Non-Violent Insurgency: How Smart Rebels Win small wars

[Global Scout]

Posted by Dayuhan,

Some dictatorial regimes (eg Philippines 86) collapse before non violent resistance because they have already decayed to the point where they no longer command the loyalty of their own armed forces.

I think you hit the nail on the head, another peaceful protest would have simply been crushed by Marcus if he believed he could control the military, but he knew his military was divided and the U.S. Government gave him and Imelda a comfortable exit. He didn't have to worry facing a violent end like like Mussolini did; otherwise he made have made a different decision.

Many of the examples given as noted by Wilf are not accurrate. King's Civil Rights Movement was NOT an insurgency, it was simply a political movement working largely within the established legal framework. There was no intent to overthrow the government.

Gandhi was NOT responsible for India's independence. Serious Indian and British historians will tell you that Gandhi's civil movement had minimal impact on Britian's decision to give up India. As a matter of fact, Gandhi's movement died 10 years before the British decided to leave. Several factors influenced their decision, but the main one according to knowledgeable historians was the revolts of Indian National Army led by Bose. Although the military revolts failed, the subsequent trial of the militants exposed that Britian lost control of Sepoy's and could not count on them to maintain order in India. Furthermore, not only didn't Gandhi's movement contribute in any significant way to India's liberation, it didn't stop Britian's decision to divide India and create a separate country for the Muslims (East and West Pakistan), which led to consider slaughter on both sides (Hindu and Muslim). Since the Hindu nationalist movement wouldn't support Britian during WWII, the Brits relied on willing Indian Muslims to do so, and in return for their support they were rewarded with Pakistan (a gift that just keeps on giving).

Violence or the threat of violence has always played a key role in these movements. In the case of the Philippines the critical role of the threat of violence was mitigated because Marcus's behavior alienated much of his military. The movement started by Aquino and supported by Cardinal Sin definitely set the conditions for this to happen, but if the military remained loyal to Marcus the movement would have failed.

[Bob's World]

Violence or the threat of violence has always played a key role in these movements.

Is this not also the case with Diplomacy? With Deterrence? Is not "the threat of violence" typically the forcing function behind much of the influence that governments wield?

Do not be distracted by that fact, the point is that insurgent movements may well set conditions for success through violence; but that they ultimately achieve their aims more effectively once they switch to non-violent tactics.

I was under the impression that this site was focused primarily on not how to go out and about the globe starting and winning small wars so much as it is about effectively preventing, or when that is not possible, prevailing when confronted with the same.

Currently there is tremendous unrest in many populaces around the world. They will act out. They have a choice, to do nothing and endure the unendurable; to act out violently; or, to act out non-violently. Insurgency is the condition among the populace that makes them feel this way. Violence is merely a tactic they employ to address that condition.

The point of this thread in not just to get those out there faced with this condition of insurgency to see that they have other options than to act out illegally to address such conditions when legal options are either denied or ineffective than to go straight to violent warfare against the state. The point of this thread is also to those in the Counterinsurgency business to see that COIN is not warfare per se, but rather that it is a condition that must be addressed, not an enemy defeated or war won. At times it will become just that, a bloody affair that must be dealt with. That won't resolve the conditions of insurgency, but if the populace goes down that route they need to understand that it will not end well for them.

For those who prescribe to "protecting the populace" as the primary tenet of COIN, why not make part of your campaign being to encourage the populace to switch to non-violent tactics to address their concerns? That is going to be far more acceptable to them than accusing them of having mass mental illness through "radicalization," or simply telling them through information campaigns that they are wrong about how they feel about there government. At times it might be better to simply say "you make a good point, but you are going about it all wrong." As has been pointed out, even the hardest, most warlike insurgents have found the success they seek in making such transitions from violence to non-violence.

For parties who are outside the "family" of the populace from which both the insurgent and government rise and compete for influence over, what does it matter who prevails so long as they represent the majority of the populace and are willing to join the global community and operate reasonably within the same? Every successful insurgent becomes immediately a struggling counterinsurgent unless they evolve to providing good governance to the populace they represent. If those foreign parties are focused on stability and securing their interests in a particular region first, and who actually governs second, they will be more successful.

This is one of the largest disconnects in US COIN doctrine. It makes the presumption that success requires sustaining the current government in power. Unless that government evolves in the process, all that does is reset the conditions of failure when an insurgent organization was merely defeated militarily. Once we retire the presumptions that COIN is war, and that sustaining a poor governance in power is success, we move to the next level in dealing more effectively with such situations.

[Bob's World]

"War is war. There are varying types of warfare, but defeating an irregular enemy is rooted in some fairly well understood methods of applying military force. What we see with "counterinsurgency theory" is a collection of fallacies that seeks to suggest that somehow defeating an irregular force in rebellion or revolt is not best enabled by applying lethal force against the right people for the right political reason.
If you inflict military defeat on the enemy, you remove his ability to use violence as a political instrument.
You do not out-govern the enemy. You kill him." (Posted by Wilf on a different thread).

Ok, I think this quote represents fairly Wilf's point. It is a reasonable position, and one that is widely held. You don't have to knock on too many doors at the Pentagon to find someone who thinks the best response to illegal violence is a well applied dose of legal violence in kind.

But how does that resolve the underlying condition that gave rise to that violence? Suppression of insurgency works, granted. Tito's Yugoslavia, Stalin's Russia, Saudi Arabia, to name but a few. The examples are many. But in all of these the conditions of insurgency continue to smolder and fester, and once that suppressive force is removed, tend to explode in uncontrolled violence that no one wants (Balkans, Rwanda, and on and on...)

So, if insurgency is seen not as the violent response to these conditions, but rather as the condition itself, it opens up options to both the insurgent and the counterinsurgent as how to go about best resolving the problem. The military may well be given the task of violently suppressing some insurgent group; but that will not resolve the conditions of insurgency. It never has, and it never will. Just as the state must judiciously apply violence when necessary, but most often hold it back in the form of the threat of violence to impose it's will, so must a savvy populace when faced with conditions of insurgency.

Besides, sometimes the government yields its position when faced with non-violence because they recognize it is the right thing to do for everyone involved, and the actions of the insurgent have served primarily to accelerate the timeline. They are not faced with the potential loss of face associated with yielding to violent pressure, and they also have many sane and legal voices from respected organizations around the globe that often come on line supporting the position of the non-violent insurgent as well. Bottom line is that while they could win "the final argument of kings", they realize that doing the right thing is more important than proving one is more powerful. The U.S. Civil rights movement, the collapse of Soviet control of Eastern Europe, the independence of India, etc.

I suspect there are some timelines in the Middle East that could use a bit of acceleration as well. Better that is done non-violently than through the terrorist tactics espoused by Bin Laden and his AQ organization. The sooner the populaces of the Middle East come to recognize this, the sooner they can correct the conditions that they find oppressive. Bin Laden is not an insurgent, he is waging UW to leverage the conditions of insurgency that exist in these populaces. Once those populaces believe they have better options, Bin Laden becomes moot and his movement collapses. To simply destroy Bin Laden and AQ will open the door for the next generation to step forward, and they may well achieve levels of violence that Bin Laden only dreams about. That would be a major strategic error on our part to enable that to happen.

[MikeF]

My curiousity of late has centered around the decision making process an actor uses to determine:

1. Rebel/Revolt/Secede violently
2. Rebel/Revolt/Secede non-violently
3. A dual prong strategy of violent and non-violent movements

Here's a couple of good references,

Constructing the Revolution:
The Social Psychological Development of Radical Spiritual Leaders
by John Ty Grubbs

Deep Inside the Insurgent’s Mind:
Past the Motorcycle Diaries towards understanding Che Guevera
by Hugues Esquerre

Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement
by John Lewis

Mike

[Bob's World]

A note and link from Dr. Stephan:

"...As for the empirics behind Dr. Erica's Chenoweth's and my contention that nonviolent campaigns have been nearly twice as effective at achieving their strategic goals as their violent counterparts, please check out Erica's web-site (she directs the Program on Terrorism and Insurgency Research at Wesleyan), which contains the Nonviolent and Violent Conflict Dataset (NAVCO). Here it is:"
http://echenoweth.faculty.wesleyan.edu/ptir/.

[jmm99]

to expanded versions of her publications and primary sources, Research and Data.

Cheers

Mike

[William F. Owen]

If you inflict military defeat on the enemy, you remove his ability to use violence as a political instrument.
You do not out-govern the enemy. You kill him." (Posted by Wilf on a different thread).

Correct. This is an immutable verity.

But how does that resolve the underlying condition that gave rise to that violence? Suppression of insurgency works, granted.

None of your business. The underlying causes of an insurgency are utterly irrelevant to you. As a US Army officer, it is absolutely above your pay grade and not your job to address these problems.- quite the opposite! You are an instrument of US Government Policy. You are not there to make the world a better place. Your job is to make the US President the most powerful man in the world, if that's what he wants.
You are their to lay the hard hand of war on who he tells you. He has other people to do the non-violent parts of diplomacy.

With some sense of irony, US Special Forces once had a de-facto mission to create violent insurgencies amongst populations who were not dissatisfied with their Government. - and they still should if that serves US policy.