This study uses a comparative analysis of the Malayan Emergency, the American experience in Vietnam, and Operation IRAQI FREEDOM to examine the role and effectiveness of artillery units in complex counterinsurgency environments. Through this analysis, four factors emerge which impact the employment of artillery units: the counterinsurgency effort's requirement for indirect fires; constraints and limitations on indirect fires; the counterinsurgency effort's force organization; and the conversion cost of nonstandard roles for artillery units. In conclusion, the study offers five broadly descriptive fundamentals for employing artillery units in a counterinsurgency environment: invest in tactical leadership, exploit lessons learned, support the operational approach and strategic framework, maintain pragmatic fire support capability, and minimize collateral damage. Finally, the study examines the role of education for leaders in a counterinsurgency, and its influence on these imperative fundamentals.

A collection of essays profiling: Alexander the Great; Ghenghis Khan; Napoleon Bonaparte; Horatio Nelson; John J. Pershing; Erwin Rommell; Curtis LeMay.From the foreword: "In selecting the seven great commanders presented in this volume, the contributors sought to cover a wide spectrum of military endeavor, encompassing a very broad time-frame, different nationalities and cultures, and representatives from ground, sea, and air warfare. The commanders selected were masters of warfare in their particular time and environment. Each capitalized upon the social, political, economic, and technological conditions of his day to forge successful military forcees and win significant and noteworthy victories that profoundly altered the world in which he lived."

From the foreword: ""The Drillmaster of Valley Forge"-Baron Von Steuben-correctly noted in his "Blue Book" how physical conditioning and health (which he found woefully missing when he joined Washington's camp) would always be directly linked to individual and unit discipline, courage in the fight, and victory on the battlefield. That remains true today. Even an amateur historian, choosing any study on the performance of units in combat, quickly discovers how the levels of conditioning and physical performance of Soldiers is directly proportional to success or failure in the field. In this monograph, Dr. Whitfield "Chip" East provides a pragmatic history of physical readiness training in our Army. He tells us we initially mirrored the professional Armies of Europe as they prepared their forces for war on the continent. Then he introduces us to some master trainers, and shows us how they initiated an American brand of physical conditioning when our forces were found lacking in the early wars of the last century. Finally, he shows us how we have and must incorporate science (even when there exists considerable debate ) to contribute to what we do-and how we do it-in shaping today's Army. Dr. East provides the history, the analysis, and the pragmatism, and all of it is geared to understanding how our Army has and must train Soldiers for the physical demands of combat."

From the foreword: "The present volume, Vanguard of Valor II, offers six accounts of US Soldiers at the tip of the spear during the Afghan campaign. The Combat Studies Institute's Vanguard of Valor series is intended to document small unit actions in Afghanistan. These books play an equally important role by offering insights to Soldiers who may find themselves in the years ahead under similar conditions, whether in Afghanistan or in some other troubled land where they have been deployed to conduct the dangerous business of defending the national interest in a theater of war."

Prepared by the Afghan Study Team of the Combat Studies Institure, U.S. Army, From the foreword by Genral (ret.) David Petraeus: "In 2010, as the scale and tempo of Coalition operations in Afghanistan increased, so did the need for historical accounts of small-unit actions. As commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), I commissioned the Combat Studies Institute to research and write the cases collected in this volume and in those that will follow. By capturing key insights from both lethal and non-lethal operations, I hoped these accounts would be of immediate utility to sergeants and lieutenants at the center of future operations. The eight actions described in these pages take the reader through a wide range of platoon-level operations, from an intense firefight near Kandahar to an intricate civic action project in Kunar Province. Drawing from dozens of Soldier interviews, these accounts vividly depict the actions themselves and offer critical insights of greatest benefit to the small-unit actions leaders of today and tomorrow. The US Army always has prided itself as an institution of constant learning, strongly committed to drawing lessons from its past. This volume from the Combat Studies Institute is an excellent example of that long and honorable tradition. I hope that you will find the actions n Vanguard of Valor to be both instructive and compelling. I am sure that you will find them to be inspirational."

Full color maps and illustrations throughout.

This work is the continuation and revision of a project started in 2006 with the publication of In Contact by the Combat Studies Institute. The original concept was to present a series of military vignettes in a style similar to the widely used case-study methodology commonly found in military literature. The final version of Between the Rivers, instead of following this strict case-study format, presents combat action vignettes as narrative accounts of the various types of actions challenging combat leaders in Iraq in 2003-2005.

Historians tend to agree that Ramon Magsaysay's leadership and his relationship with Edward Lansdale are two of the most important features of the Philippine governments campaign against the Huks from 1946-1954. Yet the nuances of his leadership and the nature of their relationship deserve greater investigation. This thesis seeks to further illuminate Magsaysay and Lansdale's relationship by focusing on the role of empathy and sociocultural understanding, in defeating the Huks and restoring the Philippine government's legitimacy. US policy in the Philippines at the time, bolstered regimes riddled with corruption, graft, and nepotism, reinforcing poor governance, and resulting in a loss of government legitimacy. This energized the Huk movement until they were on the verge of toppling the government. A change in US policy coincided with the emergence of Magsaysay and Lansdale. They reversed Huk momentum, rejuvenated the demoralized and oppressive armed forces, and restored the Philippine government's legitimacy, all in less than four years. Their shared, genuine empathy for the Filipino people fostered deep sociocultural understanding. Their combined capabilities and resources then translated empathy and sociocultural understanding into concrete measures to combat the Huks and rebuild popular support for the government.

In the years after invading Iraq and Afghanistan, the US military realized that it had a problem: How does a military force set the economic conditions for security success? This problem was certainly not novel-the military had confronted it before in such diverse locations as Grenada, Haiti, Bosnia, and Kosovo. The scale and complexity of the problem, however, were unlike anything military planners had confronted beforehand. This was especially the case in Iraq, where some commentators expected oil production to drive reconstruction.1 When the fragile state of Iraq's infrastructure and a rapidly deteriorating security situation prevented this from happening, the problem became even more vexing: Should a military force focus on security first, or the economy? How can it do both? This is the challenge of Stability Economics.

The United States failed in both Lebanon in 1982-1984 and Iraq in 2003, to achieve its political objectives. While there are many reasons for this, perhaps the greatest is that the government failed to coordinate and direct all of its resources in a unified manner to achieve its goals. This book outlines four key indicators, present in both Lebanon and Iraq, that suggest the United States did not have a grand strategy. Further, this book reveals that Lebanon and Iraq are not anomalies; there are both historical and structural reasons why the United States struggles to implement grand strategies.