A collection of original works covering all aspects of insurgency and counterinsurgency through a multinational lens, Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Modern War addresses the need to look beyond the United States and other prominent counterinsurgency actors in the contemporary world. It also reassesses some of the latent and burgeoning insurgen
This timely book offers a world history of insurgencies and of counterinsurgency warfare. Jeremy Black moves beyond the conventional Western-centric narrative, arguing that it is crucial to ground contemporary experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq in a global framework. Unlike other studies that begin with the American and French revolutions, this book reaches back to antiquity to trace the pre-modern origins of war within states. Interweaving thematic and chronological narratives, Black probes the enduring linkages between beliefs, events, and people on the one hand and changes over time on the other hand. He shows the extent to which power politics, technologies, and ideologies have evolved, creating new parameters and paradigms that have framed both governmental and public views. Tracing insurgencies ranging from China to Africa to Latin America, Black highlights the widely differing military and political dimensions of each conflict. He weighs how, and why, lessons were “learned” or, rather, asserted, in both insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare. At every stage, he considers lessons learned by contemporaries, the ways in which norms developed within militaries and societies, and their impact on doctrine and policy. His sweeping study of insurrectionary warfare and its counterinsurgency counterpart will be essential reading for all students of military history.
A fascinating discussion of the development of counterinsurgency by experts in the field. Throughout history armies of occupation and civil power have been faced with the challenges of insurgency. British and American involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan has highlighted this form of conflict in the modern world. Armies have had to adopt new doctrines and tactics to deal with the problems of insurgency and diverse counterinsurgency strategies have been developed. Here, fourteen authors examine the development of counterinsurgency from the early 20th century to the present. Including information on the Arab-Israeli conflict, Afghanistan and Iraq this book is a timely and accessible survey of a critical facet of modern warfare. This new paperback edition features a revised introduction, updated chapters on Iraq and Afghanistan and a completely new chapter on Columbia by expert Thomas Marks.
Long considered the masters of counterinsurgency, the British military encountered significant problems in Iraq and Afghanistan when confronted with insurgent violence. In their effort to apply the principles and doctrines of past campaigns, they failed to prevent Basra and Helmand from descending into lawlessness, criminality, and violence. By juxtaposing the deterioration of these situations against Britain's celebrated legacy of counterinsurgency, this investigation identifies both the contributions and limitations of traditional tactics in such settings, exposing a disconcerting gap between ambitions and resources, intent and commitment. Building upon this detailed account of the Basra and Helmand campaigns, this volume conducts an unprecedented assessment of British military institutional adaptation in response to operations gone awry. In calling attention to the enduring effectiveness of insurgent methods and the threat posed by undergoverned spaces, David H. Ucko and Robert Egnell underscore the need for military organizations to meet the irregular challenges of future wars in new ways.
This book explores how unconventional warfare tactics have opposed governments, from eighteenth-century guerrilla warfare to contemporary urban terrorism. The tactics of guerrilla leaders such as Lawrence, Mao, Guevara and Marighela are examined and the works of counter-insurgency theorists such as Galleni, Callwell, Thompson and Kitson are analysed.
Armies are invariably accused of preparing to fight the last war. Nagl examines how armies learn during the course of conflicts for which they are initially unprepared in organization, training, and mindset. He compares the development of counterinsurgency doctrine and practice in the Malayan Emergency from 1948-1960 with that developed in the Vietnam Conflict from 1950-1975, through use of archival sources and interviews with participants in both conflicts. In examining these two events, he argues that organizational culture is the key variable in determining the success or failure of attempts to adapt to changing circumstances. Differences in organizational culture is the primary reason why the British Army learned to conduct counterinsurgency in Malaya while the American Army failed to learn in Vietnam. The American Army resisted any true attempt to learn how to fight an insurgency during the course of the Vietnam Conflict, preferring to treat the war as a conventional conflict in the tradition of the Korean War or World War II. The British Army, because of its traditional role as a colonial police force and the organizational characteristics that its history and the national culture created, was better able to quickly learn and apply the lessons of counterinsurgency during the course of the Malayan Emergency. This is the first study to apply organizational learning theory to cases in which armies were engaged in actual combat.
A fascinating look at the insurgencies and counterinsurgencies throughout history with a concentration on the 20th and 21st centuries. This encyclopedia examines insurgencies—and the counterinsurgency efforts they prompt—through history, addressing military actions and the techniques and technologies employed in each conflict, significant insurgency leaders, and the leading theorists, with emphasis on the "small wars" of the 20th century and most recent decades. The clear, concise entries provide a breadth of coverage that ranges from the Maccabean Revolt in 168–143 BCE and the Peasants' Revolt in Germany in the 1500s to the American Revolutionary War and the ongoing insurgency in Syria. Readers will gain a solid understanding of how insurgency warfare and counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy has played a key role in the U.S. conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq in the early 21st century, and grasp how this important military strategy has evolved during modern times.
David Kilcullen is one of the world's most influential experts on counterinsurgency and modern warfare, a ground-breaking theorist whose ideas "are revolutionizing military thinking throughout the west" (Washington Post). Indeed, his vision of modern warfare powerfully influenced the United States' decision to rethink its military strategy in Iraq and implement "the Surge," now recognized as a dramatic success. In Counterinsurgency, Kilcullen brings together his most salient writings on this vitally important topic. Here is a picture of modern warfare by someone who has had his boots on the ground in some of today's worst trouble spots-including Iraq and Afghanistan-and who has been studying counterinsurgency since 1985. Filled with down-to-earth, common-sense insights, this book is the definitive account of counterinsurgency, indispensable for all those interested in making sense of our world in an age of terror.
