T. E. Lawrence famously described guerrilla warfare as akin to “eating soup with a knife.” Nagl, a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, chose that expression as the title for an earlier book on how armies conduct counterinsurgency; the title of this memoir alludes to it as well. In 2004, as an operations officer in a tank battalion in Iraq, Nagl witnessed U.S. forces commit critical errors. Later, he became familiar in defense and media circles as a scholar-soldier -- a leading light among the “COINdinistas,” the group of academics and officers associated with U.S. General David Petraeus, who pushed hard for and then implemented a new approach to counterinsurgency, or COIN, in Iraq. This engaging book exhibits droll humor and a sharp grasp of the limits and possibilities of the U.S. Army as a learning organization.
