In The Warlords' Shadow: Special Operations Forces, the Afghans, and Their Fight Against the Taliban

Book Review

Note

Nathaniel L. Moir reviews In The Warlords' Shadow: Special Operations Forces, the Afghans, and Their Fight Against the Taliban by Daniel R. Green  (Naval Institute Press, 2017).

Village Stability Operations (VSO) were one of the most important pacification-stability operations efforts in Afghanistan during the late stages of Operation Enduring Freedom. Aptly named as an approach to Taliban intimidation, In the Warlord's Shadow recounts Daniel R. Green's experience as a tribal advisor to U.S. forces in Uruzgan Province in 2012. Green, a scholar-analyst and Naval Reserve Officer, provides a unique view due to his previous deployment to Uruzgan as a member of the Provincial Reconstruction Team for the province in 2006. In addition to other tours in Iraq, he brings an important comparative experience that adds value to his broader analysis of pacification that Village Stability Operations provided in 2012, and in other contexts as well.

Green describes how the years after the initial intervention in Afghanistan were consequential for subsequent efforts to improve governance....