ETA raises $10 million dollars annually. Mexico recentlyexpelled a member of ETA’s Vizcaya Commando to Spain, where he appears tohave taken part in many terrorist attacks and to have caused 16 deaths.

Articles in this section are written by Dr. Graham H. Turbiville Jr. of the U.S. Army’s Foreign Military StudiesOffice, Fort Leavenworth, Kan. All information is unclassified.

Paris counterterrorism program takes new emphasis

Mexican guerrilla groupsremain active

Basque terrorists maintainpresence in Latin America

SWCS to host 2003 SF Branch Week

The JFK Special Warfare Centerand School, in conjunction with theU.S. Army Special Forces Command,will host the 2003 Special ForcesBranch Week June 24-27.

Activities will consist of a golftournament, June 24; the annual SFBranch Conference, June 25-26; andthe SF Ball, June 27. The theme ofthe 2003 SF Branch Conference willbe “Building the Special ForcesObjective Force.”

To obtain registration forms ormore information, visit the SF BranchWeek Web site: http://www.soc.mil/swcs/sfweek.htm.

CA soldiers receive medalsfor Afghanistan service

Army Reserve soldiers from the489th Civil Affairs Battalion,Knoxville, Tenn., received awards fortheir service in Afghanistan during aceremony held at Fort Bragg Dec. 3.

The special-operations soldiersreceived 83 awards, including 21Bronze Star Medals, 51 Joint Serv-ice Commendation Medals and 11Joint Service Achievement Medals,for their efforts in rebuildingAfghanistan during a nine-monthdeployment that ended Nov. 25.

The mission of the 489th inAfghanistan was to rebuild the coun-try’s infrastructure. The unit’s proj-ects included building schools, roads,wells, dams and clinics.

Lieutenant Colonel RolandDeMarcellus, commander of the489th, said that the work his sol-diers accomplished as a team wasmore important than the activitiesthat earned the soldiers’ individual

awards.“Most of this ceremony will focus

on individual awards,” DeMarcel-lus said. “The ceremony shouldfocus on you as a unit, because it isas a unit that you have earnedyour place in history.”

DeMarcellus said that theimpression his soldiers left onAfghanistan could not have beenproduced by any other soldiers.“America’s mission then was tosecure … victory, and to do that (it)turned to one battalion — the489th Civil Affairs Battalion. … Nobattalion had a greater impact onthe history of Afghanistan over thisperiod, or more importantly, (on)the lives of the Afghan people.”

“These fine young men andwomen who stand before you heretoday took a message toAfghanistan,” said Major GeneralHerbert L. Altshuler, commander of

the U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psy-chological Operations Command.“(They) looked the people ofAfghanistan in the eye and toldthem, ‘We are Americans. We repre-sent the greatest country on thisearth and we have come here to helpyou rebuild your country.’ ” — PFCJennifer J. Eidson, USASOC PAO

SWCS NCO plans 2003fund-raising march

In September 2002, SergeantFirst Class Julio C. Ramirez, a Spe-cial Forces NCO, and three friendscompleted a 400-mile walk aroundthe perimeter of Puerto Rico toraise money for firefighters whorisked their lives during the attackon the World Trade Center.

In 2003, Ramirez, a training eval-uator at the JFK Special WarfareCenter and School, plans to repeatthe walk and hopes to increase thenumber of participants and theamount of money they can raise.

During the first march, Ramirezand his companions, Sergeant FirstClass Larry W. Hemingway (alsoassigned to SWCS), Vilma Fortis andMark Person, began their trek Sept.1 and walked 40 miles a day. Eachnight the four camped out or stayedin hurricane shelters along theroute, rising early each day to con-tinue the march. They finished themarch at El Morro Castle in SanJuan on Sept. 11 at 8:46 a.m., theprecise moment the World TradeCenter was struck the year before.

Ramirez, who has been in theArmy since 1985, said he felt anobligation to organize the march inrecognition of the firefighters. “Theproudest day of my life was when I

50 Special Warfare

UpdateSpecial Warfare

Soldiers of the 489th CA Battalion receive awards fortheir service in Afghanistan.

Photo by Jennifer J. Eidson

visited “ground zero” [in November2001] and was stopped by at least adozen people who wanted to talk tome because I was in my Army uni-form. That was when the seed ofthis idea was planted.”

This year the marchers plan tobegin hiking Aug. 31 and again fin-ish at 8:46 a.m. Sept. 11. The Cityof San Juan, which Ramirez sayshopes to make the march an annu-al event, plans to hold a ceremonyto remember the victims of theWorld Trade Center attacks.

Ramirez and seven others (fourother SF soldiers from SWCS andthree civilians, including Ramirez’swife, Coco) plan to march this year.The group is looking for other hikerswho are willing to undertake the400-mile walk. “Through this walkaround Puerto Rico, we hope to raisemoney that is desperately needed tobuy equipment and keep the fire-fighting units prepared for emer-gency situations,” Ramirez said.

Donations for the march can bemade to the “Cinco de Mayo 10K”fund (account number 431967253) atthe Fort Bragg Credit Union; PO Box70240, Fort Bragg, NC 28307. Alldonations will go to the fire depart-ments of New York City; Cameron,N.C.; and Ceiba, Puerto Rico, Ramirezsaid. For more information, telephoneRamirez at (910) 867-6319, or send e-mail to cincodemayo10@aol.com.

SWCS staffing PSYOP TTPmanual

The Psychological OperationsDivision of the JFK Special War-fare Center and School’s Direc-torate of Training and Doctrine, orDOTD, is staffing the initial draftof Field Manual 3-05.301 (FM 33-1-1), Psychological Operations Tac-tics, Techniques, and Procedures(TTP), for review by PSYOP com-manders, staff officers and soldiersof every skill level.

The initial draft has been producedon CD-ROM to facilitate the reviewprocess. The CD-ROM also contains

examples of the official review formatand instructions for forwarding com-ments to SWCS. Copies of the CD-ROM were distributed to PSYOPunits during the Worldwide PSYOPConference in Raleigh, N.C., Nov. 21-24, 2002.

The publication can also beaccessed from the DOTD home pageon the USASOC internal web, byclicking the link to the ARSOF Doc-trine and Training Library. The draftmanual will also be available soonthrough Army Knowledge Online.

Distribution of the initial draft ofFM 3-05.301 is restricted to per-sonnel of the U.S. Department ofDefense. Reproductions are autho-rized by local commanders only,and then only for the express pur-pose of performing an officialreview. The content of the initialdraft of FM 3-05.301 is not yetapproved; FM 33-1-1 remains thecurrent doctrine.

For more information, telephoneStephen Childs at DSN 239-7257,commercial (910) 432-7257, or sende-mail to childs@soc.mil.

SWCS to begin externalevaluations in 2003

In 2003, the JFK Special WarfareCenter and School’s Department ofQuality Assurance, or DQA, willbegin conducting a different type ofevaluation on field Army special-operations units.

The difference is that the evalu-ators will not assess the perform-ance of the units themselves, butrather the performance of SWCSgraduates in the field.

Using observation, interviews andquestionnaires, DQA will obtaininformation from field units; combattraining centers, or CTCs; and theCenter for Army Lessons Learned.Because of resource constraints,DQA will also gather informationusing “distance evaluation” tech-niques, such as the Internet, e-mailand video teleconferencing.

DQA’s eight military evaluators

and four civilian instructional sys-tems specialists will assess thefeedback from active- and reserve-component units to determine thethe competency of graduates, theeffectiveness of the SWCS trainingthat the graduates received, andthe utility of that training.

DQA evaluators will observe fieldunits during CTC rotations, exer-cises and missions. They will inter-view individuals and small groupsat units’ home station. To obtainsurveys, the Army Training andDoctrine Command plans to fieldan automated survey generatorsystem called AUTOGEN. Devel-oped with the assistance of theArmy Research Institute, AUTO-GEN, once fielded, will allow DQAto evaluate the skills acquired bySWCS students. DQA will accom-plish the evaluation by assessingsurveys completed by SWCS gradu-ates and their supervisors.

During the fourth quarter of fiscalyear 2002, DQA evaluators begandeveloping interviews and trainingon AUTOGEN.They also began coor-dinating upcoming visits with units.During the first quarter of FY 2003,DQA began conducting interviewswith ARSOF units based at FortBragg — a technique that allowsevaluators to validate interviewsbefore “going on the road.” DQA hasconducted two evaluations to date.

During the remainder of FY2003, DQA will visit other FortBragg ARSOF units and all SFgroups not headquartered at FortBragg. DQA hopes to observe aCTC rotation during the thirdquarter of FY 2003. By the end ofFY 2003, DQA plans to have visit-ed each active SF Group, PSYOPgroup and Civil Affairs battalion.

For more information, telephoneSFC Larry Hemingway at DSN 236-0270 or commercial (910) 396-0270;or send e-mail to hemingwl@soc.mil.

December 2002 51

Vietnam and American Doc-trine for Small Wars. By Wray R.Johnson. Bangkok, Thailand:White Lotus Press, 2001. ISBN 974-7534-50-9. 334 pages. $19.50(through http://thailine.com/lotus).

The long and costly involvementof the United States armed forces inVietnam did nothing to revolution-ize the art, science or doctrine ofunconventional warfare. Now some30 years after the end of the South-east Asia debacle, Wray Johnsonprovides a critical and dispassion-ate re-examination of how conven-tional and traditional military prin-ciples and organizations, coupledwith the formulation of “new” meth-ods of fighting unconventional wars,led to the unacceptable outcome ofthe Vietnam War.

Furthermore, Johnson offers aprimer for understanding the longprocess of knowing who, what,when and why men turn to uncon-ventional warfare. During the Viet-nam War, as now, there was a grimtruth that had to be faced —unconventional warfare will not bewon cheaply, quickly or with force-on-force doctrine.

Because the U. S. military tendsto retire its officers and NCOs after30 or fewer years of service, it issafe to say there are virtually no“Vietnam experienced” warfightersremaining on active duty. Thank-fully, Johnson’s book, a scholarlyachievement in every sense of theword, addresses most dimensionsof the evolution of U. S. militarydoctrine for countering guerrillas,terrorists and other irregularforces in “small wars.”

Johnson, a lieutenant colonel

whose entire Air Force career hasbeen in special operations (a rarity inthe Air Force), illuminates his workwith references to scholarly studiesand with insights gained from mili-tary and civilians who were directlyengaged either in fighting or in plan-ning our small wars.

The book provides a finely shad-ed, deeply intelligent, and superblyfair assessment of the special andregular forces of the U. S. militarywhose “no more Vietnams syn-drome” has shadowed the U.S. mil-itary throughout the often tortuouspath from the Cold War doctrine ofnuclear deterrence to the currentBush doctrine of “transformation.”The assessment is not pretty, andsome of the doctrinal issues thatmilitary strategists have formulat-ed, or have attempted to formulate,are even less pretty.

Doctrine, according to Johnson,is to all but a few elite militaryanalysts “gosh-awful boring.” There

are no medals or promotions to bewon by sitting in a room analyzingthousands of words of doctrine —the strands that form the essenceof why Americans fight the waythey do. So doctrine is neglecteduntil the military is again calledupon to secure the nation.

Now that terror/guerrilla/insur-gent/shadow warfare is upon usagain, American military leadersshould read this doctrinal primer onthinking about warfare unconven-tionally. One can only hope that Sec-retary of Defense Donald Rumsfeldread this book and then canceledthe Crusader weapon system sothat the billions of dollars savedcould be poured into the restructur-ing, rethinking, retraining and re-equipping of the forces who knowhow to fight and who understandunconventional conflict.

Johnson shrewdly devotes a gooddeal of his book to getting the defi-nitions of terrorism, insurgency,guerrilla, counterinsurgency, mili-tary operations other than war,etc., right. Furthermore, he pro-vides a historical analysis of theway these terms can be subvertedby political machinations as theyare worked into and out of U.S.Army (and Joint Staff) publica-tions, especially FM 100-20, Mili-tary Operations in Low IntensityConflict. As Johnson so accuratelystates, “Doctrine reflects the timesin which it is written.”

In the uncompromising reality of21st-century warfare, our nationnow faces an enemy that will not bedeterred. Few seem to understandthat terrorist attacks are nothingmore than another, albeit unpalat-able, tactic in guerrilla warfare, just

52 Special Warfare

Book ReviewsSpecial Warfare

as they are another tactic, alsounpalatable, in conventional war-fare. Terrorist attacks against U.S.targets can be slowed with properinternal homeland-security mea-sures, but until the U.S. formulatessuch security measures, we aregoing to pay a grisly price.

In Vietnam, we had to be pre-pared for every eventuality. Today,the requirement is no different.Johnson’s description of whatshould come first, the doctrine orthe fighting organization’s struc-ture, is as relevant today as thediscussions that were held 45 yearsago when pentatomic divisionswere introduced to coincide withNSC-68’s policy on nuclear war-fare. Interestingly, as Johnson’sbook is gaining popularity, the U.S.Marine Corps has announced theformation of its own special-forcesunits for combating terrorists.

One inevitable doctrinal outcome ofAmerica’s involvement in Vietnamthat should be carried into the newbattles being fought globally is thatthe enemy must be killed or dis-armed. Why? Because just as the VietMinh were too committed to be effec-tively discouraged from violence, soare the followers of Bin Laden toocommitted to be effectively discour-aged from destroying the Westernworld. To date, not one of them hasstepped forward to claim the $25 mil-lion by betraying Bin Laden to Amer-ican authorities,and apparently thereis no shortage of people who are will-ing to strap on explosives or fly sui-cide missions into areas crowded withinnocent civilians.

Are we willing to heed the lessonsoutlined in Johnson’s book andlearn from them, or, 30 years fromnow, will there be a need for some-one to write the sequel to Johnson’sbook and title it, al-qaeda andAmerican Doctrine for Small Wars?

Dr. David BradfordDirector, Shadow Warfare

Study CenterMerritt Island, Fla.

Palace Walk. By Naguib Mahfouz.New York: Anchor Books, 1991.ISBN 0-385-26466-6 (paperback).498 pages. $14.

Palace Walk (Bayn al-qasrayn inArabic) is the 1990 English trans-lation of a 1956 work by NaguibMahfouz. It is the foremost of morethan 30 novels written by Mah-fouz, who was born in Cairo in1911 and who won the Nobel Prizefor Literature in 1988.

Palace Walk is the first volume ofThe Cairo Trilogy, which follows amiddle-class Arab family for threegenerations. A historical novel,Palace Walk is based upon theauthor’s personal experience ofgrowing up in a changing Egypt.

Set in Cairo at the end of WorldWar I, Palace Walk offers insightinto urban Arab family life. It fol-lows the lives of the members ofthe household of merchant al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad. Thetradition-bound father is reservedand tyrannical at home, but whenhe is away from home at night, heis a libertine — drinking and wom-anizing. Confined to the house, thewife is submissive and accepting.The five children live in fear oftheir father.

Mahfouz’s novel explores Arabprecepts of family, honor andshame. The characters face uni-versal human issues, and the bookshows their individual choicesagainst the backdrop of theirIslamic religion. Palace Walk giveshuman context to customaryIslamic beliefs and values, such asarranged marriages, obedience,the Jinn (similar to spirits orgremlins), and venerated Muslimsaints. The book also examines theEgyptian concept of freedom, atboth the individual and thenational levels.

The characters are caught up inthe rise of Arab nationalism andin the eviction of the British pro-tectorate after World War I. Thestreet-level Egyptian reaction tothe occupying English and Aus-tralian soldiers is relevant topresent-day events and militaryoperations.

Mahfouz masterfully takes thereader onto Cairo streets and intothe home of al-Sayyid Ahmad.Many of the same political, socialand historical forces that affect thelives of Mahfouz’s characters arestill at work in the Middle Easttoday. Palace Walk is recommendedreading for anyone who seeks anunderstanding of the Arab world.

MAJ Clarke V. Simmons, USARSpecial Operations Command,

U.S. Central CommandMacDill AFB, Fla.

December 2002 53

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