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?”     

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     

加强公安现役部队基层文化设施建设的思考

公安现役部队基层文化设施建设是衡量基层政治工作和全面建设的重要标志,部队要结合自身文化活动特点,从实际出发,科学谋划,合理配置,综合利用,使之成为开展群众文化活动、传播先进文化的重要阵地。针对公安现役基层部队在文化设施建设中存在的不足,以提高文化设施的利用效果、发挥育人功能为切入点,就基层文化设施的配置、更新、管理等方面提出了相应的对策。     

把握武警部队初级任职教育院校特点提升学科方向建设水平

武警初级任职教育教学特点决定着学科方向建设和发展。而学科方向对学科建设具有决定性的推动作用。武警部队初级任职教育院校要针对影响学科方向的问题,结合武警部队需要和院校建设特点,搞好学科方向建设。     

《孙子兵法》谋略思想对武警部队执勤、处突的启示

中国人民武装警察部队（以下简称武警部队）作为我国的一支重要武装力量,担负国家赋予的安全保卫和维护社会稳定任务。在当前日益复杂的斗争形势中,完成执勤、处突任务不仅要具备过硬的军事技能,而且也要善于运用谋略。《孙子兵法》中所蕴涵的“道义”、“庙算”、“知彼知己,百战不殆”等谋略思想,对武警部队执勤、处突具有很强的借鉴意义。     

How might Democratisation Affect Military Professionalism in Africa? Reviewing the Literature

The search continues for methods to improve security for development in Sub-Saharan Africa. One of the important actors in this security arena is Sub-Saharan African governments’ armies. Much of their capability to meet security challenge depends on how militarily professional they are. The wave of democratic evolution in Africa since 1990 also affected military professionalism. This article reviews three models for assessing how democratisation might affect military professionalism in Sub-Saharan Africa, with special attention to post-conflict states. This should make it possible to decide which analytical methods are most appropriate to measure military professionalism in the particular circumstances of Sub-Saharan African post-conflict democratisation. Depending upon the particular nation-state in question, this decision on analytical methods may be useful for other Sub-Saharan states as well.     

Optimal defence structure for a small country

Small countries may not be able to afford all force elements (army, navy, air-force) operated by larger countries and certainly cannot afford all sub-elements (aircraft carriers, submarines, etc). This paper provides a framework for a small country to analyse its force structure, examining the influence of objectives, international co-operation, funding and technological constraints, and uncertainty. We analyse when a small country may choose to retain a balanced structure (with each force element) and when it may choose to drop one or more elements. The issues are illustrated with the decision by the New Zealand government over whether to retain a strike aircraft capacity.     

AD HOC TRIBUNALS IN AFRICA

International judicial norms developed slowly during the Cold War but have recently begun to draw on the experiences of the Criminal Tribunal in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. These ad hoc bodies had to respond quickly to emergency situations by combining different international approaches to justice and prosecution. The Special Court for Sierra Leone is the latest of these experiments. Despite having had more time for reflective discussion and negotiation, the Special Court faces the same challenge and constraint: the parameters of time and resources are set by political imperatives. The International Criminal Court goes some way to addressing the problems of funding, good judicial appointments and contrasting legal systems, the details of future trials will not be easy. Ad hoc tribunals will probably still have a role to play in cases where the ICC cannot intervene.     

The challenge and meaning of justice in northern Uganda

Even though the peace talks in northern Uganda have faltered, attempts at negotiations between the Ugandan government and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army are continuing. The current rapprochement between the two sides is the most significant move towards peace in the twenty-year civil war in northern Uganda. Even though the war has been extreme in its brutality, it is little known of outside the region—with reports on the conflict often portraying a protective government pitted against a crazed rebel group. But the issues are much more complex. The article examines the history of abuses and atrocities committed by both sides; the wider implications of the conflict for the north; why the rest of Uganda are seemingly disinterested in the conflict; and the politics behind why northern civil society have little trust in the Ugandan government or the International Criminal Court (ICC). The current prospect of peace has also stirred up the debate around justice and the forms of justice for victims of both rebel and government atrocities. And this is where the biggest cleft between the northern civil society and officialdom (government and international NGOs) resides. The article further examines the implications of the ICC's work in Uganda, and why there has been such widespread hostility towards it from northern civil society. The article also asks if—beyond the end of fighting and terror—peace will really mean that northern Uganda can finally partake in the prosperity the rest of the country has almost taken for granted.