I found this article to be fascinating. Partly because this is a social experiment of the highest order, and partly because the proof in the pudding for COIN, is to be able to apply those principles to ‘other than war’ insurgencies. So this is a test, and if they can actually get it to work in Salinas, then maybe other law enforcement agencies will catch on. This will be a very interesting experiment to watch, and perhaps if the mayor kept a running blog on this effort, then we could see what worked and what didn’t. Much could be learned from this effort. –Matt
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Iraq’s lessons, on the home front
Volunteer veterans help California city use counterinsurgency strategy to stem gang violence
By Karl VickWashington Post Staff WriterSunday, November 15, 2009
SALINAS, CALIF. — Famed to readers as the birthplace of John Steinbeck and in supermarket produce circles as the “Salad Bowl of the World,” the city of Salinas carries darker renown in the netherworld of California’s prisons. Instant respect is accorded any inmate tattooed with the words “Salad Bowl” or “Salis” — gang shorthand for a city now defined most of all by ferocious eruptions of violence.
In the space of 11 days this year, seven people were murdered in Salinas. Each killing, like the record 25 homicides the previous year, spilled from the gang warfare that this summer pushed the homicide rate in the city of 140,000 to three times that of Los Angeles. Residents retreated indoors at night, and Mayor Dennis Donohue affirmed his decision to seek help from an unlikely source: the U.S. military.
Since February, combat veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan have been advising Salinas police on counterinsurgency strategy, bringing lessons from the battlefield to the meanest streets in an American city.
