Military Review English Edition March-April 2016 | Page 123

REVIEW ESSAY

counterinsurgency method as a major subject after
the Vietnam War, and it’s easy for the reader to forecast the same happening again, but Donovan doesn’t
dwell on it. Far more important to him is encapsulating lessons learned based on his experiences from over
four and one-half decades ago in a concise, digestible
format for future generations of leaders who will
once again, as he argues, have to advise and assist host
nations fighting insurgencies.
The resulting product favorably compares
to other better-known
classics of counterinsurgency theory and
practice. The work
consists of checklists
of things to consider
or execute, with a few
real-world illustrations
and examples from the
author and other advisor colleagues. Those
lists cover everything
from strategic estimates to operational
design challenges, from
specific tactical tenets
for advisors to twelve
general principles for
counterinsurgency
programs, and from
a dozen ways those programs can fail to what
drives a bureaucracy
to put the best face on
things and paper over
such failures. The text
is both pithy in its advice and also rich in its
rationales and examples.
One is reminded of the Samuel B. Griffith translation of Sun Tzu’s Art of War, with its selected ancient
commentaries on the master’s aphorisms.2 Like the
Chinese classic, Donovan’s Counterinsurgency has
something to say to both strategic policymakers and
lower-level military leaders, particularly the need for
high degrees of discernment and nuance in estimating,
MILITARY REVIEW  March-April 2016

planning, and executing support to counterinsurgency.
Unlike Sun Tzu’s maxims, this text is written less in a
positivist, prescriptive voice and more in a tone warning of dangers to be dodged and pitfalls to be avoided.
Most readers with firsthand experience in implementing counterinsurgency in the field will nod their heads
in agreement with what Donovan says.
Does this book offer anything to those critical of
counterinsurgency theory, such as Col. Gian Gentile
or Douglas Porch?
As can be seen in
Wrong Turn: America’s
Deadly Embrace of
Counterinsurgency,
Gentile has long been
skeptical of the Army’s
efforts in developing
and implementing
counterinsurgency as
“community building”
at the cost of what the
institution is primarily
intended to do: dispense organized violence in the service of
the state.3 Porch makes
a compelling case that
counterinsurgency is
not so different than
other kinds of wars
in Counterinsurgency:
Exposing the Myths of
the New Way of War.4
Given Donovan’s
background, his first
book, and the title of
this one, it’s easy to
assume that there is
little in this slim volume that answers the concerns of Gentile and Porch;
however, that would be a mistaken impression.
In chapter 9, “The Soldiers They Send,” Donovan
simultaneously stakes out requirements not only for
advisors with special training in counterinsurgency,
but also for conventional forces that execute more
traditional tasks. Perhaps this is not surprising, given
that Special Forces advisors and conventional forces
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