View Full Version : Why democracies don't lose insurgencies
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 03:39 AM
Need to know if anyone can cite a post-1945 insurgency against a democracy that won, as defined by achieving all goals. (separation or overthrow) Political settlements are a different set.
I'm considering my grad thesis on Democracies and Insurgencies. Specifically, in the RAND insurgency dataset of 89 insurgencies 1945-2006, I found no examples of a democracy (defined by government enduring the insurgency, not the government of external supporters) losing an insurgency, as defined by the insurgents attaining all of their objectives (overthrow or secession). Of 20 democratic insurgencies in the database, 10 beat the insurgent, 5 are ongoing, and 5 reached some sort of political accord between sides.
I have some subjective coding questions, but the results hold true even when I "play" with the inclusion of certain cases not in the RAND set. (i.e. Russia 1999 (Chechnya II) is not considered a democracy, but in 1994 is)
Other casual observations include:
* last longer on average (AVG 17 yrs vs. 11)
* less likely to settle politically than the mean for all governments in the dataset
* results seem to hold true regardless of GDP, external support (either side), external sanctuary, political freedom, and even military competence
* Average insurgency size is less than half the mean of all insurgencies
* Nearly all post-cold war democratic insurgencies are separatist in nature, not aiming for regime change.
My overall research will involve why democracies are more resistant to insurgencies. Sort of a "Democratic Insurgency" theory.
Possible hypothesis include:
For reference, the 1945-2006 Democratic insurgencies, by outcome: (note, "Lose" means insurgent loss, included is start date of insurgency, and length of insurgency)
Philippines (MNLF) Lose 1971 25
Argentina Lose 1968 11
Peru Lose 1981 11
Philippines HUK Lose 1946 9
Uruguay Lose 1963 10
Lebanon Lose 1958 1
Uganda (ADF) Lose 1986 14
Northern Ireland Lose 1969 30
Philippines (MILF) Lose 1977 29
Turkey (PKK) Lose 1984 15
Philippines (NPA) Ongoing 1969 37
India Northeast Ongoing 1975 31
Nigeria (Niger Delta) Ongoing 1991 15
Sri Lanka Ongoing 1976 30
South Thailand Ongoing 2004 2
Senegal Political 1980 22
Chechnya I Political 1994 2
East Timor Political 1975 25
Georgia/Abkhazia Political 1992 2
Papua New Guinea Political 1988 10
Input appreciated about the viability of this topic or holes in the thesis before I go to far. Also any literature pertaining to this topic appreciated.
Schmedlap
01-29-2009, 03:59 AM
Fishel's post from another thread came to mind...
the theoretical position he noted was stated by Ted Robert Gurr in his 1970 classic, Why Men Rebel. It may be summarized as follows:
1. The absolutely deprived/oppressed do not rebel.
2. Neither do those who are doing well.
3. Rebellion happens after a period of social/political/economic improvement is followed by a sudden and relatively steep downturn causing the government to lose its legitimacy.
Gurr calls this "perceived relative deprivation."
It's still the best theoretical explanation for insurgency out there.
With that in mind, I would guess (and this is a pure guess - not even an "eduated" one) that most democracies tend to experience less drastic social upheavals than other forms of government. Using the theory above, less drastic upheaval means less intense insurgency (if any). The weaker insurgency gets defeated.
Another uneducated guess: in a democracy, change is less likely to take the form of armed upheaval because a democracy, in theory, gives everyone at least some voice or the perception that they have a voice and they are less likely to lash out. Hitler comes to mind. He didn't wage an insurgency. He got elected.
Third thought: an insurgency can gain legitimacy by demonizing a king or oligarchy. Who does it demonize in a democracy? The people? That doesn't sound like much of a rallying cry. "We suck - let's overthrow ourselves!"
jmm99
01-29-2009, 05:01 AM
put Algeria ? Part of France - not part of French Union colonial structure - which was a democracy. Easy enough to explain it away since the democratic standards applied to Paris did not apply to Algiers, etc., etc. But, the result was secession.
PS: the topic seems OK - and, in the examples, the term "quasi-democracy" would fit many (IMO); thus, slanting the playing field in favor of insurgency "winning". Maybe there are two questions:
1. Why are there insurgencies in democracies ? E.g., Why the War of Northern Agression ? :D
2. Why are those insurgencies unsuccessful, etc. ?
Starbuck
01-29-2009, 06:02 AM
Does the money play a role? I was reading something from Fareed Zakaria the other day regarding liberal democracies, and he stated that they tend to occur (and become stable) when the per capita income exceeds a certain point. If that's the cases, then people feel less likely to wage war against the government if they have money, property and thus, something to lose.
A democracy also gives the violent minority a voice in the government, a chance to elect people to advance their agenda, whereas non-democratic nations do not. Exceptions should be made in cases like Israel, where a minority group is not represented in the government, and experiences a very low standard of living, and thus, we might not call it a "true" democracy.
Furthermore, I would expect that most democracies would be more likely to reach a political settlement in the face of a protracted conflict, as democracies tend to not settle for protracted wars. Or am I just looking at this from a Western American point of view (Phillipines, Eastern Europe, etc).
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 06:03 AM
put Algeria ? Part of France - not part of French Union colonial structure - which was a democracy. Easy enough to explain it away since the democratic standards applied to Paris did not apply to Algiers, etc., etc. But, the result was secession.
PS: the topic seems OK - and, in the examples, the term "quasi-democracy" would fit many (IMO); thus, slanting the playing field in favor of insurgency "winning". Maybe there are two questions:
1. Why are there insurgencies in democracies ? E.g., Why the War of Northern Agression ? :D
2. Why are those insurgencies unsuccessful, etc. ?
Algeria was considered an Anocracy by RAND- rule by minority, since the (democratic) French denied suffrage to the Algerian population.
I replied to a PM on the civil war question - as I have read various definitions I have concluded that not all civil wars are insurgencies - mainly because the pol-sci definition of civil war requires "organized military units" among other things, which not all insurgencies (even some successful ones) have.
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 06:09 AM
Fishel's post from another thread came to mind...
With that in mind, I would guess (and this is a pure guess - not even an "eduated" one) that most democracies tend to experience less drastic social upheavals than other forms of government. Using the theory above, less drastic upheaval means less intense insurgency (if any). The weaker insurgency gets defeated.
Interesting, must think on this.
Another uneducated guess: in a democracy, change is less likely to take the form of armed upheaval because a democracy, in theory, gives everyone at least some voice or the perception that they have a voice and they are less likely to lash out. Hitler comes to mind. He didn't wage an insurgency. He got elected.
I think this explains why democratic insurgencies seldom hit "tipping points" where they gain mass support - most of the electorate feels they have a means to resolve political grievance. Those who are "democratic insurgents" are mostly irreconcilable to the existence or shape of the government in some form and thus see no hope in the democratic process. Ethno-sectarian secession comes to mind.
Third thought: an insurgency can gain legitimacy by demonizing a king or oligarchy. Who does it demonize in a democracy? The people? That doesn't sound like much of a rallying cry. "We suck - let's overthrow ourselves!"
Agreed.
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 06:14 AM
Does the money play a role? I was reading something from Fareed Zakaria the other day regarding liberal democracies, and he stated that they tend to occur (and become stable) when the per capita income exceeds a certain point. If that's the cases, then people feel less likely to wage war against the government if they have money, property and thus, something to lose.
Starbuck - welcome to the board. Please introduce yourself here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?goto=newpost&t=1441). Like the BSG handle.
My first thought was that it involved money, but the "democratic insurgencies" span the gamut from extremely poor to rich on a relatively even bell curve - take the UK/Northern Ireland example. For example Uruguay and Senegal are on there, hardly economic powerhouses then or now.
A democracy also gives the violent minority a voice in the government, a chance to elect people to advance their agenda, whereas non-democratic nations do not. Exceptions should be made in cases like Israel, where a minority group is not represented in the government, and experiences a very low standard of living, and thus, we might not call it a "true" democracy.
The RAND set calls this an anocracy, which accounts for Israel, South Africa, and the French (Algeria) case. Rule by minority or small majority (often democratic), but without universal suffrage for a significant portion of the electorate.
Furthermore, I would expect that most democracies would be more likely to reach a political settlement in the face of a protracted conflict, as democracies tend to not settle for protracted wars. Or am I just looking at this from a Western American point of view (Phillipines, Eastern Europe, etc).
I would have thought so too, but when compared to the mean of political settlements across all insurgencies, democracies actually settle LESS! I think democratic insurgencies involve issues or ideologies less willing to compromise.
There are some dataset coding issues, but none of my quibbles has changed the overall observation significantly.
William F. Owen
01-29-2009, 06:54 AM
Third thought: an insurgency can gain legitimacy by demonizing a king or oligarchy. Who does it demonize in a democracy? The people? That doesn't sound like much of a rallying cry. "We suck - let's overthrow ourselves!"
You may want to look at the Insurgency in southern Thailand, were to my mind the "Insurgents" - and it is by no means clear who they are - never say anything against the Thai King - because should they, things would get very brutal, very quickly.
William F. Owen
01-29-2009, 07:04 AM
Cav,
Merely some suggestions, but I would also suggest you look at the role physical land and territory in your thesis.
The IRA was aiming at a unified Ireland.
The PFLP and PLO wanted land and territory - still do.
The South Thailand Insurgency wants the states with a Muslim majority to be part of Malaysia, or secede from Thailand, in some form.
Insurgencies are generally about the control of terrain. I might add that pure terrorist groups on the other hand, generally aims at a change of policy, rather than terrain, but that needs to be held to rigour.
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 01:39 PM
Cav,
Merely some suggestions, but I would also suggest you look at the role physical land and territory in your thesis.
The IRA was aiming at a unified Ireland.
The PFLP and PLO wanted land and territory - still do.
The South Thailand Insurgency wants the states with a Muslim majority to be part of Malaysia, or secede from Thailand, in some form.
Insurgencies are generally about the control of terrain. I might add that pure terrorist groups on the other hand, generally aims at a change of policy, rather than terrain, but that needs to be held to rigour.
I have found the same so far - most post-cold war "insurgencies" seek separatism of some form - not regime change or overthrow.
The definitions are imprecise and have overlap between political terror, civil war, and insurgency, which makes the inclusion/exclusion of certain cases somewhat subjective - my key is not to introduce bias by excluding a case which potentially undercuts the theory and can reasonably be called and insurgency.
I have other quibble issues across the dataset, but the inclusion of my quibbles doesn't change the empirical observation. (For example, including Chechnya II, Iraq, or Afghanistan as an insurgency against a democracy doesn't change that democracies don't outright lose (yet))
William F. Owen
01-29-2009, 01:55 PM
The definitions are imprecise and have overlap between political terror, civil war, and insurgency, which makes the inclusion/exclusion of certain cases somewhat subjective - my key is not to introduce bias by excluding a case which potentially undercuts the theory and can reasonably be called and insurgency.
May I offer,"Pedants will be able to cite exceptions, and thus undermine useful (insightful) theory. Their depredations must be firmly resisted by one simple test: does the theory generally aid understanding of useful military problems? If so, then exceptions are permissible."
John T. Fishel
01-29-2009, 02:33 PM
While not only democracies are legitimate (departing from Weber: traditional and charismatic legitimacy) democracies do have what I would call "face legitimacy." Look at our SWORD Model article in the Journal - especially at the Host Government Legitimacy variable in Table 3. The first varible in the table specifically relates to democracy (electoral). Corruption is a classic driver of insurgency or, simply, electoral turnover. As long as you can throw the rascals out by election there is no need for armed rebellion. Same with "motivation of the people" which here refers to the ability of the government to deliver the basic "goods & serices" such as security demanded by the people. The last of the most important variables really asks if there are alternatives to political violence such as free, competetive elections. If all these are present one is dealing with a democracy and that democracy is perceived as legitimate by its population. Given that legitimacy is the single strongest internal dimension explaining the outcome of an insurgency, then it seems clear that deocracies will generally defeat insurgencies directed against them. The correlation should range from very high when using a rigourous definition (criteria) for democracy to high for a less rigorous formulation.
Cheers
JohnT
As I look over your database (and I am by no means an expert on many of these insurgencies) it occurs to me that insurgencies in a democracy results when a particular group feels that it is vulnerable to the tyranny of the majority. In other words, there is no overt mechanism (such as our bill of rights and judicial review) that protects minority political/cultural/economic rights that they consider vital to their security or to their identity - usually both.
I also note that in most of the cases the democracy in question is not one with a long democratic tradition. Therefore minorities are less trusting that, in the long term, the democratic values of the majority will serve to resolve their grievances.
Finally, in most of the cases, the insurgents occupy a geographically distinct part of the country - that is, they have a coherent (usually defensible) base from which to operate, as opposed to being a faction 'immersed' in the majority.
All this means that an insurgency within a democracy will normally be able to force the government to a political settlement acceptable to both sides more easily than one fighting against a totalitarian state. In the former case, achieving overt safeguards against the tyranny of the majority (autonomy, voting rights, guaranteed representation, etc) will be acceptable substitutes for "total victory" in the eyes of the insurgents, and will be seen by the government as acceptable concessions within the framework of a democratic state. Especially when the alternative is continuing a debilitating, costly insurgency. In the latter case - insurgencies against totalitarian states - the stakes are far higher and the capacity for compromise far lower, making it easier to sustain the will of both sides to continue the fight.
Thus I would question whether I would characterize a political settlement as a loss for the insurgents - it merely allows them to continue the struggle through other means.
Steve Blair
01-29-2009, 03:17 PM
"How Democracies Lose Small Wars" (http://www.amazon.com/How-Democracies-Lose-Small-Wars/dp/0521008778/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233242185&sr=8-1) might provide you with some interesting information as well. Granted the author's focus is more on the involvement of democracies in external small wars as opposed to internal insurgencies, but he does have some good observations about the ability of democracies to conduct wars that might be unpopular with a segment of their own electorate.
Eden makes a good point regarding a political settlement. In some cases it might actually be a victory of sorts for both sides. Sounds like an interesting topic, although you may need to be mindful of the Cold War political impacts within some of the earlier insurgencies mentioned. By that I mean the actual motivations and driving forces behind some of those movements, which might have made them more vulnerable to political settlements by the government (i.e., grant concessions to some of the local insurgent demands [land reform, minority representation, etc.], thereby undercutting the political leverage of some elements of the insurgency.
UrsaMaior
01-29-2009, 03:18 PM
I found the below study.
Lyall, John, ’Do Democracies Make Inferior Counterinsurgents?’, 2007, Available at: http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/DemoWar.pdf
I would appreciate your opinion about it.
THX in advance.
Rank amateur
01-29-2009, 03:40 PM
To somewhat echo Wilf's coments, I'm not sure that it will produce a lot of valuable insight, though I guess part of the process is that you never know what kind of insight you'll find until you go looking.
I think you also need to consider situations where the insurgents didn't win, but the democracy came to an end. In other words, one reason democracies don't lose is because if the weak kneed liberal Democratic politicians start to lose, the military stages a coup. Pakistan comes to mind. There may be some examples in Central and South America.
Also - I meant to mention this a couple of times - it seems to me the French defined victory as maintaining their colonies and the British defined victory as giving their colonies independence. Since what most of the insurgents wanted was independence from the British, it seems to me that democracies have a lot more ability to spin the definition of "victory." For that matter, changing the definition of "democracy" invalidates your thesis:
There is debate about how closely the South Vietnamese government was linked to the United States, which was a strong supporter of South Vietnam. The country is alleged by many historians to have been nothing more than an American-backed puppet government, but many others claim that it was genuine democracy (or, at the least, a patriotic movement with genuine concern for the Vietnamese people). An individual's views on the matter generally correspond closely to their views on the Vietnam War in general - supporters of the war often believe that South Vietnam was a democracy, and thus worthy of defence, while opponents of the war often believe that South Vietnamese democracy was a sham. (http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/South-Vietnamese)
William F. Owen
01-29-2009, 04:04 PM
To somewhat echo Wilf's coments, I'm not sure that it will produce a lot of valuable insight, though I guess part of the process is that you never know what kind of insight you'll find until you go looking.
I think it may well produce some insights.
I kind of hope they may support the bones of my basic thesis that Insurgencies are merely a style of warfare and subscribe to all the Clausewitian doctrines.
Bob's World
01-29-2009, 04:40 PM
put Algeria ? Part of France - not part of French Union colonial structure - which was a democracy. Easy enough to explain it away since the democratic standards applied to Paris did not apply to Algiers, etc., etc. But, the result was secession.
PS: the topic seems OK - and, in the examples, the term "quasi-democracy" would fit many (IMO); thus, slanting the playing field in favor of insurgency "winning". Maybe there are two questions:
1. Why are there insurgencies in democracies ? E.g., Why the War of Northern Agression ? :D
2. Why are those insurgencies unsuccessful, etc. ?
I see insurgency as the course of last resort of a populace to effect change of governance. In a country with no or few legitimate means to effect change, the popualce as a whole both loses hope sooner that change will not occur in due course, and gets to "last resort" sooner as a result.
So why do you still get situations like the American Civil War? Two factors are important. All legal means had been exhausted and we were at a stalemate; two, the issued divided the populace in clear geographic sides. If the issue would have been more like gun control or abortion, that is difused accross the populace in no neat, geographic segments, it is unlikely to result in insurgency. Just suck it up and keep voting.
Look at Tailand. Not a US brand democracy, but there is an ongoing islamic insurgency even though Muslims are less than 5% of the populace. Geographically though, that 5% is a compressed majority down on the Malaysian border. Similar in the Philippines.
2. Why are they not successful? As far back as Sun Tzu military leaders have know that an enemy with no recourse but to fight will fight harder and longer than one who knows that they can either escape, or if forced to surrender, will face a fate better than death. Same concept probably applies here. If a democratic populace is finally pushed to fight, like the South, once that fight appears hopeless they are probably much more inclined to accept a compromise than a popualce that knows that once committed to the fight they must either prevail or die. It was a matter of honor that drove them to fight, and given the option of an honorable surrender, they were willing to take it.
To me this all seems like common-sense, but as that isn't as common as one might hope, this may make a worthwhile paper. My only real reservation is that I am really against all of the "Democracy" rhetoric that has permeated the U.S. message, strategy, and activities of late. I far prefer self-determination and popular sovereignty.
To me, Democracy is a lot like sex. Its great if everyone involved wants it, but if forced upon you it is rape. To carry that analogy probably one step too far: If the Uncle Sam would improve his message and delivery, he'd probably find a lot more willing takers...
Rank amateur
01-29-2009, 04:44 PM
I think it may well produce some insights.
I kind of hope they may support the bones of my basic thesis that Insurgencies are merely a style of warfare and subscribe to all the Clausewitian doctrines.
OK, then to completely disagree with Wilf, my concern would be that if everything depends on how you define things, it might be hard to gain a lot of insight.
To me, Democracy is a lot like sex. Its great if everyone involved wants it, but if forced upon you it is rape. To carry that analogy probably one step too far: If the Uncle Sam would improve his message and delivery, he'd probably find a lot more willing takers...
To carry it further, if you're carrying an assault rifle, no matter what happens, some people will never believe it was voluntary.
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 05:52 PM
Good input all, these are the kinds of holes/skepticism I want to hear before I head too far down my research path.
RA, understand your point about democracy change, but the dataset allows for regime change during the insurgency (Indonesia is a key case - autocracy to democracy)
To Bob's World, I would definitely opine that the focus of my paper would not be to justify forceable democratic change, but to determine why, out of 89 insurgencies (as classified by RAND) observed since 1945, there are 25 insurgent "wins" against autocracies, anocracies, monarchial, and colonial governments, but none against democracies.
Like the "democratic peace" question - I am curious as to the reason - is it a facet of democracy that prevents insurgent victory, or some other reason?
Again, my initial findings indicate that not only are democracies resistant to insurgent victory, they actually directly politcially settle LESS than other forms of goverment.
Ron Humphrey
01-29-2009, 05:54 PM
OK, then to completely disagree with Wilf, my concern would be that if everything depends on how you define things, it might be hard to gain a lot of insight..
Whenever approaching any study such as this definitions do tend to effect what you see, that however doesn't represent the truth of what they are.
Given that one approaches the subject in such a manner as to tracing the roots and from there following up the tree this could turn out to be very insightful;)
To carry it further, if you're carrying an assault rifle, no matter what happens, some people will never believe it was voluntary.
While perhaps true that nonetheless fails to prove that it wasn't voluntary.
Lots and lots of "some people" out there. Never gonna please em all:D
Ken White
01-29-2009, 07:29 PM
...For that matter, changing the definition of "democracy" invalidates your thesis:
"...The country is alleged by many historians to have been nothing more than an American-backed puppet government, but many others claim that it was genuine democracy (or, at the least, a patriotic movement with genuine concern for the Vietnamese people). An individual's views on the matter generally correspond closely to their views on the Vietnam War in general - supporters of the war often believe that South Vietnam was a democracy, and thus worthy of defence, while opponents of the war often believe that South Vietnamese democracy was a sham.[/URL]stupidity in the discourse on Viet Nam. It was emphatically a democracy but one in the Asian model; an oligarchy at the top, elected politicians below -- particularly at Province and local level. The leaders responded to the populace. Anyone who contends it was a puppet government in verging on idiocy. The Viet Namese ran their country, took little to no advice from the Americans (unless we offered a healthy bribe; even they'd demur frequently) and did what they wanted to -- frequently stymieing US goals.
To echo Ron Humphrey on your later comments:
OK, then to completely disagree with Wilf, my concern would be that if everything depends on how you define things, it might be hard to gain a lot of insight.Doesn't almost everything depend on how one defines things? Acknowledging that 'one' is human and we are infinitely variable.
All inquiry starts with a postulation, not the postulation...
To carry it further, if you're carrying an assault rifle, no matter what happens, some people will never believe it was voluntary.Oh, I dunno, I carried a rifle for years, it was purely voluntary. Still do on occasion; still voluntary. As an aside, 'Assault Rifle' is a term invented by the mostly ignorant popular media and perpetuated by even more ignorant Congroids who banned all "Assault Rifles" except those they didn't ban. A rifle is a rifle, not really any such thing as an 'Assault Rifle' (other than in the eyes of the US Congress. I rest my case...). That also excuses people who carry just pistols or who carry SMGs, MG, RPGs and such, I guess... :D
If, OTOH, as opposed to what you said, what you meant was if someone carrying a weapon was strolling about, any changes in the local milieu brought about by the elements that person represents will not be viewed as voluntary by some observers in the population of the locale where said weapon carrying soul then I'd say you're correct. I'd also suggest that the number so viewing that issue in that light will depend on many things and that for the most part, there will always be some nervous, whiney types who will see danger in anything but that most people have enough sense to judge things based on reality instead of ideology.
For example, the Gendarmerie in France has been wandering about with Rifles, Pistols and SMGs for years and a few people in France see that as threatening -- most of the French nation and its visitors, however, do not.
Rank amateur
01-29-2009, 07:33 PM
Lots and lots of "some people" out there. Never gonna please em all:D
And every one of them is a potential insurgent.
Neil, another factor to consider is that in a democracy, the environment isn't binary. In other words, if people hate the government the insurgents aren't their only alternative. (I believe you have a wee bit of experience in what happens when you give people a third option. ;))
jmm99
01-29-2009, 07:34 PM
The conclusion of UM's link (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/DemoWar.pdf) (p.24) is interesting:
While better measures of democracy may lead to a reassessment, it appears that regime type has little analytical utility for explaining COIN war outcomes and duration. Instead, emphasizing battlefield dynamics (the “how” of fighting) may prove a better theoretical bet than focusing on regime-specific variables (the “who” of fighting). Indeed, the degree of a military’s mechanization, its status as an external occupier, and the level of material support for insurgents all proved more consequential for explaining outcomes and duration. In short, democracies do struggle to defeat insurgents — but not because they are democracies.
Wilf, is this your position - more or less ?
-----------------
Some more articles by the same author are here (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/Lyall_Newtest_Research.htm).
Rank amateur
01-29-2009, 07:38 PM
It was emphatically a democracy but one in the Asian model
Didn't the insurgents win that one?
A rifle is a rifle
I suspect that if anyone asked you to carry one of these around Vietnam, you may have had a slightly different opinion.
http://tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:E2xWzWUQ5B_FrM:http://www.sdgfp.info/wildlife/education/StepOutside/STEPOUTSIDEHuron22rifle1.jpg
but to keep the conversation on topic, weapons obviously matter: both physically and symbolically.
reed11b
01-29-2009, 07:52 PM
I find this whole thread misleading and dangerous due to the vast assumptions going on to fuel it. One, a true democracy of "one person, one vote" is essentially mob rule and where the majority is in violent opposition to the minority then there is strong fuel for insurgency. If the minority is either, by coalition, a larger force then the nominal majority or has better support and resources, then they can "win". period. Too assume otherwise is foolish. Second it assumes that a democracy is what everyone really really wants in there hearts of hearts and if only they could truly experience it, the world would be better. The insurgencies that we face today are often fueled as much by international ideology, particularly radical Islamic ideology as they are by national or sub-national concerns. Don't get to hung up on the west vs. Islam either, because that can change just as quick too. Third it assumes that terrorism and insurgency are unique and cleanly separate from each other, they are not, terrorism is a means or technique of insurgency. Focus on the realities of the fight you are in, instead of trying to develop a COIN master plan because in order to do that you have make assumptions, and when you assume it makes an ass out of u and me.
Reed
Ken White
01-29-2009, 08:20 PM
Didn't the insurgents win that one?No. More ignorance. The insurgents were severely tromped and almost totally ineffective before the last US troops left in 1973. The North Viet Namese Army won it in 1975 -- with a conventional invasion, not an insurgency.
I suspect that if anyone asked you to carry one of these around Vietnam, you may have had a slightly different opinion.Since I carried an M16 and there was little difference between that and your pictured weapon, I don't see a problem. A .22 is a .22... :D
In any event, as the Actress said to the Bishop it's not what you have...
but to keep the conversation on topic, weapons obviously matter: both physically and symbolically.Physically, of course. Symbolically, not nearly as much as you appear to believe. There are a lot of areas in the world where weapons are routinely carried -- there, they tend to look askance at those who do not have a weapon.
If I may, you seem to be judging everything from a western perspective. We westerners account for about 25% of the world population -- the other 75% don't think like we do and to judge their responses by our thought processes is dangerous (See Viet Nam, to use your favorite whipping boy ;) ).
Ken White
01-29-2009, 08:33 PM
I find this whole thread misleading and dangerous due to the vast assumptions going on to fuel it.Your prerogative. Couldn't you say so without being confrontational?
One, a true democracy of "one person, one vote" is essentially mob rule and where the majority is in violent opposition to the minority then there is strong fuel for insurgency.There are several places where that isn't entirely true; the mob rule aspect, I mean. As for the other, did you mean where the minority is in violent opposition to the majority?
If the minority is either, by coalition, a larger force then the nominal majority or has better support and resources, then they can "win". period.Can you validate that with examples? I can't think of any right off hand but since you mention it, I'm sure you can provide a couple of examples.
Too assume otherwise is foolish.Is that fact or your opinion?
Second it assumes that a democracy is what everyone really really wants in there hearts of hearts and if only they could truly experience it, the world would be better. I did not see or assume that. Why do you think so?
The insurgencies that we face today are often fueled as much by international ideology, particularly radical Islamic ideology as they are by national or sub-national concerns. Don't get to hung up on the west vs. Islam either, because that can change just as quick too.Probably true.
Third it assumes that terrorism and insurgency are unique and cleanly separate from each other, they are not, terrorism is a means or technique of insurgency.Why do you say that? I do not see such a linkage in the postulation.
Focus on the realities of the fight you are in, instead of trying to develop a COIN master plan because in order to do that you have make assumptions, and when you assume it makes an ass out of u and me.That's all very well for a COIN Master Plan -- but the man said he was doing it for his Graduate School Thesis -- a very different thing. Thus, I'm not at all sure why you're objecting to it...
UrsaMaior
01-29-2009, 10:19 PM
De Gaulle and Liddell-Hart met deaf ears. Surprisingly, Guderian and Tuhachevski were only listened to in the world’s two most oppressive political systems.
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 10:22 PM
Reed,
It's for a graduate Security Studies/PolSci major. Thus, the terms I am using are those related to that academic field, and not the colloquial or subjective use of the terms which you seem to be confusing them with.
In the intl relations fields, the definitions of government types are generally accepted (one can always argue fringe cases) based on characteristics - not moral value. Hence, a democracy in this academic context is usually defined as a government freely elected by the people (either representative or direct), with high degrees of political, press, and economic freedom, and conducting regular elections of some sort, driving turnover. Also, the electorate must be inclusive to the population of the country.
There is a huge body of literature based on the emperical observation of the "Democratic Peace" - i.e. that from 1945 forward democracies have not gone to war with each other or generally initiated wars. The argument as to why (casual and structural arguments) has burned up more journals and books than I care to count. I tend to come down on the structuralist side, but that is neither here nor there.
I have uncovered an emperical observation concerning insurgencies, as separated from terrorist groups and civil war. For an my version of what constitutes a terrorist group vs. insurgency vs. civil war, see below:
Why Insurgency?
Insurgency is a unique type of conflict encompassing a wide range of political, military, social, and economic factors. (Galula 1964) The term “insurgency” is defined by the United States Military as “An organized movement aimed at the overthrow of a constituted government through use of subversion and armed conflict.” (Department of Defense 2008) The US Government Interagency definition is a little more expansive, saying, “Insurgency is a protracted political-military campaign conducted by an organized movement seeking to subvert or displace the government and completely or partially control the resources and/or population of a country through the use of force and alternative political organizations.” (Department of State 2007) The nature of insurgency is primarily political waged against a constituted government with an objective of regime change or secession. Insurgences often occur against the influence of a foreign occupying power or for regional/local autonomy.
From a combat standpoint, insurgency is distinctly guerilla in character, involving small bands of partisans operating within the population against the existing regime. It places a high value on political mobilization, drawing its fighters, supplies, intelligence, and refuge from the population of the involved country. (Trinquier 1964) Many insurgencies receive support from outside forces, whether states or non-state organizations. Because of their military weakness and lack of heavy forces, insurgencies seek to attack a regime’s weakness and avoid open conflict with organized military forces unless a clear military or political objective can be obtained. Victory is usually achieved through “wearing the enemy down” rather than through military conquest, or through coup-like action. Some insurgencies manage to field organized military forces in the end stages, escalating the conflict to civil war.
Insurgency is distinct from civil war. US Army Field Manual 100-20 provides the definition of civil war accepted by the United States military. Five criteria exist for a conflict meet the standard of civil war – control of territory, functioning government, foreign recognition, regular armed forces, and capability to engage in major military operations. (Department of the Army and Department of the Air Force 1990) Some academics are less demanding, defining civil war as, “Sustained military combat, primarily internal, resulting in at least 1,000 battle-deaths per year, pitting central government forces against an insurgent force capable of effective resistance, determined by the latter's ability to inflict upon the government forces at least 5 percent of the fatalities that the insurgents sustain.” (Henderson and Singer 2000). What is common between the two definitions is an emphasis on conflict internal to a state conducted largely with organized military forces. Because insurgents often organize in highly irregular groups and cells without clear chains of command, not all civil wars meet the criteria of insurgency. Insurgents usually do not completely control the terrain they operate in, and thus operate in a non-linear method against the established government. Therefore, civil wars are different in character from insurgencies, and require a different approach by the government to control. The distinction is imperfect, and there will always be overlap between civil war and insurgency.
Defining terrorism versus insurgencies is also important so as not to confuse all insurgencies with terrorist groups. Terrorism is described as, “… the deliberate creation and exploitation of fear through violence or the threat of violence the pursuit of political change.” (Hoffman 2006) Thus terrorism is primarily a tactic employed for political ends, and can be used in almost any dispute context. Terrorist groups in many cases may be insurgencies, or simply political organizations seeking recognition of their cause. Regardless of the objective, it is clear that while not all terrorist groups are insurgencies, most insurgencies use terrorism as a tactic against either the population or the government to achieve their political goals. (Hoffman 2006)
So while examining 89 cases of insurgencies identified by RAND (vice 600 terrorist groups in the same period), There were 26 insurgent victories. Of those 26, none were against democracies, even though 20 of the 89 cases were against democratic regimes.
The scholarly question becomes - why are democratic governments less likely to fall to insurgencies? The point of this thread was to see if any of the experts lurking or present here could demonstrate selection bias - cases I ignored which may discredit the empirical observation I am preparing to write the thesis on - a qualitative and quantitative examination of why this may be so. At this point, I don't know if it is luck, economics, governmental inclusion, military competence, etc. The point is that I don't have a conclusion, just an empirical observation and some data points.
That is what this thesis will test, and attempt to draw potential conclusions and inferences from. It will also hopefully provide avenues for others to research in more quantitative or qualitative detail.
So yes, this isn't a muddy boots thesis, but it may (or may not) have muddy boots implications. Remember, I'm writing for an academic committee.
Cavguy
01-29-2009, 10:37 PM
I found the below study.
Lyall, John, ’Do Democracies Make Inferior Counterinsurgents?’, 2007, Available at: http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/DemoWar.pdf
I would appreciate your opinion about it.
THX in advance.
Thanks for the good read. However, it is a little apples to oranges for the following reasons:
1) Dataset is 1800-present. I have a big issue equating democracy pre-1945 with democracy post-1945 in structure - lots of variables change in that period. One could successfully argue in the pol-sci sphere that the US was not a full democracy (in the pol-sci sense) until either 1920 or the 1960's, as significant populations (women and African Americans) were denied full voting rights - for example. Using this standard, there are actually very few democracies pre-1945 in the world. The post 1945 dataset helps compare apples to apples.
2) They count Malaya, Kenya, Vietnam (FR) , Algeria, India (UK), etc. as "insurgencies" against democracies. I would say they are insurgencies against colonial powers who tend to be democracies at home. The population of those countries were not participants in the democracy fought against. Therefore, I would exclude them from my test, as I am evaluating indigenous insurgent success against sovereign democracies.
In other words, the population generating the insurgents must have voting rights in the state.
My observation from the RAND data was based on those cases. I think introducing anti-colonial insurgencies where the affected population was denied suffrage into the mix skews the data heavily.
I'll take a harder look. Thanks!
reed11b
01-29-2009, 10:39 PM
Your prerogative. Couldn't you say so without being confrontational?
Yes, I'll blame low blood sugar and apologize.
There are several places where that isn't entirely true; the mob rule aspect, I mean. As for the other, did you mean where the minority is in violent opposition to the majority?
It may not be always true, but without protections for the minority built into the body of law, it is a very real possibility. Iraq in 2005 could be considered an example of this, as for the other, either way it still is true, right?
Can you validate that with examples? I can't think of any right off hand but since you mention it, I'm sure you can provide a couple of examples.
I'll get back to you on this one, but would not most insurgencies be led, at least initially by a minority population?
Is that fact or your opinion?
Opinion, but it is based on the opinion that underestimating your opponent is dumb, likely a shared opinion with many would be my guess. :p
I did not see or assume that. Why do you think so?
Did not say you did, it is a response to the many "global community" theorists I have read and seem mentioned in this council, I disagree with them, but I can't put my thumb on a good enough example to communicate it very effectively yet.
Why do you say that? I do not see such a linkage in the postulation. More on this later, while I figure out how to communicate it well.
That's all very well for a COIN Master Plan -- but the man said he was doing it for his Graduate School Thesis -- a very different thing. Thus, I'm not at all sure why you're objecting to it...Can I go with low blood sugar again?
Reed
P.S. Please do not respond to my posts line by line anymore. It is a pet peeve of mine and it is almost impossible to respond without sounding defensive. I always appreciate your feedback, but please do it the conventional manner
Bob's World
01-29-2009, 10:45 PM
No. More ignorance. The insurgents were severely tromped and almost totally ineffective before the last US troops left in 1973. The North Viet Namese Army won it in 1975 -- with a conventional invasion, not an insurgency..
Ken,
You've raised this point at least a couple of times that I am aware of, and while you are factually accurate, the grand design of Maoist Insurgency is to culminate in a conventional force that seals the deal. So to say that the insurgency did not win is not really fair, they simply followed the full program to its logical conclusion, moving up and down between phases I and II, attempting III prematurely and backing down to II again, and finally, as you state, in 1975 being able to pull off the phase III conclusion.
I am quite confident that if that attack had been defeated, things would have simmered down in phase II for a while until they felt the conditions were right to try a phase III operation again.
Which goes to the point of insurgency: So long as the underlying conditions that gave rise to the insurgency exist, you can suppress it, but you can not stomp it out. The government must ultimately answer to its populace; either at the end of a bayonet, or by simply doing their job and addressing the legitimate concerns and grievances (or getting out of the way and allowing a governance that will do so) before it comes to that.
Ken White
01-29-2009, 11:17 PM
...It may not be always true, but without protections for the minority built into the body of law, it is a very real possibility. Iraq in 2005 could be considered an example of this, as for the other, either way it still is true, right?True -- but a lot of nations have that protection and obey their laws -- just as some do not. Point was that was sort of a sweeping statement. On the 'either way' -- if you mean that the majority is oppressing the minority forcefully causing them to rebel, then it's possible.
I'll get back to you on this one, but would not most insurgencies be led, at least initially by a minority population?Or by a neighbor who stirs up that minority and leads them or by an outsider like Guevara in Bolivia a who tries and fails. Such outside 'leadership' or incitement is not at all unusual and was very prevalent during the Cold War...
Opinion, but it is based on the opinion that underestimating your opponent is dumb, likely a shared opinion with many would be my guess. :pTo assume much of anything when discussing warfare can be foolish. Size does not always win, usually, yeah but not always. See the Confrontation in Malaysia for an example -- or Mao in China. :D
Did not say you did, it is a response to the many "global community" theorists I have read and seem mentioned in this council, I disagree with them, but I can't put my thumb on a good enough example to communicate it very effectively yet.I didn't see any global theorists positions mentioned in the thread, either. My question was why you mentioned it in view of that, no more.
More on this later, while I figure out how to communicate it well.No terrorism stipulation in the thread; you can of course pop it in a as a new thread but I don't see that it's germane to this one.
P.S. Please do not respond to my posts line by line anymore. It is a pet peeve of mine and it is almost impossible to respond without sounding defensive. I always appreciate your feedback, but please do it the conventional mannerSorry, to me it's logical way to respond; someone makes a specific statement; I respond to that with a specific comment or question. I'm not sure I see it as an attack or necessitating a defensive answer but I will suggest that if one makes a statement, one should be prepared to defend it or otherwise address the issue head on. As for conventional, to me that is the conventional way to respond, it seems better to me than a big paragraph that touches on five or more topics which makes it hard to pull the thoughts to address. We're all unique and do things differently and that should be generally okay, particularly on a public board where a lot of varied people are going to do things their way. :eek:
It is okay with me...:cool:
Ken White
01-29-2009, 11:32 PM
You've raised this point at least a couple of times that I am aware of, and while you are factually accurate, the grand design of Maoist Insurgency is to culminate in a conventional force that seals the deal. So to say that the insurgency did not win is not really fair, they simply followed the full program to its logical conclusion, moving up and down between phases I and II, attempting III prematurely and backing down to II again, and finally, as you state, in 1975 being able to pull off the phase III conclusion.And by that time well over 90 plus percent of the original insurgents were dead. I'm aware of Mao's Phases -- even more aware of Giap's (who was about twice as smart as Mao) plan.
I am quite confident that if that attack had been defeated, things would have simmered down in phase II for a while until they felt the conditions were right to try a phase III operation again.Probably true.
Which goes to the point of insurgency: So long as the underlying conditions that gave rise to the insurgency exist, you can suppress it, but you can not stomp it out. The government must ultimately answer to its populace; either at the end of a bayonet, or by simply doing their job and addressing the legitimate concerns and grievances (or getting out of the way and allowing a governance that will do so) before it comes to that.Not really true with respect to Viet Nam -- most of the populace just wanted to be left alone. Some insurgencies are started and run by very dedicated folks who take the semblance of a problem, elevate it to a casus belli and go for broke.
I usually object to comparisons of Malaya and Viet Nam because the efforts were so very different -- but they do have one thing in common; in both cases an outside power (China in the first case, North Viet Nam in the second) took some social ills and raised them to start insurrections. Both were effectively stopped by a combination of good COIN tactics (very belatedly in VN) and political fixes. The big difference was that China was in no position to elevate to Phase III.
So yeah, it was a three phase effort -- but the insurgents didn't win they were mostly Southerners who did not necessarily want to hew to Ho. Another nation's fighters did win -- and the North had manipulated the VC almost as badly as they did the US.
The insurgency in VN, BTW, does not meet your definition of bad underlying conditions; the South was in better shape than the North on that score in the early 60s an people in both nations knew that.
reed11b
01-30-2009, 12:01 AM
The insurgency in VN, BTW, does not meet your definition of bad underlying conditions; the South was in better shape than the North on that score in the early 60s an people in both nations knew that.
Is this considered nessecary to be defined as an insurgency? What about where ideological or political differences are the drive behind armed resistance, such as the religious conflicts in the ME, or the Chechan revolt?
What about the Kurdish attempts to build there own homeland, this fights across multiple nation borders and would they still fight eben if they were financialy well off? I feel that they would if some one sold them on the concept of greater Kurdistan effectivly.
Reed
Cavguy
01-30-2009, 12:07 AM
Is this considered nessecary to be defined as an insurgency? What about where ideological or political differences are the drive behind armed resistance, such as the religious conflicts in the ME, or the Chechan revolt?
What about the Kurdish attempts to build there own homeland, this fights across multiple nation borders and would they still fight eben if they were financialy well off? I feel that they would if some one sold them on the concept of greater Kurdistan effectivly.
Reed
I think the definitions my above post (USG and DoD) answers your question.
There is no "hard" standard for categorization. Some subjectivity is involved.
Ken White
01-30-2009, 01:41 AM
Is this considered nessecary to be defined as an insurgency?Bob's World whose position my response that you quoted was directed to; to me; or to Cav Guy whose thread this is?
In any event CavGuy answered and did it well IMO. As for the position Bob's World states, he didn't restrict it to economic or social matters so the religious difference or just an ideological difference as well as ethnic and other differences are covered by his conditional requirement.
I believe that all those things you mention and more in the two Viet Nams in the early 60s were roughly in balance with slightly better industry and more efficient government with less corruption in the North but better economic, religious and ethnic / individual freedom conditions in the South. It was IMO better than a draw with a fair edge to the South, thus my response to him.
ipopescu
01-30-2009, 03:17 AM
Cavguy,
One of the weeks of my graduate seminar in international security here at Duke deals with the performance of democracies in wars in general. This question is larger than your specific topic, but I'm thinking you might find it useful to look over some of these readings (unless you've done so already) to get an idea of how the literature on this issue evolved and where it is right now.
Håvard Hegre, et al., “Toward a Democratic Civil Peace? Democracy, Political Change, and Civil War, 1816-1992,” APSR 95/1 (March 2001): 33-48.
Dan Reiter and Allan C. Stam, Democracies at War (Princeton, 2002).
David A. Lake, “Powerful Pacifists: Democratic States and War,” APSR 86/1 (March 1992): 24- 37.
Michael C. Desch, “Democracy and Victory: Why Regime Type Hardly Matters,” IS 27/2 (Fall 2002): 5-47.
Responses to Desch by Choi, Lake, and Reiter and Stam; and Desch’s reply, IS 28/1 (Summer 2003): 142-94.
Alexander B. Downes, “How Smart (and Tough) Are Democracies Anyway? Reassessing Theories of Democratic Victory in War,” IS (forthcoming; Blackboard).
Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, Alastair Smith, Randolph M. Siverson, and James D. Morrow, The Logic of Political Survival (MIT, 2003).
Christopher F. Gelpi and Michael Griesdorf, “Winners or Losers? Democracies in International Crisis, 1918-94,” APSR 95/3 (September 2001): 633-47.
Gil Merom, How Democracies Lose Small Wars: State, Society, and the Failures of France in Algeria, Israel in Lebanon, and the United States in Vietnam (Cambridge, 2003).
Recommended Critiques:
Michael C. Desch, Power and Military Effectiveness: The Fallacy of Democratic Triumphalism (Johns Hopkins, 2008).
Stephen Biddle and Stephen Long, “Democracy and Military Effectiveness: A Deeper Look,” JCR 48/4 (August 2004): 525-46.
Risa Brooks, “Making Military Might: Why Do States Fail and Succeed? A Review Essay,” IS 28/2 (Fall 2003): 149-91.
I personally find your topic highly interesting. Do you have any particular case-studies in mind as well?
Ron Humphrey
01-30-2009, 03:57 AM
Forgive me for the way this may sound but doesn't it seem like the actual justification's or reasons we find for unrest in general let alone insurgency, wars and the like are formed into some sort of massive jumble through our efforts to explain it rather than just see them for what they are?
Mankind is.
Mankind thinks- (sometimes):wry:
A family is the base unit of our communal existence, within it constructs we find order through determination to follow whatever path seems consistant with survival and perhaps even more importantly further development. Call it what you will; self-determination, self-actualization, self-development, Whats in it for me, etc.
Each individual seeks to find success(for lack of a better word) through their interactions with others in context with the environment within which they find themselves and what their experiences have shown them to be at least plausible. That said the structure for leadership doesn't really seem to vary so much as many seem to believe.
Parents fill the role of providing guidance and direction for the family, that is until such time as the children feel that their (needs, wants, desires, just deserts) are not being met to their satisfaction and they choose to strike off on their own. Societal norms generally seem to follow this same basic premise. So IMHO do many if not all major forms of governance.
Dictatorial - I follow you because I have no other choice, but at least I'm alive( Let the latter part come into question and I revolt regardless of my chances for success
Ideological- Generally Same as above except its not that I have too but that I choose to ascribe to said philosophy and as such follow you
Theocratic- I follow you because my faith teaches that I must follow the direction of those who have or are being directed to lead me
( This works until, as with the family unit I feel that my needs be they spiritual or otherwise are not being met with what I believe my faith requires of my leaders.
Democratic- The family chooses its leader through whatever form its comfortable with and follows them. Society chooses it leaders and as such chooses to follow with the addendum that should you not get them what they want they can choose somebody else. Let it get to where they feel like you might take that choice away and they'll revolt.
Long and short many in this life just want to be left alone but are still a part of whatever process takes place within their environments. If things become notably out of sorts they will and do come out of their corners.
Dictatorships have a really hard time dealing with that awakened giant due to the fact their survival was enabled through that groups silence
Theocracies have the choice of adjusting their overall presentation in order to facilitate a settling of tension's. They just have a tendency of refusing to do so due to "principles" or the fact that they really didn't believe so much as they used that belief to enhance their stature.
Democracies can and do more often than not get changes sufficient to calm the heaviest part of the uprisings and when they don't wars happen. Since most still want at least a semblance of democracy the more common action is to compromise and address the grievances one way or another.
Rant complete
OH well Good luck with the paper Niel :D
Cavguy
01-30-2009, 04:13 AM
Cavguy,
One of the weeks of my graduate seminar in international security here at Duke deals with the performance of democracies in wars in general. This question is larger than your specific topic, but I'm thinking you might find it useful to look over some of these readings (unless you've done so already) to get an idea of how the literature on this issue evolved and where it is right now.
Håvard Hegre, et al., “Toward a Democratic Civil Peace? Democracy, Political Change, and Civil War, 1816-1992,” APSR 95/1 (March 2001): 33-48.
Dan Reiter and Allan C. Stam, Democracies at War (Princeton, 2002).
David A. Lake, “Powerful Pacifists: Democratic States and War,” APSR 86/1 (March 1992): 24- 37.
Michael C. Desch, “Democracy and Victory: Why Regime Type Hardly Matters,” IS 27/2 (Fall 2002): 5-47.
Responses to Desch by Choi, Lake, and Reiter and Stam; and Desch’s reply, IS 28/1 (Summer 2003): 142-94.
Alexander B. Downes, “How Smart (and Tough) Are Democracies Anyway? Reassessing Theories of Democratic Victory in War,” IS (forthcoming; Blackboard).
Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, Alastair Smith, Randolph M. Siverson, and James D. Morrow, The Logic of Political Survival (MIT, 2003).
Christopher F. Gelpi and Michael Griesdorf, “Winners or Losers? Democracies in International Crisis, 1918-94,” APSR 95/3 (September 2001): 633-47.
Gil Merom, How Democracies Lose Small Wars: State, Society, and the Failures of France in Algeria, Israel in Lebanon, and the United States in Vietnam (Cambridge, 2003).
Recommended Critiques:
Michael C. Desch, Power and Military Effectiveness: The Fallacy of Democratic Triumphalism (Johns Hopkins, 2008).
Stephen Biddle and Stephen Long, “Democracy and Military Effectiveness: A Deeper Look,” JCR 48/4 (August 2004): 525-46.
Risa Brooks, “Making Military Might: Why Do States Fail and Succeed? A Review Essay,” IS 28/2 (Fall 2003): 149-91.
I personally find your topic highly interesting. Do you have any particular case-studies in mind as well?
Thanks. I had a similar IR class last semester covering all the major theories - balance of power, power transition, etc, and we spent time ad nauseum debating the effects of democracy. Some of the works above were in the course readings.
While working on another research paper on the effects of external support/sanctuary on insurgency I stumbled on the "Democratic Insurgency", and my advisor thinks it would make a worthwhile investigation.
===
My alternate topic would have been to compare cases where nations have defeated insurgents with external sanctuary and contrasted the principles employed with "classical" COIN (i.e. Galula et.al) and see if there were differences - and also whether FM 3-24 holds up to it. One critique of our major COIN "success" case studies is that they lack real sanctuary and generally had little external support - Malaya, Kenya, Algeria, El Salvador. Obvious implications for Afghanistan. Figured I would save that for a potential MMAS.
Gian P Gentile
01-30-2009, 04:18 AM
why do you confine yourself to the post world war II period? Is there something special about that period that interests you or do you see it as more relevant to the present day than other previous periods? Perhaps instead of taking 15 or so cases from that period you should expand your historical horizon and move farther back into time.
Cavguy
01-30-2009, 04:33 AM
why do you confine yourself to the post world war II period? Is there something special about that period that interests you or do you see it as more relevant to the present day than other previous periods? Perhaps instead of taking 15 or so cases from that periods you should expand your historical horizon and move farther back into time.
Sir,
I just have problems with the inclusion of "democracies" prior to 1945 because (a) there are so few, and (b) even fewer experienced insurgency outside of a colonial context. Anti-colonial insurgencies posess a different dynamic. Secondly, it would require coding a completely new dataset than the very robust post-1945 RAND one I have now, which may be beyond my current capabilities. If I pursue my PhD route I probably will re-do and expand the dataset. Kinda hard to do all that research while holding my day job and soon to be in CGSC. The Correlates of War dataset doesn't have sufficient rigor for intra-state war to be useful. There is another finnish dataset but I found multiple errors in coding that would be painful to fix.
Now if you can convince the army to give me two years off after S3/XO time to get a PhD that isn't tied to teaching at West Point, I'm game. :D Because I was YG 97 and exited my BCT as a MAJ they wouldn't give me advanced civil schooling because I was too senior, hence night classes for me.
=======
I am hard pressed to think of many democracies that experienced indigenous insurgency outside of the USA and UK prior to 1945 (Brits all over - won every one, and the US vs. Native Americans, again, victory.) I am open to any examples of indigenous insurgent victory against democracy (loosely defined) that cross your mind. And no, I don't count our revolution because I don't think the UK meets the PolSci definition of a democracy until the early 1800's.
I am interested if you can think of any exceptions to my thesis prior to 1945, it would help.
======
My alternate topic (potential for MMAS, if I do SAMS) is evaluating whether the historical approach/basis for FM 3-24 (very heavy Philippines, Algeria, Vietnam (x2), and Malaya) and approach to COIN by external counter insurgents holds true across other similar cases, especially those where insurgent possesses external sanctuary. Greece 1945-1950 is the best example, where it was heavily lethal in nature and won when Yugoslavia cut of support for the communist insurgents, as I understand.
Thoughts?
Entropy
01-30-2009, 05:25 AM
The scholarly question becomes - why are democratic governments less likely to fall to insurgencies? The point of this thread was to see if any of the experts lurking or present here could demonstrate selection bias - cases I ignored which may discredit the empirical observation I am preparing to write the thesis on - a qualitative and quantitative examination of why this may be so. At this point, I don't know if it is luck, economics, governmental inclusion, military competence, etc. The point is that I don't have a conclusion, just an empirical observation and some data points.
I understand and agree with your justifications for limiting the scope to post-1945, but that is a relatively short period of time considering the breadth of history. Still, it looks like you have enough examples to make a case. Sounds like a good topic to me.
Your real challenge looks to be finding the causalities behind the correlation you've found.
Because I was YG 97 and exited my BCT as a MAJ they wouldn't give me advanced civil schooling because I was too senior, hence night classes for me.
Wow, that's too bad.
William F. Owen
01-30-2009, 06:40 AM
The conclusion of UM's link (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/DemoWar.pdf) (p.24) is interesting:
Wilf, is this your position - more or less ?
-----------------
Some more articles by the same author are here (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/Lyall_Newtest_Research.htm).
Close but not exactly. My contention is that "Insurgency" is a style of warfare, or type of warfare, (and not a distinct one) but that it is generally applied to fulfilling political aims that are not possible with so-called conventional means. - though they may create the conditions for the use of conventional means.
Basically, insurgency is warfare. It is not something "other than war." Many different people may use an insurgency to get what they want, for many different reasons. - Just like War.
Bob's World
01-30-2009, 12:27 PM
And by that time well over 90 plus percent of the original insurgents were dead. I'm aware of Mao's Phases -- even more aware of Giap's (who was about twice as smart as Mao) plan.Probably true.Not really true with respect to Viet Nam -- most of the populace just wanted to be left alone. Some insurgencies are started and run by very dedicated folks who take the semblance of a problem, elevate it to a casus belli and go for broke.
I usually object to comparisons of Malaya and Viet Nam because the efforts were so very different -- but they do have one thing in common; in both cases an outside power (China in the first case, North Viet Nam in the second) took some social ills and raised them to start insurrections. Both were effectively stopped by a combination of good COIN tactics (very belatedly in VN) and political fixes. The big difference was that China was in no position to elevate to Phase III.
So yeah, it was a three phase effort -- but the insurgents didn't win they were mostly Southerners who did not necessarily want to hew to Ho. Another nation's fighters did win -- and the North had manipulated the VC almost as badly as they did the US.
The insurgency in VN, BTW, does not meet your definition of bad underlying conditions; the South was in better shape than the North on that score in the early 60s an people in both nations knew that.
Ok Ken, now I have to comment on your supporting argument that N.Vietnam was an outside power that instigated and manipulated and sustained a S. Vietnam insurgency. This is whole idea of a "North" and "South" Vietnam is just another aspect of the Western Colonial influence imposed on one populace. Vietnam had enjoyed some 900 years of independence from China prior to being subjected to about 100 years of French occupation and colonization. Upon successfully defeating that occupation the country was artificially divided into North and South states for purely Western political purposes. Did China and Russia support the Vietnamese movement to liberate themselves from this Western influence? Absolutely. Was North Vietnam somehow an "outside power" because a group of white men thousands of miles away drew a line on a map? Hardly.
This goes to a key aspect of my Populace-Centric theory. (Not controlling the populace, as in Kilcullen's population-centric tactics applied in Iraq; but in focusing on the needs, desires, perspectives and will of the populace as one engages through their government. To seek to meet our own interests in ways that are not counter to the interests of the populace; and to be, where necessary, an enabler of better relations between a populace and its governance and not a wedge to the same.)
We ignored the will of the Vietnamese populace writ-large by first reinstating the French occupation, and then by enforcing the artificial border through the heart of their homeland as part of our Cold War hedge against the Soviets.
I'd hate to see us make the same (similar) mistake in Afghanistan / Pakistan where a historic populace is also in revolt and we are preparing to commit tremendous energy once again to enforce a border created by white men thousands of miles away that cuts through the heart of the Pashtu homeland to reinforce states that reflect Western interests more than the interests of the Populaces they encompass.
When we learn from history, it is important that we take away the right lessons. Just me, but to me the main lesson is that the west can no longer simply expect eastern populaces to accept what we lay out for them, but that we can still achieve our vital interests in these areas by changing our approach to one of reinforcing the will of the populaces of these regions as prioritized over any vestiges of western governmental constructs imposed over the years, or ideas of how we currently want them to behave.
Surely we can be smart enough to find a way to support divided historic populaces around the world without having to destroy the states they reside within. Surely we can be smart enough to support troubled states without having to destroy the historic populaces that are divided by their borders.
My vote is for fighting smarter, not harder. We need a surge of strategic thinking, not a surge of hard young riflemen like my son. As long as we think we are there to "defeat" some threat as opposed to enable a stronger relationship between a populace and its governance we will fail. As long as people seriously think that a Clausewitzian model of warfare based on study of the Napoleonic wars between states applies directly to this type of conflict we will fail.
This is people business. Understand people first; second understand what actions over the years have manifested in the conditions of conflict that exist. Next, sit down and figure out new ways to meet your national interests in that region that are designed not to reinforce the failed system, but to enable a new system that has a chance to work.
(Ok, this is way longer, and went down a path I did not fully intend when I started typing 20 minutes ago, but sometimes you just have to go with the flow. Ken, clearly this is not all aimed at you. I just think you mischaracterize the true Vietnamese populace, but I also understand you have valid reasons for your positions. You earned them, and I have the highest respect for that.)
UrsaMaior
01-30-2009, 12:53 PM
Thanks for the good read. However, it is a little apples to oranges for the following reasons:
1) Dataset is 1800-present. I have a big issue equating democracy pre-1945 with democracy post-1945 in structure - lots of variables change in that period. One could successfully argue in the pol-sci sphere that the US was not a full democracy (in the pol-sci sense) until either 1920 or the 1960's, as significant populations (women and African Americans) were denied full voting rights - for example. Using this standard, there are actually very few democracies pre-1945 in the world. The post 1945 dataset helps compare apples to apples.
2) They count Malaya, Kenya, Vietnam (FR) , Algeria, India (UK), etc. as "insurgencies" against democracies. I would say they are insurgencies against colonial powers who tend to be democracies at home. The population of those countries were not participants in the democracy fought against. Therefore, I would exclude them from my test, as I am evaluating indigenous insurgent success against sovereign democracies.
In other words, the population generating the insurgents must have voting rights in the state.
My observation from the RAND data was based on those cases. I think introducing anti-colonial insurgencies where the affected population was denied suffrage into the mix skews the data heavily.
I'll take a harder look. Thanks!
Thank you very much for your answer sir.
In my really humble opinion statistics is not a good way to approach such a complex phenomenon with so high number of variables and so little number of cases (opposed to Entropy's opinion).
John T. Fishel
01-30-2009, 12:57 PM
Take a bit closer look at El Salvador. One of the major problems there was the existence of sanctuaries - the so-called "blosones" - of disputed territory along the Salvadoran/Honduran border allegedly administered by the UN. That was where the FMLN took R&R and massed their supplies from Nicaragua and points beyond.
Much of the discussion here hinges on different definitions of democracy. Suggest you pick one that corresponds well to your Rand dataset and just stick with it.
Cheers
JohnT
William F. Owen
01-30-2009, 02:43 PM
As long as people seriously think that a Clausewitzian model of warfare based on study of the Napoleonic wars between states applies directly to this type of conflict we will fail.
Clausewtiz did not base his understanding of war purely on his experiences of fighting against Napoleonic armies. Clausewitz observations on the nature of war is applicable to any form of armed conflict.
This is people business. Understand people first; second understand what actions over the years have manifested in the conditions of conflict that exist. Next, sit down and figure out new ways to meet your national interests in that region that are designed not to reinforce the failed system, but to enable a new system that has a chance to work.
Well that's exactly what Clausewitz says, except he wrote On WAR, and you are drifting off into National Policy and Strategy, of which WAR is a subset of skills and capabilities.
Warfare is a tool, and a pretty dam good one, when applied to right problem.
Steve Blair
01-30-2009, 03:24 PM
Ok Ken, now I have to comment on your supporting argument that N.Vietnam was an outside power that instigated and manipulated and sustained a S. Vietnam insurgency. This is whole idea of a "North" and "South" Vietnam is just another aspect of the Western Colonial influence imposed on one populace. Vietnam had enjoyed some 900 years of independence from China prior to being subjected to about 100 years of French occupation and colonization. Upon successfully defeating that occupation the country was artificially divided into North and South states for purely Western political purposes. Did China and Russia support the Vietnamese movement to liberate themselves from this Western influence? Absolutely. Was North Vietnam somehow an "outside power" because a group of white men thousands of miles away drew a line on a map? Hardly.
Not that this has anything to do with Neil's topic, but....
I have to agree with Ken on this one. There were any number of cultural differences (some major, some minor) between the population in the north and that in the south, as well as the (often ignored) central Vietnam subset (the region around Hue). I would actually characterize the idea of a "unified Vietnamese populace" as another Western fiction that doesn't square well with the reality on the ground. If you dig into any of the literature of the period as well as VC narratives, you'll find that many of them resented the influence of the "foreigners" from the north (ranging from their views on social/moral issues to their harsh accents and different way of doing business - and the dislike was often returned by the cadres from the north who considered their southern counterparts lazy and morally 'loose'). Much of this had to do with the way the Vietnamese people expanded their own influence within the region, but to say that they were the same people because they are ethnically identical (or close to identical) is to ignore the impact that cultural development has on a national or regional identity.
And now back to the thread's topic. I would also agree that it's best to limit this study to the period after 1945, even though I'm personally much more interested in earlier insurgencies. When time and number of available sources are two major considerations, the post-1945 period is hard to beat.
Bob's World
01-30-2009, 05:05 PM
Clausewtiz did not base his understanding of war purely on his experiences of fighting against Napoleonic armies. Clausewitz observations on the nature of war is applicable to any form of armed conflict.
Well that's exactly what Clausewitz says, except he wrote On WAR, and you are drifting off into National Policy and Strategy, of which WAR is a subset of skills and capabilities.
Warfare is a tool, and a pretty dam good one, when applied to right problem.
Good points, but said another way, one might ask: "Is all violence "warfare"? or "If a state opts to respond to violence by waging warfare against the perpetrators of that violence does that make it warfare"?
Or, as WILF suggests, perhaps is it really a much larger issue that touches National Policy and Strategy?
I believe that many see this the way WILF does and I recognize that it is the majority position, so by a purely democratic or mathmatic analysis, it must be right.
I challenge that status quo thinking though, believing that an insurgency is most often better "neutralized" through addressing root causes than "defeated" by waging war against one's own populace as if it were a foreign state.
When a foreign country intervenes in such an internal conflict to protect interests they have there, they tend to want to keep the current government in place so work to not only do so, but also to help put down the rebellion. Right or Wrong is not the metric, preserving access to the national interest is.
When a foreign country intervenes in such an internal conflict to create interests they desire there, they tend to want to dispose of the government in place, so work to do so and to also lend aid to the rebellion in its efforts. Right or Wrong is not the metric here either, gaining access to the national interest is.
These actions of National Policy and Strategy revolving around these popular revolts make up the family of operations we call "Insurgency" and "Counterinsurgency" and "Foreign Internal Defense" and "Unconventional Warfare." But is it warfare in the true Clauswitzian sense? Perhaps. My point is that it is worth considering through both lights to have the best perspective. The concept of "Irregular Warfare" is based on the perspective that all of these activites are indeed war. But consider the source, IW came from the military, so naturally they see it that way.
Another way is to look at all of these violent internal struggles as all part of man's natural reaction to dealing with problems that can't be resolved peacefully, the appliation of violence. But that does not make it necessarily "war."
William F. Owen
01-30-2009, 06:06 PM
I challenge that status quo thinking though, believing that an insurgency is most often better "neutralized" through addressing root causes than "defeated" by waging war against one's own populace as if it were a foreign state.
I'm not sure you are actually challenging a position I in particular hold. Insurgency is the use of "military means" - organised violence for a "political purpose."
The problem is that the root cause is often impossible to address without defeating the insurgents first. What is more, as in Sierra Leone, the stated cause, (democracy) was not actually the source of the violence (resources).
Sure, addressing the roots of conflict, often avoid/delay conflict. One you are fighting though, it's best to win. Peace is nice. It's not a requirement.
Ken White
01-30-2009, 06:08 PM
Bob's World said
...now I have to comment on your supporting argument that N.Vietnam was an outside power that instigated and manipulated and sustained a S. Vietnam insurgency.I do not agree with that statement, not what I said. However, that is closer to reality than the rest of your admittedly correct in idealistic terms argument. Reality differed. As you said:
We ignored the will of the Vietnamese populace writ-large by first reinstating the French occupation, and then by enforcing the artificial border through the heart of their homeland as part of our Cold War hedge against the Soviets.And the rest as they say is history -- in the Case of Viet Nam, history with many myths embedded and the normal case of people believing what they want to believe.
Steve Blair has it right IMO.
To get back on the thread, Bob's World later said:
I challenge that status quo thinking though, believing that an insurgency is most often better "neutralized" through addressing root causes than "defeated" by waging war against one's own populace as if it were a foreign state.
When a foreign country intervenes in such an internal conflict to protect interests they have there, they tend to want to keep the current government in place so work to not only do so, but also to help put down the rebellion. Right or Wrong is not the metric, preserving access to the national interest is.I agree and that tracks with what I believe CavGuy is trying to show. I'd only offer two cautions for him as to what happened in several of his examples and for the consideration of all as policy issues:
Be very sure you truly understand what are the root causes. As the digression on Viet Nam shows, opinions can vary and affect the outcome...
On the second quoted point, I believe such 'keeping' should be determined based on the host nation's national interest, not the intervenor's as generally occurs.
Bob's World
01-30-2009, 06:34 PM
I'm not sure you are actually challenging a position I in particular hold. Insurgency is the use of "military means" - organised violence for a "political purpose."
The problem is that the root cause is often impossible to address without defeating the insurgents first. What is more, as in Sierra Leone, the stated cause, (democracy) was not actually the source of the violence (resources).
Sure, addressing the roots of conflict, often avoid/delay conflict. One you are fighting though, it's best to win. Peace is nice. It's not a requirement.
I will have to join Mr. Webster (": a condition of revolt against a government that is less than an organized revolution and that is not recognized as belligerency"), the U.S. DOD and NATO("An organized movement aimed at the overthrow of a constituted government through use of subversion and armed conflict.), and a host of others in disagreeing with your definition of insurgency. In fact, an insurgent, not having a military, can not likely employ "military means." He employs violence. He employs terror, but only in phase III as in Vietnam or China (sorry Ken) does he employ "military means" Certainly the counterinsurgent, possessing a military is free to, and often does, "employ military means" in responding to such violent popular uprisings.
I also take the position that defeating a symptom, (the insurgent), is the delaying action, as new insurgents will always emerge so long as the underlying conditions exist. Addressing the concerns of the populace is the enduring solution. Again, we will remain 180 degrees out on this point, and I am comfortable with that.
Example: The defeat of the MNLF in the 70's is cited as a "victory," yet here they are still fighting the government of the Philippines as the underlying conditions were never addressed.
Any "victory" in an insurgency built primarily on the slain bodies of the rebelling populace has merely buried the coals to burst into flames again in due time. The history of man is replete with examples of this fact.
jmm99
01-30-2009, 08:12 PM
the last few posts are not really off-topic. Although they deal more with the "How of Fighting" (rather than the "Who of Fighting"), that seems to be a fundamental dichotomy in how these armed conflicts are analysed - and what is considered more important, the "How" or the "Who".
The Lyall paper (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/DemoWar.pdf), "Do Democracies Make Inferior Counterinsurgents? Reassessing Democracy’s Impact on War Outcomes and Duration", and a forthcoming Lyall and Wilson paper (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/Rage_Final.pdf), "Rage Against the Machines: Explaining Outcomes in Counterinsurgency Wars", with supporting dataset (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/Rage_Supporting.pdf), emphasize the "How" - seemingly, a counterpoint to Niel's tentative suggestion as to where his dataset is taking him.
That is an observation only - not a judgment.
Brief opinion piece (looking at Vietam from a different viewpoint):
Vietnam seems to me to be a tough nut to catagorize. From the French and US viewpoints, it was an insurgency by the Viet Minh and later Viet Cong with a heavy North Vietnamese overlay. Viewed from Giap's standpoint, it was an insurgency by Vietnamese (North and South) who cast their lot with the French and Americans. From his standpoint (he was a lawyer; then a general), his was the legally constituted government of Indochina from 1946. As such, he mounted counter-insurgency campaigns using different methods depending on the totality of circumstances he faced at the time. Some worked; some didn't. He adapted.
William F. Owen
01-31-2009, 07:03 AM
I will have to join Mr. Webster (": a condition of revolt against a government that is less than an organized revolution and that is not recognized as belligerency"), the U.S. DOD and NATO("An organized movement aimed at the overthrow of a constituted government through use of subversion and armed conflict.), and a host of others in disagreeing with your definition of insurgency. In fact, an insurgent, not having a military, can not likely employ "military means." He employs violence. He employs terror, but only in phase III as in Vietnam or China (sorry Ken) does he employ "military means" Certainly the counterinsurgent, possessing a military is free to, and often does, "employ military means" in responding to such violent popular uprisings.
Bob, very happy to disagree with you, if that it what you wish, but I do not disagree with the definitions you cite. I just used a broader description. For example, there are and have been insurgencies not aimed at "overthrowing a government," as Cavguy points out.
I think you are quibbling over "military means." Military means is 4 guys with AK's, hand guns, or farm implements. Military merely means organised and for a purpose. It is entirely possible to have a military with fewer weapons than members. The Palmach had most of their weapons confiscated by the British, but remained a military force.
"Terror" to mind is the use of criminal means, but with a political purpose - though can equally be employed for criminal purposes.
I also take the position that defeating a symptom, (the insurgent), is the delaying action, as new insurgents will always emerge so long as the underlying conditions exist. Addressing the concerns of the populace is the enduring solution. Again, we will remain 180 degrees out on this point, and I am comfortable with that.
Sometimes the populace has not position in that at all. In Sierra Leone, the population had no stake in the game at all. In Southern Thailand, there is not a lot you can do to help the Muslim population. They have a pretty good life comparative to the native Thai, - some just think they should not be part of Thailand.
Cavguy
01-31-2009, 07:22 AM
the last few posts are not really off-topic. Although they deal more with the "How of Fighting" (rather than the "Who of Fighting"), that seems to be a fundamental dichotomy in how these armed conflicts are analysed - and what is considered more important, the "How" or the "Who".
The Lyall paper (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/DemoWar.pdf), "Do Democracies Make Inferior Counterinsurgents? Reassessing Democracy’s Impact on War Outcomes and Duration", and a forthcoming Lyall and Wilson paper (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/Rage_Final.pdf), "Rage Against the Machines: Explaining Outcomes in Counterinsurgency Wars", with supporting dataset (http://www.princeton.edu/~jlyall/Rage_Supporting.pdf), emphasize the "How" - seemingly, a counterpoint to Niel's tentative suggestion as to where his dataset is taking him.
That is an observation only - not a judgment.
A lot of the differences are explained in the dataset inclusion of (a) the 1800's, (b) a looser definition of insurgency, and (c) counting draws as insurgent victory.
Secondly, I have major, major issues with their "case study" of 4ID vs. 101st ABN (AA) in OIF 1 as the example of how mech hurts COIN forces Comparing the 82d ABN in Anbar 2003 and 1AD in Baghdad would yield a somewhat different result. That assertion is plain crap. My IR professor forwarded me that article, and I am working on a rebuttal piece for International Organizations. We hashed a SWC thread on it here (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=3951) - but bottom line if mech hurts COIN forces than how come 3ACR (has least number of dismounted troops of any BCT in the Army), and 1/1 AD (heavy legacy BCT) were hugely COIN successful?
Finally, I would submit the correlation of mechanization and decreasing counterinsurgent success is also clearly related to the information revolution - insurgencies need to spread their message.
Rex Brynen
02-01-2009, 01:33 AM
What's the dataset coding definition for insurgency, Cavguy? Does it depend on battle deaths (and if so, is the threshold set in absolute numbers, or relative to population size)? How does it differentiate from terrorism?
I ask this because, arguably, the great success of democracies might be that groups never make the transition from protest movement > small terrorist group > full-blown insurgency, and that the "success" of democracies lies rather earlier than their ability to engage in full-scale COIN.
A critic might argue that it is rather like trying to measure the effectiveness of a bug-zapper atop Mount Everest (the body count isn't really getting at the issue of why there are so few mosquitos around...)
AmericanPride
02-01-2009, 02:37 AM
He employs violence. He employs terror, but only in phase III as in Vietnam or China (sorry Ken) does he employ "military means" Certainly the counterinsurgent, possessing a military is free to, and often does, "employ military means" in responding to such violent popular uprisings.
In your opinion, what is the significance and consequences of differentiating between violence as "military means" and other forms of politically-driven violence?
jmm99
02-01-2009, 03:59 AM
because of the differences you cite, seem to engage using the statistical approach (vs. the "matched" units approach) only in their Model 7, where their criteria do still differ from yours, as you point out:
(Mech article, p.25 in .pdf)
Interestingly, REGIME only reaches statistical significance in the post-1945 era ~Model 7! and is negatively associated with incumbent victory, suggesting that as states become more democratic their vulnerability to defeat increases. This at once supports and qualifies existing arguments about presumed ineffectiveness of democratic states in COIN wars. To be sure, it suggests that as political systems become more open, the likelihood of defeat is also increased. Yet these shifts in regime type could occur at lower ends of the 21-point Polity2 values—that is, a shift from 5 to a 0—and therefore one should not conclude that stable democracies are especially vulnerable. [71] Moreover, the time-dependent nature of this effect is at least partially inconsistent with claims that audience costs or educated middle classes are hobbling democratic war efforts. Indeed, neither mechanism is exclusive to democracies, nor is it clear why their effects should only be observed after 1945.
[71] We re-estimated Model 7 with a dummy DEMOC variable that denoted whether a state’s regime score was .7, the conventional threshold for being coded a stable democracy, DEMOC was not significant.
This part of the discourse reminds me of many "battles of the experts" in which I've participated - not as an expert, but as the guy who had to translate the expert to the judge or jury. As you know, many of these battles degenerate (from the non-expert's standpoint) into inside baseball arguments between the experts.
What I've gleaned from my experience is that the practical examples weigh more with the non-expert than anything else. E.g.,
from Cavguy
... but bottom line if mech hurts COIN forces than how come 3ACR (has least number of dismounted troops of any BCT in the Army), and 1/1 AD (heavy legacy BCT) were hugely COIN successful ?
because ... da, da, da - and you're off to the races. After reading through Lyall's articles, I can see why you are considering the topic. Bonne Chance. :)
Ken White
02-01-2009, 04:11 AM
Whoops -- already used that line once this month...:D
I'll change it; I love inexperienced experts...:cool:
...because ... da, da, da - and you're off to the races. After reading through Lyall's articles, I can see why you are considering the topic. Bonne Chance. :)See what I mean about the number crunchers getting it wrong. They almost always do.
Always hated it when my Commander was one of them; the intuitive guys just do it a lot better. No numbers or machinery involved. Ain't at, right Niel... ;)
Cavguy
02-01-2009, 05:24 AM
Because my degree is in Security Studies, papers tend to focus on the quantitative. I am less than impressed with the way IR "codes" history. I think Stephen Walt captured most of the issues well in "Rigor or Rigor Mortis?" (http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/584/rigor_or_rigor_mortis_rational_choice_and_security _studies.html)
That said, quant has its uses but can be carried too far. It does tend to delve into "inside baseball" between datasets, coding issues, and regression. It's also why most policymakers pay little attention to "hard" IR theory.
Cavguy
02-01-2009, 05:30 AM
What's the dataset coding definition for insurgency, Cavguy? Does it depend on battle deaths (and if so, is the threshold set in absolute numbers, or relative to population size)? How does it differentiate from terrorism?
I ask this because, arguably, the great success of democracies might be that groups never make the transition from protest movement > small terrorist group > full-blown insurgency, and that the "success" of democracies lies rather earlier than their ability to engage in full-scale COIN.
A critic might argue that it is rather like trying to measure the effectiveness of a bug-zapper atop Mount Everest (the body count isn't really getting at the issue of why there are so few mosquitos around...)
Agreed. The RAND Terrorist post-1945 dataset has over 600 listed entries. The Insurgency dataset has 89. The coding is based off of a number of factors, including size, goals, casualties, and other factors. Adding terrorist data actually reinforces the hypothesis, as they are often defeated and rarely successful.
Intuitively, I think you have hit on the reason - the structure of democracy makes it hard for terror groups to metastasize into full blown rebellions. There would have to be a huge reservoir of non-reconcilable discontent unresolvable through political means - which in turn suggests the contest is hardcore ideological (religious-like or separatist) in nature, rather than grievance based.
Bob's World
02-01-2009, 12:48 PM
In your opinion, what is the significance and consequences of differentiating between violence as "military means" and other forms of politically-driven violence?
First to preface this, the core concept being developed here is that:
"In order to resolve a problem one must first have a good understanding of what the nature of the problem is."
If an infantry squad is moving down a country lane and enters into an L-shaped ambush, it pretty much looks the same and has the same effect if it is executed by a state-opponent's military force or if it is executed by a bunch of local men who have joined an insurgent movement.
Similarly, the tactical actions to counter that ambushing unit are much the same as well.
To successfully address and resolve WHY the ambush was executed, however, are two very different things altogether. This is why I immediately become guarded when things that appear very similar on their face are immediately lumped into convenient bins based not on the purpose for action, but more by the physical nature of the action itself.
Examples of this currently are those who lump many diverse groups with equally diverse purpose for action under the deliberately inflammatory banner of "Terrorist." Similarly, the U.S. conventional force has recently trended to lumping actions against a similarly diversely motivated set of organizations as being "COIN." Taken to an even larger generalization, because we are using the military to defeat violent activities we lump it again under the even broader umbrella of "war."
Such lack of sophistication in seeking to understand ones opponent's purpose for action prior to defining and shaping your own counter to resolve such problems can only lead to long, drawn out affairs that will tend to be too heavily weighted toward military action directed at the symptoms of the problem, as opposed to a holistic program of engagement directed with laser precision at the sources of the problem.
So just as every fist fight is not a boxing match (both look similar, but begin for different reasons, and are won by different measures) all violence is not warfare. The boxer jumped in the alley on the way home will use all of his boxing skills and have a much greater chance of prevailing over a street fighter than an untrained individual encountering the same problem. But if the boxer thinks he's going to get a break every 3 minutes, receive no punches below the belt, or not get hit on the back his head by a pipe swung by his mugger's girlfriend, he is going to be in trouble. We all can grasp this, but for some reason when 200,000 of us get on planes and fly to a foreign country to wage "war", we can't seem to look past the "threat" we are there to defeat and really do the frontend analysis to figure out not just HOW he fights, but WHY he fights and then correspondingly, how to get him to stand down.
Many previous operations chalked up as COIN "victories" were really little more than a temporary set back for the insurgent movement. Insurgencies are internal violence for political change by a populace against its own government. If beaten down from phase II to phase I or even 0, so long as the conditions giving rise to the insurgency remain unaddressed, the populace will move back up into higher phase insurgency as soon as they have the capacity to do so. Algeria and the Philippines are both great examples of this. You can kill Berbers and Moros every generation for the next 1000 years; or you can take the time to figure out why they are so willing to keep getting back up to fight, and attempt to shape a solution that provides some sense of justice and good governance for the affected populace.
Intervening powers are like police officers responding to domestic violence calls. Dangerous crazy stuff. You can't really hate someone unless you love them first. Similarly, a populace driven to violence against itself has a whole other degree of motivation than a professional army sent against another state for King and country. The latter is just business. The Former is personal.
So, in a democracy, a populace is less likely to revolt as they typically can resolve their differences with their government by legitimate means short of violence. Democracy is the greatest COIN tool ever devised for this very reason. The other side of this though, is that when a democracy intervenes in someone else’s insurgency their actions are tempered by their own populaceslack of will for harsh violence, which prevents them from waging the type of insurgent crushing operations that will put an insurgency into phase 0 for an extended period of time. Insurgency was not a big problem in Yugoslavia until Tito's iron hand was removed from back of the populace’s neck.
So I guess here is a take-away: Insurgency is not apt to erupt in either a strong democracy, or a strong dictatorship. The first because the conditions giving rise to insurgency can be addressed peacefully, the second because any effort to protest those conditions can be immediately and brutally crushed. Insurgency will then tend to occur in those governments that lie in between these two poles. Worst case is a democracy too insecure to allow true popular input to effect change, but not heavy handed enough to crush those who chose to act out. When you intervene in such a country (think, oh, how about Iraq or Afghanistan) you are in for a challenge. But remember what pole we are there to lead them toward, and shape your engagement accordingly.
AmericanPride
02-01-2009, 04:11 PM
Bob,
I agree with much of what you said, though I would go further and argue that violence is at the foundation of all political activity, and only that mitigating factors such as time, resources, the strength of the opposition, etc prevent distributing power based solely on the capacity to impose one's will on another through violence. That said, selective and subjective definitions of 'democracy' and 'dictatorship' (i.e. modern, Western versions of either) seems to suggest that insurgencies are unlikely to erupt in either. But I would dispute any correlation on the basis that every democracy, dictatorship, and insurgency are different, and that any conclusion drawn from such comparisons would be incomplete. There is no absolute democracy or dictatorship that we can use as an appropriate measure. I would argue that why democracies (and dictatorships) are successful in either mitigating insurgency or do not generally face the threat in the first place is a function of class factionalism and not the organization of government (which, IMO, reflects the distribution of power among classes; hence the different shapes of governments that are nonetheless characterized as the same or similar). Whatever the agenda of post-WW2 insurgencies, the common attributes are often a dispossessed concentrated ethnic majority led by an educated, relatively well-off (whether in wealth, prestige, power, etc) ideological elite. Looking through Cav's examples in his first post, I have to ask how many of those insurgencies "lost" as a direct result of the system of government in place? Or in contrast, how many "lost" because of violence, resettlement, etc but they happened to have been defeated by a democratic government (Chechnya, Lebanon, Turkey)? Another question: given that the minority of states were democratic through the latter half of the 20th century, what is the possibility that democratic states appear statistically more likely to defeat insurgencies because there are fewer examples of 'democratic insurgencies'?
The common factor, IMO, seems to be that democratic governments are more willing to use violence to defeat insurgencies that are considered 'illegitimate' according to the political climate/context of the time. Given that democracies are generally ruled by the ethnic/ideological majority, are democracies more likely to pursue violence until the 'bitter end' so to speak? And since the democratic state is often at war with a dispossessed minority, how does the advantage in resources and mobilization for the state impact the outcome of the conflict? Last question: if democratic governments are more successful in mitigating insurgency because of ease of accommodation for rival political factions, why do 'democratic insurgencies' occur in the first place?
Just my thoughts.
AmericanPride
02-02-2009, 03:03 PM
Ron,
In Post #40 (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showpost.php?p=65609&postcount=40), you describe a number of different classes of governemnt and how that may impact the distribution of power and the propensity for internal violence. I will suggest here a similar argument: that liberal/revolutionary/revisionist states face less problems with internal violence than do conservative/reactionary/traditionalist states because the factions within the former can more easily redefine/reshape/modify ideologies, institutions, and policies as the circumstances dictate. I would further argue that most liberal/revolutionary/revisionist states eventually become conservative/reactionary/traditionalist as the 'dust settles' so-to-speak, and power becomes more formal and institutionalized.
William F. Owen
02-02-2009, 03:31 PM
I would further argue that most liberal/revolutionary/revisionist states eventually become conservative/reactionary/traditionalist as the 'dust settles' so-to-speak, and power becomes more formal and institutionalized.
"Every revolution must end with a reinforcing of power to the state". - Lenin!
50Bravo
03-21-2009, 05:31 AM
The short answer is, no, I can't think of one.
As to suitability for your Thesis, the information you provide seems to me, possibly correlated but not necessarily causal. If the data are not or cannot be demonstrated to be causal then you are in for a long walk in the sun.
It is difficult for me to fit those governments into one box called Democracy, as many of them are at odds with what you and I might think of as a democracy... so you got that definitional thing.(Maybe the "spectrum" of democratic characteristics might have some impact on the term of the insurgency?)
I would be leery of making the commitment to this topic until I had found some relationship that looks causal. The tough part about a Thesis (IMHO) is picking a subject that you can run with and use that yet allows a narrow enough focus to allow a clear and succinct examination of your hypothesis. This is what you need for a clean product.
I think that to make this work, you'll need to tunnel deeper and discover something that might (or might not) be demonstrable as a causal factor. If it was my assignment and I could not identify that prospective relationship, I'd shift targets.
50Bravo
03-21-2009, 05:49 AM
Fishel's post from another thread came to mind...
With that in mind, I would guess (and this is a pure guess - not even an "eduated" one) that most democracies tend to experience less drastic social upheavals than other forms of government. Using the theory above, less drastic upheaval means less intense insurgency (if any). The weaker insurgency gets defeated.
Another uneducated guess: in a democracy, change is less likely to take the form of armed upheaval because a democracy, in theory, gives everyone at least some voice or the perception that they have a voice and they are less likely to lash out. Hitler comes to mind. He didn't wage an insurgency. He got elected.
Is the corollary that, in a democracy, insurrection is more likely if a large enough part of the polity perceives that they have no voice, that the situation is out of control? i would also suggest that Hitler did wage an insurgency, there was plenty of violence and intrigue. Saying that his deal wasn't an insurgency is, I believe inaccurate. The elections were a side show, the game was over well before then. Another example would be Hamas. They were "elected" yet who believes that there was no violence or coersion. w
Third thought: an insurgency can gain legitimacy by demonizing a king or oligarchy. Who does it demonize in a democracy? The people? That doesn't sound like much of a rallying cry. "We suck - let's overthrow ourselves!"
But you could say (as many do) our representation sucks, lets remove them. It seems that there is a lot of that going around these days. Cavguy you may have a foam rubber pinata here..
Schmedlap
03-21-2009, 07:38 AM
This is somewhat of a rambling post, but I'm pressing "submit reply" anyway.:D
To answer the question, another question may be worth pondering. Why have some countries not converted to democracy?
I was re-reading Bernard Lewis’ piece (https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/64830/bernard-lewis/free-at-last) in the latest Foreign Affairs (March/April 2009) and I thought his description of the models of Arab governance was interesting. Starting on page 86, he writes “most Arab regimes belong to one of two categories: those that depend on the people’s loyalty and those that depend on their obedience. Loyalty may be ethnic, tribal, regional, or some combination of these… The regimes that depend on obedience are European-style dictatorships that use techniques of control and enforcement derived from the fascist and communist models. These regimes have little or no claim to the loyalty of their people and depend for survival on diversion and repression: directing the anger of their people toward some external enemy.”
The recent order has been the loyalty regimes like Morocco and Saudi Arabia or the obedience regimes like Egypt or Syria (I presume). But, he goes on to point out that these two models “are becoming less effective; there are groups, increasing in number and importance, that seek a new form of government based not primarily on loyalty, and still less on repression, but on consent and participation. These groups are still small and, of necessity, quiet, but the fact that they have appeared at all is a remarkable development.”
A trend for the future may be a move away from the either-or choice of loyalty versus obedience toward a third option of consent (democratic-like models). Lebanon, he states, “is one country in the entire region with a significant experience of democratic political life. It has suffered not for its faults but for its merits – the freedom and openness that others have exploited with devastating effect.”
This, to me, seems to suggest a first-mover disadvantage within the Arab world. The creation of a government modeled on consent necessarily creates a situation in which there is also freedom to openly oppose the government without fear of suppression or social chastisement, creating a situation amenable to not just political disagreement, but is also like sending an invitation to Hezbollah or al-Qaeda to come set up a recruiting center or a jihadist FOB (see Lebanon and Iraq).
Who wants to be first to open up if it means you trade your tyranny, which for whatever its sins at least ensured stability and security, only to get in return Hezbollah or the latest “al-Qaeda in (insert region)” franchise? This creates a paradox in which the only way to ensure your consent model of government is to rely upon the very secret police and oppressive arm of the government that you were hoping to get rid of. And what if they finally purge the foreign fighter? Can they be expected to just disband, as their rank and file smoothly transition into the private sector? Not likely.
Iraq seems to be the best hope for the region in transitioning to the consent model. But is OIF a blueprint for success? Operation Syrian Freedom doesn’t sound good. Operation West Bank Freedom? Sounds like an industrial meat grinder, wrapped in flypaper. How about sanctions against the bad regimes and foreign aid for the goods ones? How’s that working out for us?
Democracy may simply be a manifestation of a country's social evolution to a point where it is more resistant to the elements of a successful insurgency (rather than having any special tools to combat them after the fact). That the insurgencies were unsuccessful may be due to their failure to achieve certain decisive tasks, rather than the democracy's success in responding to the insurgencies. Democracy may be more akin to a preventive vaccination than to a post-diagnosis dose of antibiotics. But in some countries, like in the Mideast, it is like a flu vaccine - the vaccine brings risk in the early stages.
AmericanPride
03-24-2009, 02:05 PM
Schmedlap,
I'm not convinced by Lewis' argument. While accurate to some degree, it has no precision. The 'people', 'loyalty' and 'obedience' are too broad to be of any use (which goes along with another criticism I have of the concept of the 'mass base', but that's for later). All governments use a mix of loyalty and obedience (and even some consent) to maintain influence over different elements of the population. The problem isnt that these states are dependent on "loyalty" or "obedience" but that they are generally weak institutionally (with the exception of the security forces), and liberalizaiton, democraticization, and modernization create significant instability because the state is the prime mover. The elites that govern therefore assume all of the risk. And in the last 100 years, how many states have successfully been pushed into modernity? Anyone other than Stalin's USSR?
Who wants to be first to open up if it means you trade your tyranny, which for whatever its sins at least ensured stability and security, only to get in return Hezbollah or the latest “al-Qaeda in (insert region)” franchise?
That's not really an accurate definition of the problem. Groups like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood offer consent-based alternatives to the Western-backed "obedience" regimes. And because the states are weak institutionally, these groups have significant influence when filling the capabilities gaps (social welfare, etc).
Iraq seems to be the best hope for the region in transitioning to the consent model.
I disagree. Iraq (and Syria) had republican forms of government in their recent history. Both failed to be sustained because of factionalism and instability, resulting in the establishment of a one-party state (Egypt is not remarkably dissimilar). What has changed in Iraq that will prevent future factionalism? Will Iraq require an enduring US presence to maintain stability?
I'd argue that Syria is in the best position to modernize (and eventually democratize), if it can make peace with Israel. Peace will allow Syria to integrate into the international community, draw in wealth that will enable modernization, and allow it to address some of its social and economic problems that currently prevent modernization and the subsequent liberalization.
Why have some countries not converted to democracy?
Because the risk of failure is too costly and the cost of success is too high.
Schmedlap
03-24-2009, 09:11 PM
Thanks for taking the time for a lengthy reply. I was beginning to fear that I rambled on for nothing.:cool:
While accurate to some degree, it has no precision. The 'people', 'loyalty' and 'obedience' are too broad to be of any use...
I don't think so. I think there is an important distinction between a government that has a ruling family in a country where kinship lines are respected versus a government that has a repressive bureaucracy of ideologically driven nutbars from all walks of life. The former would never work in Iran and the latter would never work in Saudi Arabia, imo.
The problem isnt that these states are dependent on "loyalty" or "obedience" but that they are generally weak institutionally (with the exception of the security forces), and liberalizaiton, democraticization, and modernization create significant instability because the state is the prime mover.
I don't think he was articulating "the problem" so much as "the situation." But, I agree with the second half of your sentence. Good point.
Groups like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood offer consent-based alternatives to the Western-backed "obedience" regimes. And because the states are weak institutionally, these groups have significant influence when filling the capabilities gaps (social welfare, etc).
I think there is an awful lot of fear mixed in there that is more significant than the consent. I think the consent is just feigned in public by many who privately live in fear. But, regardless of my disagreement on that point, I think your second sentence is correct.
What has changed in Iraq that will prevent future factionalism?
Prevent? Nothing. Significantly reduce the odds? I think you answered that when you responded to my question of, "Why have some countries not converted to democracy?" You responded...
Because the risk of failure is too costly and the cost of success is too high.
Exactly. So what changed in Iraq, you ask? The injection of US troops changed the situation in Iraq to reduce the risk of failure (primarily that of ethnosectarian factionalism) and to shift the cost of success to the American taxpayer.
The Bernard Lewis piece requires a subscription, so I'm not sure if you were able to read the full thing. I suspect that his full essay is more convincing than my brief summary - don't take my word for it. Many have gone astray by relying too heavily upon me.:eek:
Schmedlap
06-10-2009, 08:51 PM
I'm considering my grad thesis on Democracies and Insurgencies. Specifically, in the RAND insurgency dataset of 89 insurgencies 1945-2006, I found no examples of a democracy (defined by government enduring the insurgency, not the government of external supporters) losing an insurgency, as defined by the insurgents attaining all of their objectives (overthrow or secession).
This thought just popped into my mind today.
Perhaps democratic systems condition the populace to wage its battles at the battle box rather than in the streets by...
1. providing a mechanism for grievances (throw the bums out)
2. providing the belief that something as drastic and risky as overthrow/secession is unnecessary
3. creating a climate where discourse and airing out grievances publicly is encouraged, preventing the need to go underground. Removing the need to go underground ensures that grievances are not only aired - which gives some therapeutic effect, but also invites rebuttal, which deters others from joining and helps to prevent the aggrieved from becoming too removed from reality.
In other words, provide an alternative, raise the risk-reward ratio, and counterattack while the threat is emerging, rather than after it arrives.
This might also be a "chicken or the egg" case. Democracy is more than just casting ballots. The process must be fair, the choices must be real, the debate must be unrestrained, and there must be no fear involved. Otherwise, it is only a democracy in name, not in substance. How many countries achieve that highly sophisticated state of social order and stability? Once a country achieves that, it seems that the society should also be smart enough to figure out how to sort out its differences before they devolve into fisticuffs, tomfoolery, assassinations, and urban sniping.
Likewise for the bad guys. If they have somehow arrived at the conclusion that things are so bad/backwards/intolerable that armed action is the only solution, then they are probably hopelessly disenfranchised. Why? There are always a few outcasts in society. But when enough of them exist to form a viable counter-movement, then that means that something is wrong.
This may lead back to one of the conclusions that many of us so often find ourselves revisiting: the way to defeat an insurgency is to prevent it.
Ken White
06-10-2009, 10:00 PM
This may lead back to one of the conclusions that many of us so often find ourselves revisiting: the way to defeat an insurgency is to prevent it.I came to that conclusion in 1962. Nothing I've done, heard, read or seen since has given me any reason to change my mind...
Bob's World
06-10-2009, 11:39 PM
It's really not about "Democracy" at all, and I find very dangerous broad proclamations such as:
"Democracies never fight each other!" or "Democracies never lose insurgency!"
The reason being that some huge importance is then placed on democracy itself, which leads to dangerous policies, such as the one embarked under the Bush administration of promoting and imposing one form of governance that we think is best. To me that always seemed a little too much like what we were so opposed to the Soviets doing during the Cold War; and also very counter to the American principles of Self Determination that are codified in our Declaration of Independence and that shaped our foreign policies all the way up through the end of WWII.
So, I think one gets to this concept of why insurgency don't fare well in democracies far better by starting not with the form of governance in place, but instead by going to what causes insurgency in the first place.
Many focus on human aspects at the bottom end of Maslow's hierarchy as being causal. Lack of security, hunger, etc. But history really simply does not support that as being the true cause. Many people are widely hungry or fearful in their nations, and are loyal citizens. So it must be something else.
Many then point to dynamic leaders that are opposed to the government, and the ideologies they use as being causal. Yet this too falls short of any historical study conducted with even a basic understanding of the nature of insurgency. If the populace is not ripe for insurgency no amount of ideology or charisma will incite it to insurrection. As I have stated before, the Pied Piper is a fairly tale.
So where I am currently at is that insurgency is caused by poor governance, that being:Some situation or condition, real or perceived, that is so egregious to some significant segment of the populace, that they also perceive they cannot resolve through legitimate means, so as to move them to seek change through illegitimate means.
The safety valve that democracy provides is that if it is a democracy that the populace has confidence in, then it provides the hope of addressing such conditions through legitimate means. The key is that other forms of governance that also provide some mechanism of legitimately addressing such grievances will also effectively deter insurgency.
This is why I am a firm believer of promoting self-determination. This in of itself implies some democratic process in determining what form of government one wants to live under. To have someone else impose democracy is really not very democratic at all. So if a populace votes for dictatorship, then they have exercised democracy and achieved the form of government they desire. Any government desired by a populace is superior to any form of government imposed upon them. Likewise, any country that is seen as an enabler of such self-determination is far less likely to find it self on the blame line (target list) of a populace that drifts into conditions of poor governance than a country that has directed the establishment or sustained artificially the despotic power.
Legitimacy and goodness. Promote goodness for others, but avoid taking on a perception of legitimacy for their governance. This strikes at causation. A good democracy achieved through self-determination is very resilient to insurgency for this reason. It self-corrects "poorness" and it has "legitimacy" that is fully recognized and accepted by a majority of the populace.
Schmedlap
06-11-2009, 01:28 AM
So where I am currently at is that insurgency is caused by poor governance, that being:Some situation or condition, real or perceived, that is so egregious to some significant segment of the populace, that they also perceive they cannot resolve through legitimate means, so as to move them to seek change through illegitimate means.
That sounds about right to me. I would only add that "poor" is pretty relative; relative to the culture. If a government demonstrates no particular acumen for governance, then it might resort to changing the culture, so that the tipping point of perceived injustice is defined downward. For example, North Korea's culture may have become so obsessed with the ideas of unity at any cost and subservience to their potbellied ruler that no matter how poorly they are governed, they will accept that poor governance as a necessary evil to retain their national unity. Eating tree bark? Babies dying for lack of immunizations? Childrens' growth stunted due to malnutrition? All due to a closed, command-economy administered by boobs? No problem for North Koreans. Transpose that level of incompetent governance here in the US and there would be blood in the streets. We get outraged if ATM fees go up another quarter and the gov't refuses to intervene.
Bob's World
06-11-2009, 01:27 PM
"Poor" is absolutely relative. It only matters what the populace in question believes. An outsider's opinion or standards of what is "good" for them, or what they think an "effective" government does is interesting, but should never be the basis for a FID effort to help prevent or quell insurgency in some other country.
North Korea is an interesting example because it is one of the few completely state controlled dictatorships in the world that can still control information to it populace as well as the populace itself. A populace experiencing condtions of poor governance is easily suppressed by such a government from rising up. They are also far less likely to realize how bad their situation is relative to everyone else in the world and not realize that it is "poor" governance. It just is what it is. As the people of the North come to realize how different their world is from that that has emerged in the South, it is only a matter of time before the people will effect change to end the current system. (I.e. there will then be causation, so all required then will be the elements of motivation to get things moving. Some event, some leader, some ideology...
slapout9
06-11-2009, 01:42 PM
BW, can you give us an example of your concept of operation against Target Country X. How would you do it?
Bob's World
06-11-2009, 02:49 PM
Slap,
Yes, but right now I am hairline deep in a major QDR project. Will gladly address. In general though, we tend to fear the wrong things, and then launch into COAs that probably create even greater dangers than if we would have gone with what scared us. We also then tend to exert too much control into the environment, which tends to paint us with too much legitimacy over the government we are helping; which both undermines their efforts while increasing our risks of attacks from that same populace.
Some of this is a little counter-intuitive. I worry about what decisions my kids will make as they enter adulthood as well; but at the end of the day you have to primarily trust them to do the right thing, and recognize that any action they choose for themselves is going to be better that any action you impose upon them. They'll get bumps and scrapes, but they won't blame you for them. Right now we are treating a whole lot of countries around the world like a controlling parent treats it's young adult children with predictable results.
slapout9
06-11-2009, 03:23 PM
Some of this is a little counter-intuitive. I worry about what decisions my kids will make as they enter adulthood as well; but at the end of the day you have to primarily trust them to do the right thing, and recognize that any action they choose for themselves is going to be better that any action you impose upon them. They'll get bumps and scrapes, but they won't blame you for them. Right now we are treating a whole lot of countries around the world like a controlling parent treats it's young adult children with predictable results.
BW,can't wait for your response but I like your analogy;)
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