Talk:Asymmetric warfare

message: Wasn't it an outstanding example of asymmetrical warfare? The most powerful army in the world with the backup up the local goverment all all major western military powers against a often poorly armed, politically, organically and military outlawed force of revolutionary dissidents/insurgents?
Besides that ones used conventional full-scale warfare and razing, and the others rainforest guerrilla tactics... If that is not asymmetrical, then what is? --190.174.67.86 (talk) 08:47, 20 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Viet-Nam war

message: I've started rewriting to remove some of the pov and plan to start finding sources.  Everyone is welcome to join in on the fun!  – Dreadstar † 08:22, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Sourcing and rewriting

message: This article skips over the American revolution entirely, THE asymmetric war that set the standard for all asymmetric wars, Missing.  Why? PiAndWhippedCream 06:13, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't know why, but it'll be fun finding out, so I've put in a basic attempt. David Trochos (talk) 21:34, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  American revolution? 

message: I went to check the second footnote, which appears after the author's description of Parthia's defeat of the Seleucid empire, and found an article that said nothing about Parthia. Though the article linked (and analysis of asymmetric warfare, with a great comparison of the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest to Chechen/Russian conflict) is great and I highly recommend it to anybody, I was really looking forward to a similar analysis of the Parthians' conflict with the Seleucid empire. If the original author is still around, please, please, PRETTY PLEASE post that article! :) 
And while I would not say that the American Revolution set the standard for all such conflicts, it definitely deserves mention in an article about asymmetric warfare.
Timfever 05:40, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Second footnote? 

message: I admit I'm no scholar in this field, but shouldn't the Battle of Thermopylae  get some mention?
75.18.20.150 (talk) 07:40, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: So far, all the sections of the article refer to wars/campaigns; once we start including individual battles, it'll be hard to stop. because purely symmetrical battles are very rare. David Trochos (talk) 08:19, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Thermopylae? 

message: Perhaps a speculative section be in order, e.g. 'asymmetric warfare in the 21st century', given that various experts have stated that in the event of a short war between China and the US over Taiwan, China would: 1) utilize asymmetric tactics against the US to take advantage of the (over)reliance on electronics, either in battle or against non-military targets in the US via hacking and related activities, and 2) capitalize on the US dependence on satellites via land-based attacks on US satellites. Recall the recent testing of a Chinese anti-satellite weapon (used I think, in this case, against one of their own weather satellites).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.201.230.216 (talk) 03:05, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: China vs US: Asymmetric warfare in the 21st century

message: FYI, a list of sources on this subject can be found here:  . Cla68 (talk) 03:38, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  List of sources 

message: The citation of the Battle of Agincourt requires further consideration. After review of the "Battle of Agincourt" page it seems that use of the English longbow was not critical in the discourse of the battle. Perhaps citation of the use of palings in this battle (although circumstantial as well) would better satisfy the epistemological integrity sought by the authors. Flux (talk) 07:21, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Battle of Agincourt 

message: That paragraph is ridiculous. Three people committing suicide is not warfare, assymetric or of any other type. It must be removed from the article.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fbastos7 (talk • contribs) 00:51, 11 March 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree - 3 people committing suicide while in detention is not an act of war. PiCo (talk) 07:13, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Guantanamo Bay and Assymetric Warfare 

message: Quote: "The Palestinians deploy their forces inside civilian areas in an attempt to prevent Israel from responding with conventional forces and tactics. Israel tends to use focused targeting tactics, including intelligence-based assassinations of individual leaders, and assigns the responsibility for any resulting civilian casualties to Palestinian forces for their use of human shielding"
Their is an obvious bias in this section. This is not a place to display propagendas. give a reference. one that is neutral like the UN reports--SHAHINOVE (talk) 15:49, 23 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Israel/Palestinians 

message: It was a major effort from the Muslim world. The cost for them was far higher then the US. Also they sent volunteers. It also included a substantial Israeli commitment. 
This all should be written into it.
Nor am I happy with it being called tactically secret. It was not plausible denial is probably a better description.
Also I am not sure from the US point of view it was the highest cost/benefit. Many proxy battles costed the US less and were also successful. Could you please come up with some facts to backup this statement.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Reargun (talk • contribs) 09:03, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Afghanistan 

message: "Abd el-Krim led resistance in Morocco from 1920 to 1924 against French and Spanish colonial armies ten times as strong as the guerilla force, led by General Philippe Pétain." I was under the impression that Petain was leading a conventional army, but perhaps I was wrong. (Two 'r's in guerrilla, by the way). PiCo (talk) 07:17, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Petain, guerrilla leader 

message: Shouldn't there be at least one verifiable source for such bold claims? I'm deleting that section.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.200.65.19 (talk) 09:38, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Croatia-Serbia ? 

message: "For a more comprehensive listing, including outcomes, see Arreguin-Toft."
This text is not informative, within the text of the article.
Perhaps this book should be mentioned in the Literature-section. If someone wants to do that, I have no misgivings.--80.203.102.99 (talk) 06:10, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Non-informative text moved to discussion 

message: The article does NOT mention the attack on the modern Destroyer Ship USS Cole, where a comparatively large Destroyer was heavily damaged by a small boat full of explosives, a rudimentary vessel in comparison.  Very Assymetric losses of 17 death and 39 wounded against tow to three attackers is a good example of an "assymmetric warfare". There is a link to the attack in Wikipedia detailing it.  Another example is the complete destruction of heavily armed "Humvee" type vehicles with improvised explosive devices IED's, much less costly but effective. amclaussen.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.100.180.20 (talk) 17:17, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  The USS Cole attack is not mentioned in the article, along with other examples 

message: This is copied from the article 
The first sentence above and the paragraph after it can not be both correct. The two  juxtaposed together exhibit the worst type of example of the Wikipedia tendency towards "a camel is a horse designed by a committee".
Also "industrialized countries" and "primitive nations" is not the best wording. Many developed counties have less of their GDP in the industrial section than they did 30 years ago and bigger service sectors, so "industrialized countries" is misleading. Developed and underdeveloped are better adjectives than industrialized and primitive.
-- PBS (talk) 16:59, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  paragraph in the section "Definition and differences" 

message: Pentagon Tries to Counter Cheap, Potent Weapons  by Thom Shanker published January 9, 2012; excerpt "... the use of inexpensive weapons like mines and cyberattacks that aim not to defeat the American military in battle but to keep it at a distance."
99.181.131.214 (talk) 01:06, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[NYT]] resource 

message: Asymmetric warfare can not be reduced to the fact that one party has advanced technologies and the other party does not, or to a significant numerical advantage over the other party to the conflict. Asymmetry does not mean a disproportionate difference of potential, but the clash of two different types of organizations, ways of thinking, and even ways of life. --Matrek (talk) 00:15, 25 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Where did you get that from? Is that something you just made up? Please provide a reference to this new definition that you are giving. Instead of sticking [fact] tags all through the article you could have corrected what you perceive to be wrong, and provided the appropriate citations. What you have stated, "the clash of two different types of organizations, ways of thinking and even ways of life" is what we call "war". It is only when the two sides are not relatively equal in capability that we call it "asymmetric war". Primium mobile (talk) 17:30, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is the definition of asymetric warfare in this article right ? Doubt 

message: I think that the Vitnam war deserves a significant mention on the page,specifically in the Examples section. It is a perhaps the most significant example of a small country fighting a more powerful country to a standstill,mostly using asymmetrical tactics.I see this is mentioned above,but without any significant objections.Rwenonah (talk) 21:07, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: There is already a short mention of the action in Vietnam, very similar to what you suggested, under the "Asymmetric warfare#After World War II" section.  It says, "In Southeast Asia, specifically Vietnam, the Viet Cong and other communist insurgencies engaged in asymmetrical guerilla warfare with the United States during the period of the Vietnam War."  Although the fighting is known as the Vietnam War in the US, other countries tend to have different names for it, as it wasn't just Vietnam, there was quite a bit of fighting in Laos and Cambodia as well.  One person responded to a question like this already and said that the Vietnam People's Army was more of a conventional army and that, "some of the battles were much more stand up fights (Ia Drang Valley, Hue, Khe Sanh etc) than guerilla warfare".  One of the tenets of Wikipedia is that new material should be verifiable.  Perhaps you could list some books, magazines, etc., which describe the asymmetrical tactics employed during the Vietnam War? Banaticus (talk) 02:20, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: That mention is insignificant, a small subsection of another small subsection. And also:   
a) When Southern California Shootings has an entire section,there is precedent to give every tiny military encounter containing even a mention of asymmetric warfare a section on the page,let alone a conflict as major as the Vietnam war. It seems to deserve a subsection to itself.
b)About three-quarters of the examples section has no citations. 
c)I never referred to the Vietnam People's Army,and it made a smaller contribution to the war than the Viet Cong anyway.
I'll try to find some citations. Rwenonah (talk) 20:45, 22 February 2013 (UTC)

text: Do not use the Southern California Shootings section as precedent. It will be removed as soon as the lock is. --Tarage (talk) 11:19, 23 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vietnam War 

message: Hi there. I have been adding references to topics my supervisor (T.V. Paul) has written extensively on. Asymmetric warfare is one of them. I will not add any of his argument here or try to sell what he is doing. I just want to provide the reference for further reading. Is that ok? I received a warning about that (I am very new to the editing business here) and I want to do things right in the future. Thank you!  Coercive Diplomacy (talk) 01:56, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: See below. Mysterious Whisper 14:50, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Adding references 

message: Hi, I added one reference to the further reading section this morning (Complex Deterrence). I am the student of one of the author, T.V. Paul. I will not add summaries anymore as it was mentioned to me it may be a conflict of interest. Simply adding books or articles (in this case one) that are of relevance to the topic. Is that ok? Thank you! Coercive Diplomacy (talk) 02:01, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: No, that may be considered a form of spam. Rather than add books or articles to the page directly, it is preferred that you post them on the relevant talkpage (with a brief explanation) so that uninvolved editors may add them if they deem them appropriate. Mysterious Whisper 14:50, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Making sure I am doing this right 

message: By the definition of partisan (in the article of that namej, the word is used incorrectly in the section about the American Revolution:“The return of the British force to Boston … was subject to constant skirmishing, using partisan forces…”
The definition is given as: “A partisan is a member of an irregular military force formed to oppose control of an area by a foreign power or by an army of occupation …”
Despite the propagandists efforts to portray the British as a foreign power or an occupying army, they were not, at least until the treaty creating the United States and certainly before the Declaration of Independence. They were the legitimate authority in the colonies. Consequently those who opposed them were rebels rather than partisans.
Nevertheless, I anticipate some resistance to calling them rebels. Moreover, the definition of partisan is debatable. (See the talk page of the article Partisan, under the topics “terminology” and “etymology”.) 
Therefore I have changed it to the accepted “Patriots.” Humphrey Tribble (talk) 05:13, 8 June 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  American rebels, not partisans?