The Rise of Special Operations Forces: Generalized Specialization,Boundary Spanning and Military Autonomy

The special operations forces (SOF) of the industrial democracies have suddenly and rapidly grown in numbers and resources during the past decades. Most explanations for this growth focus on factors external to the armed forces. We argue that the enlargement of SOF is also the result of internal organizational dynamics. First, we compare SOF to other units and military appendages that have grown over the past 30 years in order to delineate what is unique to their development and the special adaptive potential they bring to the armed forces: generalized specialization, boundary spanning roles, and enlargement of military autonomy. Second, we analyze the actions of internal military entrepreneurs and their organizational mentors to show how they use this adaptive potential to “sell” the use of SOF to key policy-makers and decision-makers.     

‘Pounding Their Feet’: Israeli Military Culture as Reflected in Early IDF Combat History

Abstract

How did the Israel Defense Forces' (IDF) organisational and military culture shape their understanding of security threats, perceptions of warfare, and instinctive responses to security challenges? Israel's early military history is marked by the stubborn persistence of accepted patterns of thought and action. In the first twenty years of its existence, the IDF habitually came to sacrifice both political and military long-term and medium-term considerations in favour of the superficial, short-term satisfaction of its drive for action. The Israeli Army as an institution separated military actions from their political implications, and all too often, granted itself freedom of action at all levels of command. That myopic pattern led to recurring raids and minor operations during the 1950s, and contributed notably to the outbreak of the Six-Day War in 1967.     

Planning for the next Takur Ghar

The USA is currently facing an increasingly diverse range of threats, including non-state actors, particularly violent extremist organizations attempting to do harm. The national leadership has made it clear that for the near future it will employ Special Operations Forces (SOF) as the tool of choice in short-duration, high-intensity operations that have more in common with the battle of Takur Ghar, than those with a larger footprint. It is critical then that the lessons of the past are learnt now and are applied before employing SOF in the future. This becomes especially important given the short lead-time in concert with the short-duration/high-intensity tempo of their operations. In the Battle of Takur Ghar, during Operation Anaconda, rigid adherence to the joint functions, especially clearer and more robust Command and Control (C2) and Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) in the planning and execution of Operation Anaconda would have yielded a better operational outcome and saved lives. With the benefit of hindsight, many things could have been done differently, but several key issues stand out. The C2 structure must include all components from the outset to synchronize effects and rapidly re-task ISR. There must be multiple communications redundancies and adequate bandwidth. Finally, all SOF, conventional and interagency capabilities must be synchronized under one task force commander with a sufficiently robust C2 infrastructure to direct the entire effort. As our nation calls on SOF at an ever-increasing rate, we must take those lessons learned and apply them to future operations.     

From the people's army to the Jewish people's army: the IDF's force structure between professionalization and militarization

The article discusses processes of “religionization” within the institutional identity and ethos of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the connection of these processes with the significant structural changes the IDF has undergone in recent decades. The main argument presented is that since the late 1980s, the IDF has been in a culture conflict, torn between soldiers and civilians who advocate turning the IDF into a professional army “military professionalization,” and others who wish to preserve, and even strengthen, the “people's army” model. The present article shows that the meaning of the term “people” in this phrase has shifted to refer strictly to the Jewish people, and that a national-ethnic perception strongly influenced by religious-national ideology has been adopted.     

Introduction: Exploring the jungle of terminology

When twentieth-century authors wrote about ‘partisan warfare’, they usually meant an insurgency or asymmetric military operations conducted against a superior force by small bands of ideologically driven irregular fighters. By contrast, originally (i.e. before the French Revolution) ‘partisan’ in French, English, and German referred only to the leader of a detachment of special forces (party, partie, Parthey, détachement) which the major European powers used to conduct special operations alongside their regular forces. Such special operations were the classic definition of ‘small war’ (petite guerre) in the late seventeenth and in the eighteenth centuries. The Spanish word ‘la guerrilla’, meaning nothing other than ‘small war’, only acquired an association with rebellion with the Spanish War of Independence against Napoleon. Even after this, however, armies throughout the world have continued to employ special forces. In the late nineteenth century, their operations have still been referred to as prosecuting ‘la guerrilla’ or ‘small war’, which existed side by side with, and was often mixed with, ‘people's war’ or popular uprisings against hated regimes.     

Chief of staff in quest of a war: Moshe Dayan leads Israel into war

That Dayan was a central figure in Israel's formative years during the 1950s is beyond dispute. His star blazed particularly bright in the Sinai War of October‐November 1956. However, the roots of Dayan's extraordinary influence are to found in the period leading up to the Sinai War rather than in the war itself.

It is impossible to understand the Sinai War, particularly its Israeli aspect, without understanding the central role played by the army and its chief in the preparations and in lobbying for its execution. For the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the idea of an Israeli‐initiated war was neither a theoretical or a practical surprise. The IDF was prepared to launch an offensive against Egypt, and that fact was of major importance far beyond the Israeli government's decision to launch a war against Egypt.

It was Dayan who ensured full coordination between progress in the military preparations and progress in the diplomatic process (the negotiations with France and Britain), as he himself was at the center of events in both spheres of activity.     

United States special operations forces and the war on terrorism

Those leading the war on terrorism have emphasized from the beginning that this war would be unlike other wars. Special Operations Forces (SOF) are military forces unlike other military forces. The implication is that SOF and the war on terrorism are thus made for each other. This contribution examines this assumption, the war on terrorism and SOF in greater detail.     

The Afghan model in northern Iraq

In Operation ‘Iraqi Freedom’, as the Coalition's heavy forces fought in the South, in the North a handful of special operations forces, working with Kurdish rebels, clashed with the Iraqi army along the Green Line. In operations reminiscent of those used a year earlier to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan, the lightly armed and heavily outnumbered Coalition forces called in air strikes to defeat Iraq's regular and Republican Guard army divisions. This article tells the story of these operations and discusses some of their implications for future US military policy. The success of the Afghan model in Iraq goes a long way toward demonstrating the efficacy of new air-heavy tactics and shows the strategic value of using light indigenous allies to replace heavy US land forces in both conventional combat and occupation operations.     

Neo-conservation

Africa's wildlife is in danger. The last couple of years have been disastrous for the African elephant as poaching for ivory reached record numbers. Rhinos have been hit hard with several sub-species becoming extinct. The current anti-poaching and anti-trafficking operations lack the sophistication and determination that is found abundantly within criminal organisations immersed in this illicit trade. Terrorism, rebellious elements and corrupt officials all benefit from the destruction of Africa's eco-system and the inaction or lack of efficient action thereof by law enforcement officials. This commentary suggests new courses of action using methods from the fields of counter-terrorism and special operations.     

‘A Time of War’: contextual and organisational dimensions in the construction of combat motivation in the IDF

This paper explores the construction of combat motivation in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), arguing that although Israeli society at large is in a ‘Post Heroic’ era, the ‘Heroic Spirit’ is revealed during emergencies. A total of 1535 questionnaires were administered among combat soldiers during large-scale operations fought during national emergency and during small-scale routine operations. The results reveal differences in the construction of combat motivation typical for emergency vs. routine, as well as for reserves vs. regular units. These results indicate that the Post Heroic era is a condition that could be shifted according to cultural, organisational and individual determinants. This paper discusses the roots of these constructions and their implications on the theory of combat motivation and combat experience.     

The sixteenth-century antecedents of special operations ‘small war’

The first conceptual, theoretical treatises about small war (la petite guerre) as special operations appeared only from the middle of the seventeenth century. The term is not used in the eighteenth-century sense of ‘special operations’ in older sources. The supposed absence of any treatment of the subject is surprising considering the obsession with the ‘art of war’ in the Renaissance, but other authors attribute it to a supposed antinomy between chivalric ideals and irregular warfare. But the absence of explicit manuals on the subject is not evidence of absence of advanced reflection on this kind of operations in the Middle Ages and in Early Modern times. We should thus look elsewhere, in other genres, for writings that contain and pass on military knowledge. Epics, romances, educational and military treatises, and memoirs in fact contain elements of a theory of special operations, even though these genres differ from our conception of rationality inherited from the Enlightenment.     

The Strategic Impasse in Low-Intensity Conflicts: The Gap Between Israeli Counter-Insurgency Strategy and Tactics During the Al-Aqsa Intifada

Over the past 15 years Israel has been involved in a bitter counter-insurgency campaign against the Palestinians. Palestinian insurgency, particularly during the current Al-Aqsa Intifada, has posed serious challenges to the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). Whilst being able to adapt successfully its tactics to Palestinian terror and urban guerrilla warfare in order to reduce the level of Palestinian violence, the IDF has not been able to achieve a battlefield decision or victory. This has been due to the nature of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which ultimately necessitates the provision of a political solution by the Israeli political leadership, which has relied too often on the IDF as a panacea for its own strategic and political indecisiveness vis-à-vis the Palestinian national question.     

Military Innovation and Tactical Adaptation in the Israel–Hizballah Conflict: The Institutionalization of Lesson-Learning in the IDF

This article highlights a pattern of military adaptation and tactical problem-solving utilized by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) while engaged in protracted conflict with the Lebanese militant group Hizballah. It discusses the IDF’s recent attempts to institutionalize their historically intuitive process of ad-hoc learning by developing a formal tactical-level mechanism for ‘knowledge management’. The diffusion of this battlefield lesson-learning system that originated at lower-levels of the organization is examined, as well as its implementation and effectiveness during the 2006 Lebanon War. A nuanced analysis of IDF adaptation illustrates the dynamic interplay between both ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ processes of military innovation.     

Special Operators: A Key Ingredient for Successful Peacekeeping Operations Management

As an integral component of the Military Observer Mission Ecuador and Peru (MOMEP), 1995-99, Special Operations Forces (SOF) performed as a true confidence-building measure (CBM). They succeeded in changing the behaviour of states, helping to resolve a longstanding conflict. MOMEP consequently serves as an example of risk management and reduction measures that insure regional stability. Further, it is an example of a regional multi-national military peacekeeping effort (PKO), conducted by conventional forces from various nations with influence and guidance from SOF, that succeeded without the reliance upon the United Nations.     

Revisiting J.C. Wylie's Dichotomy of Strategy: The Effects of Sequential and Cumulative Patterns of Operations

J.C. Wylie presented his dichotomy of sequential and cumulative operational patterns in a context of effect through control, not victory or peace, as the objective of war. The author refines concepts of control presented by Rosinski, Eccles, Schelling and Corbett and presents its three facets (taking, denying, exercising) to develop a model of control as manipulation of the opponent's operational choices. This concept of control, when applied to sequential and cumulative strategy, reveals the effect each has operationally and, from there, strategically, in the primary arenas and forms of engagement (land, sea, air and cyberspace; conventional, guerrilla, terrorism, special operations).     

Bayonets on Musa Dagh: Ottoman Counterinsurgency Operations – 1915

This article examines the Ottoman military's escalatory response to violence and frames the Armenian insurrection of 1915 in the historical context of contemporary early twentieth-century counterinsurgency campaigns. A case study is presented, from a military historian's perspective, of counterinsurgency operations conducted by the Ottoman Army's 41st Infantry Division against Armenian insurgents on Musa Da? (Musa Dagh) in an operational area south of Iskenderun (Alexandretta). In this particular operational area, it appears that the modern label which most closely approximates what happened there is ethnic cleansing. Finally, the article concludes with an objective assessment of the effectiveness of the Ottoman Army's counterinsurgency operations.     

What Happened to Israeli Military Thought?

Abstract

This article addresses the following question: how can one explain the neglect of the intellectual aspects of the profession on the part of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF)? The explanations offered for that neglect are a mixture of cultural and societal factors. The cultural explanation focuses on Israeli strategic culture; the traditional Israeli perception of the combination of rich experience and experience-based intuition as a winning ticket; the tendency to extol improvisation; a cult of material strength; and a strong belief in technology. The social explanation stresses the declining attractiveness of a military career for qualitative young Israelis. The article contends that change can take place only if the IDF undergoes a process of institutional intellectualism – if not willingly then one imposed by the political echelon.     

India's counter-insurgency experience: the ‘trust and nurture’ strategy

The Indian Army, a force trained primarily for conventional warfare, has been engaged in internal counter-insurgency operations since the 1950s. Despite such a long innings on a counter-insurgency mode, little attention has been accorded within military circles to doctrinal innovation for waging sub-conventional warfare in India's democratic political context. At best, the Army continues to view counter-insurgency duty as secondary to its primary duty of defending India from external conventional threats. By conceptualizing a counter-insurgency strategy of ‘trust and nurture’, this article aims to fill this critical doctrinal gap in India's military policy. The author argues that a counter-insurgency strategy of ‘trust and nurture’ based on democratic political culture, measured military methods, special counter-insurgency forces, local social and cultural awareness and an integrative nation-building approach will result in positive handling of India's internal security problems. The author utilizes India's counter-insurgency experiences in Assam, Mizoram, Nagaland, Punjab, and Operation ‘Sadhbhavana’ in Jammu and Kashmir as illustrative empirical indicants in order to validate the ‘trust and nurture’ strategy.     

A simulated port facility in a theatre of operations

A hypothetical port facility in a theatre of operations is modeled and coded in a special purpose simulation language, for the purpose of conducting simulation experiments on a digital computer. The experiments are conducted to investigate the resource requirements necessary for the reception, discharge, and clearance of supplies at the port. Queue lengths, waiting times, facility utilizations, temporary storage levels, and ship turn-around times are analyzed as functions of transportation and cargo handling resources, using response surface methodology. The resulting response surfaces are revealing in regard to the sensitivity of port operations to transportation resource levels and the characteristics of the port facility's load factor. Two specific conclusions of significant value are derived. First, the simulation experiments clearly show that the standard procedures for determining discharge and clearance capacities take insufficient account of the effects of variability. Second, the response surfaces for ship turn-around times and temporary storage levels indicate that an extremely steep gradient exists as a function of troop levels.