IW-401 is a 3-day resident course which develops practitioners who can facilitate the design of integrated interagency irregular warfare campaign plans at the regional and operational level. This in-person course is intended for graduates of the IWC online course IW-301, and the instruction builds directly on the student developed integrated interagency IW campaign plans required for completion of IW-301. IW401 focuses on campaigning strategies with interagency competence and design thinking as interconnected disciplines supporting campaigning through small group discussions and practical exercises.
The course teaches three disciplines as one system: design, the interagency, and campaigning. Each is necessary and none is sufficient alone. A student who masters one and ignores the others will plan confidently in the wrong direction. The value is in the overlaps, and the prize is in the center.
The course learning objectives include:
LO1 Assess a regional IW campaign concept (from IW301)
LO2 Evaluate optimal U.S. government interagency integration for IW
LO3 Develop and defend an integrated interagency IW campaign design
Students review their own IW301 plans rubric-light, synthesize what IW301 taught, and surface the problem-setting gap it did not cover. The afternoon pivots to the IW401 rubric and delivers design as a two-hour anchor block, the tool students apply to the exemplar on Day 2. The day closes by introducing the single class exemplar campaign all groups will work from that point forward.
The morning delivers the campaigning and interagency anchors, with the interagency holding the larger share. The afternoon opens the exemplar and runs a dedicated, instructor-led right-problem determination using design, so the class shares one finding on the problem frame before judging the plan. Students then examine the plan against the rubric and stress-test it in an interagency deskside brief, presenting to role-players acting as Ambassador and country team who challenge feasibility, authorities, and sequencing.
Groups rebuild the campaign on the corrected problem frame, applying campaigning logic and the rubric findings, with the instructor cadre floating to clear muddied areas and micro-classes called as the exercise needs them. The course lands with each group presenting and defending its redesigned campaign in an adjudicated murder-board with structured challenge roles, not a soft brief. Roughly nine hours of student group time goes to the campaign build across the three days.
If interested in attending a IW401 pilot course to be held at JSOU at McDill AFB from 18-20 August 2026 you can register HERE. (Make sure to use an official email such as .mil, .gov. edu, etc. Free email accounts will not be approved.)
IW-401 also requires completion of IW-301 “IW Campaign Planning” a self-paced eLearning module with knowledge checks, development and submission of a regional, integrated interagency IW campaign plan, and an evaluation of the submitted IW campaign plan compared to an exemplar (provided to the students after submission of their plan). IW-301 is hosted by the Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS) at the Naval Postgraduate School. See this site for more information and specifics on registration Irregular Warfare 301 – Irregular Warfare Center
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