text: Chapter 6
  Command in Counterinsurgency
  Our area of operations began along the Syrian border and extended down
  to the Jordanian border. We were also responsible for the Marine expeditionary force
  security area, which extended to Saudi Arabia. This was a large area, and it was not
  possible to be everywhere. This situation forced us to work with the locals and to
  work and play well with other units operating in the region, such as the special
  operations forces (SOF). But there in 2006, we were the surrogate government. We
  did not have mayors at the time. The provincial governor was in Ramadi, and he
  stayed there. Twice we were able to get him out to western al-Anbar in the year I was
  there, and it took a regimental-sized operation to get him out to cities such as
  Baghdadi, Haditha, and al-Qa’im. We spent nearly thirty days’ worth of planning to
  get him out there because for us he was more important than the President of the
  United States. I think Marines here would understand that.
  Our first mayor came in six months into my deployment in al-Qa’im.
  Lieutenant Colonel Dale Alford, commander of the 3d Battalion, 6th Marines, was
  involved in setting the conditions for that success. We didn’t have a mayor in Haditha
  because we had to arrest him. He was an insurgent. We didn’t have a mayor in Hit
  because the previous ones had been killed. So until December 2006, we were the
  surrogate local government. We learned very quickly that if we allowed the Iraqis to
  fail to build and provision their security forces, then we would have failed as well. So,
  we had to step in and fill that surrogate role.
  There is a debate concerning these operations and whether or not they are
  counterinsurgencies, hybrid operations, or distributed operations. We did them all. In
  al-Qa’im, we conducted what I would call a pure counterinsurgency (COIN) operation
  because the conditions had been set by the previous regiment. We were still having
  major manned gun, tank rounds, and combined arms in downtown Hit with more than
  one hundred insurgents surging on twelve- to fifteen-man positions. Phasing,
  synchronizing, supporting, and enabling formed what I thought was my primary role
  there.
  Every battalion commander wants to be the main effort. Every regimental or
  brigade commander wants to be the main effort. We weren’t the main effort in Iraq.
  And every battalion could not be the main effort, and that’s the hard thing for people
  to reconcile. How come I’m not getting all these assets?
  When I was in Afghanistan, I received everything. We were one Marine
  battalion attached to the Army and we were given everything. In Iraq, I had five
  battalions in my command and one reduced force reconnaissance company
  commanded by six lieutenant colonels. At least one unit is not going to get what they
  want in a timely fashion. The battalions, companies, and platoons had autonomy, but
  autonomy doesn’t mean that they operated independently. That’s where
  synchronizing comes in. It means going out and working very closely to the battalions
  and blurring the borders between zones of responsibility and forcing commanders to
  get together and have a cup of coffee. Just as we needed to have tea with the local
  nationals, we also needed to do that among ourselves. We did that very well with the
  SOF through liaisons. We established an ad-hoc tactical fusion center at the
  regimental level.
  [W]e raised close to 4,000 police officers. I waited a year and was told the
  police stations are coming. They never did. So we created expeditionary forward
  operating bases, because that way I could use Marine Corps money. I could put
  police in them, although they could not be designated official Iraqi Police stations. If it
  was designated as such, you would get reported because it would not be official. So,
  there are things that you have to do. It’s not selective disobedience of orders, but
  rather a creative way of getting the mission accomplished.
  We had two force protection measures: the American standard and what
  was acceptable to the Iraqis. Casualties were unacceptable to me as a commander.