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Saturday, 08 May 2004

4GW -- FOURTH GENERATION WARFARE

4GW (fourth generation wafare) is the term used by military thinkers to describe conflict at the end of the 20th century. In general, 4GW is an extremely effective method of warfare that the US and its allies will find very difficult to defeat (a slow burn, rather than complete eradication, may be the best possible outcome). I have outlined the basics of 4GW warfare below to enhance your understanding of the term.

Definition
4GW can be defined as a method of warfare that uses the following to achieve a moral victory:

  • Undermines enemy strengths (this may seem obvious, but most of modern warfare has involved direct attacks on enemy strengths -- find the enemy army and destroy it).
  • Exploits enemy weaknesses.
  • Uses asymmetric operations (weapons and techniques that differ substantially from opponents).

Drivers
The rise of 4GW is both a product and a driver of the following:

  • The loss of the nation-state's monopoly on violence.
  • The rise of cultural, ethnic, and religious conflict.
  • Globalization (via technological integration).

Tactics
4GW is fought on the tactical level via:

  • Rear area operations -- 4GW warriors do not confront a nation-state's military but rather it society. 
  • Psychological operations -- terror.
  • Ad-hoc innovation -- use of the enemy's strengths against itself.

Generations of Warfare
The generational development of warfare can be outlined as:

  • First generation -- wars of Napoleon, conscription and firearms (the decline of mercenaries).
  • Second generation -- the US civil war and WW1, firepower and nation-state alignment of resources to warfare.
  • Third generation -- WW2, maneuver and armored warfare.
  • Fourth generation -- ad hoc warriors and moral conflict.

Differences
Many of the methods used in 4GW aren't new and have robust historical precedent. However, there are important differences in how it is applied today. These include:

  • Global -- modern technologies and economic integration enable global operations.
  • Pervasive -- the decline of nation-state warfare has forced all open conflict into the 4GW mold.
  • Granularity -- extremely small viable groups and variety of reasons for conflict.
  • Vulerability -- open societies and economies.
  • Technology -- new technologies have dramatically increased the productivity of small groups of 4GW warriors.
  • Media -- global media saturation makes possible an incredible level of manipulation.
  • Networked -- new organizational types made possible by improvements in technology are much better at learning, surviving, and acting.

Winning a 4GW conflict
Victory in 4GW warfare is won in the moral sphere. The aim of 4GW is to destroy the moral bonds that allows the organic whole to exist -- cohesion. This is done by reinforcing the following (according to Boyd):

  • Menace. Attacks that undermine or threaten basic human survival instincts.
  • Mistrust. Increases divisions between groups (ie. conservatives and liberals in the US).
  • Uncertainty. Undermine economic activity by decreasing confidence in the future.

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Comments

I don’t want to be too controversial but 4GW sounds, to my un-academic eye, like a fancy name for what the US has experienced. Either it started earlier than the 21st century or your enumeration of the generations of warfare should include terrorism as a separate item.

Terrorism has been big for a long, long time: it’s an end-of-empire thing and drove the British and French out of various places. Just because the US hasn’t experienced it directly before (I exclude a few indigenous redneck nutters) doesn’t mean it hasn’t existed – and, more importantly, if you don’t analyse previous experience of it you will be doomed to repeat the mistakes. Consider:

No-one in the US supported the British policy of internment in Northern Ireland. Why do you think it will work now?

No-one in the US supported hooding of prisoners in Northern Ireland; the UK banded the practise in the 70s. Why do it now?

Sure, terrorism has been around for a long time. So has maneuver (Mongols) and firepower (Agincourt) warfare. Terrorism in the modern age was never a strategic threat until today. There are reasons for this (listed above).

I suggest that terrorism is now is considered a “strategic” threat because it is deployed against the US; I’m sure that the British felt that the Mau-Mau et al were also a strategic threat. To be blunt, you’re only part way to losing a single colony. The British lost pretty much the lot, and you can’t get more strategic than that.

I’m very supportive of any attempt to study terrorism (he said conciliatorily). I’m just suggesting that the best results will probably come from viewing the current US conflict as a continuation of the past rather than a radical new generation will probably be more productive.

I submit that if the threatened country destroyed the terrorist-supporting nations, the conflict would end. Nothing new about that idea, I know.

Don

Unfortunately, Don, it isn't that easy. Groups like al Qaeda are different mainly because they don't need state sponsorship. They operate out of failed states/lawless areas and they finance themselves. Also, by destroying a state you create the exact environment that the new non-state terrorists need to thrive.

World War 2 not only had vast armies, fleets and airforces, but gave rise to large guerrilla movements trained and financed and armed by Western Democracies e.g. Yugoslavia, China, Philippines, Vietnam etc. so does that make them 3rd or 4th Generation Warfare ?

From the viewpoint of their enemies in the Axis alliance, these guerrilla movements were pretty effective and strategic.

4th GW is the future we now live for 14 years now. It’s astonishing to note that the military still think in symmetric warfare terms. That concept died when on 9th November 1989 “peace broke out”. It’s all about good Intelligence now, in more than one explanation of this word.
In the potential and possible areas of conflict (Middle East, Africa) you cannot find an army which can be compared with any sophisticated Western army.
So, if NATO goes in, wherever, the initial entry will last for outmost 5 days of Peace Enforcing and than it will turn into guerrilla tactics, hit and run action and terrorism. The best answer to that is good Intelligence.
Although there are many good books written about these subjects I like to suggest two very good books to you all.
“Military Intelligence blunders and cover-ups” from Colonel John Hughes-Wilson, ISBN: 1-84119-871-4. Especially read prefaces 11 and 12.
The other very good book I like to recommend is: “Dude, where’s my country” from Micheal Moore, 2003.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

Below please find some resources that might be useful in further consideration of Asymmetric and/or 4th Generation Warfare.

5 May 2002, “Military Response to Fourth Generation Warfare in Afghanistan,” By Greg Wilcox and Gary I. Wilson
http://www.emergency.com/2002/4gw5may02.htm

19 Feb 2001: "Anticipating the Nature of the Next Conflict," Wilson, GI, Bunkers, F. and Sullivan, JP
http://www.emergency.com/Emergent-thrts.htm

24 Sep 2001 - "WAR ON TERROR-2001; What We Expect in The Coming "War on Terrorism" Staten, C. L.
http://www.emergency.com/2001/war-on-terror-2001.htm

04/27/98 - "Asymmetric Warfare, the Evolution and Devolution of Terrorism; The Coming Challenge For Emergency and National Security Forces," Staten, C. L., at http://www.emergency.com/asymetrc.htm

"29 Mar 2003 - "Urban Warfare Considerations; Understanding and Combating Irregular and Guerilla Forces During A 'Conventional War' In Iraq," Staten, C. L.
http://www.emergency.com/2003/urban_warfare_considerations.htm

Please let us know if we may ever be of assistance regarding this important topic.

C. L. Staten, CEO and Sr. Analyst
Emergency Response & Research Institute (ERRI)

Don't forget the importance of D&D (denial and deception; former name CC&D, or camouflage, concealment and deception) in fourth gen warfare. It's essential for guerrilla forces to be successful, and we need to pay more attention to it.

Would you consider the israeli-palestinian conflict to be of this "fourth generation"? Do you think that decisions to perpetuate the "failed state" by Arafat to be deliberate, or out of stupidity and corruption and inability to act in the interests of the people?
Do you consider Israel's security measures adequate? (Every person is searched a few times a day, at entrance to every single mall, every single disco, every single big party [much more than the average palestinain]).

What about ideology? You consider the islamist pro-terrorist movement to be acting out of pure calculation, however it seems likely that the terrorist attacks are done for internal muslim-world consumption. Would the ideological aspect prevent the sort of concerted 4th generation warfare to fully take shape?

Taking the example of Iraq, it is possible to galvanize the Iraqi population enough to accept, demand and personally support efforts to make Iraq a "successful" state, at least in terms of security. A constant terrorist campaign makes a population over time more willing to sustain and inflict an increasingly large number of casualties. If the level of threat increases, eventually it is possible for a population to support a "total war" with a decisive victory no matter the casualties, which will ensure a new pecking order for another few decades.

Spread of guerillas is fourth generation, after armoured warfare etc, what about spread of ideas to support "your side" and against "the other side"? 5th? But we've had that for a long time now. That is ultimately where victory and defeat lies, in people's minds and in ideas.

While searching for a 4GW definition I came across your site. Thought your treatise was concise and well written. I believe the arguments that are military must change to meet the changing threat maybe incomplete. Warfare is cyclical. If we were to loose our massive force capabilities then enemies that are asymmetrical in nature would rise to challenge us on that, more productive (or at least faster) level of decisiveness. Keeping a foundational belief in adaptability as our goal the military should elevate other elements of existing military doctrine to that of the supremacy devoted to air dominance, armored maneuver, naval power and massed artillery. Special Ops as a striking capability has nearly been elevated so. However psyh-ops in the forms of propaganda (the military lags WAY behind modern advertising in this), operations in which enemy morale is denigrated, and the wiliness to take into account cultural differences in op-planning and exploiting these weakness, seem to be lagging perhaps because of cultural difficulties with in military institutions or the society as a larger whole.
An allusion might be made that we do hammer-ops better than anyone else, dagger-ops as good as any one else, but rope/whip-ops at a level below our technological inferior enemies.

Meyer,

I understand "hammer" as massive force like armour and bombers. I understand "dagger" as Green Berets and Delta Force. I'm not sure what you mean by rope and whip. It seems like quite an interesting division of operations and I'd like to fully understand it.

Thank you for you question, let me see if I can answer coherently. Obviously terms like "hammer" & "dagger" are common allusions and I have only seen "whip warfare" referred to infrequently in that exact terminology. (e.g. Bob Woodward’s Shadow Warriors book) Hammer/dagger/rope are used to show a progression on a continuum of threat/force style. Hammer allusion equal strength over flexibility (again these are not dichotomies but continuums) and the results are more permanent i.e. “you own the ground” or “control the area.” Dagger ops would be raid like, resulting in a limited but beneficial effect i.e. assassination, sabotage, confusion. By themselves that won’t win a “war” but in conjunction with the hammer they work synergistically and the result is often greater than the parts.
Rope/whip operations are not the pinnacle of asymmetrical operations, they are asymmetrical operations. Terror(ists) are not an enemy in the sense that the Nazis or the N. Koreans were the enemy, this is because terror is a weapon, not a political/national/religious entity in and of itself. Saying you fight terror is like saying you fight T-72’s or AK-74s, these are things you fight with, not against. Propaganda, psy-ops, financial subversion (as opposed to destruction) are examples. These things will never cause you to “own the ground” but will cause that ground to turn slippery or crumble beneath the feet of the enemy.
As an illustration take the enemy propaganda machine Al Jezeera. A hammer op would be a bunker buster or cruise missile on the station. A dagger op might be to assassinate the owner or kidnap the reporters. A whip op would be to buy the station and reframe the message it sends out to the Arab world in a subtle pro-western manner.
I know I covered a lot of stuff you probably already know, I was just attempting to provide a coherent frame work. Thanks

Thanks for the answer Meyer.

Nathan - what evidence do you have that Al Jazeera is "the enemy propaganda machine" ? They might show shocking videos and alleged statements from terrorists, but they are just about the only Arabic TV station which also questions the brutal dictatorships which rule the region.

If they were just an "enemy propaganda machine" they would never have broadcast interviews with Western leaders like Tony Blair or the appeals for mercy and clemency to try to get various kidnap victims released.

They have been banned and censored by Arab regimes, and, during the conflict before the fall of Saddam Hussein, they were kicked out of the country for trying to do their job of fair and balanced reporting. Al Jazeera's journalists are BBC World Service trained, and they are financed by the government of Qatar.

Where thay have had "exclusive scoops", it is the Western media who have re-broadcast their material ad nauseum, in many cases pirating their copyright footage without attribution.

Very few Westerners watch the Arabic or even English versions of Al Jazeera, so any effects on our Western public's morale is nothing to do with them. It the video image hungry Western media which no longer seems to bother with proper news analysis, in its haste to pretend to show "instant breaking news", which is to blame, almost to the point of active collaboration with terrorists by giving them unedited "oxygen of publicity".

Destroying Qatar might be a little bit counterproductive, given that that is now the major US military HQ in the region.

If Western Governments are serious about re-engineering the Middle East, then we need more TV media like AL Jazeera, not fewer.

Would it be morally justifiable to sub-contract "rope and whip operations" to

Wow. Seemed to touch a nerve. Try to answer as best I can without getting to worked up. First I had no intention of justifying anything I said; my use of Al-J was in context of providing an example of illustrating the differences in types of warfare only. I used the Al-J because it was handy, easily recognizable and convenient. Of course it would due no good to bomb Al-J, which is precisely why I gave it as an example of something to be used as a “rope op“. Hammer or dagger would be fruitless and even counter-productive. Plus I also had just seen excerpts of an interview where two guests were explaining to each other why beheadings of kidnap victims are good things. My use of Al-J was only to illustrate and was not meant to be a discussion about the tv station itself.

Having said that, I do admit to using the term “enemy propaganda” without qualification, much in the same way I would say “water is wet.” To my understanding this is the largest Arab station, or certainly a prominent one. I believe propaganda to be a legitimate weapon of war, I am not going to spend time justifying whether it is “nice or fair.” When in a war, fight to win or give up. Having a news agency which the majority of the Arab world things of as fair and balanced and then using it to subtly promote pro-western view points and to under-mind radical Islamic influence is, as a purely tactical move, a great idea. You’ll have to make up your own mind if “pro-western” views is a good thing or not.

As far as Tony Blair being on, so what? If you take a newscast, formulate the questions properly ahead of time, edit content appropriately, use inventive background music and lighting you can turn a reasonable exchange of ideas into a propaganda film for use against your guest. Merely showing a story is not a litmus test on fairness, presentation of that story is. (making such things a great what? a great whip-op).

In closing let me say thank you. I have opinions and ideas and like anyone else I can be wrong, it is good to be challenged, it helps to avoid mistakes or strengthen resolve. Hope I addressed your question so that even if you do not agree with me you understand my initial use of Al-J as an example.--Nathan

Going to appear like a long winded jerk here, but I just saw your question at the end. I will answer “yes” with the caveat that it is always a touchy thing to sub-contract any aspect of warfare as you give up some control in order to gain a quality of plausible deniability. Personal I whole heartedly thing that Madonna’s spin people are better at propaganda than are U S military folks, lol. Morally I also yes, but I will forgo qualifying the belief system behind this in order to allow other people to post.

"but I will forgo qualifying the belief system behind this in order to allow other people to post. "

No, no, please do. Does it have to do with Bentham and Mill?

Hammer/whip:It seems that today, owning the minds is more useful than owning the ground.

I've been thinking about a 4 tier type of foreign policy:
1 ) Fastest, much like the RMA. Strike aircraft, Rangers. Dagger.
2 ) Most conventional. Armour divisions, seapower, artillery. Hammer.
3 ) Subversion/anti-subversion. Green Berets, advisors, psy-ops. Whip.
4 ) Longest term, deepest effects. About institutions building; helping a country become a republic and have a responsible, rational, prosperous population. A Marshall Plan that extends to politics and culture as much as economics, in other words. Also, infiltration of other countries' bureaucracies, political parties, juntas, industries, media. I don't know which tool could be used to symbolise it.

Oh, umm, I guess short term aid ( aka bribes ) and diplomacy/PR would be in the third tier. It's about changing people's mind punctually ( structurally would be part of the 4th tier ).

I must admit to being slightly discombobulated by your post. E-messages lack room for nuance and subtly because they don't convey inflection, gesture ect, ect. Your 4-tier plan seemed a very succinct way of rephrasing my own attempt at explaining what I had originally meant by “whip ops.” I was attempting to speak factual, or tactically, divorced from the morality issue in general, much as one would talk about moves in chess. The first part of your post seemed to have been written in a little more energetic tone but it is hard to pick up sarcasm from type. I take it utilitarism (sp) is not a favorite philosophical view point? I find Mills just fine in a general theory way but am not wedded exclusively to it.

My own belief system is pyramidal in structure. The very foundation of the system is the belief that a system of though must first survive to be valid. If everyone holding a belief (good, bad, or pizza-based) is dead because their belief system did not allow them to defend themselves or secure for their base needs then that system is an invalid one. Having established that defense (not always to be defined as simple “force”) for survival is necessary one would then move on to ask, what is the best defense? Offense is the universally regarded best form of offense. (If you lose on offense then you become defensive, if you lose on defense, you are lost) From there on out situations growing increasingly complex and Mills may not be that far off in totality. Allowing of course, that everyone has a God or biological given right to fight for their survival so that the needs or good of the few might triumph over the needs or good of the many and this may not be intrinsically unjust.

In closing, if you (you being the general, not the specific in this case) pick a fight with me I will not box with you. I’ll not only gouge your eye, kick your groin, and bite your ear, but I might bribe your mother into calling you names so you feel bad as well. ;>
Disclaimer--All references to personal violence are made in the abstract and no small animals were harmed in any way during the writing of this post. N

"Your 4-tier plan seemed a very succinct way of rephrasing my own attempt at explaining what I had originally meant by “whip ops.” "

I understood whip ops to be similar to the third tier. I was adding the 4th one. Perhaps 3 and 4 are not that different?

"The first part of your post seemed to have been written in a little more energetic tone but it is hard to pick up sarcasm from type. I take it utilitarism (sp) is not a favorite philosophical view point"

Oh no, not at all, I'm currently doing a reading course on Mill and am quite fond of him. The only thing holding me back from being 100% utilitarian is the calculation problem.

The survival requirement seems a wise meta-ethical criterion. Saving it to my files.

I don't know precisely what people really mean by "asymmetric warfare" or what is so new about it.

For example, in the Dreadnought era, when heavily armed and armored battleships ruled the waves, one of the major strategic threats to the battleship was posed by destroyers armed with torpedoes. Basically, an extremely fast small ship, because it was difficult to hit, was defensible just as was an extremely slow ship plated with iron. Moreover, torpedoes packed the same punch as big guns. Therefore, destroyers armed with torpedoes posed what appears to be an 'asymmetric' threat to battleships, in today's terms.

In WWII, the British George V class battleships were armed with 14 inch guns but armored against 16 inch guns while the American North Carolinas were armed with 16 inch guns but armored against only 14 inch guns. Battleship buffs love to pose hypothetical encounters between the George V's and the North Carolinas. Sort of the irresistible force vs. immovable object conundrum. Asymmetric warfare?

(We can go back even further, and pose hypothetical battles between carronades and canons or three frigates vs. one seventy-four. The Patrick O'Brian novels are full of such stuff.)

The game of chess is full of such asymmetric features. Volumes have been written on the knight vs. bishop. Other asymmetries are queen vs. two rooks and one minor piece vs. three pawns.

And wasn't Agincourt, where English longbowmen mowed down French chivalry, asymmetric?


This is not the type of asymmetical warfare that is essentially being discussed. The chess pieces "compete" for control of the same squares on the same board. The same essentially goes for naval comparisons and the Agincourt.

The idea of asymmetrical warfare is fighting not with confrontation between forces with different tactics or technological capacities but the same aim, but rather a change in aims.

A 4th generation warfare force (which is a type, a subdivision, of asymmetric warfare - not interchangable) does not aim to compete with a conventional force for control of a given geographic area or position, but rather to attack leveraged targets outside the main conventional battle order.

Some people seem to be using the terms asymmetrical warfare, terrorism, and 4GW force as though they are interchangable. That should be cleared up

Asymmetrical warfare is simply a conflict between two forces of different operational and tactical aims and styles who are dissimilarly equipted.

Fourth Generation Warfare Forces are engaged in a style of utilizing weaknesses and leveraged targets outside the main convetional battle force to undermine it. They often exist autonomously of state control - and may or may not be terrorists.

Terrorists are those who utilize intimidation and fear tactics while holding no position of legitimate recognized authority in order to press political aims - still war as an extension of politics.

Found the site to be VERY interesting since I am currently researching information on my terminal dissertation under the question "Evaluate how inserting PMC's with traditional ground forces has historically impacted the relationship and the ability to operate as cohesive combat units." or "Does introducing mercenaries into a countries traditional military historically increase its combat effectiveness?"

Interested in contacting any active military officers willing to discuss this topic in total confidentiality.

T. Thanks. I think you are going to find recent history on this topic is pretty thin except for Iraq. There are lots of examples from this conflict, like the Zapata saga:

http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/johnrobb/2005/06/tension_between.html

Talk to NGOs about other examples. Also sign up for newsgroup run by Doug Brooks:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/warriors/interviews/brooks.html

http://www.hoosier84.com/pmcsinformation.html

The definition of 4GW seems to be taken straight from Sun Tzu. Isn't it slightly ahistorical to start counting generations of warfare with Napoleon?

Sun Tzu also famously stated that -war is based on deception. Thus, in a state of war there is always a risk that one can be confused, that the enemy is really not who you think it is.

Such confusion seems very real in the unclear and contradictive reasons for America to be in Iraq in the first place. Before entering war it seems pertinent to ask two questions: Is the enemy really my enemy or is it someone else’s? Is a 'friend' who put me in harms way to fight his enemies, really my friend?

Let me submit the proposal that some terrorists are not your enemies. Instead they are your instruments, your friends, your staunch allies, fostered by you and fighting wars for you since Jimmy Carter. This relation, I’m sure you agree, is a historical fact whose recent denial hinges on an arbitrary reference to 'blowback'.

To me as a European this is a key to understand current history as evidence seems to point out that 'blowback' just might be another instance of 'the secret of Wu Tui'. http://www.cyberspaceorbit.com/TheFall5.htm

For an excellent account providing context for this watch the BBC documentary 'The Power of Nightmares', google for it.

'Other Kevin' said:
"Terrorists are those who utilize intimidation and fear tactics while holding no position of legitimate recognized authority in order to press political aims - still war as an extension of politics."

Nahh.. the same definition is true for both media and freedom fighters and 'holding no position of legitimate recognized authority' is meaningless as the opposite is equally true.

http://tinyurl.com/dco2z
"apparently Aswat was working for British intelligence"

Check the links at the bottom of this post for references to the blowback thesis.
http://tinyurl.com/buag2

Nathan Meyer made a profound statement:
"The very foundation of the system is the belief that a system of though must first survive to be valid"

The only thing to add is, unless the system is an expendable component in a larger system. Missiles and suicide bombers are both 'valid' systems although self destructive.

I think survival is threatened because you have not identified the enemy and are standing in harms way by nourishing a set of lethal ideas like empire and 30 years of war. In that time nothing will be left of the values, prosperity and freedom you once cherished and claim you are fighting for.

Two questions:
In what larger system is Americas self destruction expedient?
Which epistemological change is required to solve the problem?

For some time now I have held a belief based on the observation that the invention of the fission/fusion bombs, but particularly with ICBMs and strategic bombers and cruise missiles and bunker busters, means that any target which can be located can be destroyed. It seems only natural then that our enemies will seek to keep their location, and by extension, identities and other ancilliary information, secret. Since the invention of gunpowder, there has been a slow but steady decline in the utility of defensive fortifications, to the extent that unconventional warriors don't even bother with it; it is far better to be anonymous and camoflauged (by melting into the civilian population) than to build fantastic bunkers, and a heck of a lot cheaper, too. Should your bunker be impenetrable, and have adequate provisions and an air supply that isn't subject to chemical or biological agents, then the US conventional forces might easily collapse the entrance, build a fence around it and call it "New Gitmo".

There is a parallel in technical intelligence as well; given sufficient time and resources, any fixed location may be listened to or spied upon. Is it surprising then that mafiosi so frequently go mobile, keep travel plans unpredictable, and have guarded discussions while on long walks? Incidentally, this is why hotels and such are of critical importance to intelligence collection; international figures have to stay somewhere, and while a few pitch tents or sleep in caves in Afghanistan, most terrorists/mafiosi/public figures like to stay in a warm room. Similarly they don't particularly care to spend 10 hours hiking through bush country to cross a border without presenting identification; they acquire fake passports and drive through, more often than not.

Re: Al-J broadcasting subtle western notions to win hearts and minds. Its stupid. Better to broadcast their truer selves. Without ease in themselves, without their own hearts and minds, they'll never be able to even hear the armies of occupation. The looters of Baghdad proved that - ten thousand years of ascension stuffed in a warren of basements. Now their children are blowing our souls up; like the Bonzes - they know what sticks.
By the way, peace is where you can come home to.

What purpose does it serve to elevate terrorism and label it "warefare"?

What purpose does it serve to elevate terrorism and label it "warfare"?

As a former Naval Special Warfare operator, I will say that this article is useless and the author has no idea how to fight unconventionally.

An armchair insurgent.

Blogs are good for every one where we get lots of information for any topics nice job keep it up !!!
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On Brave New War

  • Purchase Brave New War
  • New York Times Op-Ed
    ...a fast, thought-sparking book.. -- David Brooks
  • Greenpeace
    I read it twice and bought six copies for my friends -- John Passacantando (Exec. Dir. Greenpeace)
  • G. Gordon Liddy Show (radio)
    ...this is a seminal book in the truest sense of the term.. way ahead of the curve... go out and buy it right now -- G. Gordon Liddy
  • City Journal
    Robb has written an important book that every policymaker should read -- Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit)
  • Small Wars Journal
    Without reservation Brave New War is for professional students of irregular warfare and for any citizen who wants to understand emerging trends and the dark potential of 4GW -- Frank Hoffman
  • Scripps Howard News Service
    A brilliant new book published by terrorism expert John Robb, titled "Brave New War," hit stores last month with virtually no fanfare. It deserves both significant attention and vigorous debate... - Thomas P.M. Barnett
  • Chet Richards DNI
    John has produced an important book that should help jar the United States and other legacy states out of their Cold War mindset. You can read it in a couple of hours – so you should read it twice...
  • Washington Times / UPI
    Robb correctly finds the antidote to 4GW not in Soviet-style state structures such as the Department of Homeland Security, but in decentralization -- William Lind (the father of 4th generation warfare).
  • Robert Paterson
    Having painted a crystal clear picture of how a war of networks is playing out, he comes to an astonishing conclusion that I hope he fills out in his next book.
  • The Daily Dish
    John Robb of Global Guerrillas has written the most important book of the year, Brave New War. - Daily Dish (The Atlantic)
  • Simulated Laughter
    Well-written. Brave New War reads more like an action novel than a ponderous policy book. - Adam Elkus
  • FutureJacked
    Go buy a copy of this book. Now. If you are low on cash, skip a few lunches and save up the cash. It is worth it. - Michael Flagg
  • ZenPundit
    The second audience is composed of everyone else. Brave New War is simply going to blow them away. - Mark Safranski
  • Haft of the Spear
    There aren’t a lot of books that make me recall a 12-year-old self aching for the next issue of The Invincible Iron Man to hit the shelves. Well done. - Michael Tanji
  • Ed Cone
    His book posits an Army of Davids -- with the traditional nation state in the role of Goliath. - Ed Cone (Ziff Davis)
  • The Newshoggers
    I highly recommend reading and re-reading this work. - Fester
  • Shloky.com
    This is the first real text on next generation warfare designed for the general population and it sets the bar high for following acts. It is smart, it is a short read, and it will change your thinking. - Shlok Vaidya
  • Politics in the Zeros
    I suggest this is something Lefties need to start thinking about now, as that decentralized world is coming. - Bob Morris
  • Hidden Unities
    A thoughtful book that should be read more widely than the latest Tom Friedman whopper, Chalmers Johnson scare tale or Bill Kristol hack fest. - EB

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