Defining Insurgency

[William F. Owen]

Oh, and what does my approach tell us:

1. That it is Governments who cause insurgency, not Populaces.
- Therefore resolution comes through understanding the populace and addressing the failures of governance.

Ya All*h! That is pure sophistry. Governments do not cause insurgencies. Insurgents cause insurgencies. It is the choice of some of the population to use violence against a government that causes so called insurgency. People rebel because they want to. Not because they need to.

If we forget that we will all disappear down the liberal post-modern plug-hole which is responsible for all this hand wringing about how to crush rebellions.

Resolution comes about killing and capturing the right folks. That done the non-violent politics can kick in.... or not.

[slapout9]

Did the southern populace choose a "strategy of insurgency"? No.
Could they have? Yes.

Bob, the South had a mixed Strategy, which was one their problems. But there was certainly an Insurgent component to it.

[Bob's World]

Ya All*h! That is pure sophistry. Governments do not cause insurgencies. Insurgents cause insurgencies. It is the choice of some of the population to use violence against a government that causes so called insurgency. People rebel because they want to. Not because they need to.

If we forget that we will all disappear down the liberal post-modern plug-hole which is responsible for all this hand wringing about how to crush rebellions.

Resolution comes about killing and capturing the right folks. That done the non-violent politics can kick in.... or not.

We'll forever agree to disagree on this one.

However to accuse another of "sophistry" is either poor word choice or an intentional attempt to start a fight by calling anothers intentions into question, rather than simply disagreeing with their positions.

(•sophism: a deliberately invalid argument displaying ingenuity in reasoning in the hope of deceiving someone)

My argument is every bit as valid as any posted by any other; is backed by the facts of a thousand insurgencies over time, and is offered to deceive no one, merely rather to offer a persective that is too often shouted down those who cannot get past the inherent illegality of insurgency to assess why such a drastic approach was thought appropriate to begin with.

[William F. Owen]

(•sophism: a deliberately invalid argument displaying ingenuity in reasoning in the hope of deceiving someone)

Take it as a complement!

My argument is every bit as valid as any posted by any other; is backed by the facts of a thousand insurgencies over time, and is offered to deceive no one, merely rather to offer a persective that is too often shouted down those who cannot get past the inherent illegality of insurgency to assess why such a drastic approach was thought appropriate to begin with.

You certainly have a right to your argument, but I cannot accept that it is valid to suggest "Governments cause insurgencies," as a statement of fact. It's certainly an ingenious argument to free the populace for responsibility for their actions.

[Bob's World]

I hold everyone resposible for their actions. Governents as well as populaces. We must seek balance.

Not all that is legal is also right, though certainly much that is illegal is also wrong. With insurgency we get deep into that grey area between right and wrong, legal and illegal. Complicating it further is that governments assess "facts" from their perspective, and populaces assess very different "facts" from theirs.

Like an arguement between a husband and his wife, being "right" will only take you so far, and telling her how she is supposed to "feel" about your actions is rarely a wise path. Sure the husband is stronger and can always play that card, but there are consequences and such decisions should not be made lightly. Better to listen, adjust, and move forward. (Oh, and yes her friends will conduct UW to encourage her frustration is they don't much like you; just as yours may conduct FID suggest ways you could be more effective in your approaches...)

But "I'm right and you're wrong because I said so" is not apt to lead to resolutions acceptable to anyone. Certainly not the poor bloke in this example, nor for Mr. Karzai in his example either.

[jmm99]

I'm not totally buying this:

from Wilf
Resolution comes about killing and capturing the right folks. That done the non-violent politics can kick in.... or not.

in terms of how I view the "political struggle" and "military struggle". The term "non-violent politics" applies, e.g., to what we in the US are seeing now (the pre-election month).

The JMM "political struggle" is not necessarily non-violent. In my construct, both the "political struggle" and the "military struggle" have as their goal "neutralizing" the opposing group (using three means). In the "political struggle", the priority of means is more "convert, capture, kill". In the "military struggle", the priority of means is more "kill, capture, convert".

"Conversion" (to JMM) includes infiltration and subversion; and frankly, the threat or use of violence if necessary to remove (kill or capture) barriers to the conversion process.

The JMM "political struggle" also includes activities such as intelligence gathering and establishing networks. For example, Wilf, you want to use my Special Branch and its networks. Fine, you are welcome to drink from my well; but please remember who owns the well.

Where I believe you err (not necessarily in every case) is on putting the "political struggle" (as I am using it) on a shelf until the military has put paid to "killing and capturing the right folks".

As a general rule, I'm suggested a triad arrangement at all levels: Policy Group (that drives both the "political struggle" and the "military struggle"), Political Struggle Group and Military Stuggle Group. We've been discussing this on and off for about a year.

Regards

Mike

[William F. Owen]

Where I believe you err (not necessarily in every case) is on putting the "political struggle" (as I am using it) on a shelf until the military has put paid to "killing and capturing the right folks".

I am in no way putting the political struggle on the shelf. They go hand in hand, and they alter and fuel each other. The issue is that any action the government wants to take AFTER the conflict will be by its very nature "non-violent." War is merely the violent transmission/"setting forth" of policy.

If folks want to change sides (convert) then OK. They wouldn't have wanted to unless you had used violence to convince them they were going to suffer. The conversion is the realisation of a policy.

As a general rule, I'm suggested a triad arrangement at all levels:

A triad? Could you say Trinity? Have I heard this before? I wish I could claim credit for my views. Sadly they are all CvCs!

[SteveMetz]

A triad? Could you say Trinity? Have I heard this before? I wish I could claim credit for my views. Sadly they are all CvCs!

Actually, it was more Pythagoras

[Entropy]

Col. Jones,

I'll repeat here what I think is the biggest flaw in your theory: Government's limited ability to deal with irreconcilable differences within a governed population. Your theory, by placing all responsibility on government, assumes that government always has the capacity to satisfy all its people enough to prevent insurgency from occurring or defeating insurgency through government reform. I don't think this is universally true. It also fails to consider cases where government simply cannot meet the demands of a populace.

I'll try to illustrate this point with a bit of reductio ad absurdum:

Is it possible, for example, to unite the populations of the US and Pakistan under a single system of governance? Could any kind of "good governance" keep such a Frankenstein nation together, much less keep everyone happy enough to forgo violence? Probably not in my view, since the nation of "USPAK" would have too many internal, competing and irreconcilable contradictions. The very idea of such a nation is ludicrous. Yet we tend to assume that because a nation's borders are drawn on a map that such nations are not similarly Frankensteins.

The point here is that national viability is a problem that good governance cannot solve. Those same questions can be asked of any number of "nations" especially those often referred to as "failed states." See also the USSR, Yemen, Yugoslavia, etc. It seems to me that under your theory those states failed only because of bad governance.

So before addressing governance, I think one must consider whether a state is viable to begin with. If you focus on improving governance in a state isn't viable, or is just barely so, then one is not likely to get the outcome one expects.

Consequently, I suspect that many authoritarian states are actually just on the edge of viability and are only held together through authoritarian governance. Take away the authoritarian component and the state falls apart. Promoting "good governance" in such cases has the effect of advocating the dissolution of the state itself as a coherent political entity. It shouldn't be surprising that these countries resist such calls for reform and I doubt there is any amount of pressure the US can bring to bear to cause them to reconsider.

[Ken White]

My argument is every bit as valid as any posted by any other; is backed by the facts of a thousand insurgencies over time, and is offered to deceive no one, merely rather to offer a persective that is too often shouted down those who cannot get past the inherent illegality of insurgency to assess why such a drastic approach was thought appropriate to begin with.

That's true. Conversely, the arguments of others also have the same validity and merit the consideration you desire for your arguments. You rarely give that consideration and thus perhaps do your arguments no favors. Bulldozing may be overkill when only a Bobcat is needed. Said another way, shouting is a two way street..

Can you provide me a list of those "thousand insurgencies?" Does that list also include those where the governance was an issue only in the sense the insurgents wanted to replace the existing governance with their own brand -- which they KNEW would be less tolerable. Iran comes to mind. The Cuban, US and USSR (among others) fomentations around the world during the 60s are prime examples of 'our' form of governance versus anyone's status quo and with little to no regard for the quality of said quo.

A response to that is that if poor governance did not exist, such efforts would draw no followers. That is almost certainly an erroneous assumption. There are a lot of malcontents in every society. IIRC, Bertrand Russell put the figure at nearly half, providing a low threshold for violence with the proper incentives. My personal observation says Bert overstated it, I'd say in most societies it runs around 20 to 30 percent. However, that is enough to provide a cadre of folks who see only slight difference between grumbling and fighting versus the big difference their more complacent neighbors see. Which it will be often lies in subtle manipulation...

I'm not at all sure too many get upset about the illegality of insurgency. In fact, my belief is that most are far more concerned about the potential threat to their perceived well-being than they are about legality. Nor am I sure that insurgency is a drastic approach in many cases. Again, Iran comes to mind -- as do several of the various Mexican Revolutions.

Then we also have various worldwide military coups as insurgencies...

[Pete]

Bob, the South had a mixed Strategy, which was one their problems. But there was certainly an Insurgent component to it.

John S. Mosby's operations in Northern Virginia weren't a grass-roots insurgency by the local population -- rather, it was an organized military unit of the Army of Northern Virginia that used unconventional tactics to infiltrate into Union rear areas. By and large Mosby's operations were supported by a sympathetic local population. However, there were times when local farmers were in the same position as South Vietnamese peasants; not wanting to show overt allegiance to any of the combatants in the area.

[jmm99]

this:

from Wilf
The issue is that any action the government wants to take AFTER the conflict will be by its very nature "non-violent."

One cannot expect violence to turn off instantly - it's not a spigot. There will be violence before and after an armed conflict. The level of violence simply does not rise to that level (which gets into another discussion of what is "war" and what is "armed conflict").

This also is overstated:

from Wilf
If folks want to change sides (convert) then OK. They wouldn't have wanted to unless you had used violence to convince them they were going to suffer.

If fact, violence can cause folks to change sides in the opposite direction. E.g., the executions of the 1916 Easter Rebellion rebels pursuant to military commission sentences (perfectly legal violence) ended up making the republican movement (IRB, etc.) respectable in the eyes of many Irish who initially opposed the 1916 Rebellion itself.

Regards

Mike

[Bob's World]

That's true. Conversely, the arguments of others also have the same validity and merit the consideration you desire for your arguments. You rarely give that consideration and thus perhaps do your arguments no favors. Bulldozing may be overkill when only a Bobcat is needed. Said another way, shouting is a two way street..

Can you provide me a list of those "thousand insurgencies?" Does that list also include those where the governance was an issue only in the sense the insurgents wanted to replace the existing governance with their own brand -- which they KNEW would be less tolerable. Iran comes to mind. The Cuban, US and USSR (among others) fomentations around the world during the 60s are prime examples of 'our' form of governance versus anyone's status quo and with little to no regard for the quality of said quo.

A response to that is that if poor governance did not exist, such efforts would draw no followers. That is almost certainly an erroneous assumption. There are a lot of malcontents in every society. IIRC, Bertrand Russell put the figure at nearly half, providing a lo
w threshold for violence with the proper incentives. My personal observation says Bert overstated it, I'd say in most societies it runs around 20 to 30 percent. However, that is enough to provide a cadre of folks who see only slight difference between grumbling and fighting versus the big difference their more complacent neighbors see. Which it will be often lies in subtle manipulation...

I'm not at all sure too many get upset about the illegality of insurgency. In fact, my belief is that most are far more concerned about the potential threat to their perceived well-being than they are about legality. Nor am I sure that insurgency is a drastic approach in many cases. Again, Iran comes to mind -- as do several of the various Mexican Revolutions.

Then we also have various worldwide military coups as insurgencies...

Such a focus leads to overly agonizing over what the challenger offers or what his motivations are; rather than what the problems of the current governance are and what the causation among the affected populace is that allowed this challenger to come in and make headway.

So, ok, lets pick one off of your list and look at. Cuba sounds interesting. To put everyone on a common footprint to begin with I'll look at this reference
The Casebook on Insurgency,
http://www.usgcoin.org/library/USGDo...s/AD416553.pdf
or
http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ook+insurgency

I've not looked much at this particular insurgency, nor this reference version of facts. It is in Section II Latin America; #5 Cuba 1953-1959.

I'll look at it with an eye to how the populace percieved their government and why it is that Castro could emerge to take down a standing government supported by a powerful backer only a few miles away.

[jmm99]

your links to the The Casebook on Insurgency do not work for me; and I and others had problems with the link in the original thread:

- as to .pdf link - present message: Sorry, "www.usgcoin.org" is unavailable or could not be found.

-------------------
Anyway, Cuba is a very unusual case where one Power (Batista group) in effect committed suicide - the other Power (Castro group) took advantage of the default and vacuum.

Regards

Mike

[Ken White]

missing the point...

Such a focus leads to overly agonizing over what the challenger offers or what his motivations are; rather than what the problems of the current governance are and what the causation among the affected populace is that allowed this challenger to come in and make headway.

I do not agree agonizing is involved for most people nor do I think most fail to look at causation. Most do look for it. Many will see poor governance (as it often is), many will see other factors (also often the case). It is possible to over-focus on things besides the protagonists.

The really sharp will divine the truth which is likely somewhere between the two. Well, as much truth as any conflict offers -- to wit: not much...

So, ok, lets pick one off of your list and look at. Cuba sounds interesting. To put everyone on a common footprint to begin with I'll look at this reference
The Casebook on Insurgency...

Umm, Bob -- we're off on the wrong foot. You missed the point or tried to divert the argument. Don't waste your time on the why of the Cuban revolution. Note I did not give a list, nor did I cite Cuba as an insurgency -- what I did write was:

""The Cuban, US and USSR (among others) fomentations around the world during the 60s are prime examples of 'our' form of governance versus anyone's status quo and with little to no regard for the quality of said quo."" (emphasis added / kw)

Note I said the 60s and the fomentations of the Cubans plus the US plus the USSR (among others). So I'll give you Cuba as a case of bad governance leading to the Castro insurgency of 1956-59.

My reference was to the attempts of Cuba to export 'revolution' to Africa and South America and to those of us, the USSR and others to change the governance in other nations (which may or may not have been bad) for 'own' governance (which may or may not have been one bit better * )

I'll look at it with an eye to how the populace percieved their government and why it is that Castro could emerge to take down a standing government supported by a powerful backer only a few miles away.

Good try, but leaners only count in Horseshoes. Batista was a creep and had a bad government. Castro is not the issue, Ol' Che and exporting insurgency is...

As for why he prevailed, I can tell you that -- because many in the US government of the day totally supported Castro, hated Batista for being a minor despot and their librul instincts allowed them to voice and provide support to Fidel, thus over riding those who warned that Fidel was not what he seemed...

Same thing happened in 1976-9 in Iran. The well intentioned and poorly informed would not listen then, either. They rarely do because they are so-o-o-o righteous...

Bad trait, that...

Note in both those cases (and in Kosovo for another...), the librul intelligentsia fostered insurgencies which effectively replaced poor governments with a far worse government. Fidel, Che and Khomeini all killed more people in their first two years than the previous regimes had in a decade or so. Big help we were...

* That includes the 'governance' fostered by the US which in many cases was not really a bit better for most of the populace than were the ideas of the former regime. Though a good lawyer could probably twist that.

[Bob's World]

Well Ken, it is pretty widely appreciate that throughout the Cold War the U.S. and the Soviets waged a broad game of what I call "pawn warfare", each employing their agents and conducting FID where they had interests and relations with a government, or UW where had interests but no relations with the government.

Cuba was clearly an agent of the Soviets, little different than the relationship of Israel with the U.S. Both needed a big daddy and were willing to do "dirty deeds, done dirt cheap." Both big daddies had plenty of dirty work that needed doing.

But all of that misses the point. My point is that if you look at any of those states where the Soviets or the U.S. or any of their surrogates, showed up to conduct UW, it only had significant effect when conditions of insurgency already existed in the target populace.

You can't pin Angola, for example, on Cuba. Cuba did not place an illegitimate colonial governments over Angola, Portugal did. Cuba saw opportunity in countries rich in natural resources but subjugated to colonial control and offered hope (yes, wrapped in Communist ideology and with long strings running back to Moscow). But this was the game of the day, this jockeying of pawns on the periphery as the two super powers each looked to gain advantages short of nuclear exchange. So the Soviets worked through Cuba, the US worked through South Africa...it was the Cold War.

None of this would have been going on in Angola though, but for the promise to super power national interests of the resources there; and the conditions of insurgency from generations of colonial rule. To blame Cuba for Angola is like blaming a shovel for a hole.

There will always be jockeying for power where conditions of insurgency exist. Some will be internal to the state, some will be external. Some of those external players are the agents of other external players. But at the core of this all, is a populace that is ripe for exploitation. And still, I do not see conditions of Good Governance being successfully exploited by anyone, internal or external. But where poor governance exists, and there are interests (power, money, key terrain, etc) to be served, the exploiters will gather.

[Bob's World]

your links to the The Casebook on Insurgency do not work for me; and I and others had problems with the link in the original thread:

- as to .pdf link - present message: Sorry, "www.usgcoin.org" is unavailable or could not be found.

-------------------
Anyway, Cuba is a very unusual case where one Power (Batista group) in effect committed suicide - the other Power (Castro group) took advantage of the default and vacuum.

Regards

Mike

Apparently "links" are one of my many challenges. If all else fails, just use the SWJ search function and it takes you to the thread with the link to the casebook (that drill into 23 separate insurgencies in pretty fair fashion) and also a link to the '65 Human Factors.

Break...just tried it and you're right, the Casebook link is broken. Human Factors is working though.

WILF will love this from Page 11 of Human Factors (to show I recognize that his position is one that man subscribe to)

"PART VI. GOVERNMENT COUNTERMEASURES

The most effective countermeasure is the use of immediate, overpowering force to repress the first signs of insurgency or resistance. (empahsis added) Nations with a representative or constitutional form of government are often restrained from such action by moral, legal, and social considerations, and often attempt to combat the first recognized signs of underground movement through social, economic, or political reforms. All too frequently, however, these positive programs fail, either because of the advanced stage of the underground movement, or because of inadequate resources or time. A government must then organize for more direct, increasingly forceful countermeasures.

As an insurgency gains momentum and government countermeasures move from simple police action to involvement of the armed services, a new centralized command structure is generally required for effective counterinsurgency action."

[M-A Lagrange]

But the question is: Is this a universal conceptualization or was it specific to the 20th century? Does it explain contemporary insurgencies?

I don't know the anwer but have a suspcion that it is not.

The main question is rather: was Irak a new model or wasn't it just a huge chaos to which the response was COIN?

The "insurgency" in Irak did happen because the absence of government and incapacity of occupying power to immediatly impose order ans "satisfy" the populations needs. Basically reimpose an administration and political platform that correspond to what the local powers were expecting in terms of access to power.

Also, the exemple of the peasants is still valid. Sudan is an insurrection conducted by peasants lead by a group of intellectuals. Basically a leninist revolutionary action. The rest is just ideological blabla.

Also, I do believe that if COIN did work in Irak, it's because COIN is what you do during stabilisation phase not because it was an insurrection in the first place.
To have an insurrection you need to have a government. When you do not have real effective government and disband all the remains of what was a government you have chaos and anarchy. So you respond with COIN to install a government and make it more attractive than the other challengers.

Personnally I do not see why what was true before the 21st century would sudently become falt because you passed the year 2000.
Insurgencies and rebellion did occure in history again and again. And always, it has been the same story of a battle to size power inside a country by a group of disatisfied individuals against a government.

COIN and modern warfare are may be (and I say MAY BE) "new" in the sens that since Napoleon in Spain, partisan have become the "norm" for insurgents. But the problematic remains the same:
Government: keep on being in power
Insurgents: sizing power which is i the hands of the government

The rest is only a different appreciation of how you achieve those objectives: like Wilf, like Bob or through a combination of both.

The idea that COIN objective is to impose a democracy and that insurgencies are liberation wars are remains of Cold War.
COIN objective is, and only, to preserve power in the hands of those who claim to be the legitimate government. Insurgent objective is, and only, to size power from the hand of the government.
Is that government and the governance it applies a "good thing" is an ideological question nothing else.

My point being COIN is the technicall tool to respond to several problematic.

Now explaining "contemporary" insurgencies starts by defining what is different in "new" insurgencies versus "old" insurgencies. And I am not sure that there is something really different (part from the technology) in new insurgencies compare to old insurgencies. The non state actors did exist before 21st century: the spanish particsans were non state actors.

[Pete]

John S. Mosby's operations in Northern Virginia weren't a grass-roots insurgency by the local population -- rather, it was an organized military unit of the Army of Northern Virginia that used unconventional tactics to infiltrate into Union rear areas.

One could make a convincing argument that Mosby's operations weren't really that unconventional, what they were was an extension of the long-range scouting he had done for J.E.B. Stuart that made the ride around McClellan's army possible in 1862. The main difference between his recon work and what he later did in 1863-65 was that once he had infiltrated he did hit-and-run engagements, after which he vanished. Hence the name "Gray Ghost."

What I'm saying is that these definitions of conventional and unconventional warfare may be a bit arbitrary. One could say Mosby took conventional long-range scouting to a higher degree, because later he added brief, sharp and surprise engagements to his modus operandi.

This feeds into the notion of full-spectrum operations, that some things can have elements of both conventional and unconventional warfare at the same time. It isn't wise to let SOCOM be the UW experts, and to make armor and mech infantry the Fulda Gap guys. Both communities have to be able to adapt to the situation at hand.

[Ken White]

Cuba was clearly an agent of the Soviets, little different than the relationship of Israel with the U.S. Both needed a big daddy and were willing to do "dirty deeds, done dirt cheap." Both big daddies had plenty of dirty work that needed doing.

I missed all that dirty work the Israelis did for us. Could you point that out for me?

How's that list of a thousand insurgencies coming?

But all of that misses the point. My point is that if you look at any of those states where the Soviets or the U.S. or any of their surrogates, showed up to conduct UW, it only had significant effect when conditions of insurgency already existed in the target populace.

See, GO material! Omar Bradley said, in late '49, I believe, that there would never be another significant amphibious landing on the scale of Sicily or Normandy. Not too long after that, 1 MarDiv and 7th ID landed at Inchon, allowing the Marines to chortle at Omar (who, six years earlier had to be told by Ike that he, Omar, was not going to pull off that beach head...). Causing Omar to in defense of his statement point out that he used the word 'significant.' Define "is"...

Was Angola significant? Was Bolivia?

No problem, Bob. I long ago gave up trying to point out to you that things other than poor governance can create insurgencies and have done so for a long time -- likely will again.

You can't pin Angola, for example, on Cuba. Cuba did not place an illegitimate colonial governments over Angola, Portugal did.

I'm not trying to pin anything on Cuba. I merely pointed out that your "pawn warfare" was often responsible for fomenting an insurrection to replace poor governance (I also gave up long ago pointing out to that poor governance is the norm, not the exception -- and the US, for one, is afflicted with it). Added that the replacement was quite often worse than the replaced crowd. I note you had / have no comment on that aspect; perhaps because it isn't germane to your theory of poor governance. Or is it?

As an aside, not only Angola. Check the number of 'insurgencies' in all those places where the British and French (and others...) drew lines on maps and then just left. The Comintern went to work on those fault lines in the 1920s and I can visualize a bunch of old, fat NKVD / MVD / KGB retirees sitting around a TV in Yekaterinburg today just chuckling over the Vodka and admiring the success of their handiwork over the past 90 years or so.

However, your option to select Angola, the recent Colony among several other places Che boy visited is noted -- and unsurprising.

...the US worked through South Africa...it was the Cold War.

You might want to research that a bit more...

And still, I do not see conditions of Good Governance being successfully exploited by anyone, internal or external.

That's because there is no really 'good governance' but only acceptable governance and less acceptable. Even Scandinavia, probably the best governed Region or Singapore, one of the best governed States in the world have their dissidents. They have populations that are not terribly volatile (that matters...) and are willing to be patient and give the Government of the day a break.

However, for examples of decent -- not good -- governance that drew insurgencies, look at Riel, L.D.; Chin, P. for just a couple and then there's this statement by Alexis de Tocqueville, who remarked in his Recollections of the period that "society was cut in two: those who had nothing united in common envy, and those who had anything united in common terror." [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1848[(LINK)[/url]. sometimes just plain old greed raises its ugly head. Like the Revolution in Brazil in 1889 where the Guvmint were the good guys and the bad guys were the wealthy landowners.

...But where poor governance exists, and there are interests (power, money, key terrain, etc) to be served, the exploiters will gather.

Yes, that's what I said, backward but the same thing. Low hanging fruit and all that and, y'know what? Sometimes said exploiters work long and diligently to create conditions of poor governance in an effort to foment hate and discontent (see U.S.A. ...).