Canadian COIN manual

This thing's been out for a while, apparently -- the date of publication is 13 DEC 2008 -- but I'd never seen it. So here you have the Canadian COIN manual, B-GL-323-004/FP-003 COUNTER-INSURGENCY OPERATIONS, courtesy of The Torch (via Christian Bleuer).

The Canadian Army has recently been called upon to conduct significant and complex counter-insurgency operations. It is highly likely that future operations will also be characterised [sic, LOLOLZ!] by the requirement to continue to conduct counter-insurgency operations. As such, it is clearly time to capture our lessons learned and formalise [sic again, silly Canadians!] our doctrine.
...
Counter-insurgency is a specific campaign theme and although the key elements of our extant doctrine remain relevant in such campaigns, this publication articulates the specific framing philosopy and guiding principles that must be considered at all levels of command in the prosecution of counter-insurgency. The publication clearly indicates that insurgencies are rooted in political and social issues and thus the military has an overall supporting role to those other agencies and institutions that will create the enduring, indigenous-based conditions for peace. In essence, the military, particularly the land force, provides the maoeuvre space for those other agencies and elements of power working to a shared campaign end-state. Tactical level actions by the land force during a counter-insurgency campaign will be planned and conducted in keeping with the general principles of war and specific tactical principles; however, the tactical actions should not contravene the guiding principles and philosophy described in the publication.

I haven't had a chance to take a look at this thing -- and frankly, I can find a lot better things to do with the time that I do find than read allies' doctrine! -- but here it is if you want to skim or peruse at length.

Anybody hear the details last night?

So we're getting 30K more troops, awesome. And I suppose the specifics of all that are being elaborated this week in Congressional tesimony from Secretaries Gates and Clinton and Generals Petraeus and McChrystal. (As noted in the Politico link earlier today, even COMISAF isn't yet sure exactly what the composition of those additional forces will be. I don't think I'm alone in wondering how many of the additional brigades will be augmented for security force assistance versus operating as brigade combat teams.) But somewhere along the line, people got the idea that last night we might hear something about an actual strategy.

When President Obama outlines his new strategy for Afghanistan tonight, a pivotal element will focus on the country's south, where an influx of troops will try to secure the Taliban's spiritual center and seize a major center for bomb-making and drug-trafficking.

New forces will be concentrated most heavily in the provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, said officials familiar with the planning. Those provinces are part of Afghanistan's Pashtun heartland, where the roots of the Taliban movement are deepest.

O RLY? Must've missed that.

But elsewhere in the news, if not in the president's speech, there are signs of exactly that. Not 24 hours have passed since the escalation announcement, and we're already seeing hints that somebody understands that the "break the Taliban's momentum" part is more important and maybe even doable -- at least in the here and now, in the next 18 months -- than the "increase Afghanistan's capacity" bit.

A crack U.S. unit from the 82nd Airborne Division was placed under Canadian command at midnight Tuesday night in order to "create a ring of stability" around Kandahar City before "the fighting season" kicks off again next May.

The 2nd battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division is to be deployed in the Taliban-infested district of Arghandab by Christmas, Canadian Brig.-Gen. Daniel Menard confirmed Wednesday.

(Huge hat tip to Tintin for this link.)

Ok, big deal, right? Well, dig a little deeper and it is a pretty big deal: 2-508 is a component part of the 4th BCT, 82d Airborne Division, which -- as you already know -- has been in Afghanistan since earlier this month serving as a "modular brigade augmented for security force assistance;" that is, as an advisory brigade.

The Americans, known as the Red Devils, headed to Arghandab are already on their second tour in Afghanistan, arriving three months ago from Fort Bragg, N.C. Before getting their new battle orders, they had been scattered across Afghanistan training police.

As I said before, I've been told that SFA brigades would retain the capability to perform full-spectrum operations. I guess we're about to find out whether Gian Gentile's claims are true or not -- whether purpose-trained, COIN (/advisory)-oriented infantrymen will forget how to fight.
This is interesting largely because it turns the theme of last night's speech -- that the next 18 months will be about helping the Afghans to stand up, so that we can stand down (Obama h/t George Bush) -- entirely on its head. Here's a concrete example of a purpose-trained advisory unit, a brigade that's designed to be chopped up into advisory teams, reconstituting itself as an infantry battalion to engage in offensive combat operations in an insurgent-controlled area. (And under Canadian OPCON, at that!) Here's Tintin's commentary on that (posted from email with his permission):

It makes sense why they need to do this, in the short term: Arghandab is out of control. Before August, small Canadian elements ventured in there once in a while. In mid-August, a U.S. Stryker battalion, 1-17 Infantry, took charge, and since then it has taken insanely high casualties to IEDs (like, as bad as the worst-hit battalions in Iraq 06-07) -- 21 KIA so far, including a company commander. (The rest of the brigade has lost 6 KIA). It has some people wondering whether Strykers or their tactics are appropriate for the area, although there's not even close to enough information out there to speculate about that, and it makes it obvious that Arghandab is too lightly held.

This is decidedly not about helping to train Afghans better and faster. So again, it's going to be interesting to see which additional units end up in Afghanistan in 2010 and how many of them end up tapped for the SFA mission. As far as I can tell, the Army is only equipped to prep one brigade at a time for SFA functions down at Ft. Polk, though I could be wrong about this, so that means at best we're talking about getting maybe three brigades -- 10K or so -- into the advisory role by the end of 2010 (including 1/4 ID, which takes over for 4/82 some time around next summer). Of course, plans could change, training could be sped up, and the entire SFA brigade concept could be abandoned, I suppose, if it doesn't jibe with operational requirements. I suppose we'll wait and see.

Whatever ends up happening down the line, this is a really interesting development in the here and now. I haven't even touched the other interesting revelation (or so it seems) that springs from this bit of news and which the story cited at the beginning of this post speculates about: that new forces and operations will be concentrated in insurgent-controlled areas in the South, rather than being used to consolidate ISAF and government control in so-called "light green" areas. There's enough there for a whole series of posts...