Austin Long, Assistant Professor at SIPA and a Member of the Saltzman Institute, has released the nineteenth paper in the Saltzman Working Paper Series. The paper, “Whack-a-Mole or Coup de Grace? Institutionalization and Leadership Targeting in Iraq and Afghanistan,” addresses the practice of pursuing high-level insurgent commanders which US-led forces have pursued in these two conflicts. Dr. Long shows this technique, termed “leadership targeting,” to be more or less effective depending on the institutional structure of the targeted organization.

Dr. Long’s paper is available here; earlier papers can be downloaded from the Working Papers Series section of our website.