An Afghan boy at a medical clinic set up by American Army medics and an anthropologist in the Shabak Valley in Afghanistan. Tomas Munita for The New York TimesMilitary To Deploy Social Scientists To Africa, Searching For Signs Of War -- The Danger Room
In Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. military has embraced social science as a tool of counterinsurgency, embedding anthropologists and sociologists within brigades as part of an effort to understand local cultural and tribal dynamics. It’s a controversial approach, but in theory, it’s supposed to make military operations less lethal by helping commanders identify who their friends are.
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My Comment: Social scientists probably give added intelligence when put into a conflict zone. Their training makes them sensitive to issues that military/intelligence units would find unimportant, but to the local community it may play a significant and crucial role.
But in the greater scheme of things will their input be important? Hmmmmm .... considering what is happening in Afghanistan, I will have to say that the jury is still out on that one.
