This Week in Irregular Warfare Withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan; Al Shabab and U.S. Special Forces in Mozambique; Attacks in Mali, Niger; and more… Welcome to the fourth installment of The Irregular Warrior’s news digest on Irregular Warfare and Special Operations. We hope you’ll find this collection to be interestingly broad in its scope […]
counterinsurgency
Words Matter — Changing irregular warfare terminology can help the U.S. fight against its global competitors
Kevin Bilms argues in his recent article at War on the Rocks on irregular warfare terminology that redefining the core elements of irregular warfare (unconventional warfare, stabilization, foreign internal defense, counter-terrorism, and counterinsurgency) will help its practitioners and proponents to explain what it is they do, and why it is important. By using clearer language, […]
An Irregular Reading List
Welcome to our irregular warfare reading list. As anyone who reads this blog understands, continual study is necessary both to confront the dangers posed by the modern security environment and to understand irregular conflicts of the past. A deliberate course of reading is an essential component of that continual study. However busy our personal or […]
Unconventional Warfare Fundamentals
“This is another type of war, new in its intensity, ancient in its origins — war by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins; war by ambush instead of combat; by infiltration instead of aggression, seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. It requires — in those situations where we must encounter it […]
Doing What You Know: The United States and 250 Years of Irregular War – Lessons from History about Confronting Irregular Adversaries
A new study has been released by CSBA, “Doing What You Know: The United States and 250 Years of Irregular War,” which looks at the US’s history in confronting irregular adversaries over the last 250 years, with recommendations for the future. Because COIN is hard and messy, our natural temptation is to pivot away quickly and […]
Trump ends CIA support to Syrian Rebels – “Putin won in Syria”
The Washington Post reports that President Trump has decided to end the CIA’s covert program to arm and train moderate Syrian rebels battling the government of Bashar al-Assad, a move likely to empower more radical groups inside Syria and damage the credibility of the United States. WAPO quotes an anonymous current official as saying “This is a […]
Understanding Worley’s “United States Political Warfare Policy”
In January 2015, strategic advisor and military force structure analyst Dr. D. Robert Worley released a draft think piece that delves into how the United States should engage in political warfare in order to successfully ensure stability of countries experiencing subversion. The piece can generally be described as a blueprint for problem solving, providing background […]
The Lingering Effects of Concrete Barriers in COIN
In counterinsurgency operations, tactical successes can often lead to strategic failure. Thus the oft-repeated admonishment to consider second and third order effects. One of the reasons for this paradox is the prolonged time-horizons inherent in counterinsurgency, as is aptly demonstrated in an article published by West Point’s Modern War Institute about the use of concrete […]
Bernard Fall and Vietnamese Revolutionary Warfare: A Missed Opportunity for Counterinsurgency Doctrine?
A recent article by Nathaniel Moir in the Small Wars Journal is well worth the read. In it, he argues that “the legacy of the United States’ Counterinsurgency doctrine includes a contentious foundation” and that the work of Bernard Fall “provided a more circumspect corpus of work from which the United States’ Counterinsurgency doctrine may […]
Insurgency and Counterinsurgency
The most iconic form of irregular warfare is that of insurgency (not to be confused with guerilla warfare), and its necessary counterpart, counterinsurgency. COIN, as it is often referred to, is even more iconic of IW than many imagine, since counterinsurgency campaigns often take on the superficial guise of counterterrorism for political purposes. However, in […]