The Revision of FM3-24 is Overdue: Rethinking Classical Counterinsurgency to Defeat Contemporary Insurgents

Current United States counterinsurgency (COIN) doctrine espoused in Army Field Manual (FM) 3-24 Counterinsurgency is inadequate for the realities of the complex security environment that exist in the world today. This paper starts with a literary review of the current counterinsurgency doctrine proposed in FM 3-24 and subsequently discusses relevant critiques of that doctrine. Next, a case study on Afghanistan is then used as a vehicle to show where the current doctrine is failing in this c...