Tactical Success

vs.

Strategic Victory

Hoover Institution Working Group on Military History

How We Fight
in the Twenty-First Century
WINNING BATTLES WHILE LOSING WARS
BING WEST

The intent of this essay is to advance several observations about how we plan and fight
wars, in order to shed light upon why we are performing so poorly.

Policy Planning
We invaded both Afghanistan and Iraq with inchoate plans and inadequate forcesto
establish post-war security and governance. After winning the first battle in both
countries, President George W. Bush offhandedly decided to build democratic nations,
a task for which our State Department and US Agency for International Development
had no competence or interest. By default, the mission fell to our military, also without
competence but with unflagging devotion and determination.
In both countries, our true enemies were rabid warriors determined to win or die.
For us, the wars were limitedfought with few forces and many restraints. When the
Islamists proved dedicated to an unlimited struggle, we reversed course and withdrew.
True, President Bush did increase US forces in Iraq in 2007 and that stabilized the
country. However, in 2008 he agreed with the sectarian, serpentine Prime Minister Nouri
al-Maliki to withdraw all American troops by 2011. He threw away his success.
When 2011 arrived, President Barack Obama went against the recommendations of the
intelligence community, the Pentagon, and the State Department. Instead of politically
maneuvering to keep a residual force to check al-Malikis dark instincts, Obama pulled
out all our troops. He fulfilled Bushs foolish promise. Al-Maliki then proceeded to
oppress the Sunnis, leading to the reemergence of the extremists now called the Islamic
State. Obama quit, but Bush made it easy for him to do so.
Obama claimed Afghanistan was the war that had to be won. But as in Iraq, he headed
for the exit. To avoid a humiliating collapse before he departs the White House, he will
keep perhaps eight thousand US troops there in 2016.
On balance, the results in Iraq or Afghanistan were not worth the costs in American
casualties, money, and global influence. Several policy lessons may be drawn.

Military History

A HOOVER INSTITUTION ESSAY ON TACTICAL SUCCESS VS. STRATEGIC VICTORY

First, the Pentagon should project for the president the length of time to achieve a desired
post-war end state. In Iraq and Afghanistan, that meant staying for twenty or more years.
From the start, Bush failed to explain this to the public. He did not even try to set the
conditions in Congress and in the press for a long-term presence, as in South Korea.
Second, if our troops are killing and dying in both countries because the indigenous
troops are not capable enough to stand on their own, then our commanders have the
right and the obligation to select the leaders of those local forces. American diplomats
and policymakers, by action and inaction, did select the top leaders in both countries.
Hamid Karzai and Nouri al-Maliki were chosen by Americans behind the scenes.
Bothchoices were disasters. Yet due to unthinking allegiance to the word democracy,
we allowed these solipsistic, incompetent elected leaders to promote whom they
chose within the ranks of the police, military, and other government agencies. Like
Great Britain before us, we were a colonial power. Unlike the Brits, we did not select
thecommanders of the indigenous armies we were training, equipping, and paying.
Third, we granted sanctuaries to the enemy. Our military after Vietnam had vowed
never again to fight such a war. But we forgot that vow. We invaded Afghanistan in
2001 to destroy al-Qaeda. In December of 2001, the core of that organization and its
top leaders were trapped in a mountainous region called Tora Bora. Rather than employ
a nearby Marine brigade and special operations forces, the American commander,
General Tommy Franks, relied upon Afghan warlords whose motley troops allowed
the al-Qaeda force to move across the border into Pakistan. That was a grave, unforced
military error. Then, in a triumph of legalism over common sense, Bush decided not
tocross the border in hot pursuit to destroy the fleeing terrorists.
Afghanistan steadily deteriorated after that. Yet we persisted for fourteen years in
fighting an enemy while giving him a 1,500-mile-long sanctuary. Similarly, we knew
where the al-Qaeda safe houses were in Syria, just across the border from Iraq. But
we didnt bomb them. We granted our enemy sanctuary.
Fourth, in such countries we should influence the politics through covert means, just as
we did in Europe after World War II and occasionally during the Cold War. This includes
the channeling of money, the means of communication, and the ease of transportation.
Politics determines who gets what, when, and why. We fight wars to shape political ends.
Influencing indigenous politics during a war should be a goal, not an out-of-bounds
marker.
Fifth, we decided not to capture our enemy. In the twentieth century, many more
combatants were captured than killed. Today, we dont capture anyone. The gross
pictures from Abu Ghraib, the political storm over water-boarding, and Obamas pledge to
close Guantanamo and prosecute terrorists as criminals forced our military to turn over

Bing West How We Fight in the Twenty-First Century: Winning Battles while Losing Wars

all captured enemies to corrupt Iraqi and Afghan officials. Most of those once in prison
are now free, while the wars continue. Our troops call it catch and release. America has
no comprehensible judicial system for war in the twenty-first century.
Sixth, we remain at war rhetorically, while refusing to fight with determination. How
do we fight? The administration launches one or two drone strikes each month. White
House spokesmen have bragged that the president routinely reviews dossiers and selects
those to be killed. A commander in chief deciding upon a warfighting tactic calls into
question management priorities. It also signals an incapacity to think strategically,
illustrating that he views war as a set of morally wrenching discrete decisions to kill
about one hundred enemies each year.
Occasionally, the White House will supplement the drone strikes with a raid by our
special operations forces, especially the SEALs. This garners huge favorable press,
projecting an image of American superstar invulnerability. No wonder each SEAL vies to
receive the most publicity. Distributing photos of the entire National Security Council
mesmerized by the video of a squad raid encapsulates a strategic instinct to focus on the
capillaries.
War is the act of relentlessly destroying and killing until the enemy is broken, physically
and morally, and no longer resists the advancement of our policy objectives. By that
definition, Obama eschews war. He has declared the Islamic State will be destroyed.
Buthis actions belie his words.
Seventh, our feckless warfighting policies over the past seven years have gravely
diminished the respect of our adversaries and the trust of our friends. We refused to
provide Ukraine with weapons after the Russians invaded. After declaring a red line if
Syrian President Bashar Assad used chemical weapons, Obama asked Russia to help him
out. Now Russian aircraft in Syria are bombing the rebels Obama armed in the hope of
overthrowing Assad. In Iraq, Iranian troops have replaced American troops. Obamas
retort is that both Iran and Russia wont achieve anything more than he did. At the
same time, Obama signed a nuclear agreement with Iran and lifted sanctions, without
submitting a treaty to the Senate. In sum, Russia and Iran have undermined American
credibility and military power in the Middle East, while China steals on a gigantic scale
in cyberspace and exerts control over the South China Sea.
Currently, America has ceased to be the major power-player in the Middle East. Unless
confronted by an absolute disaster, Obama will finish out his presidency without
applying any more force than occasional bombing against the Islamic State. Russia
and Iran will remain the more dominant military actors, along with the Islamic State.
Under Iranian influence, Iraq will remain at war, divided between the Shiite and
Sunni areas.

Hoover Institution Stanford University

Fighting the War

We have done a miserable job at policy planning. But how are we doing on the
battlefield? How do we fight that is really different from the twentieth century?
The most obvious difference is our overwhelming conventional superiority. That was
clear when we took back Kuwait in 1991. It was reinforced in the invasions of Afghanistan
in 2001 and of Iraq in 2003. The world has never seen the likes of it. Yes, Alexander,
Caesar, Genghis Khan, Napoleon..., there have been numerous victorious armies and
conquests. But none like this, none with such global reach and so few casualties.
What happened here, and why? In the twentieth century, the major wars were fought
on an industrial scale. The combatants on opposing sides possessed the same sets of
conventional weaponsmachine guns, artillery, tanks, ships, vehicles, and aircraft. In
the opening decade of the twenty-first century, only America could quickly, and at low
cost, destroy all those weapons possessed by any other country.
Why? Because for a brief periodtwo or three decades?our military technology had
outstripped the rest of the world. The Soviet Union had collapsed, China had not caught
up, and no other hostile nation was remotely in our technological league. Most telling
was our leap forward in air-to-ground surveillance, detection, and destruction. Militaries
cannot move or be supplied without vehicles. Every artillery tube, every internal engine,
every human face emits heat that shines like a spotlight. Use any computer or cell phone,
walk outdoors, drive down a roadand someone above is watching, electronically or
physically. Our air-to-ground surveillance and firepower are astonishing.
Yet we did not win the battles, much less the wars, in Iraq and Afghanistan. Why?
Simple: the enemy adapted. He took off his uniform and used our morality and
befuddlement as jiujitsu to overcome our technological advantages. By hiding among
the people, he was safe from our firepower. The enemy lived in the cities and villages, or
hid across the border, coming together in small groups and choosing when and where
to initiate contact against our patrols. The Vietnam-era tactic of fire and maneuver has
gone away. Our troops wear armor and gear weighing about ninety pounds. They cannot
run ahundred meters without being exhausted. So when the enemy shoots, a patrol
gets down and returns a vicious volume of aimed fire. Except you rarely see a target,
because the enemy isnt stupid. He has selected a covered position before opening fire.
Most firefights last less than fifteen minutes, because once a gunship or aircraft comes
overhead, the enemy is doomed. So he shoots and scoots. Thus the war goes on and on,
because the enemy will not commit suicide by massing or wearing uniforms.
The Islamists in Iraq and Afghanistan did not fight fiercely and stand their ground
against our troops. Our training, shooting skills, and firepower were overwhelming.

Bing West How We Fight in the Twenty-First Century: Winning Battles while Losing Wars

Theenemy may have been a farm boy, a terrorist from Yemen, a former Iraqi soldier,
a youth from a Pakistani madras, a Taliban from Kabulwhomever. They all learned
tostay about four hundred meters away from American troops, because every grunt
nowhas atelescopic sight and most are qualified as expert riflemen.
The suicide bomber was a threat to our vehicles and fixed outposts. But it never
expanded into an enormous threat. The YouTube videos posted by the Islamic State
from the 2015 battles in Iraq suggest an exponential growth. From anecdotal evidence,
it appears the suicidal truck bomber is as much a threat as was the kamikaze during
the Okinawa campaign in 1945.
There was no solution to the improvised explosive device(IED). There were hundreds of
thousands of them, because mixing fuel and fertilizer and packing them into a plastic jug
is too easy ever to be stopped. IEDs have to be tolerated on a battlefield just as is a rifle.
Its a simple tool and therefore commonplace. We shouldnt forget that in Vietnam, we
lost over 10,000 killed to mines and booby traps20 percent of all our fatalities.
What was new in our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was not the profusion of the IED/land
mine; instead, it was the reduction in the number of American fatalities. Much has been
written about the magic hour, meaning: get every wounded to an aid station within
sixty minutes. True, the ratio of killed to injured dropped from 4-to-1 in Vietnam to
7-to-1 in Iraq. The underlying reason was better training in life-saving drilled into every
squad, along with the tourniquet. Most wounded die from exsanguination. They bleed
out because the tourniquet is inadequate. Not anymore. The modern tourniquet with its
twist and snap is as much a breakthrough for the grunt as was the stirrup for the
horserider.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, the doctrine of counterinsurgency prevailed. Practically,
this meant our troops patrolled by walking about three miles a day in heavy gear in
formations of fifteen to twenty men. The idea was to clear a populated area of the enemy
by walking around repeatedly. Once the enemy pulled out or was killed, the friendly
platoon or company would hold that area until Iraqi or Afghan forces were capable of
holding it on their own. The local forces, in conjunction with local officials, were then
to use American funds to build projects in order that the people would see a material
reason for supporting their government.
Militarily, the goal was to win over the people. Thus, rules of engagement were designed
to place severe limits upon the use of indirect firepower (mortars, artillery, rockets, or
bombs). Even one civilian casualty caused bitter complaints, although the Islamists were
responsible for three out of four killed or wounded.

Hoover Institution Stanford University

On our side, there was a yin and yang to a war that had no endpoint. Over the last four
years in Afghanistan, it became common for a platoon commander to say, My mission
is to get every one of my men back home in one piece. Why risk your men when no one
could tell you what defined victory? Why go across a field after taking some fire to check
out the compound, when you could call in indirect fire? The incentive at the patrol level
was to call in indirect fire.
On the yang side, the incentive of the senior commanders was not to allow indirect fire.
The longer we stayed, the more frustrated the top command became with the lack of
population cooperation. Every civilian casualty translated into some official complaining.
So the more rigorous became the rules, especially in Afghanistan. It finally got to the
point that the word of the forward air controller (FAC) on the ground was not good
enough. The pilot was required to cross-examine the FAC before executing the mission,
and a lawyer and/or another pilot back in an operations center miles away also had to
authorize the strike.
Today, eight out of ten US attack aircraft return from missions over Islamic State territory
without striking any target. To do so, the pilot needs the permission of a senior American
officer in an operations center hundreds of miles away. This enormous cautionand
expenseto protect the lives of every civilian is unprecedented in history. It can only be
done by the richest country in the world. However, it gravely slows down the pace of a
war and allows the enemy to recuperate indefinitely.
These rules of engagement cannot be sustained when we again fight an enemy who can
and does kill us. So far in the twenty-first century, our helicopters and aircraft have been
almost invulnerable. Our losses have been very, very small. Similarly, our forces on the
ground have not been under pressure. They are not attacked by doughty infantry in
fullbattalions like the North Vietnamese, supported by heavy artillery. When we again
fight heavy, sustained battles on a large scale, some commanders claim we can change
these highly restrained rules of engagement at the snap of the fingers. More likely, the
rules have sapped the aggressive spirit the high command must share with the warriors
on the battlefield.
Lastly and regrettably, I must mention the growing trend of victimhood. Our society
does not celebrate and single out the heroes. Instead, it tries to compensate those who
psychologically or physically did not return home able to fully cope. The Department of
Veterans Affairs (VA) provides some level of health care for less than half of our veterans.
A minority of veterans use the VA. If all who had served turned to the VA for medical
assistance, the VA system would collapse.
Yet the VA is now reporting that more than 40 percent of all individuals getting out of
the service after four yearsand the wars essentially are overapply for compensation

Bing West How We Fight in the Twenty-First Century: Winning Battles while Losing Wars

for mental or physical injury. During the Vietnam War, the VA had five injury categories;
today, it has seventeen. The more free money is available, the more will apply for that
money. What does that do to the internal morale of a service when some in every squad
put in claims, and others do not?
In summary, our enemies do not fear us and our friends do not trust us. Sensible steps
can turn that around, but that depends upon the next commander in chief. So far in the
twenty-first century, due to our vast wealth and technologies, we have not been sorely
tested. Our beloved nation does not have a martial spirit, and perhaps does not need one.
It does need a military inculcated with a warrior spirit.
Our largest deficit is national will. Consider our actions over the past decade. In 2004,
wedestroyed the Iraqi city of Fallujah in order to root out Islamist terrorists. Then in
2011, we pulled our troops out of Iraq, despite predictions that Iraq would fall apart.
In 2009, we demanded Assad leave power in Syria, but we did not use military forceto
accomplish our demand. In the resulting civil war, Islamist terrorists seized half of
Syriaand Iraq.
In November 2015, the Islamistsnow called ISIS rather than al-Qaedamassacred
130 civilians in Paris. But the American political system was unable to unite behind
committing forces, as we did in Fallujah a decade ago. Why? Our commander in chief
has rejected deploying Americans in ground combat because he believes eternal war is
the nature of the Muslim Middle East. He refuses to utter the words Islamic terrorist.
So does the Democratic contender to be our next commander in chief. The Republican
candidates are divided. Our Congress will not even debate a resolution to authorize
theuse of ground forces for fear of how the vote would affect reelection.
President Bush rashly overstepped in extending war to include nation-building. President
Obama ideologically retreated by imposing restraints that encouraged our enemies.
Congress proved irrelevant, lacking the cohesion to play its constitutional rolein
declaring foror againstwar.
In summary, as 2015 ends, a leaderless America is drifting. That should scare us all.

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Working Group on the Role of Military History

inContemporary Conflict

About the Author

BING WEST
Bing West, a former assistant
secretary of defense and combat
Marine who served as an adviser
in Vietnam, has written six books
about the American wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan. His latest is One
Million Steps: A Marine Platoon at
War (Random House: 2014).

The Working Group on the Role of Military History in

Contemporary Conflict examines how knowledge of past
military operations can influence contemporary public
policy decisions concerning current conflicts. The careful
study of military history offers a way of analyzing modern
war and peace that is often underappreciated in this age of
technological determinism. Yet the result leads to a more
in-depth and dispassionate understanding of contemporary
wars, one that explains how particular military successes
and failures of the past can be often germane, sometimes
misunderstood, or occasionally irrelevant in the context
ofthe present.
The core membership of this working group includes David
Berkey, Peter Berkowitz, Max Boot,Josiah Bunting III, Angelo
M.Codevilla, Thomas Donnelly, Admiral James O. Ellis Jr.,
ColonelJoseph Felter, Victor Davis Hanson (chair), Josef Joffe,
Frederick W. Kagan, Kimberly Kagan, Edward N. Luttwak,
Peter Mansoor, General Jim Mattis, Walter Russell Mead, Mark
Moyar, Williamson Murray, Ralph Peters, Andrew Roberts,
Admiral Gary Roughead, Kori Schake, Kiron K. Skinner, Barry
Strauss, Bruce Thornton, Bing West, Miles Maochun Yu, and
Amy Zegart.
For more information about this Hoover Institution Working Group
visit us online at www.hoover.org/research-topic/military.

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