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Counterinsurgency in Afghanistan, RAND Counterinsurgency Study Vol. 4. By Seth G. Jones. Santa Monica, Calif: RAND, 2008. ISBN 978-0-8330-4133-3. Maps. Figures. Notes. Bibliography. Pp. xvii, 157. $26.50.
This is the Afghanistan volume of a multivolume study by the RAND Corporation for the U.S. Department of Defense on different conflicts involving insurgency and counter-insurgency. As such it incorporates and refers to findings from the extensive existing literature, especially that from RAND, applying a broad range of sources on insurgencies and counter-insurgencies, development and nation-building (but not narcotics eradication), and, to a lesser extent, Afghanistan (set out in a 16-page bibliography), updated with a number of interviews with senior Afghan, coalition, and U.S. leaders.
This is not a book but rather a government report - a different prose creature - and so has been prepared and printed not to sell well or receive good reviews but to be responsive to its sponsor's specifications. Here, stressing unclassified metrics and a social-science approach, unlikely to be the top priority in a stand-alone book, is part of the multi-volume survey in which different conflicts...