My thesis looks at how the Coast Guard and the Brown Water Navy successfully completed their missions during the Vietnam War and the reasons why these two services were successful while the U.S. counterinsurgency (COIN) campaign failed. I began my thesis last spring and will finish up this semester because I am graduating in December.
The journey to my thesis topic began spring of my freshman year when I read the book “Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam” by Dr. John Nagl, (Lt. Col., Ret) for Professor William Rose’s course “Insurgency and Counterinsurgency.” Basically, this work focuses on how organizations that are able to learn and adapt tend to have more success in carrying out COIN campaigns. Nagl calls this concept organizational theory. After reading Nagl’s book I began to wonder, could this theory apply to other armed services beyond the Army and the Marines? During the spring of my sophomore year, I decided to try to tackle this question and began a one-semester Independent Study with Professor Rose of the Government department, who is now my thesis advisor.
For that project I took a very cursory look at the role of each armed service during the Vietnam War. I quickly realized there was not much analysis available about the Coast Guard or the Brown Water Navy (which undertakes all the operations that took place on rivers – brown water – rather than on the ocean) and decided to write a thesis to address this gap in the literature.
One of the best parts of my research has been gaining access to the Coast Guard Academy’s historical records from the 1960s and 1970s. Some fun facts: there used to be a girl of the month in the Academy’s newspaper, and she was almost always a Conn girl. In the back of the handbook given to all 4th Class students there was a map of Conn. Each year for Christmas, many crews sent postcards from where they were stationed back to the Academy.
I have received invaluable help from Capt. Brigid Pavilonis, an international relations professor at the Academy. Capt. Pavilonis is my second reader and along with Professor Rose, she has helped keep me focused and on track when I started to talk or think myself in circles.
Before this thesis, I really wasn’t sure what I wanted to do following graduation. I thought maybe I would go into policy planning for the government or work for a think tank dealing with foreign policy. I had thought about joining the Army previously but realized that it was not for me. However, after learning about the missions, history and culture of the Coast Guard I realized that this was a military service whose culture and values align with my own. I am currently applying for the Coast Guard’s Officer Candidate School and if accepted, I hope to continue my research into the role of the Coast Guard in unconventional warfare. •
