Third World Experience in Counterinsurgency
Cuba’s Operation Carlotta, 1975
by Russ Stayanoff, Small Wars Journal

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On December 2, 2005, Cuba's aging Fidel Castro addressed his nation's armed forces in his last personally delivered Revolutionary Armed Forces Day speech in Havana. The speech commemorated the 30th anniversary of the Cuban army’s Angolan intervention. The speech was the archetypal “Castronic” socialist diatribe long-time Fidel watchers have come to expect. However, during this speech Fidel, for the first time, shed some light on the history of the secret deployment of 36,000 Cuban troops, sent in 1975, to defend the newly declared independent Marxist government of Angola. “Never before,” declared Fidel, “had a Third World country acted to support another people in armed conflict beyond its geographical neighborhood.” The Cuban leader declared that contemporary historical assessments of the region consistently omit the contributions of the Cuban expeditionary forces. Castro called the contributions of the Cuban army "decisive in consolidating Angola's independence and achieving the independence of Namibia.”

What was Operation Carlotta and, more importantly, what will be its legacy to a people soon to have their history re-examined in the post-Castro era? What are the assessments of those who fought this bloody war some 30 years later? Pragmatic Cuban veterans consider the long official silence concerning Operation Carlotta an admission of failure in another of Fidel’s many botched programs of “Leninist internationalism.” Yet, others regard participation in Fidel’s African adventures, a patriotic duty proudly performed. A retired Cuban military doctor explained, “Well, you have to give credit to Fidel, he was one to back his words with deeds, and the deed was our presence in Angola. Most were quite proud to have participated. Remember, that at the time, the South Africans were a nasty bunch that never merited a lot of international sympathy.”

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Business Executives for National Security (Full Transcript)

As Delivered by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, Washington, DC, Thursday, May 15, 2008.

Excerpt:

... Tonight, I’d like to discuss three elements of that support structure that I’ve made my top management priorities as Secretary of Defense – areas where I’ve identified shortcomings and want to see fundamental institutional change before my time in office expires. Which if you’re wondering, that’s about 250 days, 14 hours, and 45 minutes from now.

- Sending more intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets to Iraq and Afghanistan;
- Providing troops the best possible protection on dangerous roads in Iraq and Afghanistan; and
- Improving outpatient care and support for our wounded.

- A lack of vision or sense of urgency;
- An unwillingness or hesitancy to upend assumptions and practices that have accumulated in a largely peacetime military establishment; and
- An assumption that the war would soon be over and therefore we shouldn’t impinge on programs that produce the kinds of equipment and capabilities that probably would not be needed in today’s combat.

Virginia Military Institute Commencement (Full Transcript)

As Delivered by Secretary of Defense Robert M.Gates, Lexington, VA, Friday, May 16, 2008.

Excerpt:

... The VMI community mourns the recent loss, just last month, of Marine First Sergeant Luke Mercardante in Afghanistan. VMI alum said of this honorary “Brother Rat”: “His legacy lives in his cadets and others who served with him, who are now taking the field across the globe.”

In a national radio address in 1940, on the anniversary of VMI’s founding, its most distinguished graduate, General George Marshall spoke of the Institute and the values it instills, he said: “Our graduates seldom amass great wealth, but just as seldom do they display weakness or indifference to their duties as citizens. They are trained to be soldiers, if there be need for soldiers . . . ; but what is far more important, they are trained to be good citizens.”

Taking on the full mantle of citizenship through public service is not for the timid or the faint of heart, even without the dangers of combat or rigors of military life. In fact, public service can often seem like a burden...

If, in the 21st century, America is to continue to be a force for good in the world – for freedom, justice, the rule of law, and the inherent value of each person; if America is to be, still, a beacon for all who are oppressed; if America is to exercise global leadership consistent with our better angels, then the most able and idealistic of today’s young people must step forward and agree to serve their country with the same honor, and courage, and dignity that marked the service of the long line of patriots that came before them. Your country asks nothing more than that you live up to the values you have learned and lived in this place for these past four years. You owe yourself nothing less...

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In my day job I have the pleasure of observing and interacting with majors from the Marine Corps’ Command and Staff College and the Army’s Command and General Staff College at Joint Urban Warrior, a Marine Corps – US Joint Forces Command annual seminar-style war game. Now in its sixth year, JUW has seen CSC and C&GSC participation since its inception and the success the program has seen is largely due to the extraordinary knowledge, professionalism and drive of what we call our “iron majors” and “young Turks”.

When these majors talk it’s best to listen, with one or more combat deployments under their belt and as serious students of our craft, they more often than not cut to the quick in identifying what works, what is broken and what needs to be done.

Hopefully we’ll hear much more from the Army iron majors with the recent decision by Lieutenant General William Caldwell, IV, Commanding General of the US Army Combined Arms Center, as excerpted from a recent CAC memorandum below:

Command and General Staff College faculty and students will begin blogging as part of their curriculum and writing requirements both within the .mil and public environments. In addition CAC subordinate organizations will begin to engage in the blogosphere in an effort to communicate the myriad of activities that CAC is accomplishing and help assist telling the Army’s story to a wide and diverse audience.

LTG Caldwell’s memo detailed the purpose of his directive as an essential part of CAC’s responsibilities to provide information to the public and usher in a culture of change within the Army’s officer leadership, development and education community as well as to support military operations - leaders within the Army need to understand the power of the internet and leverage as many communications means as possible to communicate what CAC is doing. You can visit the new CAC Blog here. And of course; faculty, staff and students at our PME schoolhouses have an open invitation to blog here at SWJ, contribute to the online magazine or spar with Council members at the SWC.

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In the 7 May issue of Jane's Defence Weekly there is an article about how Israel is adapting based on lessons learned from the Second Lebanon War. Here's an excerpt:

"At the same time, the IDF's doctrine was completely revised: concepts that were developed in the long years of low-intensity conflict with the Palestinians were replaced by simplified, classic warfare constructs. 'For years we have developed a language that no one understands,' said a senior IDF source. 'From now on there are no longer 'spectacles' or 'effects-based warfare'. There is the objective, the method and the required achievement."

Retired general Yossi Peled, who was one of the severe critics of the IDF's previous doctrine, told Jane's "The only effect I know in warfare is to kill the enemy."

Hat tip to Bill Aldridge.

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Army's Next Crop of Generals Forged in Counterinsurgency by Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post.

An Army board headed by Gen. David H. Petraeus has selected several combat-tested counterinsurgency experts for promotion to the rank of brigadier general, sifting through more than 1,000 colonels to identify a handful of innovative leaders who will shape the future Army, according to current and former senior Army officers.

The choices suggest that the unusual decision to put the top U.S. officer in Iraq in charge of the promotions board has generated new thinking on the qualities of a successful Army officer -- and also deepened Petraeus's imprint on the Army. Petraeus, who spent nearly four of the past five years in Iraq and has seen many of the colonels in action there, faces confirmation hearings next week to take charge of Central Command, which oversees U.S. forces in the Middle East and Central Asia...

They include Special Forces Col. Ken Tovo, a veteran of multiple Iraq tours who recently led a Special Operations task force there; Col. H.R. McMaster, a senior Petraeus adviser known for leading a successful counterinsurgency effort in the Iraqi city of Tall Afar, and Col. Sean MacFarland, who created a network of patrol bases in Ramadi that helped curb violence in the capital of Anbar Province, according to the officers...

More:

Proper Promotions - Max Boot, Contentions
McMaster Promoted, Finally... - Abu Muqawama, Abu Muqawama
This is Promising News - David Betz, Kings of War
The New Generalship - Mark Safranski, ZenPundit

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Army Values

By Major Joseph A. Jackson

General Colin Powell’s recent visit to the Command and General Staff College reminded us that history, if not repetitive, is at least parallel in its dimensions. To fully grasp what leadership and the concept of a life spent in service to the Nation means, one need look no further than to the laurels and accomplishments that mark General Powell’s service. However, as General Powell mentioned, the attainment of accolades, high office, and material rewards reflect the simple, timeless, and real values that underpin our institution at the Command and General Staff College.

A veteran of two tours in Vietnam, General Powell shared the insights imparted by his journey through history. Then, as now, CGSC stands as a bastion of learning in turbulent and ambiguous times. Our institution does not promise that academics alone or a single methodology will ever triumph; rather it proposes that capable individuals grounded in relevant axioms can hone their mental agility and will deduce the clearest path to shape successful outcomes. We know that our values – Army Values – of which General Powell spoke, work because we have seen them in action. The values that were in instilled when General Powell’s class was in attendance then do not vary greatly from those we promulgate now. The testing grounds for these values are the rotations between Iraq and Afghanistan in places with names that sound decidedly foreign here in the Midwest -- Kabul, Ghardez, Baghdad, and Ar Ramadi. Forty years ago, Hue, Be Luong, and the A-Shau Valley of General Powell’s experience would have sounded equally as exotic. Conflict forces us to re-evaluate and reinvigorate ourselves with our core principles despite the time or place.

General Powell’s words and his selection of topics resonate beyond the vaulted ceilings of Eisenhower Auditorium. They resound in the classrooms where we students remain hard at work solving fictitious problems for service in a world of often cold, hard facts. Succinctly, General Powell charged us to remember that just as those leaders who preceded us, we serve in a time of great challenge. The challenges that General Powell’s generation faced were a nation divided politically over the morality of the war in Vietnam and a culture further separated by racial tensions. Today, we are a society wrestling with the moral issues of a protracted war abroad, domestic border security issues, and financial insecurity at home.

Yet, as tomorrow’s senior leaders, we see equally that along with these difficult issues there is great opportunity. As students we recognize that the dilemmas we face are not necessarily unique to our time but have parallels in our military history. The United States and its Officer Corps continue to serve as a model and a beacon for others to follow. Further, we acknowledge that we are a resilient and dynamic culture that prizes the timeless values of equality and the rule of law. Finally, General Powell’s visit reminds us to acknowledge that the common sense values of our institutions mirror the uncommon experience that is our composite American culture.

Major Joseph A. Jackson, US Army, is a student at the US Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

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The Children of the Left

By Geoffrey C. Lambert, Major General (Ret.), US Army

From the 1960’s through the 1980’s, those of us in the US Army Special Forces, along with our interagency partners, successfully stunted communist-sponsored insurgencies throughout Latin America. One of our prouder moments was in 1967, when Bolivian solders, trained, equipped and guided by Green Berets and the CIA, captured and killed Che Guevara.

From Guatemala to Chile, we taught our allies to defeat insurgency by destroying key nodes and personalities in insurgent networks, countering communist propaganda, developing internal security measures and population control, sharing intelligence with regional partners, and suppressing leftist movements.

The dictators we supported grasped our instruction and went into action with total freedom of action, unfettered by moral or legal limitations. As a result, counterinsurgency turned ugly as anti-communist zeal led to the imprisonment, torture or death of innocents among the thousands that perished in Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and throughout the region. Sadly, it wasn’t until the Carter Administration and the War in El Salvador that human rights became a cornerstone of U.S. counterinsurgency planning and execution.

Today, we see the Children of the Left, now adults, (whose parents were disenfranchised or worse) finding their voices in Argentina, Chile, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, and elsewhere. As a result, Latin America is increasingly drifting towards building new economic, diplomatic and military relationships, diminishing US influence in the region.

As we continue our struggle against radical Islamic terrorism, expanding the effort to our allies and coalition partners, we need to remember the Children of the Left. Our 20,000+ prisoners in Iraq, the death of innocent civilians, the loss of face of the many men now unemployed in a culture that values the man’s role as bread-winner more that we can understand, and our status as occupiers and Crusaders collectively may result in conditions far worse than the situation in Latin America today.

As we begin our exit from Iraq and begin focusing on building host nation counterinsurgency capability in Iraq and other countries, analysis of long term implications of seeking only short-term gain may provide insight to allow us to match word and deed in the upcoming decades to minimize long-term blowback – blowback from the Children of the Crusade.

During Unified Quest 09, The US Army Title 10 war game, there was discussion of the long term effects of the US counterinsurgency effort in Latin America, which led to this commentary.

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