Hard lessons learned in Iraq and Afghanistan had taught Reece that going after the head of the snake could be counterproductive. Killing or capturing a senior Al-Qaeda leader always led to another one taking his place, now smarter, having learned from his senior’s mistakes. After some amount of studying and bringing in civilian anthropologists and counterinsurgency experts from academia, some commanders began to use crosscut targeting as a way to more effectively take out the heir apparent before working both up and down the enemy chain of command across multiple networks. Reece understood the
...more
