Dr. David Kilcullen on duty with U.S. force in Iraq. A photo from Dr. Kilcullen's Facebook page.Interview With Dr. David Kilcullen -- Octavian Manea, Small Wars Journal
What would success and victory look like in a counterinsurgency (COIN) operation? What specific role should the Western expeditionary forces should have in this fight?
What would victory look like? It doesn’t look like victory in a conventional military campaign. Insurgency is much like a disease. It has very negative symptoms that affect the whole of society. Victory in COIN is a lot less like military victory and a lot more like recovering from a disease. If you think about the last time you were sick, you may not able to get out of bed, you had to take medicine, you couldn’t do the things you wanted to do, but gradually you got stronger and you were able to do more. You might have continued to take antibiotics for a few weeks until you were completely better, but basically, sooner or later, you forgot that you were sick.
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