Military Review English Edition November December 2016 | Page 137

BOOK REVIEWS

and documented history book that also captures the
reader’s attention and imagination.

Col. Richard D. Koethe III, U.S. Army, Retired,
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina

THE THAI WAY OF
COUNTERINSURGENCY

Jeff M. Moore, Muir Analytics LLC,
Arlington, Virginia, 2014, 476 pages

I

n 2005, then-Lt. Gen. David Petraeus led a resurrection of counterinsurgency (COIN) doctrine
and education due to the worsening situation in
Iraq. All but banned by the Army following the end
of the Vietnam War, COIN now became the focus
of Petraeus’s Combined Arms Doctrine Directorate
and was immediately integrated
throughout the Command and
General Staff Officer Course curriculum. However, the historic COIN
experiences used to develop the
new doctrine and to educate a new
generation of officers were overwhelmingly drawn from Western
sources. Missing was the non-Western experience; while there are
published accounts of non-Western
COIN, they are not commonly
referenced by Western students and
practitioners of COIN.
Dr. Jeff M. Moore’s The Thai
Way of Counterinsurgency fills some
of this gap. Moore sets out to write
the first objective, detailed, and
comprehensive military analysis of the three counterinsurgencies that Thailand has fought since 1965.
He differentiates his work by noting that previous
analyses examined the Thai COIN fights individually, and they were mostly written by left-leaning
academics who frequently used their analyses to
criticize the Thai government. Moore wrote The
Thai Way of Counterinsurgency for U.S. national-security personnel to continue their study of COIN, with
the acknowledgement that in spite of the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq and the drawdown in Afghanistan,
MILITARY REVIEW  November-December 2016

insurgencies around the globe would continue to
threaten U.S. interests.
Moore analyzes Thai counterinsurgency techniques
through his “COIN Pantheon Model of Analysis,”
which is adapted from David Kilcullen’s “Three Pillars
of COIN” model. Moore’s Pantheon Model consists
of a foundation of strategy, upon which is laid a floor
of coordination, which supports Kilcullen’s three pillars
(security, politics, and economics). Above the pillars is
a ceiling of insurgent capabilities and intentions, which is
covered by a roof of the at-risk population. Problematic in
the graphic representation of his model is that the pillars
appear to support the “ceiling” of insurgent capabilities
and intentions, rather than combat them. Since only this
section of the Pantheon Model represents the insurgency, it makes more sense to leave that out of the “building” and perhaps represent the insurgent capabilities and
intentions as an outside force attempting to knock down
the structure.
After explaining his model and
defining key terms in the introduction, Moore provides Thailand’s
historical context in chapter 1.
Moore then chronologically applies his Pantheon Model to each
counterinsurgency in chapters 2–4.
He provides an overview of each
conflict and then breaks down the
insurgency and the at-risk population, followed by details of the Thai
COIN effort, explained through the
Pantheon Model. The conclusion
contains Moore’s analysis of the
totality of Thai COIN since 1965.
Moore compares Thai COIN to the
approaches described by “classic”
COIN theorists David Galula and Robert Thompson
and lays out his analysis according to his Pantheon
Model. In effect, the conclusion is the meat of The Thai
Way of Counterinsurgency, and all that comes prior is
background and supporting evidence.
The Thai Way of Counterinsurgency is essential
for all practitioners and students of security studies and irregular warfare. Moore’s writing is easily
comprehended and well paced. It does not delve so
deeply into details that the reader would become lost
or bored. There are many lessons here that can be
135