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| National Defense University: Unconventional Warfare in the Gray Zone |
| 2016-02-02 |
| BLUF: Unconventional warfare, whether conducted by the United States or Russia or any other state seeking to advance national interests through Gray Zone proxy warfare, has a rich history but continues to evolve to meet changing global conditions. One certainty in a world of continuing disorder, a world bereft of Cold War clarity and relative "stability," where globalization has enabled almost continuous change, is that the UW mission must continue to adapt and so must those responsible for executing it. U.S. forces can likely have the greatest chance for success in Gray Zone UW operations when engaged early in a resistance movement's development and continuously thereafter. As demonstrated in the U.S. operation to support Afghanistan's Northern Alliance in 2001, however, it can also succeed with relatively mature and experienced resistance groups, when a benefactor state's support might be just enough to tip the scales in favor of a movement that has been largely stalemated. One remaining requirement is that of determining what Gray Zone UW success looks like and establishing meaningful criteria for measuring the effectiveness of such operations. The very concept of "winning" must be fundamentally reexamined in the context of a future environment where we will likely not commit large military formations in decisive engagements against similarly armed foes. A Gray Zone "win" is not a win in the classic warfare sense. Winning is perhaps better described as maintaining the U.S. Government's positional advantage, namely the ability to influence partners, populations, and threats toward achievement of our regional or strategic objectives. Specifically, this will mean retaining decision space, maximizing desirable strategic options, or simply denying an adversary a decisive positional advantage. In these human-centric struggles, our successes cannot be solely our own in that they must be largely defined and accomplished by our indigenous friends and coalition partners as they realize respectively acceptable political outcomes. Successful culmination of Gray Zone conflicts will not be marked by pomp and ceremony, but rather should, ideally, pass with little or no fanfare or indication of our degree of involvement. History has shown that no two UW situations or solutions are identical, thus rendering cookie-cutter responses not only meaningless but also often counterproductive. Planners and operators most in demand in this difficult task will be those capable of thinking critically and creatively, warriors unhindered by the need for continuous and detailed guidance. Such special operators will be most capable of performing critical UW tasks under politically sensitive conditions, ensuring that they can serve, in the tradition of their Jedburgh predecessors, as true warrior-diplomats. |
| Posted by:Besoeker |