This is what AP writes:
U.S. Marines along the volatile Syrian border have largely abandoned big bases to fan out over a dozen smaller outposts within cities — part of a resurrected Vietnam-era strategy to live among civilians and mentor local soldiers.
Spreading out to provide security for civilians is standard operating procedure in counter-insurgency. The problem in spreading out is that if the enemy can mass forces to pick off those small detachments it gives the enemy victories. In response, the counter-insurgent force may have to mass forces and abandon protecting civilians.
That is why I've harped on the idea that we need to atomize the enemy. Break them down by hitting them until they cannot mass in larger numbers so small detachments of either Americans or Iraqis are not vulnerable to being overwhelmed. Failing to atomize the enemy means we have to operate in larger units and so cannot cast as wide a net. But we have broken up the enemy so we can spread out--even in Anbar.
The article at least hints at this reasoning without grasping the significance:
The strategy, implemented after a large-scale U.S. and Iraqi offensive in the area last November, is in part a reaction against a common U.S. military tactic in Iraq of relying on patrols that depart from sprawling bases on the edges of cities.
"You've got to be in the towns, live among the people, eat with them ... until the people start telling you where the bad people are," said Lt. Col. Julian D. Alford. "If you live on the (bases) outside the city and come in for patrols, you're not going to win this."
Got it? Our strategy is working. And in time, because of our efforts in larger-scale attacks to atomize the enemy that peaked late last year, Iraqi troops will be up to the task, too.
And it just doesn't matter that we did this in Vietnam, too. Indeed, it would have worked there if we hadn't abandoned Saigon just as we'd beaten the internal enemy and let North Vietnam's mechanized spearheads conquer South Vietnam.
