During the Vietnam War and the years following, there has been a contentious debate regarding the nature of the conflict. Some proponents argue it was an insurgency while others claim it was a conventional war, with each side advocating the...
This monograph analyzes the effectiveness of operational campaign design against an asymmetrical threat during the 1968 Tet Offensive. The focus is on conceptual elements of campaign design that are derived from theory, which incorporate the...
This monograph seeks to determine the adequacy of current U.S. Army doctrine as it pertains to the planning and execution of attacks by an armored force in restrictive terrain. Many circumstances and possible threats will require the use of a...
After action report, Ia Drang Valley operation, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry 14-16 November 1965, provides the following information: operations on 14 November (and activities during the night); enemy attacks of 15 November; the relief of the...
This monograph analyzes doctrine relating to the creation of Commander's Critical Information Requirements (CCIR) and its role in providing direction to units in combat. It compares doctrine to theory to assess it's doctrine's applicability in the...
This monograph answers the question, "Can unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) supplant manned United States Army attack and reconnaissance helicopters in the conduct of future urban operations " and the answer is, "not completely. " The future of US...
Actionable intelligence can be defined as having immediately available the necessary
information that can be acted upon in order to deal with the situation at hand. As the Army is
placed in situations where lives depend on knowing as much about the...
There is a healthy debate about hybrid warfare in American military journals and publications. Much of this discussion describes hybrid threats as a nascent phenomenon, citing the Israeli Defense Force's 2006 struggle against Hezbollah militants in...
This monograph addresses the employment of conventional military force against insurgency. First, it provides a model to analyze insurgency in terms of Clausewitz's "paradoxical trinity." Secondly, the monograph assesses this model's validity by...
Recent world events in Iraq have highlighted the power of insurgent groups in battling a more powerful opponent like the United States. Some reports have characterized the insurgency in Iraq as a technology-empowered, network-centric organization...
In 2006, Hezbollah employed a new type of warfare that it had been perfecting for 24 years. Systematically, Hezbollah adapted its tactics, techniques, and procedures for conducting its operations. This included continued emphasis on Information...
Campaign planning for major operations including Military Operations Other Than War (MOOTW) continues to be a challenge for the United States military. This monograph proposes that a major deficiency in current Joint doctrine is the failure to...
This paper discusses the nature of war and warfare. It contends that unclear policy objectives and a lack of strategy contributed to strategic defeats in Vietnam and Somalia despite tactical successes. This was in part the result of a tendency to...
This paper analyzes the relevancy of the terms center of gravity and decisive points at the operational level of war in communist insurgencies. It begins by proposing acceptable meanings for the terms center of gravity, decisive points, subversion,...
In Vietnam, the U.S. Marines was aware of the characteristics of the enemy and knew how to fight the enemy while the U.S. Army did not.
Senior General Van Nguyen Giap led the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) during the Vietnam War. Gen Giap’s...
Officers in today's United States military can learn from the policy and military decision-making failures and successes in American history. The hope is that in future military operations, they will not repeat the mistakes of the past. This thesis...
This monograph examines the Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS) program in Vietnam as a potential model for the design of modern campaigns targeted against revolutionary guerrilla insurgencies. The Vietnam War ended in...
Trends in international relations indicate that the United States must prepare to support friendly nations in repelling internal and external threats by assisting them in undertaking essential political, social, and economic reform. At the same...
This monograph offers a way of thinking about counterinsurgency tactics. There are five salient propositions that bind the paper. First, tactical success in a Phase II insurgency (such is the nature of the Salvadoran insurgency) is defined as the...
The United States Armed Forces constantly struggled to win its first battles with opposing forces throughout our history. Proper training for wars always is a problem we strive to overcome. A comparison between the First Bull Run, widely accepted...