Nicholas O Melin

Challenge of Access: Using Road Construction as a Tool in Counterinsurgency Nicholas O Melin

Publisher Marketing: This thesis seeks to illustrate both the benefits and limitations associated with using road building in COIN campaigns in South Asia, as well as highlight factors that should be considered from planning through long-term use. When employed in a counterinsurgency, roads are tools for access and control. They are key terrain that facilitates the operations of the force that controls them. Roads are not, however, short-term tools. The process of building a road takes years to complete, and the effects of a road project on the population cannot be accurately be measured during the construction process itself. Roads require dedication by the counterinsurgent not only to the process of building the road itself, but to a population-focused COIN effort along its length long after the road itself is completed. Roads may not be acceptable to local people in all areas, and road construction without local acceptance can result in the expensive project being perceived as a tool of control rather than a conduit for development. In light of these considerations, the road construction campaign in Afghanistan and Pakistan should be curtailed, with emphasis on nesting road projects directly within the COIN effort.