FM 3-24 Counterinsurgency

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The Field Manual 3-24 Counterinsurgency ( English for Field Manual 3-24 Counterinsurgency is) a field manual of the United States Army and United States Marine Corps in December 2006, developed by the generals David H. Petraeus and James F. Amos . The strategy described therein is also known as partnering in Afghanistan .

It describes a possible strategy of counterinsurgency (Engl. Counterinsurgency ).

content

According to the strategy, military action and reconstruction aid should be coordinated as optimally as possible. The aim is for the civilian population to experience noticeable improvements in their quality of life as soon as possible with the appearance of soldiers .

Constant learning is central to the strategy. Only the organization that is able to learn faster and better than the insurgents will win in the end.

The mission is divided into four phases.

Shape

Used to prepare for the mission. Above all, the need for relief supplies is determined here. Influential locals such as village elders, mayors etc. are interviewed.

Clear

Enemy forces will be driven from the target area. At the same time, the necessary funds are used for quickly implementable help. In order to waste as little time as possible with bureaucracy, these aids are made available directly to the soldiers.

Hold

The area will be held and the local security forces will gradually be given control until they take full responsibility and can guarantee security.

Build

In the last phase, investments are made in the long-term development of the area. According to the plan, the situation should remain stable and larger projects can be tackled.

Examples

Iraq

The strategy was in the occupation of Iraq 2003-2011 from the command takeover of the Multi-National Force Iraq by David H. Petraeus applied in February 2007 and was extremely successful in the opinion of the US government: Since summer 2007 violence and terror in Iraq had significantly decreased.

Afghanistan

From 2010, when David H. Petraeus took over command of the ISAF, the strategy was also used in the war in Afghanistan since 2001 . German soldiers are also entrusted with the implementation. Specifically, the strategy expresses itself in the establishment of two “ training and protection battalions ” in Mazar-i-Sharif and Kunduz , which are supposed to help increase the number of German army trainers from 280 to 1,400. A German battalion of 600 men supported each Afghan brigade with 3,500 to 4,000 men. This should pull the insert permanently into the area. Some of the soldiers had stayed in outposts for weeks. The strategy is often referred to here as "partnering". From autumn 2010, German forces and their Afghan partners began offensive operations, which were particularly successful in the Chahar Darreh troubled district. The COIN doctrine quickly developed its effect in the German area of ​​responsibility, but this development was also associated with a higher number of wounded and traumatized people.

In April 2011, Petraeus himself described the strategy in Afghanistan as successful. According to him, the forward movement of the Taliban has been halted and in some areas has even been reversed. The pace of operations was increased to an average of 18 per night. He sees problems with reintegrating the insurgents into civilian life and with the establishment of local police forces to help fight the Taliban. This contrasts with the assessment of the United Nations , which registered a significant increase in violence and civilian victims from January to June 2011.

A specific danger of partnering are so-called internal perpetrator incidents , in which the members of friendly security forces turn against their allies. By the end of October 2014 there were four such attacks in Afghanistan, in which Germans were also injured. In addition to allied Afghan security forces (ANSF) such as the Afghan National Police , the Afghan National Army and the secret service, so-called Local Security Forces, language mediators or cleaning and kitchen staff are also potential perpetrators. A particular danger arises from the proximity of the perpetrators to the members of the international protection force. The attacks are particularly explosive, as they cause deeper uncertainty than other threats and stir up distrust between the coalition partners, which directly attacks the concept of partnering. Contrary to the widespread belief that the perpetrators are regularly smuggled terrorists, intercultural misunderstandings, social insults and personal revenge often play a role in the acts.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b FM 3-24 Counterinsurgency. (PDF; 13.2 MB) December 2010, accessed on October 25, 2010 (English, original manual).
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h Sabine Siebold, rtr: Before the withdrawal comes the fight. In: Frankfurter Rundschau . October 24, 2010. Retrieved October 25, 2010 .
  3. ↑ It's about the most fundamental questions . ( Memento from January 12, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) In: Weltwoche , 01/2008
  4. ↑ Peter Blechschmidt: Bundeswehr mission in Afghanistan Bloody war for perception. In: Süddeutsche . June 16, 2011, accessed June 17, 2011 .
  5. ↑ Marcel Bohnert : COIN at the base: To implement the concept in a combat company of the Kunduz Task Force . In: R. Schroeder & S. Hansen (eds.) (2015): Stabilization deployments as a national task. Nomos: Baden-Baden, p. 244ff.
  6. ↑ New bosses for Pentagon and CIA. In: Frankfurter Rundschau. April 27, 2011, accessed April 27, 2011 .
  7. ↑ Agnes Tandler: New strong man in the Hindu Kush. In: the daily newspaper . July 18, 2011, accessed July 19, 2011 .
  8. ↑ Marcel Bohnert : Enemies in your own ranks. On the problem of internal perpetrators in Afghanistan . In: if . Journal for Inner Leadership, 2, 2014, p. 5ff.