Mission Revolution

by Taw, Jennifer Morrison

• ISBN13: 9780231153249
• ISBN10: 0231153244
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-09-30
• Publisher: Columbia Univ Pr

Summary

Defined as operations other than war, stability operations can include peacekeeping activities, population control, and antidrug efforts, and for the entire history of the United States military, they have been considered a dangerous distraction if not an outright drain on combat resources. Yet in 2005, the U.S. Department of Defense reversed its stance on these practices, a dramatic shift in the mission of the armed forces and their role in foreign and domestic affairs. With the elevation of stability and support operations, the job of the American armed forces is no longer just to win battles but to create a controlled, nonviolent space for political negotiations and accord. Yet rather than produce revolutionary outcomes, stability operations have resulted in a large-scale mission creep with harmful practical and strategic consequences. Jennifer Morrison Taw examines the military's sudden embrace of stability operations and their implications for American foreign policy and war. Through a detailed examination of deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, changes in U.S. military doctrine, adaptations in force preparation, and the political dynamics behind this new stance, Taw connects the preference for stability operations to the far-reaching, overly ambitious American preoccupation with managing international stability. She also shows how domestic politics have reduced civilian agencies' capabilities while fostering an unhealthy overreliance on the military. Introducing new concepts such as securitized instability and institutional privileging, Taw builds a framework for understanding and analyzing this expansion of the responsibilities of the American armed forces in an ever-changing security landscape.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. ix
List of Abbreviations	p. xi
Introduction. Mission Creep Writ Large: The U.S. Military's Embrace of Stability Operations	p. 1
Stability Operations in Context	p. 7
Denning Stability Operations	p. 7
The History of Stability Operations	p. 11
Stability Operations Debates	p. 25
Stability Operations: Unique Requirements	p. 31
Conclusion	p. 35
Doctrine and Stability Operations	p. 39
Stability Operations' Doctrinal Development	p. 40
Stability Operations in Post-Cold War Doctrine	p. 47
Stability Operations in Doctrine Today	p. 52
Full-Spectrum Operations	p. 56
FM 3-24, Counterinsurgency; and FM 3-07, Stability Operations	p. 59
A Brief Observation: SOF and Stability Operations Doctrine	p. 65
Conclusion	p. 67
Practical Adjustments to Achieve Doctrinal Requirements	p. 71
Force Structure	p. 73
Training and Education	p. 86
Procurement	p. 100
Stability Operations' Equipment Requirements	p. 102
Conclusion	p. 106
Explaining the Military's Mission Revolution	p. 109
Securitized Instability	p. 115
Institutional Privileging	p. 124
The Military's Embrace of Stability Operations	p. 130
Implications of Mission Revolution	p. 141
Peacetime Extension: GCCs	p. 145
Fill-the-Gap Operations: Iraq and Afghanistan	p. 153
COIN: A Microcosm	p. 173
Conclusion	p. 175
A New World Order?	p. 179
Notes	p. 189
Bibliography	p. 225
Index	p. 249
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