The Best quote about the failure of COIN I have read so far comes from Ralph Peters in a piece today in the New York Post.
But the simple fact the wise men missed was that killing terrorists works, while trying to buy the love of their fan base doesn’t.
At some point, probably another 20 years into the future when the US has sunk to second rate status we are going to look back and realize the collapse came not only because of economics but also because we forgot that war is about fighting, dying, and killing and that the US spent years and thousands of loves pursuing failed policies when all we really needed to do was concentrate on killing bad guys wherever they are at.
COIN is a failure because it is a strategy that ignores reality in pursuit of fantasy. Â Anyone who doubts this should take the time to read FM 3-24, The Counterinsurgency Bible.