As Charlie noted here last week, counter-insurgency expert David Kilcullen was pretty damning on US drone attacks during his recent visit to London. But another interesting point he made was on the need for western governments to provide more support to Pakistan’s beleaguered police. Here’s Kilcullen giving evidence to the House Armed Services Committee on April 23:
The police are a critically important element in any counterinsurgency, and I am not aware of any successful campaign in which police reform, police capability-building, police intelligence and the use of police to protect the population and uphold law and order, were not key components.
Pakistan needs a much larger, much better equipped, better trained, better supported and better paid police force. The fact that it doesn’t have one is partly because the police are a major institutional rival to the army, and we have funneled the vast majority of our aid to, and through, the military.
From a policy standpoint, increasing police reform and assistance efforts would thus serve four purposes at the same time – it would protect the Pakistani people, improve counterinsurgency performance, enhance the rule of law and weaken the stranglehold of the army over the civilian leadership of Pakistan.
As Kilcullen argued when he was in London, Pakistan’s army sees its raison d’etre in terms of Pakistan’s rivalry with India. The police, on the other hand, see their raison d’etre in terms of the rule of law: a much more useful strategic concept, given the extent to which counter-insurgency is a fight for legitimacy, or the fact that successful counter-insurgency often requires de-escalation rather upping the ante – something that often comes more naturally to police forces than armies. (Bill Lind’s seminal paper on 4GW makes the same point:
…the key to keeping the peace is to de-escalate situations rather than escalate them. Soldiers are taught to escalate. If something isn’t working, bring in more firepower. Cops don’t do that, because it enrages the local community.)
As has been widely noted, Pakistan’s army has minimal expertise in counter-insurgency, and is attempting to counter the Taliban’ offensive in the Swat valley with conventional tactics. The Taliban, for their part, appear to be clear on who they should be worrying about most: look at this morning’s attack on police HQ in Lahore, or the attack in March on the police academy in the same city.
