Specialization in defence forces

The choice between balanced and specialized defence forces depends on the technology of defence output (e.g. whether a force scope multiplier is present), the existence of scope and scale economies, the platform customization costs and, of course, the level of defence budgets. Minimum force element levels (thresholds), and scale economies facilitate specialization as opposed to scope economies (e.g. platform‐sharing), scale diseconomies and the force scope multiplier (e.g. defence weakest‐link technology). When a balanced force is not optimal, the option value of a non‐optimally maintained force element must also include the opportunity cost arising from suboptimal force elements. Shrinking defence budgets may produce two surprising phenomena. If some force elements are shut down as a result of thresholds, the surviving ones may increase in platform numbers as well as enjoying closer‐to‐most‐desirable platforms. Furthermore, if heritage force elements are shut down within the budget contraction environment, overall defence capability might rise.     

新疆边境地区恐怖活动特点及打击对策

近年来以“东突”为主的恐怖势力在新疆边境地区活动十分猖獗,呈现出联合,渗透对象多元、低龄等特点。公安边防部队地处边境一线,任务艰巨,责任重大,要通过加强反恐情报建设、健全装备保障体制、加强战法研究与战术训练、加强边境管理以及加强国际警务合作等多种对策,不断提高部队打击和防范恐怖活动的能力与水平,为维护边疆稳定做出贡献。     

Close Encounters of the Tribal Kind: the Implementation of Co-option as a Tool for De-escalation of Conflict – The Case of the Netherlands in Afghanistan's Uruzgan Province

Abstract

In contemporary counter-insurgency campaigns de-escalation is typically achieved by obtaining the local population's collaboration. The rationale underlying this approach is that such collaboration spawns control over the population and therefore weakens the insurgent's position. This article seeks to understand how this approach is practised in the reality of contemporary counter-insurgency warfare. In Iraq as well as Afghanistan counter-insurgents were confronted with fragmented indigenous societies in which the various local segments were dominated by local power-holders. Consequently, obtaining the local population's collaboration required co-option of these agents. As such a strategy of co-option is a highly localized approach, this article focuses on Afghanistan's Uruzgan province and analyzes the implementation of co-option by the Netherlands' Task Force Uruzgan (TFU), which operated there from 2006 to 2010. The analysis discusses how the counter-insurgents obtained a profound understanding of Uruzgan's societal landscape and how co-option of local power-holders became part of the counter-insurgency routine. In the end, co-option was successfully implemented as TFU even succeeded in obtaining the collaboration of previously marginalized elements of the population. However, as the methods employed for co-option were mainly of a persuasive nature, the TFU co-option strategy was less effective in containing the influence of notorious spoilers. Thus this case study provides an insight into the dynamics and limitations of co-option as a tool for de-escalation in contemporary counter-insurgency warfare.     

Learning to Fight and Fighting to Learn: Practitioners and the Role of Unit Publications in VIII Fighter Command 1943–1944

A military cannot hope to improve in wartime if it cannot learn. Ideally, in wartime, formal learning ceases and the application of knowledge begins. But this is optimistic. In 1942, USAAF Eighth Air Force assumed it had the means necessary for victory. In reality, its technique and technology were only potentially – rather than actually – effective. What remained was to create the practice of daylight bombing – to learn. This article (1) recovers a wartime learning process that created new knowledge, (2) tests existing tacit hypotheses in military adaptation research, and (3) offers additional theoretical foundation to explain how knowledge is created in wartime     

Sharing security in an era of international cooperation: unmanned aerial vehicles and the United States’ Air Force

The United States’ Air Force (USAF) has developed and used unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology to monitor and assassinate dangerous terrorists in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen. Currently, there are few countries that possess armed UAV and since the US created much of this technology, the USAF is usually part of the training that automatically accompanies the purchase of its UAVs. The research question this article attempts to answer is, “What is the extent of the United States’ Air Force assistance in the training and proliferation of UAV technology to foreign militaries?”     

Civil–military relations in francophone Africa and the consequences of a mistaken analysis

The Building Security Overseas Strategy is at its core an ‘Intervention to end all Interventions’ – from a Western as well as an African perspective. Two of its main pillars are security sector reform in specific countries and systematic support to the development of the African Peace and Security Architecture. This article addresses the question why such efforts have met little success in francophone Africa. It argues that the failure of Western advisers to understand the sociological dynamics of African armed forces, shaped by a political culture based on personal loyalty to the leader, is at the root of the problem. In that context, the Huntingtonian-type distinction between the civilians and the military does not apply as military and civilians act in concert within common clientelism systems. As a result of the curtailing of the state-formation experience in most African countries, the military never had to demonstrate its performance as a state builder, nor did it have to bargain its legitimacy against the support of the citizens. Partnership in that context will remain a misnomer, at least until African military can credibly demonstrate commitment to state-building grounded in a broad-based social contract.     

习主席武警部队建设目标提出的时代背景和重大意义

为使武警部队“牢记强军目标、献身强军实践,永远做党和人民的忠诚卫士”主题教育活动收到实效,就要学习贯彻好武警部队建设目标。论述了武警部队建设目标提出的时代背景,以及提出武警部队建设目标所具有的四个方面的重大意义。     

对提升武警“合训”院校教育质量的几点思考

如何快速提升教育质量,是武警“合训”院校教育当前所面临的一个重要课题。对此,必须将“严格选拔标准,为提升教育质量奠定基础;加强理想信念教育,筑牢学员扎根警营的意识;以任务为牵引,打牢学员履职尽责的军事素质基础;采取多种方法,激发学员学习的内在动力;突出领导管理能力培养,夯实学员的领导管理基础”等,作为“合训”学员培养的根本着力点。     

Explaining the (il)legality of Uganda's intervention in the current South Sudan conflict

During the night of 15 December 2013, fighting broke out between factions of the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in Juba, the capital of the Republic of South Sudan. The fighting pitted forces loyal to President Salva Kiir against those loyal to former Vice President Riek Machar. Five days later, Uganda sent troops into South Sudan, advancing a number of reasons for intervention, including that it had been invited by the legitimate government of South Sudan to ensure order; it needed to evacuate Ugandan citizens caught up in the fighting; it had been asked by the United Nations Secretary-General to intervene; and that the regional organisation, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development had sanctioned the intervention. As the conflict escalated, Ugandan troops started fighting on the side of forces loyal to Kiir. The underlying reasons for the intervention were clearly economic, but those advanced were legal. This article discusses both sets of reasons and concludes that the economic reasons are more persuasive. Nevertheless, while some of the legal arguments (such as being invited by the legitimate government of South Sudan) can be asserted, others are clearly dubious. In addition, the participation of Ugandan troops in the fighting on the side of the Kiir government renders the intervention illegal.