Lessons Learned - What Did We Learn from the War in Afghanistan?

Abstract

After 12 years of conflict, it is not surprising that many are beginning to ask what Australia has achieved in Afghanistan and whether Australians have really made a difference. The latter question is less pertinent for the Australian Defence Force (ADF) as, what happens in the years to come is largely a matter for the population of Afghanistan. What should concern the ADF however, is what it can learn from its longest war and its most dynamic foe. This article seeks to build on James Brown’s commentary for The Age of the same title.¹ The analysis presented is supported by research and personal experience and seeks to encourage debate on the manner in which the ADF conducts such operations. The ultimate conclusion is that Australia’s commitment, while successful, suffered from a limited strategic vision that descended into restrictive campaign plans and ultimately a confusing and conflicting tactical application of the ADF’s own counterinsurgency (COIN) doctrine.

You can be tactically brilliant and operationally superb, but if you have no strategy, you end up in Stalingrad, in winter.

- Dr David Johnson, US Army colonel (retd)

Introduction

In 2006 Australia’s conventional force commitment to Afghanistan began with the deployment of the first of 13 task forces to Uruzgan province. Uruzgan was an ambitious area of operations for the ADF. As the birthplace of Mullah Omar and the centre of the Pashtun heartland, Uruzgan was beset by issues related to poverty, narcotics and security. Initially, the ADF was praised for tackling a violent area of southern Afghanistan rather than choosing a more developed province to the north.² While the circumstances that led to the ADF’s involvement in this conflict were clear, what was critically missing was a purpose and a clearly articulated outcome that the ADF sought to achieve from its intervention in Afghanistan.

At the time of its initial deployment to Afghanistan, the ADF was also heavily involved in Iraq, East Timor and Solomon Islands and was thus, understandably, restricted in its ability to initially apply any worthwhile COIN campaign plan to Uruzgan. Australia’s was also only a contributory effort to an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) strategy in Uruzgan.³ Yet, even as the operational importance of Afghanistan began to increase, a strategy that employed effective COIN doctrine remained noticeably absent. The contributory strategy initially appeared to involve providing a low risk deployment that would perform the tasks typical of the ‘soft’ aspects of COIN while allowing the Special Operations Task Group (SOTG), the US and Dutch forces to assume the more dangerous roles of fighting the insurgency.

As the task groups began to increase in size over the years and finally take the lead in Uruzgan, this role changed slightly; yet the task groups were often still considerably restricted by their mission parameters of reconstruction, mentoring and, finally, advising. These operational restrictions significantly reduced the ADF’s ability to apply its own COIN doctrine, resulting in a tactical approach that ignored key aspects of the operating environment such as the influence of the narcotics trade and the poverty of the population. The focus of this article is thus the ADF’s operational application of COIN in Uruzgan and how this was implemented at the tactical level. This article will argue that the implementation of Australia’s strategy in Afghanistan placed significant restrictions on deployed force elements and equipped them to do little else but fight. This drastically reduced their capacity to develop grassroots solutions to issues of local security, and to perform other roles within the operating environment and, ultimately, to defeat the insurgency in Uruzgan.

COIN theory in the ADF

In its simplest form, COIN is a contest of wills for the support of the population.⁴ The ADF’s approach to COIN relates to the principle of ‘shape-clear-hold-build’ which is translated as lines of effort rather than the set phases of an operation.⁵ This approach also acknowledges that, while COIN is a lengthy process, it can succeed given the appropriate strategy and national effort. After all, insurgencies almost always fail in their objectives.⁶ Terrorists are even less successful. Yet, where they are often successful is in survival. The insurgency adapts, evolves and often innovates to maintain its profile. The Chief of Army, Lieutenant General David Morrison, recently acknowledged this in a speech to the Lowy Institute in which he stated, ‘we recognised that our enemies adapted and innovated more quickly than we did.’⁷

The insurgent is rarely fighting an asymmetric war by choice. Fighting as an insurgent requires significant funding, clear political objectives and the support of the population. Perception is just as important as reality to the insurgent.⁸ While the insurgent attempts to undermine the legitimacy and will of the counter-insurgent, that same counter-insurgent is trying to clear him from his area of operations without alienating the people. This is a notion that recognises victory as requiring a collective military and government approach capable of fighting the insurgent, but seeks to defeat him in other ways. The application of violence is therefore important and necessary but not essential.

While extremists are unlikely ever to be persuaded to lay down their arms, from what is known of the insurgents in Uruzgan, ideology is far from the key motivator in the continuation of hostilities.⁹ On the contrary, the average ‘Taliban’ combatant is far more concerned with sourcing an income and bringing pride to his family, tribe and village. He cares very little for political issues and the various power struggles in Kabul. Why should he? Such events are far removed from the fragmented, violent and poverty-stricken societies that often define southern Afghanistan. Rather than die for a losing cause, the Pashtuns are far more likely to switch sides mid-conflict to place their families in a more advantageous position.¹⁰ The Taliban will not lose this conflict unless they become irrelevant in the eyes of the Afghan population.

To both the insurgent and the counter-insurgent, money is ammunition.¹¹ The link between poverty and the recruitment of young combatants is well documented.¹² At the political level, COIN needs to demonstrate to the population that there are tangible benefits in supporting the government that an insurgency is incapable of providing. In its application at the tactical level, this implies the capacity to support local government and security forces through investments in local infrastructure that are sustainable and promote economic growth. For his part, the insurgent requires a significant and continued source of funds in order to sustain hostilities.¹³ For some insurgencies, this comes from a foreign government. For others, it comes from the control of an illicit trade.

The pool of potential combatants needs to be degraded by providing employment that is both meaningful and financially more beneficial than joining the cause of the insurgent. The economic development of the host nation is therefore one of the most important tasks in COIN. However, there is a constant risk of creating a false economy that is unsustainable once the counter-insurgent is gone.¹⁴ As former British MP Rory Stewart observed, ‘when you put $125 billion a year into a country like Afghanistan where the entire revenue of the Afghan state is $1 billion a year, you effectively drown everything.’¹⁵

The ADF’s COIN doctrine has proven its worth in Afghanistan. Indeed, anecdotal evidence would suggest that it is widely accepted at all levels and corresponds with the doctrine used across ISAF. It is also used widely within Army training establishments. However, its conflicting tactical application within Afghanistan is puzzling to say the least. As a prelude to discussing this shortfall, it is important to understand the basis of Australia’s strategy in Afghanistan.

The strategy

The ANZUS alliance has long been important to Australia’s security and, following the events of 9/11, Australia’s support during the war in Afghanistan assisted the US in its bid to establish moral authority.¹⁶ After a particularly low risk commitment to Iraq, the Australian government demonstrated a willingness to become more committed to supporting the operation in Afghanistan.¹⁷ The overarching ISAF goal of denying Afghanistan as a base to harbour or train terrorists in the future was rapidly achieved in the early days of the conflict. Many terrorist groups moved across the border to Pakistan or left the region altogether.¹⁸ The ADF’s goal in Afghanistan then appeared to shift and continued to do so throughout the period of its commitment. While avoiding a combat focus initially, this changed rapidly for elements such as the SOTG.¹⁹ Counter-narcotics was also briefly on the agenda, only to be quietly ignored soon after.

Initial task groups were heavily restricted by geographic and mission constraints and were also ill equipped to influence the situation outside the Uruzgan capital, Tarin Kowt. The period 2006 to 2010 saw a steady increase in troop numbers despite the Australian government’s repeated refusals to commit to such an increase in response to requests from ISAF. When the Dutch subsequently withdrew from Uruzgan in 2010, the Australian government refused the opportunity to take ownership of the province, only to finally do so two years later.²⁰ At the strategic level, Australia’s politicians seemed to accept that the ADF was committed to Afghanistan but could not articulate the goals of the deployment or the anticipated cost.²¹ Afghanistan was a political mission above all else, yet the goals of that mission were constantly amended or often in some way reduced.²²

Supporting the ANZUS alliance was an important and necessary goal that was largely reinforced by Australia’s involvement in Afghanistan. However, the ADF’s minor role within this conflict meant that important decisions such as any handover or timeline for withdrawal would largely be made in Washington rather than Canberra.²³ Yet within Uruzgan, the ADF had relative freedom in deciding how to fight this war within the confines of a wider ISAF strategy. While Uruzgan was by no means decisive terrain in Afghanistan, it was nonetheless an important piece of a larger puzzle for which Australia had (arguably) become responsible. Determining how seriously Australia took that responsibility is of course difficult and will undoubtedly invoke strong views in the years to follow.

The operational application of COIN

The ADF could be forgiven for commencing its operations in Uruzgan with a Reconstruction Task Force rather than first trying to secure the province. There appeared to be an assumption that someone else would take responsibility for security. However, given the sheer size of the Uruzgan battlespace, this proved an unfortunate assumption. Australian task groups were targeted by the Taliban from the outset and large areas of the province remained in Taliban control.²⁴ This continues to be true for some areas today. Deciding whether or not to seek out and close with those insurgents appeared to be driven more by the personality of key commanders rather than as part of a directed strategy or campaign plan.

In the early years of the conflict, the ADF possessed the capacity to shape and build — albeit little else. The SOTG, later enabled by an effective rotary wing, developed the ability to shape and clear many areas of Uruzgan but had no capacity for the hold and build aspects. Their efforts were also only occasionally linked to the efforts of the conventional task groups. As these groups began to extend their influence in the province, combat team-sized forward operating bases and even platoon houses were employed; yet very few areas were ever permanently held in any dominating capacity.²⁵ Valleys were cleared numerous times, only to be filled again by the Taliban once the force elements left the area.

Reconstruction Task Forces were replaced by Mentoring and later Advisory Task Forces. The very name of the task force often highlighted the restrictive nature of the campaign plan. The Uruzgan operating environment was large and significant and the ADF could never hope to extend a meaningful influence across the entire province given the size of the force elements deployed. This was further hampered by the reluctance to risk deploying small groups of soldiers to live among the populace. The ADF’s acceptance of the fact that Uruzgan Province could never be secured in its entirety allowed the insurgents to continue to access various safe havens across the operating environment. It also promoted uncertainty over the benefits of projecting force into these areas if there was no capacity to hold and build.

Reference to dealing with the insurgency was often expressed in words such as ‘degrade’ rather than ‘defeat’, ‘neutralise’ or ‘destroy’. To degrade an insurgency is an arbitrary task for a deployed force element. Insurgencies are easy to degrade — but they are much harder to defeat. If the goal was not to defeat the insurgency, then the obvious question is — what was it? Given that the ADF had focused its efforts on developing the Afghan National Army (ANA), it could logically be argued that the ADF’s goal was, in fact, to enable the ANA to defeat the insurgency. While this is a sound strategy in theory, it took a number of years for the ANA to become capable of taking on the Taliban. This left a long period of nurturing and mentoring in which the ADF would be expected to fight the war on its own.

Throughout this process, the insurgency continued to evolve and increase in lethality. In 2006, the Taliban began to use suicide attacks as a weapon in Uruzgan. In those early days, the improvised explosive device (IED) threat was considered far less dangerous than it would become only a few years later.²⁶ If these observations demonstrate anything, it is that the ADF (like all militaries) must fight wars quickly. The longer its forces remain deployed, the more its ability to respond to other threats is diminished, and the higher the costs. The more casualties the ADF takes, the more the enemy will transform, often into something far uglier than the form in which it was first encountered.

While the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan has consistently struggled to influence the remote areas of Afghanistan in the Pashtun heartland, the ADF sought to extend its influence through the mentoring of ANA company and battalion groups in these areas. However, this strategy encouraged the creation of a national army that is unsustainable in both size and geographic displacement. More importantly, it also sought to create a strong army without first creating a strong Afghan state.²⁷ Remote ANA patrol bases are plagued by difficulties with resupply and an inability to project any worthwhile force into their areas of operation.²⁸ The ANA is also far too expensive to sustain without significant foreign aid. The security solution must be sustainable and it needs to occur at the grassroots.

Defining progress in Uruzgan was an unenviable task for those required to do this. Taliban commanders were often replaced when killed or released once detained. The narcotics trade continued to expand and there were very few signs that the ADF was making Uruzgan a better place for the local populace.²⁹ Infrastructure was one success story. By 2013, over 320 kilometres of roads had been built or improved, and 166 schools and 20 public health care facilities had been constructed.³⁰ However, these figures only tell part of the story. When this infrastructure was not tied to a cohesive COIN strategy, roads would be mined and schools sit empty. Concerns were raised that the ADF legacy would be one of building facilities, but not developing the province. If economic development was central to ADF COIN theory then the underlying aspects of the Uruzgan economy were being ignored.

Stopping the drugs

‘COIN forces will be required to clear insurgent forces and eliminate the infrastructure that supports them.’³¹

In Afghanistan, the insurgent’s infrastructure is drugs. It is thus unlikely that history will look favourably on the ADF’s efforts to halt the narcotics trade in Uruzgan. Yet, for many commanders and politicians today, the impact of this failing has yet to be realised. The reality, however, is that conflicts with insurgencies that are tied to an illicit trade last five times longer than those that are not.32 The Taliban today is an unfortunate manifestation of that reality. It is a far less ideological, far more profit-driven enterprise in which peace is simply an obstacle to increased profits. Achieving any type of ceasefire is therefore likely to involve the sacrifice of key areas of southern Afghanistan, namely those surrounding the 200,000 odd hectares of poppy and marijuana fields.³³

The ADF has always been fully aware that the Taliban was tied to the opium trade. Insurgent activity drops significantly during the nesh (harvest) when Taliban commanders and fighters become traffickers and drug lords. Provinces with the highest production of narcotics also produced the highest incidence of attacks.³⁴ Yet the ADF often chose to ignore these key facts, as did most of ISAF, and they have continued to be ignored, either because of the perceived enormity of the task of tackling the drug trade, or because the sheer value of this commodity was never communicated properly to the highest levels. While most post-operation reports identified narcotics as an issue, the resounding response involved turning a blind eye in order to focus ‘on the larger issue of removing the Taliban and the insurgents’ as Major Michael Scott identified in 2007.³⁵ This failure to link the trade to the insurgency or at least acknowledge its importance has been an unfortunate legacy of the ADF’s time in Uruzgan.

While Afghanistan has produced opium for decades, it was not until the Taliban was ousted from power in 2001 that opium production began to soar.³⁶ Today, Afghanistan’s drug trade is a $3 billion enterprise and accounts for over $400 million in annual revenue for the Taliban — a 49% increase from 2012.37 While Afghan National Security Forces have adopted limited strategies to stem the flow in Uruzgan, their efforts have often been hampered by corruption and ineffective eradication techniques.³⁸ Despite this, Australian mentors were generally advised not to become involved in this process and were relegated to the role of reluctant bystanders.

While the SOTG has invested in counter-narcotics with the Drug Enforcement Administration in recent years, this effort was targeted solely at the traffickers and drug labs. After all, to target the farmers would invariably threaten the ADF’s ‘hearts and minds’ campaign. Yet this approach fundamentally misses the point. Farmers are growing poppies because it is financially viable to do so. If that same farmer could earn twice as much working in the bazaar, he would be unlikely to continue to grow poppies. While there are cases of Taliban threatening locals and forcing them to produce narcotics, their own ‘hearts and minds’ campaign is just as important for them as it is for ISAF. Unlike ISAF, however, the Taliban relies on the local populace for sustainment and protection, commodities that would surely dry up if a better alternative was provided. Targeting traffickers will therefore only stem the flow; it will not cut the supply.

While the Taliban are unlikely ever to return to government in Afghanistan, if they continue to control the narcotics trade they will undoubtedly survive and may even flourish for the foreseeable future. Similarly, if the government of Afghanistan cannot transition to a licit economy, it is unlikely to boast a GDP that can pay for its significant security expenditure. Most concerning of all for ISAF are the large sums of money that are leaving the conflict zone, often through the intricate Hawala financial network. Considering that the 9/11 attacks were believed to have cost no more than $500,000 to orchestrate, such movement of funds between terrorist groups should comprise a significant cause for concern.³⁹

The key to eradication and therefore defeating the insurgency is employment. As Ashraf Ghani (a candidate for the 2014 national elections) once commented, ‘countries that have a legal per-capita income of more than $1000 simply do not produce drugs.’⁴⁰ Presumably this was an operational failure rather than a strategic one. While tactical approaches to the eradication of the drug trade could be implemented, they would be largely ineffective without an operational strategy. Foreign investment would need to be encouraged, alternative crop programs developed and a tactical approach implemented that provided the necessary security to protect the populace and interdict traffickers.

Fighting the Taliban at the grassroots

‘One of the very difficult things for a regular army to understand is that an undefeated army can lose a war. … [But] while losing every battle ... [the insurgent] is winning the war.’⁴¹

For the soldiers engaged in this conflict, the notion of ‘a careful war’ has become a popular catch phrase.⁴² Numbers of casualties shaped the minds of many when determining what approach each task group would adopt. Such aversion to casualties may leave an interesting legacy for future ADF deployments. Yet, when a force element is tasked with achieving an immeasurable goal, a commander is naturally reluctant to take additional risks. Measuring that acceptable risk became an enduring feature of the ADF’s time in Uruzgan. The perceived futility of the mission at the lower levels almost certainly added to this confusion.

Arguably, Australia had become accustomed to deploying soldiers to various theatres around the world without taking casualties. In 2008, Major Jim Hammett’s highly publicised article criticising the Australian Army’s reluctance to use infantry in their principle role struck a chord with many in Army.⁴³ In Afghanistan the Australian government proved that it was prepared to take casualties in the pursuit of its strategic goal; yet a noticeable hesitation in the application of all types of military operations remained. While it was common for coalition partners and certainly ANA to patrol in un-armoured vehicles or lack combat engineer support, ADF elements were forbidden from taking such risks.⁴⁴

The ADF had also become a victim of its own tactical success. As a military organisation, the Taliban was simply no match for the ADF’s training, technology and application of force. Yet, as Lieutenant Colonel Chris Smith noted in his post-operation report in 2012, the Taliban is a poor adversary on which to judge the ADF’s fighting skills.⁴⁵ Unlike the Mujahedeen of the Soviet-Afghan war, the Taliban lacked the substantial support of foreign governments. Their weapons and ammunition were poor and in limited supply and they had little understanding of basic military tactics. Yet, if the Taliban taught the ADF anything, it was that even an illiterate farmer with a ten dollar home-made IED can score significant tactical success against a modern military unit. As David Kilcullen once wrote, ‘… the East has solved the riddle of the Western way of war.’⁴⁶

The IED threat fundamentally crippled the ability of junior commanders to demonstrate tactical prowess. The lack of tactical air mobility, notably from the absent Australian Black Hawks, did not help.⁴⁷ In some valleys in Uruzgan, the Taliban had dug fighting pits orientated towards a single approach, confident that ISAF forces would invariably follow the same path each time unless they moved by air. To do otherwise would often draw criticism from higher headquarters, or would be impossible due to limited counter-IED support or would be too much work for the ANA. The ADF’s tactics with the ANA were therefore simple and often repetitive.⁴⁸ Fortunately, so were the Taliban’s.

The pursuit of insurgents remained a key goal for many Australian force elements despite the mission constraints. This was often achieved in spite of an intuitive understanding at every level that ‘we cannot kill or capture our way to victory’ as Robert Gates observed.⁴⁹ The issue was primarily not simply one of training, but also of mindset. Teaching ‘hearts and minds’ to combat soldiers is effective in principle, but it will never deter them from understanding their core role and purpose in life — combat. A soldier who experiences combat is likely to be far more satisfied with his operational tour than one who does not, regardless of the long-term merits of such endeavours. In a conflict that had few measures of progress, pursuing insurgents at least provided visible and tangible outcomes to the soldiers on the ground.

According to Abraham Maslow’s law of the instrument, ‘when your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail’. In this context, Maslow’s law is an important one to remember. While soldiers can be taught cultural awareness and the basic principles of COIN, the reality is that they are prepared and equipped to do little else but fight. While they have a basic understanding of the country and its culture, they have no concept of how to create jobs and build a credible government — both of which are far more successful methods of defeating an insurgency.⁵⁰ The result is that many of our soldiers know no other way to defeat insurgents than to kill them, and those who know better are not afforded the tools to do so.

Recent studies into the success of US Army Green Beret teams (ODAs) in Uruzgan deserve closer analysis.⁵¹ The ODA program, run by small teams of US Special Forces soldiers, sought to create a local police force in these remote locations rather than a large, cohesive military force. These small teams of ODA (permanently based among the populace) were also equipped with significant resources, funding and weapons to influence every aspect of their area’s political and security infrastructure. The result was a small footprint of soldiers wielding a significantly disproportionate effect in the battlespace that created a grassroots approach to security. Comparatively, the Australian platoon and company groups working in the same areas had far less influence over the Afghan populace and were often restricted by their mission parameters and limited funds for projects.

While there are benefits to having a larger force within such areas, if that force is equipped to do little else but fight it has only limited application in COIN. As US Navy Admiral James Stavridis remarked, ‘we will not deliver security purely through the barrel of a gun.’⁵² While combat teams were equipped with the capacity to produce limited aid programs, these were often poorly executed and highly criticised by OXFAM for the limited evaluation of their effectiveness.53 While Provincial Reconstruction Teams had a greater strategic effect, they were also hindered by a poor understanding of aid distribution and limited obligations to work with military teams already based in those locations.⁵⁴

Why is this important?

As a defence force, the ADF’s inherent objective is the defence of Australia and its national interests. Within that ideology, the ADF focuses significant effort on defeating state actors; yet it also recognises that it is far more likely to be called on to defeat an insurgency.⁵⁵ After all, any smart adversary is likely to continue to remain unconventional until Western militaries prevail in conflicts such as this.⁵⁶ A quick analysis of the various asymmetric groups in Australia’s region shows numerous similarities to the insurgency in Afghanistan. At a risk of being too dismissive of the ADF’s lessons from this theatre, a repeat of the loss of corporate knowledge following the Vietnam War is appearing increasingly likely.⁵⁷ To have to learn these lessons again would be frustrating and costly.

While the ADF should aim to fight wars quickly, it must equally accept that defeating an insurgency can be a lengthy process.⁵⁸ If Australia is going to continue to involve itself in conflicts such as this, the ADF needs to become better at state-building. It is naïve to think that the ADF can achieve its goals through military might and the creation of an indigenous force to replace it. Kinetic actions must be supported by non-kinetic as part of a clearly articulated strategy. To do otherwise risks almost inevitable failure.

Conclusion

If insurgencies almost always fail, the ADF’s objective should be to make them irrelevant. They may survive, as many do, yet their continued ability to hinder state- building will be reduced. The Taliban is no exception to this logic. If an adequate strategy, backed by a suitable force and national effort, had been employed from the outset, the Taliban in Uruzgan may have been degraded far more efficiently and potentially defeated. By focussing on some aspects of the COIN battle and ignoring others, the ADF was effectively making its job harder and more protracted.

At the tactical level, soldiers and junior commanders must be empowered to fight an insurgency at the grassroots. To do this requires the ability to live among the populace, in small teams, equipped with the training, resources and strategy to create a disproportionate effect. Australian soldiers are capable of achieving this if the ADF is prepared to accept the risk and allow increased freedom of action. Strategically, Australia must have the will to do what needs to be done and accept that it will take time, money and ultimately young Australian lives. If the Australian government is not prepared to do this, then there was little point in committing to the war in the first place. 

Endnotes

1    J. Brown, ‘What did we learn from the war in Afghanistan?’, The Age, 30 October 2013.
2    A. Bubalo, ‘Obama’s Surge: The United States, Australia and the Second War for Afghanistan’,
Lowy Institute, policy brief, 2009, p. 6.
3    Ibid., p. 3.
4    LWD 3-0-1, Counterinsurgency, 2009, para 2.14.
5    Ibid., para, 3.29.
6    B. Acosta, ‘Live to Win Another Day: Why Many Militant Organizations Survive Yet Few Succeed’, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, Vol. 37, 2014, p. 135.
7    D. Morrison, ‘Australia’s Army for the next decades’, speech for the Lowy Institute, 19 February 2014.
8    Acosta, ‘Live to Win Another Day: Why Many Militant Organizations Survive Yet Few Succeed’,
p. 136.
9    P. Thruelsen, ‘The Taliban in southern Afghanistan: a localised insurgency’, Small Wars & Insurgencies, Vol. 21, No. 2, 2010, p. 265.
10    M. Semple and F. Christia, Flipping the Taliban, Council on Foreign Relations, 2009, p. 2.
11    Counterinsurgency, para 4.19.
12    M. Ali, ‘The link between unemployment and terrorism’, TED Talks, viewed 15 December 2013.
13    Counterinsurgency, para 2.21.
14    Ibid., para 4.19
15    R. Stewart, ‘Time to end the war in Afghanistan’, TED Talks, viewed 2 December 2013.
16    The Hon. J. Fitzgibbon, MP, Afghanistan speech, House of Representatives, 20 October 2010.
17    R. Heinrichs, ‘Flying the flag, not the coop’, The Canberra Times, 18 July 2010, p. 9.
18    Ibid., p. 9.
19    Brown, ‘What did we learn from the war in Afghanistan?’
20    Ibid.
21    H. White, ‘Realisation at last on Iraq, Afghanistan’, The Sydney Morning Herald, 21 July 2005, p. 11.
22    J. Brown, ABC News, 30 August 2012, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQDtQjWyOUM&gt;
23    Fitzgibbon, Afghanistan speech, House of Representatives.
24    Bubalo, ‘Obama’s Surge: The United States, Australia and the Second War for Afghanistan’, p. 7.
25    P. Connolly, Australian Army Journal, Vol. VII, No. 2, 2011, p. 18.
26    D. Green, ‘A Tale of Two Districts Beating the Taliban at Their Own Game’, Military Review, January–February, 2014, p. 28.
27    P. Miller, ‘Afghanistan After the Drawdown’, RAND Corporation, < http://www.rand.org/ commentary/2013/12/04/FP.html> viewed 15 January 2014.
28    O. Younossi, P. Thruelsen, J. Vaccaro, J. Sollinger and B. Grady, ‘The Long March Building an Afghan National Army’, RAND Corporation, 2009, p. xiv.
29    M. O’Hanlon and A. Shearerm, ‘From losing to winning in Afghanistan’, The Washington Times, 3 October 2008.
30    ADF, ‘Afghanistan Factsheets’, <http://www.defence.gov.au/operations/afghanistan/factsheets/ prt.asp>
31    Counterinsurgency, para 3.14.
32    G. Peters, Seeds of Terror How heroin is Bankrolling the Taliban and Al Qaeda, One World Publications, Oxford, 2009, p. 11.
33    J. Sopko, ‘Future US Counternarcotics Efforts in Afghanistan’, Testimony before the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control, 15 January 2014, p. 4.
34    T. Dodge and N. Redman, Afghanistan to 2015 and Beyond, Routledge, New York, 2011, p. xiv.
35    M. Scott, ‘Rebuilding Afghanistan one mud-brick at a time: lessons from an Aussie Engineer’,
Australian Army Journal, Vol. 4, No. 1, 2007, p. 56.
36    W. Maley, Rescuing Afghanistan, University of New South Wales Press Ltd, Sydney, 2006, p. 91.
37    Sopko, ‘Future US Counternarcotics Efforts in Afghanistan’, p. 4.
38    J. Glaze, ‘Opium and Afghanistan Reassessing U.S. Counter-Narcotics Strategy’, Strategy Research Paper, US Army War College, 2007, p. 7.
39    Peters, Seeds of Terror How heroin is Bankrolling the Taliban and Al Qaeda, p. 19.
40    A. Ghani, ‘How to rebuild a broken state’, TED Talks, October 2006.
41    Counterinsurgency, para 2.0.
42    C. Masters, ‘Analysing a Careful War’, speech to the Lowy Institute, 30 July 2011.
43    J. Hammet, ‘We Were Soldiers Once: The Decline of the Royal Australian Infantry Corps’,
Australian Army Journal, Vol. 5, No. 1, Autumn 2008.
44    A. Palazzo, ‘No Casualties Please, We’re Soldiers’, Australian Army Journal, Vol. 5, No. 3, 2008, p. 66.
45    C. Smith, Post-Operation Report – MTF 3, 2012.
46    D. Kilcullen, The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One, Oxford University Press, New York, 2009, p. 25.
47    P. Cleary, ‘No action for Black Hawks in war zone’, The Australian, 2 November 2013.
48    G. Keating, ‘Living In The Twilight Zone’, Australian Army Journal, Vol. VIII, No. 3, 2011, p. 13.
49    R. Gates, ‘U.S Global Leadership Campaign’, speech, 15 July 2008.
50    Ibid.’
51    D. Green, ‘A Tale of Two Districts: Beating the Taliban at Their Own Game’, Military Review,
January-February 2014.
52    J. Stravidis, ‘A Navy Admiral’s thoughts on global security’, TED Talks, July 2007.
53    D. Oaks, ‘Charity says foreign aid is driven by military’, The Age, 11 February 2011, p. 5.
54    Scott, ‘Rebuilding Afghanistan one mud-brick at a time: lessons from an Aussie Engineer’, p. 58.
55    M. Ryan, ‘Implementing an Adaptive Approach in Non-Kinetic Counterinsurgency Operations’,
Australian Army Journal, Vol. 4, No. 3, 2007, p. 126.
56    Kilcullen, The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of Big One, p. 23.
57    K. Woods, ‘An Interview With Warrant Officer Kevin Woods’, Australian Army Journal, Vol. 4, No. 3, 2013, p. 20.
58    T. Scott, ‘Adaptive Campaigning and an Australian Way of War’, Australian Army Journal, Vol. 5, No. 3, 2008, p. 208.