Counterinsurgency

Author: David Kilcullen
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199746257
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 265

Book Description
David Kilcullen is one of the world's most influential experts on counterinsurgency and modern warfare, a ground-breaking theorist whose ideas "are revolutionizing military thinking throughout the west" (Washington Post). Indeed, his vision of modern warfare powerfully influenced the United States' decision to rethink its military strategy in Iraq and implement "the Surge," now recognized as a dramatic success. In Counterinsurgency, Kilcullen brings together his most salient writings on this vitally important topic. Here is a picture of modern warfare by someone who has had his boots on the ground in some of today's worst trouble spots-including Iraq and Afghanistan-and who has been studying counterinsurgency since 1985. Filled with down-to-earth, common-sense insights, this book is the definitive account of counterinsurgency, indispensable for all those interested in making sense of our world in an age of terror.

Insurgency and Counterinsurgency

Author: Jeremy Black
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1442256338
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 288

Book Description
This timely book offers a world history of insurgencies and of counterinsurgency warfare. Jeremy Black moves beyond the conventional Western-centric narrative, arguing that it is crucial to ground contemporary experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq in a global framework. Unlike other studies that begin with the American and French revolutions, this book reaches back to antiquity to trace the pre-modern origins of war within states. Interweaving thematic and chronological narratives, Black probes the enduring linkages between beliefs, events, and people on the one hand and changes over time on the other hand. He shows the extent to which power politics, technologies, and ideologies have evolved, creating new parameters and paradigms that have framed both governmental and public views. Tracing insurgencies ranging from China to Africa to Latin America, Black highlights the widely differing military and political dimensions of each conflict. He weighs how, and why, lessons were “learned” or, rather, asserted, in both insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare. At every stage, he considers lessons learned by contemporaries, the ways in which norms developed within militaries and societies, and their impact on doctrine and policy. His sweeping study of insurrectionary warfare and its counterinsurgency counterpart will be essential reading for all students of military history.

Counterinsurgency

Author: Douglas Porch
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107027381
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 449

Book Description
Controversial new history of counterinsurgency which challenges its claims as an effective strategy of waging war.

Hearts and Minds

Author: Hannah Gurman
Publisher: New Press, The
ISBN: 1595588256
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 306

Book Description
The first book of its kind, Hearts and Minds is a scathing response to the grand narrative of U.S. counterinsurgency, in which warfare is defined not by military might alone but by winning the "hearts and minds" of civilians. Dormant as a tactic since the days of the Vietnam War, in 2006 the U.S. Army drafted a new field manual heralding the resurrection of counterinsurgency as a primary military engagement strategy; counterinsurgency campaigns followed in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite the fact that counterinsurgency had utterly failed to account for the actual lived experiences of the people whose hearts and minds America had sought to win. Drawing on leading thinkers in the field and using key examples from Malaya, the Philippines, Vietnam, El Salvador, Iraq, and Afghanistan, Hearts and Minds brings a long-overdue focus on the many civilians caught up in these conflicts. Both urgent and timely, this important book challenges the idea of a neat divide between insurgents and the populations from which they emerge—and should be required reading for anyone engaged in the most important contemporary debates over U.S. military policy.

A Question of Command

Author: Mark Moyar
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300156014
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 384

Book Description
Moyar presents a wide-ranging history of counterinsurgency which draws on the historical record and interviews with hundreds of counterinsurgency veterans. He identifies the ten critical attributes of counterinsurgency leadership and reveals why these attributes have been more prevalent in some organizations than others.

The Counter-counterinsurgency Manual

Author: Network of Concerned Anthropologists. Steering Committee
Publisher: Paradigm
ISBN: 9780979405754
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
At a moment when the U.S. military decided it needed cultural expertise as much as smart bombs to prevail in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon s "Counterinsurgency Field Manual" offered a blueprint for mobilizing anthropologists for war. "The Counter-Counterinsurgency Manual" critiques that strategy and offers a blueprint for resistance. Written by the founders of the Network of Concerned Anthropologists, the "Counter-Counterinsurgency Manual" explores the ethical and intellectual conflicts of the Pentagon s Human Terrain System; argues that there are flaws in the "Counterinsurgency Field Manual" (ranging from plagiarism to a misunderstanding of anthropology); probes the increasing militarization of academic knowledge since World War II; identifies the next frontiers for the Pentagon s culture warriors; and suggests strategies for resisting the deformation and exploitation of anthropological knowledge by the military. This is compulsory reading for anyone concerned that the human sciences are losing their way in an age of empire."

The Soviet Counterinsurgency in the Western Borderlands

Author: Alexander Statiev
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521768330
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 385

Book Description
This book investigates the Soviet response to nationalist insurgencies between 1944 and 1953 in the regions the Soviet Union annexed after the Nazi-Soviet pact.

Counterinsurgency in Crisis

Author: Robert Egnell
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231535414
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 249

Book Description
Long considered the masters of counterinsurgency, the British military encountered significant problems in Iraq and Afghanistan when confronted with insurgent violence. In their effort to apply the principles and doctrines of past campaigns, they failed to prevent Basra and Helmand from descending into lawlessness, criminality, and violence. By juxtaposing the deterioration of these situations against Britain's celebrated legacy of counterinsurgency, this investigation identifies both the contributions and limitations of traditional tactics in such settings, exposing a disconcerting gap between ambitions and resources, intent and commitment. Building upon this detailed account of the Basra and Helmand campaigns, this volume conducts an unprecedented assessment of British military institutional adaptation in response to operations gone awry. In calling attention to the enduring effectiveness of insurgent methods and the threat posed by undergoverned spaces, David H. Ucko and Robert Egnell underscore the need for military organizations to meet the irregular challenges of future wars in new ways.

Bullets Not Ballots

Author: Jacqueline L. Hazelton
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501754807
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 221

Book Description
In Bullets Not Ballots, Jacqueline L. Hazelton challenges the claim that winning "hearts and minds" is critical to successful counterinsurgency campaigns. Good governance, this conventional wisdom holds, gains the besieged government popular support, denies support to the insurgency, and makes military victory possible. Hazelton argues that major counterinsurgent successes since World War II have resulted not through democratic reforms but rather through the use of military force against civilians and the co-optation of rival elites. Hazelton offers new analyses of five historical cases frequently held up as examples of the effectiveness of good governance in ending rebellions—the Malayan Emergency, the Greek Civil War, the Huk Rebellion in the Philippines, the Dhofar rebellion in Oman, and the Salvadoran Civil War—to show that, although unpalatable, it was really brutal repression and bribery that brought each conflict to an end. By showing how compellence works in intrastate conflicts, Bullets Not Ballots makes clear that whether or not the international community decides these human, moral, and material costs are acceptable, responsible policymaking requires recognizing the actual components of counterinsurgent success—and the limited influence that external powers have over the tactics of counterinsurgent elites.

Modern Warfare

Author: Roger Trinquier
Publisher: DIANE Publishing
ISBN: 142891689X
Category : France
Languages : en
Pages : 131

Book Description