Steven Metz

This study approaches insurgency as a form of strategy, comprising of three waves: The first running from the 1920s -1990s and dominated by Maoist "people's war" and its variants, the second running from the 1990s to the present and characterized by reliance on terrorism, the merging of insurgency and crime and increased transnationalization. The third wave, currently in its early stages, is characterized by increased innovation by insurgents in response to technological, political, strategic and informational trends. Steven Metz identifies various aspects of the third wave of insurgency including increasing transnationalization, new extremist ideologies, network-and-node organizational forms, and crucially the integration of new technology. While the third wave is still in its early stages, this book proposes a range of alternative new insurgency strategies and predicts which will gain prominence in the future.

This study approaches insurgency as a form of strategy, comprising of three waves: The first running from the 1920s -1990s and dominated by Maoist "people's war" and its variants, the second running from the 1990s to the present and characterized by reliance on terrorism, the merging of insurgency and crime and increased transnationalization. The third wave, currently in its early stages, is characterized by increased innovation by insurgents in response to technological, political, strategic and informational trends. Steven Metz identifies various aspects of the third wave of insurgency including increasing transnationalization, new extremist ideologies, network-and-node organizational forms, and crucially the integration of new technology. While the third wave is still in its early stages, this book proposes a range of alternative new insurgency strategies and predicts which will gain prominence in the future.

U.S. military strategy is undergoing its most serious examination since the end of the Cold War. Led by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, this process is designed to assess every dimension of the strategy, including its most basic assumptions and concepts. For the first time in over a decade, everything about U.S. military strategy is subject to question. One of the most important elements of U.S. military strategy for the past ten years has been the belief that a force able to fight two nearly simultaneous major theater wars (MTW) of the DESERT STORM type would be capable of dealing with the full gamut of security challenges that the United States is likely to face. Now nearly every expert on U.S. military strategy agrees that this force shaping paradigm needs a relook.

Since 1995, peace operations in the Balkans have been an important part of the Army's contribution to U.S. national security. When these operations began, the Army institutionally focused on conventional warfighting. Since then, it has made significant changes to become more effective at peace operations, but this evolution continues. The goals that led the United States into the Balkans have not yet been fully realized. To meet them requires both sustained involvement in the region and continued refinement of the Army's peace operations capabilities. In this report, Dr. Steven Metz examines U.S. strategy in the Balkans and the Army's role in it. He recommends continued U.S. involvement, consideration of a long-term American military presence in the region, and some significant changes in the role of the Army. From a broader perspective, Dr. Metz argues that, if U.S. political leaders decide that involvement in protracted peace operations will be an enduring part of American strategy...

In war, there are always differences between the opponents. At times these are insignificant, passing disparities with no bearing on the outcome. At other times, the differences between opponents are important, placing one in a position of advantage, the other at a disadvantage. This is a very simple observation, but from it flows one of the pressing issues faced by the United States today: strategic asymmetry. Strategic asymmetry is the use of some sort of difference to gain an advantage over an adversary. It is an idea as old as warfare itself, appearing under a number of guises. Among strategic theorists, Sun Tzu placed great stock in psychological and informational asymmetry, writing that: All warfare is based on deception. When confronted with an enemy one should offer the enemy a bait to lure him; feign disorder and strike him. When he concentrates, prepare against him; where he is strong. avoid him.

The great difficulty in forecasting the future strategic environment and the force structure needed in response is the plethora of variables that change the calculus. Only hindsight reveals the failure of a Maginot Line or the brilliant success of a mechanized Blitzkrieg doctrine. In the final analysis, the reader must judge the line of reasoning. In this monograph, Dr. Steven Metz and Lieutenant Colonel Raymond Millen examine the trends in the strategic environment in their development of the Future War/Future Battlespace. One fact is clear. Traditional warfighting has changed in the post 9-11 era. The U.S. military must adapt or fail. There is no other recourse. Dr. Metz and LTC Millen have superbly framed the strategic environment into four strategic battlespaces and have examined the ways future adversaries will operate within them to thwart U.S. strategic initiatives.

During the past 5 years, American strategy has undergone a sea change, shifting from a focus on the conventional military forces of rogue or rising states to irregular challenges associated with the "long war" against transnational jihadism. Much of the new thinking has resulted from the conflict in Iraq. One result of this has been an attempt to relearn counterinsurgency by the U.S. military. While the involvement of the United States in counterinsurgency has a long history, it had faded in importance in the years following the end of the Cold War. When American forces first confronted it in Iraq, they were not fully prepared. Since then, the U.S. military and other government agencies have expended much effort to refine their counterinsurgency capabilities. But have they done enough?

The U.S. military and national security community lost interest in insurgency after the end of the Cold War. Other defense issues such as multinational peacekeeping and transformation seemed more pressing and thus attracted the most attention. But with the onset of the Global War on Terror in 2001 and the ensuing involvement of the U.S. military in counterinsurgency support in Iraq and Afghanistan, insurgency experienced renewed concern in both the defense and intelligence communities. In this monograph, Dr. Steven Metz, who has been writing on insurgency and counterinsurgency for more than 2 decades, argues that this relearning process, while exceptionally important, emphasized the wrong thing, focusing on Cold War era nationalistic insurgencies rather than the complex conflicts which characterized the post-Cold War security environment. To be successful at counterinsurgency, he contends, the U.S. military and defense community must rethink insurgency.