ISAF – COIN APPENDIX 2 – Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Warfare: Definitions, Political Nature, 5 False Expectations, Necessity, & Lessons from Vietnam & Iraq for Afghanistan

In blog ‘#31 BACKGROUND – COIN Warfare & the ISAF’s COIN Strategy: Battle for the Majority Population’, I briefly outlined the central theoretical doctrine and most important principles of Counter-Insurgency (COIN) warfare. This appendix will present a fuller overview of counter-insurgency, by providing various definitions of COIN, the nature of COIN warfare to quell an insurgency, and – most importantly perhaps – addressing five false expectations of COIN war in the modern era, which continue to frustrate national and international efforts to defeat dangerous and destabilising insurgencies in nations around the world today.

ISAF – COIN APPENDIX 3 – 9 COIN Characteristics: Conventional vs. COIN War

This appendix will outline nine of the most important characteristics of COIN war and contrast them with traditional war, in order to better demonstrate the differences and complexity of Counter-Insurgency (COIN) warfare in comparison with conventional warfare, as referred to in the previous blog ‘ISAF APPENDIX 2 – Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Warfare: Definitions, Political Nature & 5 False Expectations’. These nine characteristics include: (1) the basic nature of the war; (2) aim of the war;
(3) focus of the war; (4) traditional or non-traditional objectives and operations; (5) the role of armed forces in the war; (6) the role of military technology in the war; (7) defining and measuring “success” in the war; (8) the final “end point” in the war; and lastly, (9) the duration of the war campaign.