The 2010 QDR and COIN: some initial thoughts

A copy of a draft version of the 2010 QDR was leaked last week via Inside Defense (you can read the whole document over at Small Wars Journal).

As the real thing is expected next week, I have only given this draft a cursory read, focusing specifically on the provisions intended to make the U.S. military more suited toward the wars they are currently fighting, which I believe are in many ways representative of operations to come. Now, those of you familiar with my writing will know what I mean here, though you may not necessarily agree. My point is not that counterinsurgency is the future and that all capability and capacity ought to be reoriented toward preparing for and waging such campaigns. That would be a bad idea. Instead, my contention is that global urbanization, the West’s enduring superiority in conventional combat, the attractiveness and effectiveness of asymmetric tactics to militarily inferior adversaries, the increased frequency of state-building and the ‘securitisation’ of state failure following 9/11, all point to a future of irregular operations conducted among civilians and, most often, with the objective of building government capacity. So while we may not see a ‘counterinsurgency’ or ‘stability operation’ on the scale of Afghanistan or Iraq in the near future, I do believe that campaigns to come will call for similar skill sets and capabilities, which must therefore be institutionalised.

It was with this conviction in mind that I skimmed through the 2010 QDR. What would the first QDR under the reform-minded Secretary of Defense Robert Gates deliver? Well, let’s have a look.

Defense News made much of the fact that the QDR replaces the old force-sizing construct of ‘two peer militaries simultaneously’ in favour of ‘a new construct for a wider set of threats and mission’. I don’t think that this is very accurate.

It is true that the 2006 QDR stated that the U.S. military ought to be able to ‘conduct, simultaneously, either two major combat operations or a major combat operation and a prolonged irregular engagement’. In this sense it was harking back to, but adapting, the decade-old two-major-war construct (which, Fred Kagan argues in Finding the Target, the U.S. military has actually been unable to meet ever since the early 1990s).

But more generally, the two major-combat-operations (MCO) concept was already on the way out in the 2006 QDR, which instead adopted a three-fold focus on Homeland Defense, War on Terror / Irregular (Asymmetric) Warfare and Conventional Campaigns. So in terms of broad vision and force sizing constructs, not much has changed between 2006 and 2010.

Now what about the stuff relating specifically to COIN. Under the rubric of ‘Conduct Counterinsurgency (COIN), Stability, and Counterterrorist (CT) Operations’, the 2010 focus is welcomingly emphatic:

The U.S. armed forces will continue to require capabilities to create a secure environment in fragile states in support of government authorities and, if required, provide essential government services, emergency infrastructure restoration, and humanitarian relief until the appropriate civilian authorities are able to do so.

In order to ensure that America’s armed forces are prepared for this complex and taxing mission, it is vital that the lessons emerging from today’s conflicts are further enshrined in military doctrine, training, capability development, and operational planning.

That certainly sounds like Robert Gates. Yet, let us return to the 2006 QDR. Naturally, not the same clarity and emphasis, but what to make of its vision of a force as ‘proficient in irregular operations, including counterinsurgency and stabilization operations, as they are today in high-intensity combat’? The point is that it is necessary to look less at the broad vision and more at the specific provisions: how does rhetoric translate into action?

The 2010 draft QDR sets out some important decisions (and here I am focusing specifically on force structure issues and skill sets, not kit). These four strike me as particularly relevant:

• Converting heavy BCTs to Stryker BCTs
• Better security-force assistance capabilities within general purpose force
• Boosting civil affairs (including the ‘first active duty civil affairs brigade’)
• Enhance language and cultural ability

All good, important and long-overdue stuff, right? My only worry is that much as with the force-sizing construct, a lot of this was already mentioned in the 2006 QDR and has not had a lot of effect since. On security-force assistance, the 2006 QDR talked a very similar game, introducing the whole ‘indirect approach’ concept and promoting the ‘one step right’ idea whereby GPF take on more advisory activities. On civilian affairs, the 2006 QDR tried something similar, opting for an increase in PSYOP and CA by 3,700 personnel (then a 33% increase). And why does the 2010 QDR not give an equal focus to other ‘HD/LD’ MOS such as PSYOP, military police, engineers, counter/human intelligence? On the enhancing of language and cultural ability, the 2006 QDR stressed the need for U.S. forces to ‘understand foreign cultures and societies and possess the ability to train, mentor and advise foreign security forces and conduct counterinsurgency campaigns’…

I guess the main change, of the ones I have listed, is the rebalancing from HBCTs to SBCTs. That is certainly needed and overdue, and contrasts with the major force-structure provisions in the 2006 review, which sought simply to cut the end-strength of the ground forces. Still, the move toward SBCTs does beg the question of whether these units are in fact particularly well configured toward counterinsurgency and stability operations? It’s an issue I alluded to on my former blog. I remain unconvinced: perhaps there is a need for a more fundamental rethink about force structure for modern operations. Today’s BCTs simply are not configured for the attendant mission components.

I like some of what I see in the 2010 QDR, really I do, but I am quite sceptical about how, when and whether the associated changes will take place. I’m also concerned by the fact that many of its main points were already in the 2006 QDR, which has not, to my mind, done much by way of implementing its promising rhetoric. Maybe it is all a matter of time, or maybe it is this troubling inconsistency between visions, provisions and real, concrete actions. Of course that leads of to trade-offs, and I guess that’s where the trouble begins.

Originally published at kingsofwar.org.uk on January 30, 2010.