US military publishes manual to fight insurgents

Washington, Dec 16: The US military has published a new counterinsurgency manual that draws on lessons from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and stresses that troops must be able to do more than just fight.

US forces battling insurgencies must be ready every day ''to be greeted with a hand grenade or a handshake, and to respond appropriately to each,'' the US Army and Marine Corps said in a joint statement to launch the manual yesterday.

The document is the US military's first new doctrine on fighting insurgencies in some 20 years, although an interim manual was published two years ago.

''This codifies a lot of what's happening in the field already,'' said Col. Steve Boylan, a spokesman for the US Army's Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, which oversees military education institutions.

Military officials say they have drawn extensively on experience from Iraq and Afghanistan, where critics accused some US units of being ignorant of local culture and traditions and of failing to gain the trust of local people.

But Boylan said the manual, which runs to some 240 pages, was not intended just for current conflicts. ''This doctrine is for wherever in the world we may find ourselves,'' he said.

The manual lists some paradoxes in fighting an insurgency, stressing the importance of establishing good relations with local people and not alienating them by using excessive force.

''Sometimes, the more force is used, the less effective it is,'' runs one of the paradoxes.

''Some of the best weapons for counterinsurgents do not shoot,'' says another.

''Counterinsurgents often achieve the most meaningful success in garnering public support and legitimacy for the HN (host nation) government with activities that do not involve killing insurgents,'' the text says, before adding that killing will also ''often be necessary.''

The manual can be seen on the Internet at: http://usacac.army.mil/cac/repository/materials/coin-fm3-24.pdf

REUTERS

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