Fighting Irregular Wars Well
C. Anthony Pfaff
February 16, 2017
This article is a response to the #StrategyAndEthics series, which asked a group of academics and national security professionals to provide their thoughts on the confluence of ethical considerations, the development of strategy, and the conduct of war. We hope this continues a debate that may one day shape policy.
A recurring theme of the Strategy and Ethics series on The Strategy Bridge was that these concepts are typically discussed separately, with the latter treated as a checklist to constrain the former. The resulting policy dynamic often results in a disconnect between how we fight and what it takes to win. However, as Adam Elkus and David Whetam, also writing in this series, aptly point out, applying ethics as a constraining afterthought is a misuse of ethics. Ethics has its own utility and, done well, ethical analysis integrated within strategy development provides a path to identifying the best national security objectives and achieving them. In this context, I want to turn to one such disconnect between the characters of the wars we fight and the norms we employ in fighting them. Even after fifteen years of fighting irregular wars, the U.S. and many of its partners still do not have the rules right. This concern is not merely tactical. Our norms for fighting wars not only determine strategic choices about the kinds of wars we fight, but also play a decisive role in their outcomes.
http://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2017/2/16/fighting-irregular-wars-well
