COIN dilemmas

The insurgent is under pressure and has no option but to strike back. His best bet is the suicide bomber.


Ejaz Haider December 26, 2010

Khar Bazaar in Bajaur Agency has been struck again, the suicide bomber this time leaving in the wake of the attack nearly 110 casualties with over 40 killed and the toll mounting.

The agency has previously seen attacks on checkpoints and, mostly, Salarzai tribal elders (Mashraan) who are pro-government and whose armed cooperation has been essential in securing areas cleared by the army and the Frontier Corps. This time, early on December 25, the target was a World Food Programme (WFP) distribution point for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

This is a classic counterinsurgency problem, where strategy operates along four stages of clear, hold, build and transfer. Securing the area depends on successful completion of all four stages, but does not depend for that process only on military operations. That’s the tough part.

There is a semi-jocular but profound saying in the army that 'when you secure the area, make sure the enemy knows it too'. In counter-insurgency operations (COIN), the enemy, amorphous and elusive, depends for his success precisely on denying the counter-insurgency force the satisfaction that the area has been secured.

But it is important to define what securing the area means because capturing the area does not necessarily mean it has been secured. When Operation Sherdil began its roll in Sept 2008, the area west and northwest of Barang and Utman khel tehsils was almost completely under the control of the Taliban.

Three operations later, except for some fringe pockets, Bajaur Agency is physically under the control of security forces. But the dilemma is that in COIN operations, capturing physical space is just one aspect of the operations, though an important one because it gives you partial control of psychological space. The next stage is to capture the social space. That’s the real contest because, in theory, that is when the insurgent is really threatened because this means the COIN force is now moving towards ‘securing’ the area. His (that is, the insurgent) asymmetric advantage depends on controlling the population, which he partly exercises through persuasion and largely through coercion. This is what is called shaping the environment.

Now that the forces have captured the area physically and have also begun to make inroads into the social space by co-opting tribes and sub-tribes for multiple activities — patrolling, maintaining law and order, picking up intelligence on unwanted people and ensuring normal social activity — they are moving towards securing the physical, psychological and social spaces. The insurgent is under pressure and has no option but to strike back. His best bet is the suicide bomber, the ultimate smart bomb.

He will, of course, use various methods, for instance the coordinated armed raids on checkpoints recently in Mohmand Agency, which lies south of Bajaur. But armed attack is a tactic better workable in areas where the insurgent can still move relatively freely. Bajaur is more secure that way and offers very little movement to a platoon-sized body of armed men to approach the inner areas of the agency.

The relative physical and social security of Bajaur is what induced the decision to get the IDPs back in various stages. The insurgent’s objective now is to recapture the physical and social spaces by attacking the people — to signal to them that they are not secure; that the area, in real terms, is still held by him.

The insurgent’s task is easier because he needs to choose the right targets and strike at will without exposing himself through heavy movement. A suicide attack every now and then is enough. He knows that for the government to get the people to return also means the security forces will have to loosen security procedures — people gathering to get food make an ideal target from that perspective. But this also means that the insurgent realises he is losing physical and social spaces. He will attack to recapture the psychological space to try and re-dominate the social space.

That is where the contest will unfold. The fact that he is attacking the people is what needs to be leveraged against him. The WFP has suspended its programme. If it remains suspended, the insurgent would have succeeded in thwarting the return of the people and resumption of normal life. This must be avoided.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 27th, 2010.

COMMENTS (6)

Khalid | 13 years ago | Reply Paa Ejaz- very well written. Could someone translate it into Urdu for Rawalpindi?
Maulana Diesel | 13 years ago | Reply unless the government figures out sources of funds and arms these attacks will continue.
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