Thursday, December 1, 2011, is the fiftieth anniversary of West Papua’s independence. On this day in 1961 West Papuans were granted their freedom by the Dutch – they raised a new national flag and sang a new national anthem. A year later Indonesia launched a colonial invasion, and managed to annex the fledgling nation. Since then tens of thousands of civilians – almost all of them indigenous tribal people – have been killed.

Ten years after the Taliban’s leaders fled their country in apparent defeat, the war in Afghanistan has become what one observer calls “a perpetually escalating stalemate.” As in Iraq, the United States military has responded to bad news with counterinsurgency: eliminate troublemakers in the dark of night, with the most lethal arts, and befriend tribal elders by day, with cultural sensitivity and expertise. The Army has gone so far as to embed credentialed social scientists with front-line troops in “Human Terrain Teams” that engage in “rapid ethnographic assessment” — conducting interviews and administering surveys, learning about land disputes, social networks and how to “operationalize” the Pashtun tribal code. The military, in short, demands local knowledge.