The United States Army needs doctrine that addresses strategic communication based upon emerging design concepts while incorporating existing principles of strategic communication and narrative theory together with an updated communication theory....
As with a local insurgency, the Global War on Terror requires the US and her allies to win the support of neutral, wavering and hostile audiences in addition to defeating an enemy. At the tactical and operational levels of war, those audiences...
The military is increasingly using and relying on the term "narrative" in its lexicon. United States strategic guidance documents generally implore commanders to "shape the narrative," doctrinal publications recommend commanders to "exploit a...
Colombia's future hangs in the balance with dire implications for Latin America and U.S. national interests. After almost forty-five years of existential conflict, Colombia has the opportunity to be a peaceful and stable country, which is essential...
How can the Interagency Conflict Assessment Framework (ICAF) be improved in order to better understand the operational environment? The application of the ICAF requires good intellectual habits that encompass an appreciation for abductive reasoning...
This effort attempts to provide the reader with an understanding of the dynamics and rational context for Iranian Strategic power projection in the 21st century. Using the Iran-Iraq War as a lens through which to examine Iran during a stressing...
This monograph delves into the Bolshevik campaign to liquidate the Basmachi Resistance in the Ferghana Valley Section of Central Asia. The Bolsheviks employed a precursor to the modern day D.I.M.E construct in order to overcome early policy...
Since President Bush's announcement establishing AFRICOM, the Office of Secretary of Defense, the State Department, and European Command (EUCOM) began the initial planning of Africa Command (AFRICOM). As of October 1, 2007, the United States...
Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, the United States' armed forces and its coalition of allies have become deeply entrenched in the counterinsurgencies of Iraq and Afghanistan. These struggles are not just counterinsurgencies, but they also...
Traditional models representing how messages are communicated through traditional media are inappropriate for depicting how they are communicated (or, rather, exchanged) through the new media. The former depict monologic (one-to-many) communication...
Suicide terrorism is re-emerging as the dominant tactic in asymmetric warfare. Al Qaeda in association with affiliates in the greater Salafi-jihadi movement conduct suicide terror or martyrdom campaigns against strategic and operational targets....
The dominance of the U.S. Army’s conventional capabilities has forced our adversaries to generate asymmetric techniques in order to marginalize our advantages. One technique they may pursue is to target our extensive use of information...
A confluence of factors led to American engagement in one of Central America's most violent uprisings: the Salvadoran civil war. By the time of President Ronald Reagan's first term as president, the civil war had created social, political and...
Learning Counterinsurgency: Observations from Soldering in Iraq Lieutenant General David H. Petraeus, U.S. Army The Army has gained a great deal of experience in Iraq and Afghanistan about COIN operations. Here, one of the Army's most experienced...
Military practitioners are often asked to make plans that could have enormous strategic effects without having a good understanding of their operational environment. It is exactly this relationship between the plan, the environment, and the end...
The British Army is often praised for a particular skill in small wars or counter-insurgencies (COIN). Some attribute this to the special challenge of maintaining order across a global empire with a relatively small force; others cite the...
The response of U.S. foreign policy to the volatile rise of global jihadism in the wake of the 9/11 attacks has been sweeping and multifaceted. One key pillar of U.S. strategic response has been the active promotion of Western representative...
In January 2007, President of the United States George W. Bush announced a strategy called the New Way Forward in Iraq, a departure from the National Strategy for Victory in Iraq announced only thirteen months previous. Additionally, President Bush...
While the outcome of the Iraq war seems to have validated the U.S. Army's counterinsurgency manual, FM 3-24, the war in Afghanistan seems to indicate there are fundamental problems associated with its historical principles and concepts. Dr....
Two centuries of philosophy and war have informed the latest evolution of the definitions of strategy and operational art defined in the Department of Defense's Joint Publication 1-02. By harmonizing the relationship between strategy and...