Insurgencies Rarely Win

[Chris Albon]

Insurgencies Rarely Win – And Iraq Won’t Be Any Different (Maybe)

Vietnam taught many Americans the wrong lesson: that determined guerrilla fighters are invincible. But history shows that insurgents rarely win, and Iraq should be no different. Now that it finally has a winning strategy, the Bush administration is in a race against time to beat the insurgency before the public’s patience finally wears out.

[Chris Albon]

Related Article:

Can the U.S. defeat the Iraqi insurgency?

Stoker may be right. The United States is wealthy enough to foot the bill and large enough to bear the casualties in Iraq, even if the strain on the military is causing serious problems with recruitment, retention, and maintenance. And Bush acknowledged last week that he's learned a few things from his many prior mistakes in Iraq. It's certainly encouraging that Gen. David Petraeus, who had great success in Mosul early on and then went on to literally write the book on counterinsurgency, will soon be running the war effort in Iraq.

[Stu-6]

I think the author makes a mistake by focusing on an insurgent win as opposed to a counterinsurgent loss. While insurgents have rarely succeed in revolution with out transitioning to more conventional combat (e.g. Mao) they have successfully bleed organized state dry with guerrilla tactics (e.g. USSR-Afghanistan). Also Iraq gives us a unique situation in that the struggle is not over control of the state or part of the state’s territory, but rather what group(s) will take power in the wake of a destroyed state.

[GPaulus]

There is a fundamental misunderstanding regarding Insurgencies. If a word could describe insurgents, it is self-serving—power, money, lawlessness, food, freedom from oppression, survival, etc., and once spawned, their aim is protractedness; their aim is not about winning. Simply stated, insurgencies are protracted because that provides the most utility to the insurgents; they are not protracted because it is an insurgency. Insurgents don’t have a goal of winning although they would not mind seeing their enemy fail. They win if the struggle continues to gain momentum and they draw others into the fray—that breeds chaos. The insurgency in Iraq is composed of men 18 to 40. This population can be likened to the criminal gang and organized crime elements more then conventional war fighters or terrorists. They tend to be decentralized in operations, are local within a small territorial range and recruit their fighters from local talent. When the group gets too large, there may be internal violence, mass killings and rival rifts as members compete for upward mobility. Their “Cause to Die For” is the failure of the government to meet the most basic levels of life and to provide hope. They almost always spawn from decapitated states especially if the levels of basic services do not improve with time. Their cause is never an ideology or idealistic dogma, and therefore they will have the propensity to ebb and flow based on the need of the day and the targets of opportunity. The insurgent is really apolitical and much more primal in their motives as compared to terrorism or conventional war fighters. Insurgency warfare is not politically or religiously motivated. Notice how these statements fly in the face of the conventional war fighter’s paradigm proposed by Clausewitz, “War is the extension of politics by other means.” Attached is a paper that speaks to the Insurgency Paradigm

[jcustis]

There is a fundamental misunderstanding regarding Insurgencies. If a word could describe insurgents, it is self-serving—power, money, lawlessness, food, freedom from oppression, survival, etc., and once spawned, their aim is protractedness; their aim is not about winning.

Sir, if an insurgency is self-serving, then would you use the term insurgency to classify the Rhodesian/Zimbabwe situation after UDI in 1965?

[GPaulus]

Sir, if an insurgency is self-serving, then would you use the term insurgency to classify the Rhodesian/Zimbabwe situation after UDI in 1965?

The fact that "All" human behavior is motivated by one thing and one thing only "Self-interest" does not make all struggles the same. The major difference as I see it between the insurgency in Iraq, and the UDI is that the insurgents are primal in their motives, needs, wants, and desires. The UDI was much more of an ideological struggle. Consider this difference--Using the Maslow Hierarchy --the UDI was at the Self-actualizing level (freedom of oppression, selfgovernance) whereas the Insurgency, at least in Iraq, is at the Physiological level--food, water, money, lawlessness. Their fight
is not an ideological manifesto like the media leads us to believe. As a result, the insurgency in Iraq wins if the struggle is protracted. The UDI wins if their independence is granted quickly--they did not want protractedness. As a result, I would not be inclinded to call the UDI an insurgency.