Irregular Warfare Podcast - Counterinsurgency in the Philippines: An Inside Look at Partner Warfare

Episode Date: October 9, 2020

This episode is a deep dive into insurgency and counterinsurgency in the Philippines, presented through the perspectives of two guests with many years of experience in Philippine counterinsurgency efforts. Dr. Joe Felter and retired Col. Dennis Eclarin discuss the history and evolution of insurgency and counterinsurgency in the Philippines, with a focus on US support to building effective counterinsurgency forces in both the pre- and post- 9/11 eras. Based on shared operational perspectives and collaboration on research—specifically an extensive micro-conflict database—they describe what makes COIN forces effective. They then discuss the implications of their lessons learned for counterinsurgency and security efforts around the world.

The lessons that we learn from studying insurgency, counterinsurgency, the hypothesis we can test with the kind of quality data that this is an example of, it's going to be relevant. We can't just wish away the threat. Even in an era of great power competition. But the greatest challenge is rallying people to embrace an idea, which I think is the hardest part that any special forces officer, especially in host nations, would have to contend with. Welcome to Episode 11 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast. I am Shauna Sinnott, and I will be your host today, along with Nick Lopez. Today's episode is a deep dive into insurgency and counterinsurgency efforts in the Philippines, presented through the perspectives of both a Philippines Armed Forces officer and a U.S. Special Forces advisor,

each of whom has decades of experience in Philippine counterinsurgency efforts. We start today's episode with an introduction to the history and evolution of insurgency and counterinsurgency in the Philippines, with a focus on U.S. support to building effective counterinsurgency forces in both the pre- and post-911 eras. Based on shared operational perspectives and collaboration on research, specifically an extensive microconflict database, our guests discuss what makes coin forces effective. They then discuss the implications of their lessons learned for coin and security forces around the world. Dr. Joe Felter is a William J. Perry Fellow at Sanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation and a Research Fellow at the

Hoover Institution. From 2017 to 2019, Dr. Felter served as U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania. He is the co-director of the Empirical Studies of Conflict Project and the co-author of Small Wars, Big Data, The Information Revolution, and Modern Conflict. Dr. Felter retired as a colonel from the U.S. Army's Special Forces. Dennis McLaren is a retired colonel in the Republic.S. Army Special Forces. Dennis Aclarin is a retired colonel in the Republic of the Philippines Scout Ranger Regiment. After decades serving in elite combat roles, Colonel Aclarin directed the Training Development Center of the Philippine Army's Training and Doctrine Command, where he played a lead role in analyzing data and implementing

the findings of the empirical studies of conflict projects efforts in the Philippines. Colonel Aclarin is the author of several books on Philippine insurgency and counterinsurgency forces, including Scout Ranger War Stories and Philippine Rebel Stories. You are listening to the Irregular Warfare Podcast, a joint production of the Princeton Empirical Studies of Conflict Project and the Modern War Institute at West Point, dedicated to bridging the gap between scholars and practitioners to support the community of irregular warfare professionals. Here is our conversation with Joe and Dennis. Joe, Dennis, thank you for being here today.

We've really been looking forward to this discussion, and I know it's also a great reunion for the two of you. Thanks, Sean and Nick, and thanks for all you're doing. This is a great initiative, and it's just really great to be part of it. Thank you. Thank you. Happy to help. So Joe, to start with you, the breadth of your experience working Philippine counterinsurgency efforts has spanned your career. You've served as a special forces team leader. You've built counterterrorism forces from the ground up. You've been the senior

military attache and eventually served at the policy level as a DASD. In addition to the academic research that you've done to study Philippine counterinsurgency, how do you distill decades of historical and political context in a manner that helps us understand how we should approach Philippine security issues? Yeah, sure. Fortunately for researchers in those studying insurgency, the Philippines is just a very rich case.

Now, the downside is, you know, the Philippines has suffered and endured long-running insurgencies for literally for centuries. But you think about it, they have very suffered and endured long-running insurgencies for literally for centuries. But you think about they have very separate and distinct long-running insurgencies. The separatist challenges there literally began when, I would say, when Magellan showed up back in the 1500s and said, hey, what do you think about Christianity? And some of the Filipinos didn't take so kindly to that. And there have been groups, certainly down in the southern Philippines, the island of Mindanao, that have been struggling to have their own form of Muslim identity and avoid assimilation into a very Christian state. Then you've got a long-running communist insurgency,

maybe early roots in the Huk Rebellion, but certainly in the late 60s with the New People's Army, the Communist People's Party. So long-running communist insurgency. And then you've got what I would call maybe bundle of extremist groups. Obviously, F Group, for example, and more recently, ISIS, which we saw some of the devastating activities of ISIS done on morality in the Southern Philippines. Then you've got these criminal groups, and then you've got a lot of gray areas. One day someone might identify as obviously F group,

the next day they might be more as a separatist, as a MILF, for example. So long-running insurgencies in the Philippines with very separate and distinct motives really provide us an opportunity to study so much about the Philippines. So Dennis, given what you've experienced in your decades as a scout ranger, when did the coordinated military response to insurgency in the Philippines begin? Is this something that's manifested in the post 9-11 era? Or did it start earlier? Yeah, yeah, much, much earlier, because the insurgency here has been multi-generational. 1950s to 1957, that was the height of the Hukbalahap rebellion. And then we quashed that. And starting 1969, that was like

the second wave of insurgency here with the separatists and the insurgents, communist insurgents. And since then, we are in our 51st year of solid counterinsurgency here in the Philippines. Well, given that, would you characterize the counterinsurgency strategy as being very military heavy or as having more of a whole of government and whole of society approach? Yeah, we've tried very hard to involve the entire society to help in the counterinsurgency. But during the early stages of the insurgency, not too many were willing to help because they were directly threatened by the rebels. Local officials would not cooperate because if they cooperated, their family members would get killed. Village leaders would not cooperate for the same reasons. NGOs would not help.

So for at least two decades, the Philippine military almost had it alone doing the counterinsurgency work. But now we are starting to form coalitions with NGOs and with other government organizations. or who were like fence-seaters who did not really want to help because they would be threatened physically or their businesses would be closed or their political support will be threatened by the rebels. They're now starting to embrace the Philippine military counterinsurgency approaches. However, their support is not permanent. I mean, they could swing anytime because, again, because of the presence of the rebel threat at any time. Because when we leave, the rebels are still there. But in that way, we have been making some progress, but not as much

though. And Dennis, if I could follow up with that, when did the U.S. military start providing advisory assistance and what did that look like? Well, you will see at the Hoover Center the diaries between Colonel Lansdale and our former President Magsaysay. Colonel Lansdale was a guy who, a USMAC guy who advised President Magsaysay how to quash the Cook Rebellion in the 1950s. So regarding counterinsurgency, that was the start in the early 1950s. And then up to now, you guys are still here. And we had a war in the Philippines at the turn of the century. Some people characterize it as America's first Vietnam. So not quite an insurgency, but it's very much in the memory of the Filipinos. And many

Americans don't really appreciate that we actually fought a pretty bloody campaign in the Philippines and occupied the country and it later became our province. And that's just important history to understand for context. But American security interests were very different in that war than today. So why has the US been so invested in Philippine counterterrorism, counterinsurgency efforts over the past two decades? What are those contemporary security interests? Yeah, so I mean, that's a bigger question. And you know, I'm a friend of the Philippines, but on a number of levels, one is certain the nature of transnational terrorism, you know, if you can get safe haven in a cave in Afghanistan and plot to do us harm, you know, there's safe havens in other areas to include

the Philippines. So, you know, this is safe havens and other areas to include the Philippines. So, you know, this is a transnational threat. And so we need to be concerned about it wherever it may manifest itself or be allowed to manifest itself. But this is where, you know, I'm going to reveal my affinity for the US-Philippine relationship. You know, this is a treaty ally. This is someone who's literally gone to bat with us. I mean, you know, some of the stories back in World War II with Philippine civilians literally risking their life and losing their life to provide aid and comfort for Americans and getting killed by the Japanese because of it. But this is a long, close relationship. When I served in the Defense Department, Secretary James Mattis would say, alliances don't stay the same. They get better

or worse based on how much you invest in it. Can you explain then how that investment has manifested in the structure and application of Philippine coin forces? Sure. The special operations forces within, if you will, in the Philippines, I would say the lead members are the Philippine Army Scout Ranger Regiment, the 1st Scout Ranger Regiment. We have a special forces regiment on the army side. And then the Navy does have their equivalent of navy seals a special swag that has helped me out this special warfare operations group is that this yeah yes sir yeah so there's and then there's a some air force components but that's how it's configured and you know historically the philippine military was modeled to some degree after the u.s i mean again as a former colony and we've been

working with the philippine military for some time so structurally they did look so many ways similar to the united states military i don't think he mentioned that he's the co-founder of the Light Reaction Regiment now here, which won the Marawi siege in 2017 against the ISIS-inspired group. So that was his enduring contribution to the Philippines. So Joe, can you tell us a little bit about that? How you were involved and what was the motivation behind the project? Sure. And a lot of people were involved in this. And I had just a real privilege to work with some amazing people.

But this is going to think about this in the Philippines. 2000, we just had a major international hostage situation where several Americans were taken hostage. The Burnhams, for example, I think this was back in 2000, other international hostages and certainly Filipino hostages. But certainly, there was a heightened awareness that, wow, there's groups in the Philippines that threaten our interests. And there was a recognition that, wow, we should really work with our partner, our treaty ally, the Philippines, to help build their counterterrorist capabilities. Admittedly, while they had some good counterterrorism forces, we thought that we had an opportunity with some U.S.

training and resources, we might be able to raise the bar of Philippine counterterrorist capabilities. But this is pre-911. And Dennis, remember this, there was interest, but not nearly the overwhelming enthusiasm for developing counterterrorism forces. So we had to be a bit creative. We ended up getting the state coordinator for counterterrorism, Ambassador Mike Sheehan, who was just extraordinary, committed to provide us some initial seed money. Ended up with the Philippine Special Operations Command commander, General Dionisio Santiago, worked with him and he had some members of his staff. We got together and we literally were having a Sam Adams beer at my place in Makati talking about, hey, how can we help the Philippines build its capabilities? That's where the best problem solving happens, over Sam Adams.

Yeah, yeah. So we sketched out a plan, but then there's a whole lot of challenges getting support for it. But this one individual, we were just three mid-grade officers, Ted Yarmus, Tata Sievert, and some other Scott Rangers at the staff level that worked for General Santiago. But we came up with a plan. And again, there's a lot went into this. We got the U.S. support. We found the right place for it at the Philippine Special Operations Command. We drew from these scout rangers and the special forces and put together what was called a light reaction company. Again, this is pre-9-11, although we had hostages there. Boy, after 9-11, the interest just skyrocketed for Philippine counterterrorist capabilities. And then

eventually brought you just sort of P and other efforts to help build the capabilities. But early days, it was a handful of us, I think, recognizing that this close treaty partner, the Philippines, we had a shared interest in helping build its capabilities to interdict terrorism threats. And we worked closely together at the 1st Special Forces Battalion under Lieutenant Colonel Dave Maxwell, and Major Max Carpenter came down and just did an extraordinary job training that first cohort of this combined scout ranger special forces, the light reaction company, if you will. But, you know, I would say an interesting part of this emphasis was this wasn't about giving them high-speed gear. It wasn't about giving them MP5s and advanced communications and equipment, although that was part of it. The big emphasis,

it was on the training. Let's develop leadership and training at the small unit level. And we really wanted to commit the majority of our resources was to training. We built a shoot house up at Fort McSysi. And this light reaction company, extraordinary. They work closely together. They train closely together. And they became a really powerful extraordinary. They work close together. They train closer together. And they became a really powerful asset for the Philippine military and hence grew a bit to a regiment. Had to contend with all the same challenges that our own special forces do with quality versus quantity. But they struck that balance. So there are two things that stand out about that story to me.

The first is the interagency approach to building out the Light Reaction Company and the initial support from the State Department pre-9-11. Secondly, is that almost two decades later, the organization that you helped stand up was crucial in the fight against ISIS and the Battle of Marawi in 2017. What more can you share with us about the training that the light reaction company received? And what really made it successful, especially against ISIS in the Battle of Marawi? Yeah, sure. So I mean, you mentioned early days, and you know, I'm out of the army, I'm out of the DOD as of this year. So I could be a little more candid. I'm not exactly going to point any fingers. But I'll admit, in 2000, when we had Americans held hostage, I would have hoped that maybe our Defense Department and the military options would have been more quickly forthcoming.

But getting funds for something new, it's an understandably challenge. Then we really got an ally on the State Department side, but not to fund forever. Maybe get some seed resources in there to get it going. And certainly then the DOD stepped in big time after 9-11 and helping to stand up the Chisotof. So they recovered nicely. But those first months, I really give a lot of credit to Ambassador Sheehan and alluded to General Santiago at Philippine SOCOM. But it was a bunch of us field grade officers getting together and identifying a need

and working together and presenting it to the senior leadership in ways that they could get their head around and support both on the Philippines and the U.S. side. I think it was a real positive outcome that benefits us up to date. And Nick, shifting to your question about ISIS, it's a small unit enterprise, counterinsurgency, counterterrorism. On the counterterrorism side, when you're kicking in a door in morality in a high threat area, it comes down to the training and discipline and proficiency of that small team. And you don't just spin that up. You don't buy it.

It takes lots of training, lots of discipline, lots of focused resources. And to the Philippines credit, certainly within the light reaction regiment, that's exactly what they focused on. Dennis, how was this received by the scout rangers and by the Philippine government? I mean, this seems like some pretty substantive organizational change. And you're doing it through collaboration between two partner nations, which could have encountered a certain level of resistance. Yeah, well, I think I have to highlight the particular skill set that Special Forces Officer, you know, then Major Felter really possessed to be able to organize this thing because I think he succeeded in where some other U.S. officers or units have failed, which is to rally a certain idea, peddle it to his friends here, and then create a lasting unit out of it. I think there's some

interpersonal skill that he possessed, which I like to highlight because I don't think the light reaction regimen would have been established had he not had those close relationships. Because especially at that nascent stage where everything was still being formed and forged and the fringe and then you know just just putting it at the mainstream is the biggest challenge maintaining a unit after it is in the mainstream is really very easy because all you need is resources and putting all those mainstream people there you know doing their job but the greatest challenge which I also do especially here in the Philippines, is rallying people to embrace an idea, which I think is the hardest part that any special forces officer, especially in host nations, would have to contend with. But I imagine it's interesting, too, because in your context, there's a great motivation for wanting to find a solution because it's where you live.

This conflict is happening in your backyard. Did that affect the willingness to move forward on these initiatives? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Of course. I mean, we needed to quash the terrorist here, but I don't think it would have gotten to a good start without the assistance of Kenneth Elter and his team. Sean, I might riff on that comment a bit. Gosh, I know we've been in two decades of conflict

and seen some extraordinary hardship for our military. You get to the Philippines, you realize they literally are in combat. It's conflict their entire career. They've known nothing but. And, you know, there's this notion of low-intensity conflict, small wars, limited wars. You guys both know that there's not this notion of low intensity conflict, small wars, limited wars that you guys both know that there's nothing low intensity about a conflict when you're in it. And Dennis, he was commissioned, you're out of West Point and then going back to at a time when, you know,

it was pretty quiet days in the U S military. No one was thinking about going to war, but he always had in the back of his mind that he's going to go back and literally fight for his entire career, especially in the units he was serving. And this is to your point, Sean, about in their backyard. They've been fighting their whole career, and it's very real to them. You just can't overstate the long-term challenges and stress that the Armed Forces of the Philippines has endured

with these long-running insurgencies. And I think it's hard for the United States, maybe even in these long wars we've been in, to really appreciate what it's like to be constantly at war. We don't have tours. You guys have tours, right? We don't have tours. We get to come home, you know, take off at the Kevlar. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We count our service in five years. So first long pay, second long pay, third long pay. And it's all combat.

You're lucky if you're like, get back into headquarters. long pay, and it's all combat. You're lucky if you get back into headquarters. So yeah, that's the difference. So Dennis, one of the things I found really interesting is you started talking about the attributes of an effective counterinsurgency advisor. And one of the things that you pointed out about the then major felter was what seemed like empathy, the ability to build relationships and understand where the partner force is coming from. Are there any other attributes that you could point out that were effective or otherwise throughout your military career that you saw of advisors? Novel ideas are resisted by mainstream people. Like when you start thinking like, okay, this might work, the initial reaction is like, no, it won't work. I think one of the unsung characteristics of an

effective special forces officer, advisor in countries like this is, you know, knowing that you will encounter a lot of resistance and you are going to do your very best to conquer all those resistance. That will give you the respect of people. That's why he's still much respected up to now. He received the... Hey, sir, you got the special blah blah award during the anniversary. I did get that special blah blah award. Yeah, he was awarded for being the co-founder of the anniversary. I did get that special blah blah. Yeah. Yeah.

He was awarded for being the co-founder of the unit. I'm like, oh, see? Because I can empathize and sympathize with the challenges that one faces when you are doing something very novel. All militaries are big bureaucracies. It's hard to step out of line and be on the fringe, as Dennis described. And I would say in the Philippines, there is just a lot of pressure to conform, to fall in line with the chain of command, just like in the U.S. military. But to address threats like we're talking about today, you know, terrorism and assertiveness,

you got to think creative. You got to think out of the box. But I think the penalties for thinking out of the box may be even stiffer in the Philippines than they were in the U.S., where I felt that we were tolerated a bit, certain special operations community. There's some really incredibly forward-thinking officers there, you know, Dennis being one of them, Ted Yamos, I mentioned, who was the Light Reaction Regiment commander and others. I think institutionally, I'd like to see some of those big idea mid-grade officers become general officers. Some of them do, but there are some penalties for being on the fringe. Well, I think the additional layer here and what makes your story so compelling is that you did not stop at the operational experience. You decided to look at this through

a different lens. Together, you collaborated on a very substantive research project that sought to identify the real nuances of what makes an effective counterinsurgency force. Joe, how did this project start and what were you trying to solve? Sure. The project started for me, I was trying to get a PhD dissertation done as quickly as possible. So I need to leverage some of my field time, if you will, in the military. I ended up working with David Layton and James Fearon, who had just published a really similar article called Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War in the American Political Science Review. I think this is 2003. The piece said, hey, state capacity matters. It's not just grievances predict whether you're going to see civil wars and insurgency. Those conditions are

ubiquitous. In fact, it's really the capacities of the military and police forces of a state. So my motivation was, well, I think that small unit level characteristics can predict variation in military effectiveness and counterinsurgency. And this was kind of like my intuition, but anyway, the challenge was getting data. And this is where I was very fortunate. And Dennis mentioned some of the relationships. I went to the Philippines hoping to find a way to test this. When you came up with this idea, did you know that there was data available that you could use? No. I knew it was out there, but I didn't know if I could get it. And I'll just tell that the vignette was, and then this goes back to our West Point

connection, but I was literally invited over to the home of the chief of staff of the armed forces. General Narciso Obay was a class of 1971 West Point graduate. And I developed a relationship. And the Philippines are wonderful in many ways. One is that they really value their alumni connections. As a West Point in the Philippines, you just have this great access to this amazing group of alumni. But I was able to eat with him. And I talked to him, hey, General Biden, I'm trying to learn about Philippines, what makes units effective in counterinsurgency and the policy relevant implications are how can we develop more effective counterinsurgency forces. And I told him the types of data I needed. And he pulled out his cell phone and said, he called up his J3, his operations officers. Hey, I'm sitting here with Major

Joe Felter. He's a friend of mine. I'm going to send him over to see you tomorrow. And can you help with his research? And that's when I knew I was going to finish a dissertation. It was all or nothing. And coming up with the findings were not shocking, that high quality troops operating with good information tended to perform better on multiple dimensions and that indiscriminate actions that kill or harm civilians, they're going to undermine your ability to conduct effective counter-surge. Dennis, how did you get roped into this effort? One of his friends, his co-founder in the Light Reaction Regiment, recommended me way back, I think, 2007. And he was doing his stuff then, this study of his, which had been like three or four years in the making when we met. Yeah. And then we started working on his data set because I was then the director of the Training Development center at the training doctrine command and after that we have been working for like how many years now almost a decade yeah oh yeah yeah

i've loved working on this data set because nobody has really touched it before uh even the philippines has not really even cared looking at it so it's good that we finally even the Philippines has not really even cared looking at it. So it's good that we finally got to tabulate and study in some detail the experiences. The real big epiphany was going back with Dennis and what that four-year trove became like a 30-year trove thanks to Dennis's intervention. But this is again this is where Dennis put together a team of coders, largely a Philippine military non-commissioned officers. Because the restriction I had was we can't take this out of the headquarters, but we can code certain fields that are deemed not too sensitive. So this is where he stood up an entire coding.

I mean, these guys were working on their off-duty time, often through the night. So now we can tell the story of Philippines counterinsurgency going back to 1975 in a very granular way. Philippines counterinsurgency going back to 1975 in a very granular way. So you had this gut instinct, you had this gut instinct that, hey, small units with great leaders, with effective training, and access to local information, that's going to lead to effective results in a counterinsurgency campaign. And then you couple that with a partner nation force with locally recruited soldiers, and that's effectiveness, essentially. So I guess my first question, is that an accurate characterization of your findings? Then the second is, did anything surprise you as you started running this data set

and working with Dennis? It's always a surprise working with Dennis. But we found that when local forces worked with highly trained, highly professional cadres like the special forces, that was kind of the sweet spot. That was the efficient sweet spot where I call the cadres kind of adult supervision, if you will. Because these local forces, what they bring to the table is they know the community. They know what's going on, you know, who's saying what, who's doing what. But for a range of reasons, they may not be the most disciplined or professional or trained. But one of the findings was, and this is kind of, you know, the height of the Iraq and Afghan challenge when I wrote this initially was maybe, you know, if you're a few more likely Afghan local police and those things. But it was kind of validating this notion that let's take local forces and let's bring specially trained elite or specially trained professional cadres and combine them and that's going to be an efficient combination for effective counter-surgery. But the Philippines gave us this great opportunity to test

the capabilities and effectiveness of counter-surgery forces against different distinct rebel threats. A communist insurgent is very different than a separatist insurgent. In the case of the Philippines, let's say it was a Moro National Liberation Front rebel fighting at the height of the war in the 70s versus a communist guerrilla. When you're fighting the communists, for example, this goes back to work I did with Jake Shapiro and Ellie Berman on really how insurgent it is. It's kind of a three-player game, the rebels and the government and the civilians, and you're really kind of competing for information from the civilians. And when you're fighting the MPA, that's very much fits that model. Whereas it's in the balance, the insurgents of the local population are,

which side of the fence am I going to fall on? And your actions are very consequential as a counterinsurgeon as far as discrimination, civilian abuse, aid and services, they all kind of impact. Whereas some areas, if you're down in the Southern Philippines, maybe you're not going to get local information. So maybe your investments may be in more on the government force side where you're going to have to sadly maybe pursue more conventional means to advance your interests. Well, the findings sound significant because they appear to indicate that building partner capacity can actually improve coin outcomes. Dennis, how did these findings resonate within the Philippine Armed Forces? Is this something that was expected based on what you saw in practice? There were no surprises from the results. Because I mean, everybody knew that you really need well trained and well led, you know, units to follow through

on these rebel forces. So I think this finding really fits more and especially during the early build-up stages of an insurgency where there's like really massive recruitment massive movement of force enemy forces this this particular finding really really works but when the insurgency kind of tapers down to a level where there are not too many enemy forces and they're so ingrained in society doing revolutionary taxation. That's another level of warfare that, of course, the findings of Kennerfelter would still be applicable, but it takes a different skill set again, when you try to like really kill an insurgency that's so deep rooted, that's even more efficient than the government in taxing the people. That's the biggest challenge of quashing an insurgency. You know, and Dennis, I recall talking to some of the senior leaders, sometimes it's the findings

can help reinforce budget decisions. You know, when we know that maybe better equipment or a ship or a fighter is not necessarily going to translate into better internal security. And there's a whole lot that goes into this, but I know Dennis helped me with this, but it was able to come out and brief some of the senior officers as they try to develop, you know, where their budget priorities are. But sometimes it's kind of squishy to invest in training. I'd rather get something I can shoot. And we found this with the Light Reaction Company. And once they bought into it and they became great believers in the value of that. But there is a tendency, not just in the Philippines, but if you have a resource to spend, you want to get some pieces of equipment. But these findings really

acknowledge how important the development of the human capital kind of research is. Let me add on that, sir. Because the findings of that one, I was still in the trading and doctrine command then. Based on these findings, we really ramped up the redesign of our curriculum to put a sharper edge among our officers and enlisted personnel. focusing on subjects like military correspondence, et cetera, et cetera, and not like really the real stuff, the twin wars. So, yeah, that was one of the major contributions of this finding. It even got to the Philippine Military Academy because I also was the one that designed their curriculum. So I also inputted these findings from Colonel Felter's study. But I tell you, it was a tough crowd briefing, like the Philippine Division Commanders and

Brigade Commanders. Yeah, I knew their boss, but they were like, what's this American showing up with these academic findings telling us how to fight our wars? You know, a lot of the case studies that we have looked at, there was a major focus on tactical and operational level capability development, but a lack in institutional level advising. It seems like your research helped the institution reorient and invest in human capital. And if I'm understanding Dennis correctly from the training and doctrine

side, there were, there were some effects at the institutional level from this research project. Yep. Yeah. I'll defer to Dennis on that. That's right. Hopes. And then there were some examples of that and Dennis highlighted a few, but it project. Yep. Yeah, I'll defer to Dennis on that. That's what I'd hoped.

And then there were some examples of that, and Dennis highlighted a few, but it was... Yeah. So, well, as an offshoot of my relationship with Kenneth Felter, I got to do several documentaries of four decades of insurgency in the philippines so we got to interview around 1 500 people and the three sides of the counter of the insurgency coin i interviewed at least 500 rebels from the 1950s up to 2015 i interviewed around 500 of our key military officers from the 1950s up to now and i interviewed more or less around 500 leaders from from this uh from from the 1950s up to now and i interviewed more or less around 500 leaders from from this uh from from the society mayors governors cabinet ministers etc and tried to

you know bring this cohesive view of okay how they perceive the insurgency is was or is. And it's quite enlightening because, I mean, from the perspectives of these people, insurgency is avoidable if there's only strong government and sincerity in every public servant to run a corrupt free government, which we don't have. So, yeah. I mean, we still have that. And actually, Kenneth Felter and I are planning to donate those solid, solid interviews. I don't know how many thousands of hours to the Hoover Institute. Dennis, I'd like to follow up on your interviews with the rebel forces, because that is certainly a unique perspective

when analyzing coin effectiveness. From those interviews, what did you glean from the rebel force in terms of what they saw as effective in Filipino counterinsurgency units? Okay. From the combat perspective, they fear the the Scout Rangers. And I mean, I think the data shows that we have consistently, you know, scored against them on a much higher basis than normal infantry forces. They hated it when the counterinsurgency forces designed counterinsurgency methods that really blocked their advance as far as the evolution of their tactics is concerned. They also hated it when we also employed guides, local guides. And this is where the information thing that Kenner Felter's study points out.

Because much of our successes here, I would say when you have a guide that volunteers to guide you where the rebel camp is, 90%, 95%, you're going to figure in a violent clash because they know the terrain, they know the secret paths, etc. But the rebel forces were just laughing at ordinary units, ordinary infantry units who did not know anything about where the location was. Like, you know, these search and destroy things, you know, it never works. They never work. Without information, any patrol will never work. You will tend to get exhausted. You can be mined. It's not worth anything. It's just useless use of resources. What's very important is like precision operations led by locals.

That's the formula that we found to be very interesting, very effective. And you found that conventional forces were unable to get that local information and to get those local guides. Yes, yes. Although I would not discount, there are also excellent combat leaders in the conventional forces who, by their long association, one or two or three years in the locality, would gain friends, gain the trust of people, and start getting nice tips from friends. Dennis, I want to follow up on something that

you said that was rather fascinating, which was that rebels could not stand certain methods that counterinsurgency forces employed. Other than using local guides, what were those methods that really got to the rebels? One of the, as the data shows, many, many of the surrenders, rebel surrenders come out after really intense campaigns, intense military campaigns, like bombings, like solid coordinated, not small unit campaigns, but in the battalions and brigades. It's when you exert that intense military pressure that they cannot find food, they cannot find shelter, they're so scared. They cannot find food.

They cannot find shelter. They're so scared. And then when you start offering them a chance to walk away from the rebel movement, they do that. The data shows that. But the data also shows that during these tense times when they are contemplating and surrendering, money matters. It's when the government offers them livelihood and cash for their firearms, they would rank and file, consider leaving the movement. But what you will find interesting in our data, especially the rebel data, which we also quoted, is that not too many of their top leadership ever surrender. And the reason why

is because they're making money, so much money from the rebel movement. So that's my key finding there. So your characterization of the data and findings of this project were essentially maximum pressure involved with violence. And that coupled with opportunities for a livelihood outside of the conflict really offered opportunity to the rank and file, whether that's monetary considerations or otherwise, that's what drew them out of the insurgency. However, the caveat is that with the leadership, the top leadership, because they

really were making a livelihood out of the conflict, they never surrendered. Is that correct? Yeah. Yep. Yep. And that's where you use assassinations and all those other methods to get the top leaders. Interesting. So a leadership targeting type tactic, if you will. We'll use different words in our military, but you got to, they use their own. Leadership targeting. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever you call it.

So speaking of methods, Joe, how are these findings applicable to counterinsurgency efforts outside of the Philippines? Yeah, so given the counterinsurgency and internal security operations, it's really a local struggle, really a local enterprise. The more and better quality microdata we have, the more that that data can be relevant and the findings can be relevant to other conditions. So I'm hoping that this micro-conflict data set going back to 1975, hopefully it'll help inform and test hypotheses for a range of other cases. So yeah, I'm optimistic that it's going to be a data set that scholars can use to study many other cases of conflict around the world. So real quick, Joe, to follow up on that,

with the cyber domain and access to information expanding, do you think your findings with this data set and research will change? Yeah, that's a great question. Technology is going to be interesting. Going back to some of the joint work with Jake Shapiro and Oli Berman, how you get information, how you get it and how you transmit it is certainly being affected by technology. Some recent research as far as just imagine what cell phones have done as far as the information access and transfer. Information is always going to be important, but how you get it and transmit it could change with technology, but certainly it will remain important. And I do think the quality of force is now, you're going to be able to leverage technology better i would

imagine a higher quality force and there's been some work on this as well so i think investments in the human capital of the counter insurgencies i think is going to be important even as as technology changes and the nature of warfare changes some of the principles are going to be enduring as far as quality forces and importance of information um and it's still going to be human, despite AI, there's going to be humans in the loop that are going to have to make a decision. Appreciate that. So, Dennis, in the Philippines,

a lot of things have changed in the past couple years with the security situation, with just relationships. Since this project started and since you started looking at this data, how are things different now? Are the threats the same? Are the way you approach them the same? Do you anticipate different types of threats coming into play now? No, it's the same thing. I mean, there's the China factor, but it's largely an external issue in the South China Sea. What remains is we still have this internal situation where we have to contend with.

But we have brought the numbers of the insurgents to their lowest, I guess, in several decades. But it's like we can never seem to quash the whole thing. So that's the next level is now. And much of it's like, you know, those in the active service now are really experimenting and information operations, social media operations. But insurgency is so complicated when you cannot root out their source of finances and logistics. Sean, let me expand a bit on that question. One challenge now, you know, I just left OSD policy where our national defense strategy is the tagline is, you know, we're in long-term competition with Russia and China. Many would argue much less emphasis on the threats we've been focusing on the last 20 years.

But I would say a bit of caution. Some might say, hey, well, this research was so last couple of decades. It's great power competition is back. But, you know, I remember when I was a West Point cadet, a major Dave Petraeus I had in class. I was commuting down to Princeton to get his PhD done. And it came to light that his dissertation was on the lessons from Vietnam. And we're thinking like, God, that is so like 1975. And we're fighting the Soviets. Who cares about that? You know, fast forward, I'm part of his team helping with, well, we didn't have a counter insurgency doctrine when we finally, or man, when we realized we're fighting an insurgency in Iraq.

And he had to kind of give the big, I told you so, and lead that FM-324 effort. But I say that because let's not, the lessons that we learn from studying insurgency, counterinsurgency, the hypothesis we can test with the kind of quality data that this is an example of, and there's others, it's going to be relevant. We can't just wish away the threat. Even in an era of great power competition, you remember in the Cold War, the actual shooting wars were, the adversary was the USSR and China in some respect, but the actual conflicts were unconventional, were small wars, were limited wars. So I think we really need to discipline ourselves and make sure that we still study this type of conflict. We learn those lessons because the stakes are high. It's literally life and death. And if we put it behind us, we're going to see these fights again. And we're going to need to understand how to fight it more effectively, more efficiently. And hopefully this reservoir of data that we've collected will be, and then Dennis as well. And that's great power competition.

And then China's influence internally and externally in the Philippines. So how has that been affecting security considerations in the Philippines? And Dennis, it'd be great to start with you. Yeah, well, okay, if we look at the future now with China, Well, okay, if we look at the future now with China, really, really exerting a lot of influence in the Philippine society, actually, because they have invested so much already. They now control the third telecoms player that we have.

They control our national grid. They control the South China Sea with their bases in the islands of Palawan. I mean, they have like a lot of clandestine operators now here. So in this part of the world, there's still some... China hasn't gotten the hearts and minds of the Filipinos as much as the americans have as much as you have however the greatly diminished presence of american forces and added to it is the abhorrence of our president in anything american, I think. There's not too much attention now in U.S. military assistance, which I hope those could be repaired

because it takes a long time to build relationships, but it takes just a few months or even days or weeks to destroy one. I'll try to be a little more optimistic than Dennis, maybe, maybe naively so. Yes, you're absolutely right, Dennis, that we can lose the relationship we've spent so much time on, but maybe not right away. With those decades of investment, they're still going to work in our favor. I look at China, in relation to China, let's be honest.

going to work in our favor. I look at China, it's, in relation to China, I mean, let's be honest, you know, we still have a vision that is shared by the Philippines and other countries in the region. You know, we want a free and open Indo-Pacific region, you know, a rules-based order to continue. And then that vision is embraced by people. You know, we're not perfect, but we tend to share the same vision for the future for our families and posterity. China, their vision has to be imposed, coerced, co-opted. Yes, they're very good at transactional behavior where they can buy support, they can bribe their way, they can throw money. But at the end of the day, if you're getting close to China, how can you expect China to treat you any better than they

treat their own people? And I think for anyone to look at China and say, that's the horse I want to hitch my wagon to, I just don't think so. We are so close culturally. The Philippines and the United States are, I don't know of a closer relationship with any other country, really. I think as long as we respect Philippine sovereignty, but then really leverage, I mean, I say leverage, not enough, you know, probably a bit, really draw on that close relationship, that recognition that we have shared values, shared interest, and a shared vision for the future, and that we're going to work together and keep investing in that relationship. A lot of it just comes down to respect, respect their sovereignty and work with them. And then it goes both ways. I think, you know, the Philippines needs to just appreciate that the commitment the U.S. has, and we can't

take it for granted. And we've got to make sure that we earn that relationship going forward with continued investment. So Dennis, a question for you. Given your decades of experience in the Army and working with the counterinsurgency problem set, what lessons have you picked up across your career that you could share with COIN practitioners? Number one, I'd be very biased.

Support the elite forces because it's the elite forces who have that champion mindset to kill or be killed to win at all costs. And training, human resources, equipment, etc. Those are really needed. And most importantly for these elite forces, it's really the quality of leadership that matters. So it's in filtering out, it's in choosing the best. Yeah, number two is really in the training of the military officers and also for the NCOs. Much of our training has been patterned on a US trade-off, I think, curriculum, which is more on the warfighting thing. I remember like be, no, do, whatever that is. It's not effective here

because it's so narrow in its treatment of the skills needed for counterinsurgency operations, especially in a mature insurgency situation. That's why when I got tapped to redesign the curriculum of the Philippine Military Academy, redesigned the curriculum of the NCO development, officer development. I advocated the simultaneous development of the roles that a military officer or NCO must have. One is he must be a leader of character. Number two is that he must be a partner in nation building. Number three, of course, he must be a warfighter. But those are the key three things because what was not included and what was just taken

for granted in our education is our responsibilities for nation building. Because that's like an entirely different mindset apart from our being warfighters. And I think to be successful counterinsurgency operators, we must have a solid grasp of what nation building skills are needed. That's my conviction. I appreciate that. Joe, I'd like to turn to you for one last question. Your perspective is extremely unique as well, because you've seen this type of problem set from the tactical level all the way to the strategic and policy level and everything in between. And you've also dealt with it from the realm of academia. You've researched it. What are the implications of your professional experience and your research for policymakers in terms of dealing with counterinsurgency? Yeah. So first, I think it's important to get involved. And there's a symbiotic relationship between research and policymakers. There needs to be a bridge. There's much to be

learned. The operator can learn much from the academic and vice versa. But the academic needs to be grounded in operations and reality, if you will. So, but I encourage both to continue to work and get closer to, you know, a better understanding because the stakes are so high. But certainly, you know, what we try to do with eStock is really, you know, break down some barriers, create more opportunities for, you know, to get our best and brightest academics working on these tough problems. And then also build the rapport on the operator side to welcome this. You know, I remember working in Kabul, bringing in these professors to talk to General McChrystal, General Petraeus, and Sergeant Major May have bristled a little bit when we walked them in. But then you hear them talk like, wow, they bring

something to the table. They add value. They look funny in their Kevlar and they can't wear a helmet straight, but they can provide some insights that some of those grisly veteran soft operators just really hadn't had the time or inclination to maybe find. And then both ways, to encourage an appreciation amongst academics who I have great respect for that, hey, it's not just about the three stars on the regression. And never forget that those data points, and this is a part of the book, it was a scene with Dennis. We were coding these reports, and one of Dennis's coding team came across an incident report that he remembered. Someone he knew was killed.

And it's very real. These ticks on an Excel spreadsheet, these aren't just dependent variables. These are people with families and friends. So let's remember that the stakes are high and even more motivation for scholars to work on these tough issues. Because, boy, if we can learn more about conflict, maybe help our operators or policymakers understand how to reduce the horrific cost of these conflicts. And, boy, that's worth working hard for. This data set that he and I coded, and I've come to realize until he reminded me that it has now become one of the biggest conflict data sets in the world, was done because of mutual respect, which is important in every relationship. It was done because of mutual respect, which is important in every relationship.

Mutual respect about what your limitations are, what your partner's limitations are, and what you can do together. Because Kenner Felter cannot impose on me, nor I could impose on him. It just must have to be in the equilibrium that we must do this project together. And if we had been successful in coding this large data set, it was because of that mutual respect. And much of it was really over beers too. So like, you know, the importance of relationship and closeness and stuff, then you, there you go.

But it was possible because of the mutual respect between the parties involved. And it is mutual, Dennis. You know that. Yeah. I think that's a great place to stop. I'd like to thank both of you for coming on the Irregular Warfare podcast today and for sharing your insights. Thank you. Thanks, Sean. Thanks, Nick. Thanks again for listening to episode 11 of the Irregular Warfare podcast. We release a new episode every two weeks. In our next episode, Kyle and I will discuss Thanks again for listening to episode 11 of the Irregular Warfare podcast. We release a new episode every two weeks. In our next episode, Kyle and I will discuss unconventional warfare with Lieutenant General Retired Ken Tovo and Dr. Melissa Lee. Following

this, General David Petraeus will join us for a conversation about Islamic extremism and ungoverned spaces. Please be sure to subscribe to the Irregular Warfare podcast so you don't miss an episode. You can also follow and engage with us on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn. One last note, what you hear in this episode are the views of the participants and do not represent those of West Point or any other agency of the U.S. or Philippine governments. Thanks again, and we'll see you next time.