International Relations
In 1896, Colonel Charles Callwell, in his officially endorsed, unofficial Army manual, “Small Wars” cautioned against several mistakes in effecting regime change, although he couched his advice in the language of colonial conquest. Two of the chief errors he warned against was a) failing to shatter the enemy Army so thoroughly that it could not invent an excuse for failure (usually a “stab in the back”, and b) to as rapidly as possible convert the defeated enemy Army into some form of indigenous force or auxiliary unit. In the case of Iraq did failure to follow the second recommendation doom the U.S. effort?
