Military Review English Edition January-February 2014 | Page 84

Creeping
Death
Clausewitz and Comprehensive
Counterinsurgency
Ca
Capt. Brett Friedman, U.S. Marine Corps

I

N 1840, PRUSSIAN Maj. Gen. Carl
von Drecker traveled to French Algeria as a military observer. In the French
counterinsurgency campaign against Abdel-Kadr’s insurgency he found a vastly
different war than what he was used to
studying in Europe. Drecker saw no use
for Carl von Clausewitz’ On War, written just eight years prior, in defeating a
IMAGE: Carl von Clausewitz, oil painting, Wilhelm Wach, 1830
guerrilla insurrection. Contrary to Clausewitz’s work, Drecker remarked that there
was “no center of gravity” to be found in irregular warfare. He continued, “The finest gimmicks of our
newest theoreticians of war lose their magic power . . . indeed, the most sublime ‘Theory of Great War’
will be obsolete and one has . . . to come up with a new one.”1
There would indeed be a new theory, one focused on the difficulties inherent in countering insurgencies. The lessons learned by the French in places like Vietnam, Morocco, Madagascar, and Algeria would
become the intellectual underpinnings of the “population-centric” school of counterinsurgency. French
practitioners such as Joseph Gallieni and Gallieni’s understudy, the French Marshall Louis Hubert Gonzalve Lyautey, put population-centric methods to good use, and David Galula captured them in his widely
read book, Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice. The core of population-centric counterinsurgency is the belief that the civilian population is the center of gravity and, if the counterinsurgents win
the loyalty of the population, the insurgency will be defeated. The most recent expression of this school is
the current U.S. Army and Marine Corps doctrine for counterinsurgency, designated Field Manual (FM)
3-24 Counterinsurgency.

Capt. Brett Friedman is a field artillery officer in the United States Marine Corps. He is currently commanding officer of
Battery A, 1st Battalion, 10th Marines, and is pursuing a master’s degree in national security and strategic studies through
the U.S. Naval War College.

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January-February 2014 MILITARY REVIEW