Closing the Security Gap: Building Irregular Security Forces (Art of War Papers series) - Softcover

Gunther, Michael J; Combat Studies Institute Press

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1782663479 ISBN 13: 9781782663478

Publisher: Military Bookshop, 2013

Synopsis

The British and US experience with the use of local, irregular security forces suggest their importance in assisting the host nation government and counterinsurgent forces. Their successful establishment, training, and employment demonstrate the importance of several prerequisites including partnership with an advisory force, consent of the host nation's government to exist, and that the security force is accountable to the local civil authority. Without these prerequisites, the local, irregular security force could risk illegitimacy in the eyes of the populace, the host nation government, and the counterinsurgent. However, partnership does not guarantee a local irregular force's success. The host nation's involvement in the decision to build irregular forces is important from the beginning of the campaign. Through the examination of archival research and primary source interviews associated with the British experience in North-West Frontier and the Dhofar region of Oman, one can start to understand the prerequisites needed to create a successful mentorship force. The paper examines the method of partnership, selection and traits of the advisors, and the host nation government's role in building the Punjab Irregular Forces and Frontier Corps in North-West Frontier in India, the firqat in Dhofar, and the Sons of Iraq. Illustrated.

About this title

About the Author

Daniel Marston is Professor of Military Studies in the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University. He is also the Principal of the Military and Defence Studies Program at the Australian Command and Staff College in Canberra, Australia. He has also been a Visiting Fellow with the Oxford Leverhulme Programme on the Changing Character of War. His first book Phoenix from the Ashes, an in-depth assessment of how the British/Indian Army turned defeat into victory in the Burma campaign of the Second World War, won the Field Marshal Templer Medal Book Prize in 2003. He completed his doctorate in the history of war at Balliol College, Oxford, and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Edition details

• Publisher: Military Bookshop
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1782663479
• ISBN 13: 9781782663478
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 142