10,000 Won’t Do It: The Mathematics of an American Deployment to Fight ISIL
Since followers of the self-proclaimed Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) have launched a succession of attacks in Paris, Sen Bernardino, Indonesia, and elsewhere, we have been inundated with another wave of recommendations on how to fight this group. Distinguished senators and retired generals, along with security and terrorism experts, are saying the United States must commit ground forces into the fray.
Senator John McCain “wants 10,000 U.S. ground troops in Syria to crush the Islamic State — and blames President Barack Obama’s lack of leadership and strategy for the “phenomena of ISIS.” McCain, who has some experience at war, wants action now and is of course also seeking political advantage in attacking the current administration. In a recent interview retired Marine General Anthony Zinni also called for immediate action. He repeated the call for 10,000 troops to be deployed. Zinni said, “Limited airstrikes against [Islamic State] targets are not enough,” but “Two brigades would take ISIS out of Iraq in a heartbeat.” According to Zinni: “You cannot control people and ground without ground forces.” Even before Paris there were calls for such action.
On November 14, 2014, Max Boot of the Council on Foreign Relations presented Policy Innovation Memorandum 51, “Defeating ISIS.” In this memorandum Boot calls for increasing the size of the U.S. force presently in Kuwait and Iraq, citing estimates of the force size required from 10,000 (General Zinni) to 25,000 (Kim and Fred Kagan).
Although committing more troops seems unlikely now (the United States currently has approximately 3500 troops in Iraq and special operations forces in Syria) it is worth delving a bit deeper into the numbers being thrown about. While I did not command above the battalion level and retired as a colonel, I served as a planner for the bulk of my active duty career upon graduation from the School of Advanced Military Studies. In 2002, I arrived at Third U.S. Army for duty as the Deputy Chief of Staff, J5 — the lead planner for the Combined Forces Land Component Command. This command was responsible for developing the plans for and conducting the land invasion of Iraq in 2003. As a part of this job, we were responsible for developing and presenting plans which matched the reality, as we saw it, of the actual situation we would face on the ground during the invasion. From hard-earned experience, I realized pretty quickly that policymakers are enamored by numbers, and when it comes to troop numbers, the smaller the better.
One of my first experiences in 2002 took place when we were asked to answer a question from the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). Our policy guidance for the conclusion of the operation was a stable Iraq with its territorial integrity intact, as well as a broad-based government that renounces WMD development and use, support for terrorism, and threatening its neighbors. At the time, I thought perhaps answering the question would entail how we were translating policy guidance into attainable operational and tactical tasks. How silly of me. Instead the question meant, “We have a brigade on the ground. Why can’t we go now?” At the time we were asked this question, there was one U.S. Army armored brigade in Kuwait and a very senior person in OSD wanted to know why we could not begin the invasion with this single brigade, immediately.
We settled on answering the note from OSD with the mathematics of war. The conduct of war requires the expenditure of materiel. Fuel, water, food, and ammunition are among many items consumed in the execution of operations. Items expended and used require replacement. Replacement requires transport over some distance from a warehouse in the United States to the point of need in the theater of war. Some call this the “tooth to tail” ratio, but this is too simplistic. The mathematics of war encompasses all the work required to sequence and sustain the battles and engagements which are the result of a major campaign. This is especially true when we are projecting power in the form of Army units from the United States to another country — in this case, Iraq. This is why there is truth to the adage, “Amateurs talk tactics and professionals study logistics.”
So, to answer the OSD question we calculated what it would take to move one M1A1 tank, with a crew of four, from a base camp in Kuwait to Baghdad, Iraq. A tank consumes W gallons of fuel and expends X number of tank cannon and machine gun rounds against light to moderate resistance. The crew of four requires Y pounds of rations and Z gallons of water per day over an assumed duration of A days. The tank can carry some of these supplies, with the battalion support platoon carrying the remainder. To resupply the support platoon requires B number of additional trucks. To maintain and sustain B numbers of trucks requires C number of mechanics. If there are wounded, the brigade requires medical supplies and aero-medevac helicopters. The list went on. People who blithely throw about the figure 10,000 soldiers are not paying attention to the mathematics of war. The mathematics of war is compounded by the distance the force and sustaining materiel must travel.
In the case of a campaign against ISIL, the length of the lines of communication in this theater of war, from seaports and airports to key ISIL-held cities, is daunting. From our bases in Kuwait, it is roughly 1,000 kilometers to Mosul. To Raqqa it is another 400 kilometers. If we were to attack ISIL through the Syrian port of Latakia, the distance to Raqqa is 300 kilometers. We can assume these lines of communication will be contested. It may well only require two U.S. brigade combat teams, along with French, Russian, Turkish, Kurdish, Jordanian, and Iraqi forces to defeat ISIL in combat. Nonetheless, it will take a lot more than 10,000 soldiers to deliver two brigade combat teams to Mosul and Raqqa in the form required to engage in battle with an enemy who clearly knows how to fight.
We professionals know this because we know the mathematics of war. We cannot forage our way to Mosul and Raqqa. Fighting and defeating ISIL in Mosul and Raqqa is also not the end of the required action. As Boot pointed out in his Policy Innovation Memorandum, a strategy to defeat ISIL requires the United States to “[p]repare now for nation building.”
The mathematics of war also considers the “troop-to-task” ratio. In order to establish conditions of security such that the range of U.N. agencies, private and non-governmental organizations, and even Iraqi and Syrian national agencies will restore life-sustaining functions to towns and cities, a strategy has to include forces for, as Boot pointed out, “nation building” or “re-building.”
This is not blind obedience to the Powell doctrine of overwhelming force. Our military advice needs to take into account what it takes to go to the war, fight and win the war, sustain the war, and settle the war enough to handover to a transition force. If we are just conducting a punitive expedition, this is another case entirely. We can then just execute the punitive action, withdraw the force and return home.
Highlighting this need for clearly stated military advice is this example drawn from former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ memoir Duty. Military advice must take into account the problems which stem from a different baseline knowledge of military matters between military professionals and policymakers. Gates cites an incident that occurred during the summer of 2009 when he debated President Obama on troop numbers for the Afghan surge. This disagreement was driven in part by a lack of understanding of what the range of numbers included. When Secretary Gates explained that the military had assumed that the 5,000 “enablers” would be in addition to combat troops and were not part of the additional 21,000 troops that the military had requested, President Obama angrily asserted that this was “mission creep” and that the public and Congress would not differentiate among types of troops and only look at final numbers deployed. In this instance professional officers were incorrect in assuming, on behalf of some of their civilian leaders, a depth of understanding of the mathematics of war.
Military and security professionals need to overcome policymakers’ fascination with low numbers of troops being the best course of action and their resultant tendency to micro-manage troop numbers down to the tactical level. Military advice must be solid, fact-based advice on the structure we would need to put into place to truly defeat ISIL on its home turf. After 14 years at war, we know no plan can look with certainty beyond initial contact with the enemy main body — the enemy gets a vote. We know friction and the fog of battle are real. Still, unsubstantiated numbers proposed through the media and other journals do not really help address the issue at hand. Frankly, Sen. McCain and Gen. Zinni ought to realize that what they are saying about what it would take to defeat ISIL is not helpful in crafting the plans really needed to accomplish this task. Hurling low ball figures without considering the mathematics of war is not rendering sound military advice, it is chasing sound bites and re-tweets.
Kevin C.M. Benson, Ph.D. retired from active duty in the Army as a colonel after 30 years of service. He commanded tank and cavalry units and also served as a general staff officer at corps, joint task force and land component command levels. He writes for professional journals and has the privilege of teaching. He lives in Lansing, KS.
Photo credit: Staff Sgt. Jennifer Bunn, U.S. Army
Cripes 
Thank you for an excellent article that underlines the realities that so much of the current political posturing fails to factor in.
There are two other military factors that I feel might also need to be taken into account. First, an attacking force is usually reckoned to need a 3-to-1 numerical advantage over a defending force, as the latter will generally be dug-in and prepared with machine guns, anti-rank weapons etc.
Second, it is not enough to win a victory on the battlefield, as we were reminded in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is also necessary to hold the ground against a continuing insurgency while the rebuilding of civic society gets underway and until government forces and police can take over the security duties.
If one looks at ISISland in eastern Syria, for instance, there are reputedly some 30,000 IS fighters. A couple of brigades, some 10,000 men + logistic support, would be nowhere near enough. ISIS is likely to defend each town to the last and there are ten sizeable towns in the Euphrates valley that will very probably be required to be taken by street-to-street fighting. FIBUA is dangerous and manpower-heavy work.
Once the battle is won, there are 40 sub-districts (nawahi) in eastern Syria, each averaging close to 100,000 population pre-war. 10 of these are controlled by the YPG/SDF, which leaves 30 to be garrisoned for some time. To hold a district of that size and the surrounding villages would require the best part of a brigade, generally a far greater density of troops than Petraeus and others envisaged. This lesson too was rammed home in Iraq and Afghanistan.
That said, the need for boots on the ground is unquestionable, only so much can be done from the air and the virus that is ISIS needs to be terminated soonest. It is no good hoping that the Syrian resistance forces can take on the job, they are fully stretched and overwhelmed in western Syria fighting Assad’s forces and their Shia reinforcements from outside Syria.
The only way to do the job, in view of the real troop numbers needed, is by an international coalition containing a good proportion of troops from Arab League and Muslim countries. The US, as the leading NATO nation, would have to play its part and provide a portion of the ground force. I would think that would require a contribution in the order of 30-40,000 US troops. That is surely manageable and a duty that President Obama and the political establishment can and should rise to.
A welcome – and overdue – expression of sound military sense. Of course, the political downside is that accepting the real ground force requirement would – and should – immediately call in question whether the objective justifies the investment.
As a longtime observer of “Islam in the West” phenomenon, I wholeheartedly agree that it will take a coalition of military forces drawn from the Arab league and Muslim countries. UNDER AMERICAN LEADERSHIP.
An interim effort should be to focus / control the many ways in which Saudi Arabia / GCC provide material and psychological resources to the IS fighters. Of the 1,000 plus mosques in America, nine out of 10 preach Saudi Wahhabism, an ideology that runs closely to the core jihadist beliefs.
Cripes concluding remarks are totally on target:
“The only way to do the job, in view of the real troop numbers needed, is by an international coalition containing a good proportion of troops from Arab League and Muslim countries. The US, as the leading NATO nation, would have to play its part and provide a portion of the ground force. I would think that would require a contribution in the order of 30-40,000 US troops. That is surely manageable and a duty that President Obama and the political establishment can and should rise to.”
Thanks for writing
Usama
Very well put regarding the numbers needed for such a task, but what about the people of Syria and their neighboring countries? All the people that have left their home countries where the war is taking place. What if the superpowers pull back and sever the supply lines to this destructive conflict, get their residents back from Europe, the West, and who knows where else, and let them fix their problem, We cannot go in with two, three, or 10 brigades, and at the same time be putting bullets in their guns. The people of the Middle East have the brains, the bullets, and billions of dollars to fix the problem them selves. If we do not jointly, ie, Russia, UK, U.S, France, eliminate funding and supplying these groups, and insist they save their own countries with their own resources, no one wins, NOW or ten years from now. Were enabling the end of our civilized world. Brains over bullets people. D.J, US ARMY VET, DESERT STORM.
Without a doubt, there is as many gang members in any large city in the U.S as their is ISIS in Syria, and our people handle it I believe. Now what if we the residents of these cities say screw this, I’m out of here, lets go to Saudi Arabia, and let a Arab military come in here and snuff them out, and they’ll cover the war bills, reconstruction, and care for the thousands of wounded when they head back home. Does that make any sense to anyone. I know these groups cant really be compared being ISIS or a gang member, but countries have to the challenges, and can. We can sideline and be just as effective, but everyone must do the same. I am done, I’m obviously no war scholar, but please find a solution, don’t add to the destruction.
This is an excellent article and in no way undermines the desire of some to commit US ground combat formations to Iraq and Syria. It simply underscores that simplistic solutions (let’s commit 10,000 ground troops and crush ISIS) to complex issues (troops and equipment must be supported, as noted in this article; the regional geo-political situation) must be avoided like the plaque. Surely, most must remember General Shinseki advising, during G.W. Bush’s ramp-up to the invasion of Iraq, that it would take hundreds of thousands of US military personnel to conquer, occupy, and govern/secure Iraq until the Iraqi were capable of doing so themselves. Shinseki’s advise was dismissed as alarmist and unrealistic. Today, we continue to pay the price for Shinseki’s advice being dismissed. Again, simplistic solutions (i.e., defeat the Iraqi Army and everything else will work itself out okay) to complex issues (conquering, occupying, and governing/securing a nation) is a recipe for failure.
Lastly, this article should be spread wide and far. Surely, there must be a national level politician (President, someone in Congress) who has the moral integrity to speak to the American people in a honest and straight-forward manner about demands for committing US ground formations to Iraq/Syria. As the world’s only superpower, we can, quite literally, do almost anything (militarily) we want (perhaps even need) to do. But the “doing” piece comes at a price in national treasure (KIA/WIA; funding; geo-political blowback) and there is no guarantee that such a military action will be successful and ISIS either defeated or destroyed. If we push for such an action, the public needs to be told the benefits/costs of the action and the “what if” of it not being a success.
Your analysis is good as far as it goes but it begs the question: do WE need to send ground troops to Syria to defeat ISIS?
IMHO the Western powers and especially the US have already done more than their fair share. Stability will only be achieved in the Middle East once the local forces (e.g. Saudi Arabia) take over and take responsibility for providing a solution. Therefore the way forward is to agree a Sunset clause which gives the local powers a deadline by which they have to take over. Add more troops will not work and the stalemate will continue.
Roger,
No, I am not. I believe the President has the correct policy….provide air, logistic, advisory, and intelligence support to Arab (Iraqi military, anti-Assad opposition, Kurdish, Iraqi Shia militia, and (possibly) Iranian military/special ops). There are several reasons for this. First, introducing a large number of US conventional ground combat forces (and supporting elements) would likely be viewed by the Iraqi as another invasion/occupation of that country and an an act of American imperialism; the introduction of such forces into Syria would be an act of war, unless requested by Assad. I do not believe the international community would see it otherwise. The introduction of US ground formations does not mean we will be successful; I hope our political leaders (Democrat and Republican) are not living in an alternate reality. With 14 years of war in Afghanistan and 12+ in Iraq, we have yet to destroy/defeat either terrorists or other anti-US forces in those countries. Lastly, the defeat of ISIS will be, as noted by the President, a generational fight. ISIS has an ideology (the restoration of an Islamic Caliphate) that is attractive to many. Couple that with a history of how the Europeans (specifically the English and French) , following the defeat of the Ottoman Empire during WWI, determined the outline and governance of the Middle East and then the US (post-WWII) dominated Middle Eastern affairs and supported repressive and oppressive governments viewed to be nothing more than US puppets and you find ISIS as a magnet for international support in both fighters and sympathizers. This latter is not a “blame America” tirade. It is a reality, and ISIS is exploiting that and a weakened US geo-political position, to their advantage. There is a carpenter’s adage to measure twice and cut once. We, the US, had best abide by that adage, as we look at what to do next about ISIS.
There are two overlapping issues,
1. What numbers are required to do a specific task if you get an honest answer do you still want to go ahead.
2. Why are American politicians convinced that ‘something must be done’ about ISIS and it needs to be done NOW?
The first one we have seen several times in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, one example is the British deployment in Helmand the planning for the deployment quickly realised that the proposed deployment of 3,300 men was totally inadequate for the task re all of Helmand province, but part of the problem was inside the military where this was hidden from the politicians due to the fear that otherwise ‘they will not let us go’. Once the deployment had arrived the UK and Afghan politicians did not understand that 3,300 men included barely 1,100 combat forces. The on the ground officers were then too proud or arrogant to admit they could not cover the entire province. The eventual coalition commitment was approx 25,000 including over 10,000 UK and 10,000 USMC. If someone had admitted in 2006 that the campaign would require 20,000 plus and 8 years, would we have gone at all.
A US problem in planning is that there is an assumption by many 3rd country who are supporting a US led operation is he US will provide their logistic tail as well.
In terms of the US needs to destroy ISIS NOW!!! Because of a handful of deaths in San Bernadino it is simply nuts. The local powers in the region see multiple overlapping conflicts of which ISIS is one but it is not the priority. If the US wants to go to war with ISIS and invade and occupy Iraq and Syria the US is big enough and rich enough that it could even if it might require a draft to generate the manpower for long term occupation of Arabia. But Britain faced many more and larger terrorist attacks than San Bernadino on an ongoing basis for 30 years and the idea of invading Dublin or bombing the paymasters in Boston was never on the agenda.
The US public wants an operation which will be over quickly and after that there will never be any terrorist attacks anywhere on the planet, or at least anywhere that a US citizen and a TVcamera could be. Someone needs to be honest with them and explain that there will never again be a likelihood of terrorism getting to zero.
Excellent!
A well-thought out piece driven by the stark logic of the battlefield. Policy-makers’ fascination with low troop numbers continue to hobble the crafting of sensible strategies. Thank you for sharing your views.