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Americans and Asymmetric Conflict Lebanon, Somalia, and Afghanistan
Foreword by Donald M. Snow
Book Code: C9635
ISBN: 0-275-99635-2
ISBN-13: 978-0-275-99635-2
256 pages
Praeger Security International
Publication: 7/30/2007
List Price: $75.00 (UK Sterling Price: £41.95)
Availability: In Stock
Media Type: Hardcover
Also Available: Ebook
Trim Size: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4
Subjects: Reviews:
  • General and professional readers.
    —Choice
    April 2008
  • In the hopes that "we may move forward in the current conflicts with an awareness of what past experience offers," Lowther explores recent American experiences with asymmetric warfare in Lebanon (1982-1984), Somalia (1992-1994), and Afghanistan (2001-2006). For each case, he analyzes the economic, military, and political conditions prior to American intervention; examines American objectives; analyzes how American forces combated the asymmetric strategy and tactics of its adversary; assesses whether American objectives were achieved; and explores the lessons learned, which include issues of human intelligence, force capability, static defense, nation building, and conflict idiosyncrasy
    —Reference & Research Book News
    November 2007
Description: As the War in Iraq continues to rage, many in the White House, State Department, Department of Defense, and outside government are left to wonder if it was possible to foresee the difficulty the United States is currently having with Sunni nationalists and Islamic extremists. Recent American military experience offers significant insight into this question. With the fog of the Cold War finally lifting and clarity returning to the nature of conflict, the dominance of asymmetry in the military experience of the United States is all too evident. Lebanon (1982-1984), Somalia (1992-1994), and Afghanistan (2001-2004) offer recent and relevant insight into successes and failures of American attempts to fight adversaries utilizing asymmetric conflict to combat the United States when it intervened in these three states. The results illustrate the difficulty of engaging adversaries unwilling to wage a conventional war and the need for improved strategic and tactical doctrine.
"It is easy," Lowther writes, "for Americans to forget the lessons of past conflicts as the politics of the present dominate...." His purpose here is to highlight some of history's recent lessons so that we may move forward with an awareness of what experience offers.
LC Card Number: 2007014362
LCC Class: U163
Dewey Class: 355
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