Defeating the Islamic State at Three Levels of War

Abstract

The Islamic State (IS) continues to be weakened at the operational level in Syria and Iraq. To remain legitimate, the insurgency is shifting its strategy to pursue its objectives at the national-strategic (N-S) and theater-strategic (T-S) levels of war. IS is expanding throughout the Middle East, Northern Africa, and Southeast Asia while using terrorism to attack the West. In order to fulfill the Presidents end state of ultimately defeating IS, U.S. and coalition forces must not only continue to apply pressure at the operational level but also include a concept that attacks the insurgency at the N-S and T-S levels of war. This paper uses operational art and the Joint Operation Planning Process (JOPP) to identify and examine IS objective, desired end state, and center of gravity (COG) at each level of war. The current fight must attack at all three levels. This paper concludes with recommendations to aid planners in developing a concept to achieve the Presidents desired end state.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 13, 2016
Accession Number
AD1021508

Entities

People

  • Kenneth H. Chilcoat

Organizations

  • Joint Military Operations Department

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • C4I
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Engineered Resilient Systems
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Air Force
  • Asia
  • Asymmetric Warfare
  • Center Of Gravity
  • Insurgency
  • Joint Military Activities
  • Middle East
  • Military Operations
  • National Security
  • Nigeria
  • Social Media
  • Southeast Asia
  • Terrorism
  • Terrorists
  • United States
  • War Colleges
  • Warfare

Readers

  • Joint Military Operations and Doctrine.
  • Political Violence and Terrorism Studies.