The first step to victory is always working out the vital ground. Occupy that and you force the enemy to come to you. You’ve already achieved dominance and are halfway on the path to victory.

Unfortunately, when the battlefield is being fought for hearts and minds, the terrain becomes highly complex. It’s difficult to work out exactly which ‘ground’ is commanding, and what features are irrelevant. That’s why intelligence is so important. Without it, the commander can’t know how to direct their forces or where to fight.

This is particularly the case in situations such as in Uruzgan. Australian forces involved in reconstruction have been deployed here since 2006, but the social dynamics are shifting all the time. This is a prime instance of a battlefield where deciding where the human contours lie is a highly complex task.

Perhaps the best (although by no means the only) instance of this is the tribal nature of society. Like everyone, before I first travelled to the country I’d been aware of the difference between the Hazara and Pashtun people. What brought the distinction home to me, however, was a map pasted onto a wall at The Liaison Office in Kabul. A mass of coloured pins indicated the real diversity of inhabitants within the province. Read more