(Page 4 of 43) - "Draining the Sea or Feeding the Fire?": The Use of Population Relocation in Counterinsurgency Operations authored by Greenhill, Kelly.

DRAINING THE SEA, OR FEEDING THE FIRE

political and military goals (total success—i.e., a defeated insurgency).

The remainder of the paper is divided into three main sections. The first, shorter section deals
with the issue of persistent attractiveness of population relocation. It briefly traces the history of
the two main competing schools of counterinsurgency doctrine—namely, “hearts and minds” and
“coercion”—and explains why population relocation is viewed so favorably by proponents of

both schools, despite ample evidence to suggest it is not necessarily a sound strategy.

[16]

The

second part of the paper then tackles the issue of the conditions under which relocation tends to
succeed or to fail in its objectives. Finally, the paper concludes with a summary of the arguments
forwarded, some preliminary conclusions and avenues for future research, and several wider
implications of the hypotheses proffered herein.

I. The Persistent Popularity of Population Relocation
In 1988, D. Michael Shafer published an article in Political Science Quarterly, entitled “The

Unlearned Lessons of Counterinsurgency.”

[17]

In it, Shafer lamented that despite “the vast

literature of the 1960s, criticism born of the Vietnam War and renewed study of it,” our
understanding of counterinsurgency remained “analytically confused” and thus we still lacked

“an ability to read the auguries for victory accurately.”

[18]

A decade and a half later, with the

US embroiled in counterinsurgency campaigns in Afghanistan and in Iraq, arguably the auguries
for victory still remain elusive and thinking on counterinsurgency remains somewhat analytically
confused.

Such continuing confusion would appear to be, at least in part, an artifact of the existence of
contending beliefs about the best way to fight and win counterinsurgency campaigns. For
policymakers did not develop a single unified concept of counterinsurgency, but rather two basic
sets of policy prescriptions: namely, the "hearts and minds" and "cost-benefit" or “coercion”
schools. Although at the most basic level, these two schools of thought share many of the same
assumptions, they prioritize these assumptions differently, which leads to competing—and
usually mutually exclusive—policy prescriptions. More specifically, hearts and minds school
stresses the significance of development over security, while cost-benefit privileges security over

development.

[19]

Below is a short description of the key tenets of both schools as well as an

explanation for why—despite the fact that virtually all of their policy prescriptions are mutually
exclusive, both schools share a belief in the value—and even the possible necessity—of
population relocation as a key dimension of a successful counterinsurgency campaign.

The Hearts-and-Minds School
The term “hearts and minds” was coined by Field Marshal Sir Gerald Templer, high
commissioner and director of operations in Malaya from February 1952 to May 1954, a critical

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