Jim Gant

One Tribe at a Time In October 2009, Gant wrote an influential paper titled One Tribe at a Time: A Strategy for Success in Afghanistan. Gant first published the paper on the website of Stephen Pressfield, a historical fiction novelist who is popular in military circles. The paper reached a wider audience after its publication on the Small Wars Journal website. In One Tribe at a Time, Gant argued that the United States should leverage the Pashtun tribal system in Afghanistan by creating "Tribal Engagement Teams" that would embed at the village level and work with locals to build security.

General David Petraeus called the paper "very impressive," and General Stanley McChrystal distributed it to all commanders in Afghanistan. but, according to Paula Broadwell, it helped inspire Petraeus to create the Afghan Local Police.

Final deployment Gant returned to Afghanistan in June 2010, and was stationed in the village of Mangwal where he had served in 2003. and achieved significant operational success. General Petraeus called him "the perfect counterinsurgent" and compared him favorably to T. E. Lawrence, calling him "Lawrence of Afghanistan." Petraeus made Mangwal a "showcase" for his counterinsurgency strategy, and congressional delegations such as those of Lindsey Graham and John McCain visited the village. By the middle of 2011, Gant had recruited 1,300 Afghan Local Police. Gant has been credited with inspiring the Village Stability Operations (VSO) strategy which was widely employed by special operations forces in Afghanistan.

Later life Tyson and Gant have married and live in Seattle, Washington. In 2014, Tyson wrote a book about Gant titled American Spartan: The Promise, the Mission, and the Betrayal of Special Forces Major Jim Gant. In 2021, Gant participated in the efforts of Task Force Pineapple to evacuate Afghan allies during the Fall of Kabul.