Un-Winnable Wars

By Jesse R. Stewart

The only pain that exceeds the loss in war, is realizing the "Hard-fought Wisdom" accumulated during battles fought, remained left behind in the ashes of defeat. 

Society in mass is experiencing pandemic levels of an "inability to deal with discomfort and struggle," after loss and/or setback on all levels. However, this mentality has been rampant across history, especially when recording critical information, lessons, and knowledge from unconventional warfare. These essential lessons could not only save a future generation but guide policies to prevent future conflict in the first place.

 

In history, "Unconventional" warriors rise up to "Counter the Insurgency" often against great odds with limited funding, minimal leadership (with knowledge of tactics), and minimal support from the established "Conventional" leadership generally resisting change. This book is an attempt to connect the author's experience while (at first unknowingly) commanding in a Counterinsurgency War, together with the research, understanding, and application developed in the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff College's "Art of War" Fellowship Program. Analysis of the following attempts the connection:

 

• Past wars (up to Iraq and Afghanistan) and historical "unconventional" units from various countries.
• The origin, development, and "codification" of U.S. Special Forces and the Civilian Irregular Defense Group during Vietnam.  
• The research of hundreds of historical case studies and in-person oral history interviews regarding Counterinsurgency.

 

The resulting knowledge in this book, along with other recent studies on unconventional conflict extends beyond the battlefield and military. J.J. Thomas (Olympic Medalist) and Lucas Foster, U.S. Professional Snowboarders, highlight the similarities of mindset and application to that of the U.S. military (especially Special Operations Forces) based on recent connections to veterans. Their contributions to this book in "developing, collaborating, and delivering this 'Hard-fought Wisdom'" increases the chance to keep the knowledge relevant, alive, and not forgotten. That contribution is significant for two reasons:  

• First, make the knowledge available for anyone in need of a "third-door" or "unconventional" solution to various situations and people, therefore offering relief to the often concern of a U.S. "Civilian-Military" divide. 
• Second, mitigate the need for another 26-year old Company Commander during counterinsurgency operations to lose 14 Rangers in a six-month period, only to realize the knowledge and answers to fight this type of battle was there all along. Still, the wisdom was rarely documented, available, or acknowledged by those who write history. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: AM300 Solutions, LLC
• Release date: Sep 11, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393720027

Book preview

UN-WINNABLE WARS

FINDING VICTORY IN THE ASHES OF DEFEAT

––––––––

JESSE R. STEWART

FOREWORD AND CONTRIBUTIONS BY

GENERAL STANLEY A. MCCHRYSTAL,

US ARMY (RETIRED)

J. J. THOMAS, 2002 OLYMPIC MEDALIST

LUCAS FOSTER, US PRO SNOWBOARDER

UN-WINNABLE WARS

FINDING VICTORY IN THE ASHES OF DEFEAT

Copyright © 2020 AM300 Solutions, LLC

All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Elite Online Publishing is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity. In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers; however, the story, the experiences, and the words are the author’s alone. The conversations in the book all come from the author’s recollections, not word-for-word transcripts. All of the events in this memoir are true to the best of the author’s memory. The views expressed in this book are solely those of the author.

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www.am300.com

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Printed in the United States of America

DEDICATION

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This book is dedicated to all the people suffering right now during the absolute uncertain times of a global pandemic, riots, and a political divide threatening civil war in the United States. Many around the world are suffering because the Hard-fought Wisdom to get through struggles such as these times were kept hidden, never documented, or simply ignored.

This book was written to show that someone cares and wants to share historical examples of Hard-fought Wisdom that are found in the lowest of ashes of defeat, the Vietnam War.

In a period of multiple problems manifesting at a single point of time, our perception of others working just as hard to solve another problem might be distorted. I am less concerned with finding who is to blame with where we are and more concerned with finding the path back to exceptionalism.

Not just for America, but for anyone willing to attack obstacles in the way of life rather than spend all efforts avoiding them. Those obstacles provide opportunities for growth and the ability to creatively think our way through difficult situations. As Ryan Holiday put it, The Obstacle is the Way.

Rangers Lead the Way!

To those that support the Pre-order The Phoenix Project: Hard-fought Wisdom to Win from the link www.am300phoenix.com (due for publication in January 2021) will receive a signed print edition of Un-Winnable Wars as a gift.

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WWW.AM300PHOENIX.COM

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DEDICATION

FOREWORD

By Stanley McChrystal – General, U.S. Army (Retired)

PROLOGUE

By JJ Thomas

INTRODUCTION

ACRONYMS

ILLUSTRATIONS

CHAPTER 1  WHAT IS COUNTERING THE INSURGENCY?

CHAPTER 2  COUNTERINSURGENCY THEORISTS

CHAPTER 3  THE VIETNAM CAMPAIGN

CHAPTER 4  ORIGINS OF UNITED STATES  SPECIAL FORCES

CHAPTER 5  SPECIAL FORCES IN VIETNAM

CHAPTER 6  CONCLUSION

AFTERWORD

By Lucas Foster – US Professional Snowboarder

INTRODUCTION TO THE PHOENIX PROJECT

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

BIBLIOGRAPHY

FOREWORD

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By Stanley McChrystal – General, U.S. Army (Retired)

Former Commander of US and ISAF Forces Afghanistan – Former Commander of Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) – 10th Colonel of the 75th Ranger Regiment

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 inaugurated the Global War on Terror and introduced to the American vocabulary a number of new terms and places. Among these was of course Al Qaeda, the Taliban, bin Laden, Zarqawi. Policymakers, the military, and the public often deemed the answer to these broad threats to be counterterrorism, a popular though necessarily broad term that mostly conjured images of direct, violent offensive strikes against an irregular enemy.

But as the United States and our allies found in Afghanistan and Iraq, our wars there ultimately required not just operations against enemy fighters, but more tedious, complex, wide-ranging struggles for the support of the population against roiling insurgencies. In America’s first wars of the twenty-first century, the emergence of new technologies transformed our ability to conduct operations against terrorist and insurgent networks.

But at the heart of our global fight still remained the imperative to obtain the support of the people in countries that our enemy sought to contest. Here, technology mattered less than the ingenuity and patience exhibited by successful counterinsurgents for the past hundred and fifty years. In spite of this history, we did not immediately grasp—and, even then, never fully agreed—that the allegiance or support of Iraqis and Afghans was our ultimate objective. This conclusion did not negate the need for specialized units designed at counterterrorism, but rather demonstrated anew that our strategy needed to harmonize offensive targeting of the enemy with complimentary efforts to secure and win the trust of locals.

Striking such a balance can be elusive and, as Major Jesse Stewart’s study shows, hardly a new challenge. Major Stewart has found a valuable lens—the United States Special Forces in Vietnam—through which to explore the recurring tension between using our military to engage the enemy or engage the population. While each counterinsurgency confronts a unique confluence of politics, economics, ideology, culture, and history, the Vietnam experience provides particularly relevant insights into how securing the population is ultimately the key to success.

Major Stewart shows well how in Vietnam, the mission of the newly created U.S. Special Forces—known colloquially as Green Berets—began as one to secure and win over the allegiance of the population but, in time, Special Forces and the Vietnamese troops they had raised and trained were inappropriately diverted for ‘direct action’ missions. He argues this diversion ultimately led to the failure of the Civilian Irregular Defense Program.

The tension over how to employ specialized units—whether to use them to target enemies, or to grow indigenous forces as a bulwark against insurgencies and as a means to understand the populations—resurfaced in both Iraq and Afghanistan. For some of the fundamental reasons, this interplay will surely reappear in the years ahead: To citizens and policymakers who seek to understand complex wars fought in distant countries, the long-term, nuanced efforts to win over populations can be frustratingly slow and opaque.

Meanwhile, offensive operations against the enemy are easy to recognize and their quantifiable tactical impact—even when it is palliative or, worse, counterproductive—can be alluring. The same sentiment is easy to feel on the ground: To confront an insurgency is to fight wraiths, the only evidence of their existence the IED buried in the night. For soldiers, pursuing the enemy in search of decisive engagements can be far more satisfying than the tricky—and frequently more dangerous—work of defending an often-skeptical population and working to secure its trust.

The lessons from Major Stewart’s study provide a solid foundation for considering the challenges we will clearly face in the years ahead. Our need to understand and work with people—from Southeast Asia to Africa to Latin America—will only grow in the decades ahead. Striking a harmonic balance between engaging threats and making populations secure against them begins long before the outbreak of violence.

Major Stewart’s study reminds us that in training the next generations of our military, we must ensure our officer and enlisted corps understand how to conduct raids and kinetic operations, but also know that such missions often cannot bring complete success. Languages, cultural acuity, and patience are, perhaps, the warrior’s best tools.

Stanley A. McChrystal

U.S. Army General, Retired

PROLOGUE

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By JJ Thomas

2002 Olympic Bronze Medalist, US Snowboard (Super Halfpipe) – X Games Gold Medalist (Super Halfpipe) – Coach to 2018 Olympic Gold Medalist (Super Halfpipe), Shaun White

In late 2018, Lucas Foster - one of my rookies on the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Halfpipe Team, told me about this 38-year-old retired Army Ranger he was working with named Jesse Stewart. Lucas and his teammate, Jason Wolle, had already done a couple of visits with him at military bases, Veterans Affairs hospitals, and the Olympic Training Center.

I watched Jesse’s TEDx talk, The Phoenix Project, connected on a deep level with it, and welcomed him to come out to a Revolution Tour event at Copper Mountain, Colorado. Little did I know that day in 2018 that just two years later, I would be authoring the Prologue for a book with him, connecting my journey as a Professional Snowboarder to that of U.S. Military Special Operations and Unconventional Warfare.

That connection was difficult to find but came to light at another International Snowboard event in early 2019, also at Copper Mountain. Jesse and I were at the top of the halfpipe watching our team compete when I asked him, Jesse, where is the connection? As I was getting an Olympic medal to hang on my shoulders, you were having a Ranger Tab put on yours. How did we end up here?

Jesse looked at me, confused – perhaps because I didn’t already get it – and told me that the similarities are striking. He went on to describe an Army Ranger air assault mission and the snowboard halfpipe competition in a quick and fluid manner:   

"Rangers come in hot on a helicopter to the target; U.S. Snowboarders execute a death drop into a curved skating rink with walls 22-feet high. Rangers move with speed, precision, and stealth to the breach point; you do your first trick to set the stage.

Next comes the explosive breach with a big bang; you nail a monster second hit with authority. Then comes our firefight; likely comes your super big air. We search the target for follow-on intelligence for the next mission; you do a clean-up hit. Then we take off in the helicopter; you exit the halfpipe."   

He and I smiled as we turned back to watch Lucas Foster and Jason Wolle land runs in the halfpipe with authority and worthy of a podium position at the upcoming World Cup. He then simply said, Basically, we are the same breed. We match each other’s crazy.

The connection suddenly became clear. And getting to know Jesse and his Phoenix Project concept over the past two years has provided clarity that has been nothing short of fascinating.

Through his work with me and my athletes (to include hosting us at Veterans Affairs hospitals and military bases) and learning about his counterinsurgency and unconventional warfare experiences, I realized just how similar are our paths were.

Jesse brings a unique perspective that spreads beyond the athletes he influences. His past as an operator (or athlete) in the ground war gives him the respect of the Team athletes. His training capacity (or coaching) as a Ranger Company Commander in Task Force 300 allows him to connect with the coaching staff.

Given he was unable to progress the senior ranks of the military (after wounds sustained multiple times in combat and an unexpected medical retirement at a 100% disability rating), he brought in his senior mentors. They worked with the U.S. Ski and Snowboard’s Center of Excellence (retired Army General and current President of the University of South Carolina, Robert Caslen) to provide a connection with the executive staff and senior leadership.

One of the biggest challenges in professional sports is the inherent disconnect between athletes, coaches, and management. Although it is not as prevalent in the Snowboard Community, the potential for disruption is always present. This disconnect spreads across all levels of sports organizations; athletes, agents, players’ unions, owners’ groups, and everyone in between.

I am in a unique position at U.S. Ski and Snowboard in that I am one of the few coaches that were fortunate enough to have the opportunity to compete in the ultimate stage; the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. Thanks to the team behind me, years of training, and sacrifices made at every turn (to include my family), my performance in the Winter Games