Foreign internal defense


Foreign internal defense is a term used by the military in several countries, including the United States, France and the United Kingdom, to describe an integrated or multi-country approach to combating actual or threatened insurgency in a foreign state. This foreign state is known as the Host Nation under the US doctrine. The term counter-insurgency is commonly used for FID.
FID involves military deployment of counter-insurgency specialists. According to the US doctrinal manual, Joint Publication 3-22: Foreign Internal Defense , these specialists occasionally get involved with the actual fighting. This doctrine calls for a close working relationship between the Host Nation government and security specialists, which could include diplomatic, information, intelligence, military, economic, and other specialties. A successful FID action is one that leads to the suppression of actual violence. If combat operations are required, Host Nation security forces take the lead. FID is tasked with external support and training where required.

Definition

Formally, FID is defined as "Participation by civilian and military agencies of a government in any of the action programs taken by another government or other designated organization to free and protect its society from subversion, lawlessness, and insurgency."

Instruments of national power

FID is a multinational and interagency effort that requires the integration and synchronization of many different factions of national power.
The joint forces that make up the FID effort, support other instruments of national power as well, to protect and enhance Host Nation security interests. These actions may include:
The FM 3-24 Counterinsurgency, defines counterinsurgency as:
In many respects, it is the mirror image of the US doctrine for guerrilla warfare, which in US Special Operations is called unconventional warfare:

Effective FID and partnership

FID exists only within a context of host nation internal defense and development, where it can be a force multiplier for regional commanders concerned with counterinsurgency. Insurgencies today are more likely to be transnational than in the past.
It has been a basic axiom that successful FID programs are real partnerships. According to Cordesman, a set of rules for establishing such partnerships include:
  1. Real security dialogue at the bilateral and regional level means listening and last personal relationships.
  2. Security cooperation should focus on security and stability, not political or social reform. Such efforts should recognize the legitimacy of different values and be the subject of a separate dialogue.
  3. Build trust by clearly seeking friend or ally's security.
  4. Focus on building local self-defense and deterrence capabilities, not presence or dependence.
  5. Help friends and allies build forces in their own way; do not "mirror image."
  6. Recognize the reality that other nations define threats and allies differently from the U.S.
  7. Arms sales must clearly benefit the buyer, not just the seller.
  8. Ensure sustainability, capability to operate own forces in own way.
  9. Responsive, time sensitive aid, deployment, sales, and transfers.
Especially when the HN government, the insurgency, and the FID force come from different cultures, careful thought needs to be given both to the way the parties perceive the rules, and the ways they communicate their agreement to one another. Steven Metz, of the US Army Strategic Studies Institute, warns that the paradigm may have changed. He rejects the idea that transnational terrorism is uniquely Islamic.

Participants in FID programs

No external force can guarantee success against an insurgency unless the people regard the Host Nation government as legitimate. Limited external support helped Ramon Magsaysay defeat the Hukbalahap insurgency in the Philippines, with one of the most important parts of that support being the availability of air transport so he could be visible in remote areas. The Vietnam War showed that even a superpower cannot make an unresponsive and corrupt government succeed against insurgents, especially when the superpower has significant conflict in its internal decisionmaking.
The very conditions that may necessitate a stability operation or support operation—widespread human suffering, population movements, famine, human rights violations, and civil war—are also the conditions that attract the services of nongovernmental organizations and private voluntary organizations. A PVO is a subset of NGO, and is a tax-exempt nonprofit that leverages expertise and private funding to address development challenges abroad.

Military

Western special operations forces are considered strategic assets with core missions including FID and UW. They may have other capabilities relevant to specific situations, such as demining. The United States Army Special Forces are among the most versatile organizations, but not all their capabilities may be needed for a specific FID situation. For example, the most urgent need might be for public health specialists or airfield construction crews, which operate on a level far beyond the medical or engineering specialists of a US Special Forces unit. Public health or construction organizations, however, have limited or no self-defense capability and will need protection in insecure areas.

FID models

Myths and fallacies

The term Global War on Terror has been criticized, but there may be utility in examining a war not specifically on the tactic of terror, but in one or more, potentially cooperating insurgencies. "The utility of analyzing the war on terrorism using an insurgency/counterinsurgency conceptual framework. Additionally, the recommendations can be applied to the strategic campaign, even if it is politically unfeasible to address the war as an insurgency." Cordesman points out some of the myths in trying to have a worldwide view of terror:
  • Cooperation can be based on trust and common values: One man's terrorist is another man's terrorist.
  • A definition of terrorism exists that can be accepted by all.
  • Intelligence can be freely shared.
  • Other states can be counted on to keep information secure, and use it to mutual advantage.
  • International institutions are secure and trustworthy.
  • Internal instability and security issues do not require compartmentation and secrecy at national level.
  • The "war on terrorism" creates common priorities and needs for action.
  • Global and regional cooperation is the natural basis for international action.
  • Legal systems are compatible enough for cooperation.
  • Human rights and rule of law differences do not limit cooperation.
  • Most needs are identical.
  • Cooperation can be separated from financial needs and resources.
Social scientists, soldiers, and sources of change have been modeling insurgency for nearly a century, if one starts with Mao.

Kilcullen's "Three Pillars"

Kilcullen gives a useful visual overview of an insurgency and counterinsurgency of the actors in the models. Inside the box are governments, counterinsurgent forces, insurgent leaders, insurgent forces, and the general population, which is made up of three groups:
  1. those committed to the insurgents
  2. those committed to the counterinsurgents
  3. those who simply wish to get on with their lives.
The three pillar model repeats later as part of the [|gaps to be closed] to end an insurgency. "Obviously enough, you cannot command what you do not control. Therefore, unity of command means little in this environment." Unity of command is one of the axioms of military doctrine change with the use of swarming:.
In Edwards swarming model, as in Kilcullen's mode, unity of command becomes "unity of effort at best, and collaboration or deconfliction at least."

McCormick's "Magic Diamond"

McCormick's "Magic Diamond" model depicts four key elements or players:
  1. Insurgent force
  2. Counterinsurgency force
  3. Population
  4. International community

    Barnett's "connecting to the core"

In Thomas Barnett's paradigm,
the world is divided into a "connected core" of nations enjoying a high level of communications among their organizations and individuals, and those nations that are disconnected internally and externally. In a reasonably peaceful situation, he describes a "system administrator" force, often multinational, which does what some call "nation-building", but, most importantly, connects the nation to the core and empowers the natives to communicate—that communication can be likened to swarm coordination. If the state is occupied, or in civil war, another paradigm comes into play, which is generally beyond the scope of FID: the leviathan, a first-world military force that takes down the opposition regular forces. Leviathan is not constituted to fight local insurgencies, but major forces. Leviathan may use extensive swarming at the tactical level, but its dispatch is a strategic decision that may be made unilaterally, or by an established group of the core such as NATO or ASEAN.

Eizenstat and closing gaps

gives a broad view of FID involve closing "gaps", some of which can be done by military advisors and even combat assistance, but, even more broadly, helping the Host Nation be seen as responsive. To be viable, a state must be able to close three "gaps", of which the first is most important:
  • Security: Protection "against internal and external threats, and preserving sovereignty over territory. If a government cannot ensure security, rebellious armed groups or criminal nonstate actors may use violence to exploit this security gap—as in Haiti, Nepal, and Somalia."
  • Capacity: The most basic are the survival needs of water, electrical power, food and public health, closely followed by education, communications and a working economic system. "An inability to do so creates a capacity gap, which can lead to a loss of public confidence and then perhaps political upheaval. In most environments, a capacity gap coexists with—or even grows out of—a security gap. In Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for example, segments of the population are cut off from their governments because of endemic insecurity. And in postconflict Iraq, critical capacity gaps exist despite the country's relative wealth and strategic importance."
  • Legitimacy: Closing the legitimacy gap is more than an incantation of "democracy" and "elections", but a government that is perceived to exist by the consent of the governed, has minimal corruption, and has a working law enforcement and judicial system that enforces human rights.
Note the similarity between Eizenstat's gaps and Kilcullen's three pillars.