John Spencer | |
|---|---|
| Allegiance | United States |
| Branch | United States Army California State Guard |
| Rank | Major (USA) Colonel (CSG) |
| Commands | Urban Warfare Training, 40th Infantry Division |
| Battles / wars | Iraq War |
| Alma mater | Georgetown University |
John W. Spencer is a retired United States Army officer, researcher of urban warfare, and author. He currently serves as the chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute, codirector of the Urban Warfare Project, and host of the Urban Warfare Project Podcast at West Point. [1] He is a founding member of the International Working Group on Subterranean Warfare. [2]
He has commented on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. His comments on the 2023 Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip have been controversial. [3]
Spencer enlisted in the United States Army as a private, immediately after graduating from high school at the age of 17, [4] eventually reaching the rank of Sergeant first class, until receiving commission; he retired from active service with the rank of major. [1]
During his military career, he was infantry platoon leader and company commander, including two combat tours during the Iraq War. In Iraq, he served during the initial invasion in 2003 and later in 2008 during the Iraq War troop surge and the Battle of Sadr City. [5] [1] He was also assigned to Ranger School, Joint Chiefs of Staff, etc. Later he became a fellow with the chief of staff of the Strategic Studies Group, until he moved to Modern War Institute (MWI). [1]
Spencer is currently a chair of urban warfare studies at the MWI and a colonel in the California State Guard, where he is assigned as the director of urban warfare training with the 40th Infantry Division. [1]
During the summer of 2022, while Russian invasion of Ukraine was still in progress, he visited Ukraine, "to study the battle of Kyiv." [6]
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, he started giving advice on "how to resist the Russian invasions" through Twitter. [7] [8] [6] [9] [10] This culminated in him releasing "The Mini-Manual for the Urban Defender: A Guide to the Strategies and Tactics of Defending a City", which was translated into more than 10 languages. [5] [6] [9]
He is also a contributing editor at War on the Rocks . [11]
John Spencer has stated that the Israeli military has created a "new standard" consisting of a multitude of novel precautionary measures it has implemented during its invasion of the Gaza Strip, including mass calling and texting of Gazan civilians, giving them days or weeks to evacuate, as well as Israel's roof knocking before airstrikes. [12] [13] He has stated that these are practices that no military has ever implemented before. [14] Although a foreign policy advisor of Netanyahu has claimed that Spencer said "Israel sets the gold standard in terms of preserving civilian lives", [15] Spencer has refuted this, pointing out that "Israel has not created a gold standard in civilian harm mitigation in war. That [would imply] there is a standard in civilian casualties in war that is acceptable or not acceptable". [12] Nevertheless, many commentators have used this "gold standard" phrase and Spencer's name in several critiques of Israel in relation to civilian casualties in Gaza. [3]
John Spencer praised Israel's ratio of civilian casualties in Gaza as "historically low for modern warfare," citing IDF claims that 50-60% of Gazans killed were civilians and previous estimates of 80-90% of casualties in modern conflicts being civilians. [16] While these claims were later picked up by Netanyahu, Professor Michael Spagat of the University of London writes that the statistics Spencer cites, and his conclusions, are both false. [17] The myth that 80-90% of casualties in war are civilians was popular among government officials in the 1990s, but by 2010 it had been debunked by the Red Cross, World Health Organization and others. [18] Spagat points out that the Uppsala Conflict Data Program database of wars (1989-2017) shows 42–55% of casualties are civilians in modern warfare; in urban warfare, 40–70% of casualties are civilians. [17] Spagat also estimates that 80% of Gaza casualties are civilians, concluding that civilian casualties in Gaza are higher than the average for both urban warfare and modern warfare. [17]
Larry Lewis of Center for Naval Analyses has criticized Spencer's positions. [3] He argues that the IDF's order for 1 million Gazans to evacuate from northern Gaza to southern Gaza in 24 hours was deemed practically impossible by experts, [19] and that Israel attacked civilians while they were evacuating and then again once the civilians were in southern Gaza. Lewis also questions the effectiveness of communication with cell phones, given widespread destruction of Gaza's infrastructure; and that interviews with Gazans after the 2014 war showed that the effectiveness of roof knocking was mixed due to confusion among civilians caused by Israel's tactics. [3]
Maryam Jamshidi has also criticized John Spencer's praise of Israel's "precautionary measures" arguing that in reality such measures are ineffective and possibly even war crimes. She points out that many of Israel's evacuation orders contained errors, and Israel's order for 1.1 million Palestinians to evacuate could be construed as collective punishment. [20]
Geoffrey Corn, the George R. Killam, Jr. Chair of Criminal Law and Director of the Center for Military Law and Policy at Texas Tech University School of Law, wrote a piece for Newsweek magazine from the perspective of the Geneva Conventions, and concluded that "Israel consistently implements its legal obligation to avoid, whenever feasibly, [civilian deaths]". [21]
Retired US master sergeant Wes J. Bryant wrote that a "first-world military should never view a 2:1 civilian-to-combatant death ratio as acceptable, let alone remotely 'positive'." [22]
Gen. David A. Deptula, Dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies at the U.S. Air Force Academy, visited the Middle East and studied the situation, and wrote a report for Forbes magazine upon his return. In his analysis, he positively cited both John Spencer as well as Lord Andrew Roberts in explaining that Israel was working extremely hard under nearly impossible conditions to protect and assist the civilians of Gaza, and noted flatly that the "IDF [is] complying with the laws of armed conflict." [23]
In a December 2024 Spencer co-wrote an article with Arsen Ostrovsky in Newsweek denying the Gaza Genocide as documented by Amnesty International, and calling it a blood libel. [24] This denial was based on the population figure for Gaza published in the CIA World Factbook, [25] [26] with Spencer and Ortrovsky claiming that the population had "increased 2 percent in the last year" according to the Factbook. [24] The AAP Factcheck team analyzed the claim spread on social media that the Gaza population had increased by 2 percent according to the CIA Factbook, and declared it to be false, as the CIA sourced the figures from the US Census Bureau's International Population Estimates and Projections, and the projection was an estimate using data from August 2023, before the conflict began. [27]
In their criticism, Israel's opponents are erasing a remarkable, historic new standard Israel has set. In my long career studying and advising on urban warfare for the U.S. military, I've never known an army to take such measures to attend to the enemy's civilian population, especially while simultaneously combating the enemy in the very same buildings. In fact, by my analysis, Israel has implemented more precautions to prevent civilian harm than any military in history—above and beyond what international law requires and more than the U.S. did in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Now, Col. John Spencer - he says that Israel sets the gold standard in terms of preserving civilian lives.
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