least some of the warlords, the Northern Expedition might well have suffered military defeat. Besides, if the expedition had fought its way across central and northern China victoriously but too slowly, it could have opened the door to renewed foreign intervention. Clearly, then, co-opting warlords was not in itself a bad idea; it was the plan’s execution that contained the seeds of future trouble. Chiang incorporated several warlord armies into the KMT ranks as whole units, rather than admitting their members on an individual basis. This cooption, along with defection from warlord forces and civilian volunteering, increased the KMT army from one hundred thousand in July 1926 to one million in February 1928.11 The flood of new soldiers into the KMT overwhelmed and discouraged the competent and sinceretoday Nationalist China has become a synonym for corruption and ineptitude. And here Chiang Kai-shek concentrated his efforts on the final destruction of the CCP in the form of the five Encirclement Campaigns. inaugurating the period of Nationalist rule known as the “Nanking Decade. Nonetheless. and to introduce marriage choice. Chiang established his capital at Nanking. the new government could have done little more than initiate political. The reforms since 1976 reestablish this lineage but do not acknowledge it. Consequently.The Myth of Maoist People’s War
195
The Northern Expedition ended in June 1928 when the KMT occupied Peking.15 The regime also made serious efforts to abolish concubinage and footbinding. They allowed the Nationalist forces to penetrate deep into their Kiangsi stronghold. from December 1930 to October 1934.”13 Clearly.”14 Conditions were


Japanese. which lasted from October 1933 to October 1934. from January to May 1933. Factional and regional antagonisms among the commanders undermined Nationalist efforts in Kiangsi.18 In addition. An additional favorite CCP tactic was to surround some vital point and then ambush the rescuing force.”19 The Third Encirclement Campaign occurred between July and September 1931 and deployed 300. The Fourth Encirclement Campaign. and above all a lack of air power. as they would in the coming war against the Japanese. developed between December 1930 and January 1931. But Chiang remained profoundly convinced that the Communists were a greater threat to China than the Japanese.20 Renewed Japanese aggression in north China halted this effort. forcing the guerrillas out and away. Aware of the factionalism that had hampered the firsttwo campaigns. especially ones developed during the suppression of the Taiping rebellion in the mid-nineteenth century. was based more heavily on traditional Chinese strategic concepts.000 Nationalist troops against 65.196
RESISTING REBELLION
group of KMT troops. This allowed the troops time to build a
. The Second Encirclement Campaign.000 Communists22 in a campaign that united strategic offensive with tactical defensive. The First Encirclement Campaign. Other factors besides good Communist tactics account for the failures of the first four Encirclement Campaigns. The Fifth Encirclement Campaign.000 Communists. The first four campaigns had been “modern”—employing ideas borrowed from Europe—and their objective had been the annihilation of the enemy forces.21 This Fifth Campaign sought to take and hold territory. poor communications and logistics. KMT forces would move massively into Communist territory while employing self-protective tactics to


deter enemy attack. Chiang took personal charge of the third campaign.000 Nationalist troops. always hampered KMT counterinsurgency moves. Chiang deployed about 800. pitted 153. but his efforts met with little success owing in large part to a rebellion in Canton by anti-Chiang factionalists and the Japanese invasion of distant Manchuria. deployed 200. “[W]arlordism and factionalism made cooperation between Nationalist Army units difficult and was the principle reason for their defeat [in that campaign].000 soldiers. between April and May 1931.

the troops would advance a few kilometers. however. thanks largely to the radicalization of the CCP program after 1933. . the KMT introduced a major new weapon against the Communists: lines of blockhouses. and. the Nationalists had built new roads to help overcome the serious supply problems that had hinderedtheir earlier movements.24 So undeniable were the successes of the Fifth Campaign that the CCP leadership decided to abandon Kiangsi completely and embark upon the famous Long March (actually a Long Retreat). In the Fifth Campaign. surrounded by trenches and barbed wire. They also allowed quick medical care for wounded KMT soldiers. to support Chiang. It is doubtful. with interconnecting fields of machine-gun and artillery fire. At the same time. because of the latter’s superior weaponry. in north-central China. To support all this building the KMT constructed hundreds of miles of roads. the ability to maneuver.25 The March began in the fall of 1934 and ended with the arrival one year later of the party’s tattered remnants in their new home in Shensi Province.The Myth of Maoist People’s


War
197
fortified camp in order to discourage night attack (a standard procedure of the ancient Roman army). the Communist forces would almost
. “The Red Army had given a brilliant account of itself [on the Long March]. that it could have continued to maintain itself if Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek had pursued his policy of military annihilation of the Red forces. which drove the rural elite.23 Rural laborers under supervision of the local elite constructed ultimately thousands of small fortifications. Had he decided to open this campaign. To the same end they had constructed new airports and set up telephone units. . three stories high. They had also gained another accession of supporters. Since the end of the Third Campaign in September 1931. erect a new line of them. At thedevastated psychologically as well as physically. Second. felt obliged to hold fast and defend key areas. The Japanese advanced to within three hundred kilometers of Chiang’s wartime capital at Chungking. Communist guerrillas were quite free to abandon any area that the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) entered in force. the KMT lost the post–World War II struggle with the Communists as a direct result of the Japanese invasion of 1937.”26
THE JAPANESE WAR
It has sometimes been claimed that the Chinese Communists were able to expel the Nationalists from the mainland because of the latter’s military. the IJA launched Operation Ichigo (April–December 1944) with the express purpose of breaking up the Nationalist armed forces. forcing Chiang to make a stand. the backbone of the KMT. The draft produced large numbers of


that area up to CCP organization and control. The Japanese occupation of most of maritime China. The resulting confusion made it close to impossible for Chiang’s government to carry on effective propaganda in Japanese-occupied areas.30 Consequently. in general. of the party’s hopes. The war further undermined the Nationalist army by increasing the centrifugal forces within it: the presence or approach of Japanese troops meant that former warlords and provincial military commanders now had the option of switching their allegiance to Japan or to one of the several Chinese collaborationist regimes established by the IJA. During the Nanking Decade. was in its worst straits just before the Japanese invasion. and slogans as their own. . uniform. the Japanese acted as a recruiting agency for the CCP: “peasants who survivedII. to fight. The enemy tires. he can neither advance nor retreat. The enemy encamps. especially the famous Hundred Regiments Offensive (in late 1940). The Japanese army had been able to push the KMT forces out of vast areas. Rather it was the barbarous behavior of the Imperial Japanese Army—barbarism partly provoked by the operations of Maoist guerrillas. In committing their incredible atrocities in the Three-Alls campaign (“kill all. which were growing as a direct result of Japanese policy. even if the peasants did not help the guerrillas. Mao envisioned that the anti-Japanese war would consist of three periods or stages. even if they opposed the guerrillas.202
RESISTING REBELLION
In strategic terms. destroy all”). we harass. even by rapid and deceptive actions. it was not the attractions of Communist ideology


not present much of a threat because they were intent on conserving their strength. as the Communists were often poorly equipped. The IJA countered guerrilla attacks on its lines of communication with massive construction projects.61 Moreover. so that they could attack Japanese units from what at first appeared to be deserted villages.58 Partly as a response to IJA fortified-road tactics. and the consequent great showdown with the KMT. And yet despite all the shortcom-
. as the end of World War II came clearly into view. and nine thousand forts.The Myth of Maoist People’s War
203
creased hatred for them and made recruits for the Communists. the IJA was strong enough to push the Nationalists out of Nanking and Shanghai all the way back to Chungking. after the Hundred Regiments Offensive.reinforced by fortified structures. the CCP began making overtures to the troops of the various Chinese collaborationist regimes. they also severely limited the amount of economic strength the Japanese could derive from the areas they had occupied. Precisely because the CCP refrained from attacks on areas occupied by such troops. To protect an important road or railway.59 This was partly from necessity. But what is the actual validity of that criterion? Clearly. The tunnels also aided the guerrillas in escaping from encirclement efforts. and had similar consequences. Japanese brutality in China resembled German policy in Russia. the IJA turned more and more territory over to them. whose forces they constantly attacked. thirty thousand blockhouses.62
THE IJA IN CHINA
Mao Tse-tung established his reputation as a great guerrilla strategist mainly in


fighting against the Imperial Japanese Army. to say the very least. But by any account the KMT army was no world-class organization. Communist forces did not engage heavily in fighting against the IJA. They also thrust these new fortified roads directly into guerrilla-infested areas. cutting them up into sectors. All this digging aside. which of course freed Japanese soldiers for other duties. the guerrillas built tunnels and tunnel complexes under and sometimes between villages. But the primary rationale for this passivity toward the Japanese was that the Communists were awaiting the end of the war. the Japanese built broad ditches and walls on both sides.

71 The fighting equipment of the Japanese also left much to be de-
. Communist forces numbered about 440. the KMT began the war ininsufficient. But why not? What was the actual strength of the Imperial Japanese Army in China proper (excluding Manchukuo63)? One distinguished study states that in 1937 the IJA totaled less than 1 million men. by 1941 the IJA had twenty-seven divisions in China.204
RESISTING REBELLION
ings and mistakes of the KMT forces.69 Confronting these Japanese forces.70 In 1939.67 At the time of the surrender there may have been 950.000 men. Yet—revealingly—when it clashed with this same Soviet army in Manchuria.7 million by 1941.5 million men. out of a total of fifty-one. the IJA was never able to force them into surrender or accommodation. soon that army would make a scandalously poor showing against little Finland.66 Other authoritative sources suggest that Japanese troops in China and Manchukuo numbered between 1 million


and 1. the Soviet army was still reeling from the incredibly destructive Stalinist purges of its officer corps. Most of the Japanese forces were engaged in operations against the KMT army. so too was their quality uneven. not impressive.68 It appears not unreasonable.64 Another authority states that there were only twenty-three divisions in China by late 1941.1 million men. Mao himself commented on the less-than-first-rate condition of his Japanese foes many times. and disillusionment to spread among those conservative Chinese who initially entertained some pro-Japanese sentiments. of whom about two-thirds were in China. of which many were watching the Soviet border. then. Their levels of training and discipline were. a number which increased to 5.65 The Statesman’s Yearbook 1944 estimates fourteen IJA divisions in China in late 1942.in terms of numbers. This overextension of the battered Nationalist army exposed it to Mao’s favorite tactic: concentrating overwhelming force against a particular enemy unit. far from his wartime capital of Chungking. traditional constituency of the KMT. was of World War I design. Nevertheless.
. the IJA against which Mao would make his reputation was notably inadequate. CONTINUED
Soon after the surrender of Japan in August 1945. Desiring to take possession of the former Manchukuo before Mao’s forces. quality. Chiang and his associates committed one blunder after another.72 The standard-issue IJA rifle. ravenous KMT soldiers engaged in extortion and even looting. errors of the KMT had a simple root cause: a dozen years of fighting the warlords. the American Sherman tank had a 75mm gun and 75mm of armor. the


rifle. as an economy measure.81 These drastic.

could have healed those deep wounds in one decade. But the fourth burden was decisive: the Japanese invasion of 1937. so the Japanese stripped it from the Kuomintang. no party. Chiang’s chosen capital. In his haste to unify the country. It was thus vulnerable to a wellorganized group that would seek to mobilize the peasantry for revolution. first at the hands of the KMT and then of the Japanese. fell in October. The first burden was the legacy of one hundred years of Chinese humiliation and disintegration. saved Chinese Communism. The second was the nature of the party’s leading elements: the KMT was a bourgeois party in a peasant country. careerists. both of whom were prematurely diverted from their anti-guerrilla campaigns bydevelopments in international affairs beyond their control. But then the Japanese invasion. no leader. Nevertheless.
SOME CONCLUSIONS
A review of some fundamental but often-ignored facts may sharpen this evaluation of the Maoist model of revolution. it was the clear inability of the Nationalists to carry out their program of unity and independence—their inability to protect China. women. Canton. blindingly revealed and epitomized in the inconceivable savageries perpetrated by the Japanese army upon the men. Rather. and children of helpless Nanking. On two occasions—in 1936 and in the early 1940s—the Communists were on the edge of destruction. the Japanese inflicted many casualties on the
. The ultimate defeat of the Kuomintang resulted from the many burdens under which it labored. cradle of the KMT. and mercenaries who flocked into the KMT during


as one of the great guerrilla theorists and chieftains of history. and savage tactics.The Myth of Maoist People’s War
207
guerrillas and could well have destroyed them as a serious force. The CCP survived primarily because of limitations on Japanese manpower— limitations severely aggravated when Japan became involved in war against the U. it was the Americans. after the end of World War II. not the Chinese—and certainly not the Maoists—who caused the surrender of the Japanese Empire.84 Quite aside from the special geographical.000 Chinese casualties. with its 900. inadequate numbers. Third. with their alien ways. But however sound his basic concepts—establish good relations with the civilian population. were the best recruiting agents for the CCP. without Mao’s victory it is difficult to imagine how there would have been ahave been contained or eliminated in Angola.83 These defeats occurred primarily because Mao’s would-be imitators in various areas of the world became the victims of a fatally incorrect understanding of why Mao had been able to achieve what he did. establishing Maoist control over China required years of hard fighting between massive conventional armies. Thailand. or why
. not Leninist revolution. and elsewhere. pitting Mao’s forces against a regime already devastated militarily and morally by the Japanese invasion and occupation and never fully in command of its own armed forces. Peru. social. Since the triumph of the Communists in China. and political conditions of China. at the very least. And during the anti-Japanese war Mao all but abandoned his Communist program and stressed national unity. First.

In the end some


twenty to thirty million people lost their lives through malnutrition and famine because of the policies imposed upon them by the CCP. while Taiwan. Singapore. Certainly the people of China would have escaped Mao’s economic Great Leap Forward: “The national catastrophe of the Great Leap Forward in 1958–1960 was directly due to Chairman Mao. Therein are the keys to understanding why thirty years of Maoist Communism failed to make China a modern country. on the four thousand-year-old culture of China. while 220 million people (70 percent of them women) over the age of fourteen did not know how to read or write.90
. forty years after Mao proclaimed the People’s Republic. it signaled the victory of rural. whose “undeniable madness”87 led to more millions of deaths. On another level.”85represented the forcible imposition of Leninist/Stalinist concepts and policies.

the Venezuelan Communist Party.5 million.3 They could also count on money. In return for cooperating with the recently ousted dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez. The outcomes of these decisions were quite unexpected. with between 30. especially to those who had made them.000 members (hardly a mass movement). the population was about 7. the Communists had been allowed to take control of many labor unions. larger than Texas and Oklahoma combined. for reasons that may be difficult to comprehend today. Venezuela was a society of ominous social disparities aggravated by high unemployment. arms. the reformer Rómulo Betancourt won the Venezuelan presidency in a free election. Much of the national territory. especially in the south and east. According to many analysts (notably Ernesto


Guevara). The country had a long tradition of successful revolts.Two False Starts: Venezuela and Thailand
209
CHAPTER 15
TWO FALSE STARTS: VENEZUELA AND THAILAND
During the 1960s. after helping to oust a military dictatorship. but no sustained experience with representative democracy. as well as in certain conservative army circles. the nerve center of the nation.1 In 1958. nevertheless. Betancourt’s insistence on obser209
. determined that that the time was propitious for a Communist revolution in that country. the Communist Parties in Venezuela and Thailand decided to launch guerrilla insurgencies against their respective governments. and training from Castro’s Cuba. was sparsely populated.000 and 40. In the early 1960s. At the same time. President Betancourt himself was unpopular in Caracas.2 it is not possible to stage a successful popular revolution against a democratic government.
VENEZUELA
Venezuela isextensive segments of these borders were unassimilated ethnic minorities who displayed notable social and economic inequalities with the majority Thai population.Two False Starts: Venezuela and Thailand
211
THAILAND
Thailand has an area of two hundred thousand square miles. During the late 1950s Thai Communists had received training in China. carried out a bloodless coup d’état that transformed the absolute monarchy into a constitutional one.10 Thailand also possessed two powerful and popular institutions: Buddhism and the monarchy. hence the insurgents could not fly the attractive banner of national independence against a foreign overlord. Thailand looked to some like a good venue for a successful. North Vietnam. with the robe of nationalism. unlike in other countries where insurgencies flourished. This turned out to be a very fortunate change indeed. 70 percent of Thai


farmers owned at least some of the land that they tilled. and at its nearest point is less than seventy miles from China.8 In light of all these factors.11 In 1932 young army officers and civil servants. the Communist insurgency in Thailand had considerably more weaknesses than strengths.12 Communist popular appeal also encountered severe limitations because. In the first place. in light of its unique geography and population disparities. many of whom had studied in Europe. and Laos. The government also found it impossible to believe that the Thai people would find any significant appeal in Communism. Communist insurgency.8 percent as Muslims. and 3. for the monarchy and the country both. or of Colorado and Wyoming combined. The 1980 census recorded 95 percent of Thais as Buddhists. thecountry had never in modern times been colonized.”9 But as it turned out. because no Communist party had ever come to power on its own without being able to drape itself. or at least very troublesome.
. the size of Spain.

and therefore uninterested in supporting a Communist revolution. and in 1954 Thailand vigorously welcomed the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization.23 Thai troops participated in the Korean War.20 Aside from its identification with ethnic minorities and national disintegration. Air Force at four major Thai air bases unmistakably symbolized Thailand’s foreign policy orientation during the 1960s.17 The first efforts to build a Communist Party in Thailand focused on Chinese and Vietnamese living in the country.”18 Ironically. the most stigmatized ethnic identity in Thailand was that of the Chinese. indeed Bangkok became the


headquarters of SEATO. in Laos might be difficult to contain. because “prior to World War II. sent into the country from China. Communism represented the potential for invasion and/or dismemberment of Thailand at the hands of traditional enemies. the country had relatively few intellectuals whom the Communists could recruit as a membership base.S.19 The Communists also sought.14 In addition. the Chinese minority in Thailand was both economically prosperous and socially vulnerable. and they had long since been integrated into government service. with very limited success. And Ho Chi Minh himself had lived in Thailand from circa 1928 to 1930. The earliest Communists in Thailand appear to have been Chinese.”21 That is. and allowed the KMT to maintain a Chinese-language radio station in Thailand and mount operations into China.all the members of the Thai Communist Party politburo came from urban middle-class or elite backgrounds.212
RESISTING REBELLION
partly for this reason “there has been little class friction in the countryside.22 Hence the Thai government has consistently taken an anticommunist stance. . It supported the French in Indochina and the British in Malaya. The presence of the U.”13 Yet while the great majority of the population was rural. moreover.16 Perhaps the biggest albatross around the neck of the Communist Party in Thailand was its association with particular ethnic and racial groups. It recognized the Nationalist regime on Taiwan.24
.15 Another barrier to Communist appeal was the widely noted disinclination of Thais to entertain abstract schemes and ideas. most intellectuals shared in the national ethos. The party’s peculiar ethnic flavor was a


significant hindrance to its growth. Communism was also linked with foreign enemies in the minds of many Thais: “from the 1954 Geneva Conference onwards Thailand has been fearful that the power obtained by the Viet Minh in North Viet Nam and the Pathet Lao . to promote separatism among the eight million Thai of Lao ethnic origin. .

Most of this region’s population were Muslim Malays. the politburo of the Thai Communist Party decided to launch an insurgency by 1965. and the northeast. The first notable armed clash of the insurgency occurred in August 1965 in Thailand’s northeast region.28 The southern region. Thai Counterinsurgency The Thai military’s initial response to the insurgency in 1965–1966
. along the Mekong River border with Laos. which was where millions of Thais lived andthe center of everything important. the insurgents gathered recruits in remote villages of this region where a government presence had always been intermittent or nonexistent. especially Communist ones.27 Here the guerrillas sometimes operated in battalion size. even though membership in the party was probably less than one thousand. The Thai guerrillas in the region received cooperation and guidance from two thousand veteran Malayan guerrillas living illegally in Thai territory. Serious fighting broke out there in 1967. Communist guerrillas obtained money from government officials and road builders in exchange for peace and protection. and bordering Laos. Insurgent activities also displayed considerable decentralization. the region became the center of the Communist insurgency.29 The Thai government did not establish real control over the northeastern region until the late nineteenth century.Two False


Starts: Venezuela and Thailand
213
The Thai Communist Party Rising Sometime during 1963 or 1964. The northern region shared mountainous borders with Laos and Burma. The Thai Communists adopted a version of classic Maoist strategy.)26 In addition to foreign assistance.” This orientation ruled out expending very much effort in the Bangkok area. using weapons they received from the outside. the far south. The regions of especially notable guerrilla activity were the north. Combining persuasion and terror. both because of the difficulty of communications and because the regions of Thailand varied a great deal in ethnic composition and of course in proximity to frontiers. scene of a Communist insurgency in the 1940s and 1950s. with its fundamental concept that in a successful insurgency “the countryside surrounds the cities. one of theharass the guerrillas.”36 The army also rejected American-style body counts as a way of measuring progress in the conflict.34 The Thai army kept draftees in their home area and in the same unit for the two-year conscription period. As late as January 1972 the army launched a huge. The Thai army responded to ambushes by calling down air and artillery strikes. One problem with economic development efforts apparently lay in the fact that the government would arrive in a province or village and tell the inhabitants what it intended to do for them.37
. and the combination of coercion and resentment predictably resulted in guerrilla reinfiltration among these peoples.214
RESISTING REBELLION
was quite heavy-handed. The government also tried resettlement among the 260. two-month search-and-destroy operation near the Laos border that accomplished


little effect. serious armed clashes occurred with the Meo. Instead of corpses. those areas that received the most investment were also the areas of the most numerous guerrilla incidents.33 Army leaders developed a strategy based on blanketing target areas with troops. a sound counterinsurgency program was germinating within the Thai army.

seriously damaged the Thai Communists’ already limited ability to attract support. many of them veterans of action in Laos. but produce much suffering and resentment among civilians. the thirty-nine-year-old King Bhumibol. they became more willing to provide government forces with information. police. Previously. The government also began settling contested areas with ex-soldiers.Two False Starts: Venezuela and Thailand
215
A key aspect of Thai counterinsurgency was the realization that great sweep operations accomplish little against guerrillas. By 1979.42 Things were aboutthe best recruiting ground for the Thai Communist insurgency. by the late 1970s the Chinese for their own reasons wanted improved relations with Thailand.216
RESISTING REBELLION
ing example of this relationship.000 militia in the northeast alone. That message had its desired effect. and perhaps 20.51 In the beginning of 1982 the Communist Party headquarters and main guerrilla base in the Khao Khor mountain area52 fell to the Thai army. expelled most Thai guerrillas within its borders. hence Beijing cut off the aid that had previously been going to the guerrillas.44 In September 1978 Vietnamese premier Pham Van Dong made a five-day visit to Thailand and promised that his government would not support insurgency in that country. Indeed in November 1978 Deng Xiaoping visited Thailand. Indeed the northeast. always much more


dependent on outside help than other Southeast Asian parties. and the navy with 28. and at his own request attended the Buddhist ordination of the crown prince.000.000 personnel.48 Opposed to these were 170.49 There were also about 13.000 in 1979).46 The predictable denouement followed fairly quickly. also to be welcomed back with honour and the gift of good farming land. and additional larger groups started to surrender.000 guerrillas nationwide.

thereby heading off the alliance of revolutionaries with the middle class that had occurred in Cuba and Nicaragua. the abandonment of Thai Communism by those same foreign powers in the late 1970s. third. or even survive. In Venezuela. fourth. fifth. The army remained cohesive in support of the civilian president. an unavoidably close association in the popular consciousness between Communismand the Chinese minority in Thailand. these two cases of failed insurgency reveal the most serious miscalculations on the most fundamental issues of strategy. the Thai Communists were not able to overcome. The U. Oil money paid for land reform. In Thailand. second. their fundamental handicaps. and sixth.
.Two False Starts: Venezuela and Thailand
217
REFLECTION
From beginning to end. the existence of strong and popularly rooted national institutions. first. everything worked against the guerrillas. the sensible and effective counterinsurgency tactics eventually adopted by the Royal Thai Army. Free and democratic elections provided a peaceful path to change.S. the identification of the Thai Communists with foreign powers traditionally deemed dangerous. Primary among these were. notably the Buddhist religion and the monarchy (which the Communists chose to attack). the impossibility of the party


to assume the mantle of an oppressed Thai nationalism. despite the existence of substantial ethnic minorities all to some degree disaffected from mainstream Thai society. despite having for years enjoyed outside assistance and cross-border sanctuaries. provided counterinsurgency training. certainly by no means least.

comparative analytical overview of several general national approaches to. in the Vendée and Brittany. and then by unleashing systematic violence against them. and the conflict became the bleeding ulcer of the Napoleonic system: more French and Imperial troops perished in Spain than in Russia. In dramatic contrast. the other in Spain. the insurgents succeeded in extracting major concessions from the regime. Portuguese. British troops and supplies poured into the peninsula. in return for laying down their arms. the Revolutionary regime in Paris soon embarked upon acampaign of extermination similar to that of the Soviets in Afghanistan. counterinsurgency: those of the French. or styles of. The government employed overwhelming numbers of troops against the Vendean rebels.
THE FRENCH
During the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.218
RESISTING REBELLION
CHAPTER 16
COMPARING NATIONAL APPROACHES TO COUNTERINSURGENCY
This section offers a brief. first by outraging the religious sentiments of generally law-abiding peasants. Chinese. Japanese. Spain became the testing ground of the future Duke of Wellington. One of these raged along her own Atlantic coast.3 Again in contrast to the Vendée. the French never employed enough troops in Spain to achieve even superficial pacification. and Americans. France faced two major guerrilla conflicts. who received no substantial foreign assistance. Years later they took their full vengeance on the heirs of the Revolution by contributing notably


to Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo. At first failing to gauge correctly the seriousness of the rebellion in the Vendée.2 The French had succeeded in isolating the Vendean rebels from foreign help. Those
218
. Nevertheless. Russians/Soviets.1 The regime both provoked and protracted these insurgencies. British.

in order to inhibit needless damage to the economic life of the area being occupied. the two French counterinsurgency campaigns display certain glaring similarities. Out of these wars three major figures emerged in the field of French counterinsurgency: Robert-Thomas Bugeaud (1784– 1849). conqueror and governor of Morocco. The demoralized French forces there had been notably unsuccessful against Muslim insurgents. never received proper operational coordination. his troops indulged in an “orgy of brutality and excess” that both offended public opinion in France and corroded the discipline ofthe troops. During the earlier phases of his career. Lyautey was an evangel of la mission civilisatrice. killing hundreds of unarmed civilians. These include notable tendencies both to underestimate their opponents and to abuse the civil population—practices that proved extremely costly to the French regime. but he also pursued a policy of punishing civilians for acts committed by guerrillas. France engaged in several sizable colonial conflicts. whereby beginning from secure bases the French would slowly extend outward their control over a restless territory. destroying orchards. Bugeaud soon rekindled the offensive spirit of the troops. Gallieni developed and applied these concepts with great success in Senegal. He believed that French rule in Africa would liberate the native peoples from interethnic violence and from their oppressive and extortionate traditional rulers.


had published some perceptive articles on the subject of colonial pacification and administration. Bugeaud became governor-general and commander in chief in Algeria in 1840. burning fields. and Madagascar. During the nineteenth century. He urged that the person in charge of the military conquest of an area should be designated the future civil governor. Raping at will. A veteran of the Napoleonic disaster in Spain. In short. Joseph Gallieni (1849–1916). Even with these major differences. His already distinguished career reached its culmination when as military governor of Paris in 1914 he played a key role in the crucial French victory on the Marne. and justice. moreover.
. nor did they develop effective counterinsurgency tactics. prosperity.Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
219
forces the French had there. A major element of this oil-stain methoddate.6 In Vietnam the French confronted a massive challenge with which neither the Americans in the post-1898 Philippines nor the British in Malaya had had to contend. Since the French opted for war. A subsidiary but nevertheless very important step would have been (4) to redress some of the main socioeconomic grievances of the peasantry. Lyautey eventually showed himself to be quite as prepared as other French colonial commanders to respond to rebellion with brutality. they would punish whom they could. collective punishment of the civilian population. and consequently finding themselves unable to hold the northern border.

Consequently it was desirable. In
. French counterinsurgency in Algeria provides at least in certain respects a model of effective counterinsurgency. the French were able to mobilize more Algerians than the insurgent National


Liberation Front (FLN) did.
THE BRITISH
One of the most notable. Consequently. British conflicts with insurgents occurred in the Carolinas during the American War of Independence. with significant success. severely limited in the number of troops available to them. its far-flung territories included peoples of many different races and religions. Second. Thus. and. but not least. Almost immediately after their defeat in Indochina the French faced a new insurgency in Algeria. Notwithstanding all the faults of the colonial regime. elements of which rose from time to time in armed rebellion against British control. (The great exception to this condition was of course the Boer War.7 And so the French lost the war. British strategists developed a policy of restricting the use of conventional military force to the minimum level possible.)10Third. Three characteristics of the British Empire were especially relevant to that development. to recruit soldiers from among the local peoples. persistence in underestimating the enemy—the cardinal sin of the soldier—which led to the debacle of Dien Bien Phu. both to augment available manpower and to obtain useful intelligence about the nature of the particular rebellion they faced. and vigorously sought. Of first importance. even though the latter eventually received control of the country through political decisions in Paris. the standing military forces available to Imperial Britain were never large.9 But modern British counterinsurgency technique and strategy developed principally during the half-century preceding the outbreak of World War II. and unsuccessful. reliant on Parliament for both soldiers and supplies. Britain was in those years transforming itself into a


political democracy. during the Algerian conflict the French deployed troops in abundance. Constantly confronted with faraway rebellions. indeed imperative. while not perfectly comparable to the very successful British effort in Malaya and in polar contrast to the experience in Indochina. the French militarily defeated the Algerian insurgents. second.8 In contrast to their policies in Vietnam. to mobilize popular support among the Arab population. deprived the rebels of almost all outside aid.Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
221
naval bombardment of the defenseless port of Haiphong.

(5) deny the guerrillas a reliable supply of food (the Malayan campaign saw special emphasis on this technique). the nationalist/restorationist Kuomintang (KMT) regime under Chiang Kai-shek waged repeated and very damaging campaigns against the Chinese Communists. so that the authorities could move quickly toward granting Malaya independence.
THECHINESE
An impressive continuity characterizes Chinese counterinsurgency strategy from 1850 to 1950. indeed Malaya became a textbook example of successful counterinsurgency. and (7) identify and ameliorate major sociocultural irritants. (2) emphasize the central role of police measures and civil administration in counterinsurgency. and the civil government. In these campaigns the KMT deliberately sought to imitate the techniques employed by the Ch’ing Dynasty against the Taiping rebellion (1850– 1864) and the Nien rebellion (1853–1868). Perhaps the most salient of those peculiarities was Malayan geography. and to the American reliance in Vietnam on indiscriminantly destructive technology). During the 1930s. Another was the reflex hostility of the ethnic Malay majority to the essentially Chinese insurgency. (3) establish the closest cooperation among the military. (4) regroup exposed civilian settlements into more secure and


there are no bad soldiers. widespread poverty. hampered rebel mobility with cordons of fortifications. and amnesty. also affected their Communist successors. and the cultural values of the upper classes hindered their ability to become effective field commanders. the Ch’ing also deprived the rebels of food by erecting walls around countless villages. which had limited the counterinsurgent operations of the Ch’ing and the KMT. and Manchuria. after the initial failure of their wide sweep operations. the Communists built roads to facilitate the movement and supply of troops into rough and remote terrain. During the 1950s the Maoist regime faced a major national uprising in Tibet. food deprivation. only bad officers). Communist counterinsurgency policies in Tibet contrasted grimly with those of their predecessors. The Beijing regime suffocated Tibet under hugenumbers of troops. The essence of Ch’ing counterinsurgency strategy thus consisted of conciliation of the population in affected areas. In the manner of the Ch’ing and the KMT. In its campaigns against the Communists during the 1930s.15 The KMT also made use of strategic blockade in the form of extensive lines of blockhouses. Peasants could not become officers. In Manchuria (where the guerrillas often cultivated opium).Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
223
armies. ruthlessly exterminated rebel leaders.16
THE JAPANESE
During the 1930s and 1940s. which successfully contained the guerrillas and then evicted them from their strongholds. the KMT employed all the methods developed by the Ch’ing and added to them co-option (often premature and superficial) of warlord troops into the KMT armies. a variant of Ch’ing amnesty policies. and deliberately sought to destroy


the structure and values of Tibetan society. and weaned civilian support away from the Nien through benevolent administration. as well as in China proper.

224
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nese developed effective techniques of counterinsurgency. intended mainly to protect troops from small arms fire and grenades. the number of Manchurian guerrillas fell from 120. since the guerrillas almost never had artillery. They also suffered increasingly from lack of supplies. which they had erected and stocked with supplies during the summer. the Japanese built thirty thousand strongpoints (reminiscent of British practice during the Boer War). By such means the Japanese cleared the guerrillas out of large areas of Manchuria.19 They also relied on the various Chinese puppet regimes to produce armies. Kim Il Sung. Their efforts focused primarily on holding key points and thelines of communications between them.5 million in 1938) and restrict the purchase and movement of food. Responding to the Communists’ so-called Hundred Regiments Campaign in north China. Japense operations were seriously hindered by inadequate numbers. the Japanese strictly limited their numbers. These conditions resulted in inadequate control in the puppet states and thus provided scope for guerrillas.17 The Japanese built roads and railroads to increase the mobility of their limited numbers. and sometimes these ex-guerrillas would join counterinsurgent units or act as spies. The Japanese paid relatively little serious attention to political means of counterinsurgency and imposed group responsibility and collective punishment on peasant communities. with only an occasional large operation against guerrilla areas. To mitigate their numerical deficiency. This was aimed less at the guerrillas than at


the peasantry from whom they derived sustenance. destroy all.000 in 1937. in early 1941 the Japanese launched the infamous Three-Alls (sanko-seisaku) operation: Kill all. animals. The Three-Alls campaign obliterated
. Japanese troops would surround a given area and then kill every living thing in it: people. training. Decent treatment of prisoners induced guerrillas to surrender. replaced corrupt local officials. But fearing that these puppet troops might one day defect to the KMT. crops. During the harsh Manchurian winters small groups of around fifty volunteers hunted guerrillas. burn all. including the future dictator of North Korea. In China proper. In wintertime leafless trees offered inadequate shelter to guerrillas. These Japanese guerrillahunters operated out of caves or wooden blockhouses. and directed propaganda toward the peasantry. who possessed no real sanctuary. andisolate that area from outside assistance. China was too big. which usually took the form of national independence movements. Japanese numbers too small (as with the Nazis in Russia). Soviet counterinsurgency technique included systematic assassination
. and Lithuania. neutral. livestock. constantly occupying new territories from the Caucasus to Central Asia. popular hostility to Communist agricultural collectivization and religious persecution ignited these insurgencies. the Japanese and their puppet forces came close in 1941– 1942 to breaking the links between the Red Army and the peasantry.Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
225
the distinction among friend.20 Nevertheless.
THE RUSSIANS AND THE SOVIETS
The Russian/Soviet experience in counterinsurgency probably most familiar to the West is the Afghanistan War of 1979–1988. The overriding concern to destroy the KMT armies. the Russian state was amassing experience in similar types


because once the insurgents began receiving sophisti-
.23 Toward the end of World War II. these uprisings were suffocated by Soviet troops and hordes of the dreaded political police.000 Chechens aboard cattle trains without sanitation. Up to 1979. At least in part because of this numerical inadequacy. the Soviets deployed troops in numbers quite inadequate to deal with the massive popular uprising that confronted them. Between 1944 and 1952 the Stalinist regime deported 350. the Soviet army and its successors were unable to derive and preserve much of value from the experience of these conflicts.25 But since serious revolts against the Communist regime by Soviet peoples were officially unthinkable.226
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of insurgent leaders. shutting off the rebellious area from the outside world. isolated from and ignored by the outside world.offering timely amnesties. guerrilla insurgencies confronted Moscow in Lithuania and the Ukraine.

Mozambique. the full implications of which have yet to manifest themselves. the inadequacy of Soviet counterinsurgency doctrine. In the 1990s the successor Russian Federation confronted “one of the greatest epics of colonial resistance of the past century. as well as external aid and Cuban advisers. and sparsely populated.”27 the uprising of the Chechens.29 The guerrillas enjoyed sanctuaries across lengthy and remote borders. in the Afghan conflict the Soviets employed only one element of their traditional strategy: the unrestrained devastation of Afghan civilian society. who numbered less than three-quarters of a million people and inhabited a territory smaller than New Jersey or Wales. European empire in Africa. and its army had not engaged in serious combat operations since


1918. Beginning in 1961. and Guinea-Bissau—were vast (twenty-three times the size of Portugal). Faced with these far-flung rebellions. Lisbon had to confront various independence movements in her African colonies. and also the last. far from the metropolitan center of the empire and each other. These exercises yielded little that was useful to them. the Soviets had neither the technological superiority nor the numerical sufficiency to defeat or even contain them. Clearly. Thus. with the notable exceptions of making clear that they needed to avoid both the major mistake of the Americans in Vietnam—substituting weap-
.26 The failure of its counterinsurgency in Afghanistan in the 1980s presaged the collapse of the Soviet Union.S. Portuguese officers made a thorough examination of the international literature on counterinsurgency. To deal with such anenormous challenge. so evident in Afghanistan. a course of action that inflamed the native populations and also aroused the anger of the Muslim world.28
THE PORTUGUESE
Portugal possessed the first. with a population smaller than Ohio’s. had combined with a remarkable deterioration in the quality of Russia’s armed forces to produce one of the most disastrous counterinsurgency experiences on record.Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
227
cated weapons from outside in some quantity. and U. Her twentieth-century holdings there—Angola. The country was relatively underdeveloped. French. They also sent study missions to the British. Portugal’s national resources were quite modest. The Russians were unable to achieve victory in Chechnya despite overwhelming numbers and uncontested air supremacy. armies.

During the 1961–1974 effort such recruitment was greatly amplified. became a high priority. continent-wide effort. Health care. both


because of the small size of Portugal’s own population. Immediate medical attention to wounded soldiers. In the thirteenyear. about 0. From the beginnings of their African empire the Portuguese had recruited large numbers of troops from the indigenous populations. the reluctance of the guerrillas to make contact with troops. Eventually Portugal’s forces in Africa would equal five times those of the U. In the early 1970s the insurgents in all colonies totaled around twenty-two thousand. and the commercial infrastructure received special attention. because of the perception that the Portuguese would win. the army adapted itself to the war. the Portuguese employed them with such skill that they provided the government forces’ principal mobility advantage over the guerrillas. Although they had few helicopters. That is to say.228
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onry forstrategy—and the ultimately devastating consequences that overtook the French army from its use of torture in Algeria. which the Portuguese intelligence services deftly exploited. Side by side with sound military tactics. the Portuguese attempted to address systematically the social problems which they believed constituted some of the roots of the insurgencies. with all units fully integrated. Native Africans served in the Portuguese army because of the good pay and medical attention. limited casualties. 23 percent of them African.15 percent of the indigenous populations. The Por-
. and converted itself almost entirely into a counterinsurgency force. The Portuguese army developed its own sound doctrine of counterinsurgency. in Vietnam.S. instead of trying to do the reverse. The Portuguese effort came to resemble that of the British in Malaya—long-term. roughly one out


of every seven hundred. and most of all because of internecine ethnic conflicts. education. while decent treatment of prisoners yielded the predictable intelligence harvests. in proportion to population. Portuguese forces suffered only four thousand combat deaths. a powerful morale-builder. Africans comprised over 50 percent of total Portuguese military forces. and Portugal’s limited industrial base combined to shape these conflicts into low-tech wars of small infantry or cavalry units. These small numbers in a combined area of over eight hundred thousand square miles (four times the size of France). and because the Portuguese believed that the willingness of numerous Africans to serve under the flag of Portugal increased the legitimacy of their African presence. At the end. low-tech.

they effected notable improvements in the courts and penal institutions. For example.but it was undoubtedly “the most successful counterinsurgency campaign in U. health care. More immediately. They used heavy weaponry sparingly.”32 Some aspects of the American effort make it even more impressive than the British victory in Malaya. which in many areas was not extensive to begin with. and the conflict in Vietnam—has been mixed. The Americans made sure the insurgents received no help from outside. and basic sanitation. The end of the conflict was quickly followed by reconciliation and indeed friendship between the Philippine and American peoples that has endured. history. The Philippine War was not an immaculate struggle on either side (and how could it have been?). These policies helped limit the appeal of the guerrillas. the civil war in Greece. but this was the consequence of


domestic upheavals within Portugal and not of any fundamental inadequacy within their counterinsurgency doctrine and practice. Soviet aid. all of which made a deeply favorable impression on the Filipinos.30
THE AMERICANS
During their War of Independence and War of Secession. Americans gave ample evidence of their ability to effectively assume the guerrilla role.S. By 1972 the guerrillas had clearly suffered near-total defeat in Angola. They offered sincere and credible promises of selfgovernment and eventual independence.Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
229
tuguese linked their social and military efforts by establishing a workable village militia system. however. in conflicts involving counter-guerrilla warfare—including the Philippine rising under Aguinaldo after 1898. where the insurgents enjoyed foreign sanctuary. and Cuban advisers. They took pains to isolate the guerrillas from the civilian population. The Portuguese eventually lost theirAfrican colonies. and they were being contained in Mozambique and even in Guinea. for a century. relying instead on good small-unit tactics. the Americans lacked the long and intimate experience of the country that the British enjoyed in
. the Americans battled the guerrillas with the weapons of political and social reform. even through the darkest days of World War II. Perhaps most decisively. as well as in education.31 Their experience. The American campaign in the post–Spanish War Philippines is a first-rate example of intelligent counterinsurgency culminating in complete victory and enduring peace. the Huk rebellion following World War II. including even the insurgents.

great quantities of enemy personnel and supplies continuously rolled into South Vietnam. the U. exception to this distressing picture.S. and despite the fact that until close


to the end of the Greek war the insurgents there both enjoyed cross-border sanctuaries and received significant outside assistance. if neglected. and afflicted friends as well as foes with their destructive firepower. troops and applying devastating technology. They waged a conventional war. Notable aspects of American involvement in these struggles include (1) providing economic assistance that permitted the allied governments to sustain substantial counterinsurgency efforts without unduly dislocating their civilian economies. Reverting to their World War II model of warfare. In the entire history of warfare there must be few if any precedents for the combination of unnecessarily aggressive tactics with unnecessarily passive strategy pursued by the Americans in Vietnam. and in spite of the massive American military presence.35 But the Kennedy and Johnson administrations abandoned those policiesand political reforms. Accordingly. this time in Central America.S. The conflict in El Salvador witnessed an American return to the fundamental policies of their Greek and Philippine experiences: the provision of financial aid and military advice.38
. two and a half years after the departure of U. a more democratic regime eventually emerged in El Salvador. Under Presidents Carter and Reagan. the Americans broke the myth of Maoist Revolutionary People’s War in South Vietnam by inflicting insupportable numbers of casualties on the Viet Cong. the conquest of South Vietnam required a full-scale conventional invasion by the North Vietnamese Army. despite these grim self-imposed handicaps. the U.Comparing National Approaches to Counterinsurgency
231
Nevertheless. At least in large part because of these policies.

“the most successful counterinsurgency campaign in U. victory over Aguinaldo in


the Philippines. the Japanese in China. in Spain.”1 It is certainly reasonable to caution against a Procrustean approach to a complex set of phenomena. U. But it is equally reasonable to seek to learn from experience.S. Two unfolded as the nineteenth century turned into the twentieth: the British defeat of Boer guerrillas in South Africa. four successful counterinsurgencies have proven especially instructive. history. Concerning the question of “learning” (and unlearning) in counterinsurgency. Careful analysis of failed guerrilla efforts and successful counterinsurgent campaigns may therefore be highly informative in identifying elements for a viable strategy of counterinsurgency. The efforts of the Portuguese in southern Africa and the French in Algeria have also provided some valuable lessons. and the U. and the Indonesian Abdul Suharto were
232
. so governments fighting guerrillasto prevent men and arms passing from Pakistan into Afghanistan.236
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government forces is actually the result of trying to do everything at once. instead of proceeding systematically according to an intelligent order of priorities. or at least limited. Malaya. Chiang Kai-shek in Manchuria. then the Americans. the Japanese in China. and the Philippines was intimately related to their inability to receive foreign assistance. attempting to hold or take over too much territory was a key mistake of Napoleon in Spain. however massive. and President Thieu in South Vietnam. If across-the-border supplies to guerrillas cannot be interdicted. and to prevent the easy passage of guerrillas across those lines. prove sufficiently effective against guerrillas and their supply lines. in neither Laos nor Afghanistan did air interdiction. Consider the Islamic Moros


(On isolating the battle area in Vietnam. In the first place. Thus a Moro secessionist insurgency cannot rely on a regional war of exhaustion to attain its aims. Long ago Sun Tzu wrote that the enemy should always be allowed an escape route. thus diffusing support for an insurgency in these areas. the central government in Manila has granted autonomy to certain districts where Moros are very numerous. In country after country. Besides.

. “The first reaction to guerrilla warfare must be to protect and control the population. Stationing soldiers in their home areas is usually an effective means of promoting correct behavior toward civilians. and offering sizable rewards for information. wrote that “the guerrilla fighter must be separated from the people. or help in the capture of leaders.of access roads over which rescue forces were likely to pass was a major problem in Vietnam. one moves the civilians. forces in Vietnam. This sort of mobilization of the civilian population prevents the reentry of guerrillas into a cleared area.S. In Algeria.17 Nevertheless. Protecting the civilian population therefore requires a rapid response capability to counter guerrilla mobility. Moreover.S.S. In the countryside. Besides. as the U. enabling a relatively few soldiers to do the work of many. But even with its own militia unit.

20 It is doubtful. in the form of civilian sympathizers who supply them with intelligence and food. guerrillas are strangers to the civilians among whom they operate. A distinguished student of the U.”19 To settle the Vendean insurgency. In the post-1898 Philippines.240
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forts to reenter


everywhere of little avail.21 Even granting the truth of this position. and who may also terrorize persons of known anti-insurgent views. those on the bottom of the social pyramid remained on the bottom. as did similar policies of the U. that youthful guerrillas motivated by religious fanaticism may be easy to reach through reforms and concessions. to identify and uproot this infrastructure. Clear-and-hold procedures. Marines in Haiti. augmenting both the effectiveness and confidence of local militia units. real security will not exist until every effort has been made. but he also restored religious worship. In China. and their lives can become exceedingly difficult.

But attempts to confiscate arms from a large civilian population by house-to-house searches are disruptive and dangerous. In the Vendée. colonial governments especially were highly intolerantis less dangerous for the occupants to stay put and defend it rather than try to escape from it.32 It was to little avail: “the French lived in fear of ambushes to the end of the war. so does the level of guerrilla morale.35 Quite apart from the danger of capture or death. Nevertheless. as in Peru and Malaya. became a favorite target of Viet Minh ambushes. conventional counterinsurgent forces must absolutely avoid the use of inappropriate weapons and tactics (especially artillery and bombing aircraft) in populated areas.34 Of course. The young Reitz left a memorable picture of the difficult early days of this undertaking. Hence.244
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In Vietnam. the French began building strongpoints at places where ambushes had previously occurred. The following are but two examples. Failures such


the guerrillas’ food supplies and makes them easy to track in the snow (as in Greece) or among the leafless trees (as in Manchuria). 31 To discourage ambushes. Government troops. in contrast. can have the reassurance provided by mobile hospitals and kitchens. once an outpost has been established. in almost every instance. Between 1952 and 1954 alone. Of course these strongpoints then needed to be supplied. and so these outposts depended on convoys for supplies. a favorite French tactic was to establish outposts far from their Hanoi-Haiphong base. Son of a former president of the Orange Free State. guerrilla life can hold many hardships. For example. he entered the fight at the age of seventeen and was part of the guerrilla force that invaded the British Cape ColonyThe Boers were incredibly lax about posting sentinels. and attack furiously at dawn. the British in South Africa developed a new anti-guerrilla tactic. fast-moving] column will be to seek out the hostile groups. and so the new tactics were often successful. the rain beat down on us and the cold was awful. like a coat of mail.

”43 Thus.246
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U. redress salient grievances. The regime in Hanoi had become convinced by the last half of 1967 that People’s War. carrying the conflict to the guerrillas is the work of small units. their version of guerrilla
. fast-moving patrol of soldiers who are familiar with the people and terrain of the area of operations. The purpose of such units was to disrupt the security and rest that guerrillas expect to have


just some of the central myths about Vietnam that continue to befog debate in the U. Perhaps South Vietnam would have fallen to invasion in 1976 or 1980 or 1985. The war ended when North Vietnamese tanks rolled into Saigon. And that attempt in turn was provoked by the increasingly open abandonment of the South Vietnamese by the Americans.Elements of a Counterinsurgent Strategy
247
insurgency. military incompetence and cowardice. From that conviction came the Tet Offensive. any effort to conceive a more viable strategy in South Vietnam has important implications for present and future insurgencies.S. as well as pernicious.S. despite the classically conventional nature of the war after 1968.S. then why did the North have to mount a massive conventional invasion—the largest movement of regular troops since the Korean War—tothe so-called attrition strategy. probably the worst possible stance. was in Hanoi. casualties. The Johnson administration was unwilling to carry the ground war into the North. and supply (of both material and personnel). the most far-reaching act of judgment that the statesman and commander have to make is to establish the kind of war on which they are embarking. They concluded that “without question. nor trying to turn it into. electorate. In July 1965 the Army Chief of Staff commissioned a study that was completed by March 1966: a nine-hundred-page document titled A Program for the Pacification and Long-Term Development of South Viet Nam (PROVN for short).248
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An Alternative Strategy Clausewitz wrote. organization. ravaged the environment.”48 Today no one disputes that the seat of the war in South


Vietnam. direction. the American news media) would find acceptable. At the same time.S.S. which aimed to kill more of the enemy than could be replaced. village and hamlet50 security must be achieved throughout Viet Nam” by means of “effective area saturation tactics in and around populated areas. mainly for fear of Chinese intervention on the Korean model. something that is alien to its nature.49 PROVN’s officer-authors studied the history and culture of Vietnam and questioned numerous army officers about their experiences in that country. Attrition ignored the essence of sound counter-guerrilla warfare by concentrating on destroying main-force Viet Cong and North Vietnamese units instead of protecting the population. a huge American army went through South Vietnam on one-year tours. Because the Communist side usually controlled both the timingand the scale of combat. This style of warmaking inflated U.” PROVN correctly identified the cutting of the allimportant Ho Chi Minh Trail as a key requirement. It also urged unification of American programs and personnel in South Vietnam under
. the supreme. the attrition strategy was doomed to failure—if only in the sense that it could not be successful in a time frame and at a cost that the notoriously impatient American public (actually.

isolated the North Vietnamese/Viet Cong forces from the village population. optimized U. calmed alarms in the American media and Congress about a “wider war. neutralized the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The need for a workable alternative strategy was palpable and urgent. Primary among these considerations was fear of Chinese intervention. an attempt that produced the


conquest of South Vietnam? How could all this be done? During and after the conflict.” and above all avoided the 1975 ill-organized attempt of the South Vietnamese Army to retrench into the populous areas in the deep south. casualties. ambassador. roughly the distance between New York City and Philadelphia. the Combined Action Platoons (CAPs). and ARVN forces would have deployed on an east-west axis across Laos to the Thai border. on civilian security. and direct American involvement with key South Vietnamese governmental functions. Abrams well understood the essentials of counterinsurgency. the war had become largely a conventional one. (This fear was unfounded but not unreasonable: by 1968 over three hundred thousand Chinese military personnel were in North Vietnam in engineering and anti-aircraft units. numerous analysts made a convincingBut powerful political and military considerations prevented the Johnson administration from committing ground forces to Laos. U. minimized damage to Vietnamese society. PROVN and the CAPs show that there was widespread understanding of the weaknesses of the administration policies in Vietnam.S.S. Because it criticized attrition and the search-and-destroy tactics underlying it. “the most imaginative strategy to emerge from the Viet Nam conflict. not to mention the southern provinces of North Vietnam. when General Abrams took over command in South Vietnam.

South Vietnam’s geography would prove to be its doom—unless that geography were altered. how the allies could deal with the Northern troops and supplies coming through Laos. South Korea had successfully escaped Communist conquest in large part because it was a peninsula.S. then redraw the battlefield. in Vietnam. it


was essential to redefine the shape of South Vietnam: if you can’t isolate the battlefield.250
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by their principal exponent. and auxiliaries. too poorly configured. because the guerrillas were only one aspect of the conflict. In South Vietnam.56 clear-and-hold means systematically driving the guerrillas out of first one designated area and then another. and too exposed to invasion to be defended in its entirety.
. without going into Laos themselves (although a Laotian defense line would certainly have been the optimal choice). That is. therefore. the other was the slow-motion invasion of South Vietnam from the North by way of Laos (which became fastmotion in 1972 and 1975). Too big. however. Approaches to the Vietnam War TACTICS Offensive Offensive Defensive
Invade North Vietnam
Close Ho Chi Minh Trail by a Line Acrossstates. and some ARVN. and it is the heart of the strategy proposed here. The construction of a line across Laos to block the Ho Chi Minh Trail would have been the most effective U. supported by the U.S. forces in Vietnam and their casualty rates. Therefore the defense of the demographic frontier. In this approach. it would greatly decrease the size of the U. plus some coastal enclaves. The refugees who would flood into those coastal cities could be sealifted south. would deploy along the demographic frontier and along the border between Military Region III and Cambodia—a total of about 375 miles. All civilians wishing to do so would be free to move south into the defended zone. CAPs would deploy in highly exposed districts. the allied


forces would withdraw from the northern and central provinces of South Vietnam. the South Vietnamese forces could receive weapons equal in quality to those of the Communists much earlier.S. With far fewer U. plus a few urban enclaves along the central coast. (Some well-trained South Vietnamese guerrilla units would remain behind in the highlands.S. becomes the next best option. the length of the northern border of the state of Colorado. Navy. troops in country. choice for holding South Vietnam. Allied forces would hold it as an enclave. twice the size of Switzerland with a population larger than Australia’s. Mobile reserves would be in support of this deployment. along with Da Nang.Elements of a Counterinsurgent Strategy
251
The population of South Vietnam was heavily concentrated in greater Saigon and the MekongWith the enemy on one side and the civilians on the other. more professional. For years ARVN had followed a very inadvisable policy of stationing its soldiers far from their home areas and allowing their families to follow them. the Ho Chi Minh Trail would become irrelevant. Employing conservative tactics. Instead of a part-conscript army of more than half a million. but their attempts to achieve that end resulted in disintegration of many ARVN units and hence the collapse of the South.” no more body counts. With the allies retrenched into Military Regions III and IV and the coastal enclaves. In January 1975. most of ARVN was in the sparsely populated Central Highlands and the dangerously exposed Military Region I below the 17th parallel. The fourth advantage of


the demographic strategy is perhaps the decisive one: in this strategy the ARVN effort to retrench to the south in 1975. The other. Hanoi would have two choices: either to accept this de facto new partition and abandon the struggle. American firepower could have free play. much more important. or else to mount massive assaults in the face of overwhelming allied fire superiority from the land. One was hasty planning. American forces in Vietnam would be far fewer. air. the strategy would have made possible a thorough clear-and-hold operation in the regions of dense population and also have allowed time for serious social and economic improvements to take effect in those same regions. by creating an authentic rear area. was the presence of the families of ARVN troopsin the areas to be left behind. those forces would incur far fewer losses: no more hunting the enemy all over the country. could not have occurred.

thanks mainly to their sanctuaries in Laos and Cambodia.”60 In his The Art of War. First.-recognized government of Bao Dai. after its dependents had been evacuated southward. Besides. “invincibility lies in the defense. Consider the 18th ARVN Division. While agreeing with this assessment. so much the worse for them. But even the bonds of patriotism. believing that by their sacrifice they are safeguarding their families also. but in the last days of the war. the 18th put up a defense of the city of Xuan Loc that was truly ferocious. or surrender would have become hardly thinkable. a demographic strategy is defensive.


imagined that it was worth much in a fight. One may respond to this criticism by citing both traditional strategic theory and the actual situation on the ground in Vietnam. How to reduce or eliminate the effects of those sanctuaries is the real question. the great Clausewitz taught that “the defensive form of warfare is intrinsically stronger than the offensive” and “it is easier to hold ground than to take it. with their families on one side of them and the Communists on the other. the soldiers’ families would stay put in their true homes. on the defensive. If the North Vietnamese took the offensive against the demographic frontier. After all. retreat.254
RESISTING REBELLION
graphic strategy in place. They would not only hurl themselves against entrenched positions. other critics mightfind fault with the plan’s call for giving up territory in Military Regions I and II.”)59 But. is that what the Americans were in Vietnam to do. and intensity of the fighting. The borders of
. it would give the all-important initiative to the enemy. in an orderly manner. hand over territory to the enemy? Yet consider the case of the territory in North Vietnam.S. in actual fact General Westmoreland was on the defensive anyway.

Trading territory for time is a venerable strategy: the Russians retreated before Napoleon and Hitler.S. South Vietnam was under no obligation to defend every inch of the territory within those borders. In short. but it was considered politically unacceptable at the time. And the South Vietnamese did indeed eventually see the wisdom of retrenchment. outflanked


by the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
. not Arkansas. Retrenching to the southern demographic frontier—drawing that defensive line farther south. By fighting in the Central Highlands. Even the clear-and-hold strategy has as a fundamental operating principal that one concentrates on solidifying the base areas first. the Chinese before the Japanese. has been defending for more than half a century. of trading space for time—only too late. blocking the Ho Chi Minh Trail—drawing a defensive line across Laos—would have been the best strategic option to ensure a viable South Vietnam. like the South Korean state the U. allowing the enemy to run loose in other areas for the time being. would nonetheless most likely have preserved a viable South Vietnamese state. Lee defended Virginia.61 Besides. and their casualty lists showedit.S.Elements of a Counterinsurgent Strategy
255
South Vietnam had been created by an agreement between the French Army and Ho Chi Minh. a strategic regroupment is not equivalent to a political/diplomatic cession. the Americans were allowing the enemy to choose the battlefield. neither was the U. across Military Region III—while only a second-best option.

how vulnerable they are to an Iraqi version of the Tet Offensive. As the problems in Iraq became grist (or rather chaff) for partisan mills. and forty-three times the size of Kosovo. casualties in the second year after the end of the conventional war alarmed many Americans.S. Almost immediately. consider the size of the country. Iraq is larger than Germany and Austria combined. even children. widespread and indignant comparisons of Iraq to Vietnam showed how inadequately the


outbreak of terrorism struck at “soft” targets. consequently. how ill-served they are by their news media. having swiftly toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein. the victorious coalition—more than thirty countries—pledged to establish a democratic government in Iraq. however. casualties in Iraq? For one. Rising U. The latter province is smaller than Aroostook County in the state of Maine. Pennsylvania. With 173. the situation began to darken. larger than New York. including United Nations and Red Cross personnel. It is. who had the support of a majority of the local population and were close to their home bases.

nearly 16. Nevertheless. it certainly represents core Western values. and of the foreign casualties. are American. In the difficult days that lie ahead.3 Whether or not the U. “the international community. ratherthe British Army (London: Macmillan. On the fruitful symbiotic relationship between Marion the Swamp Fox and General Nathanael Greene against General Lord Cornwallis. Liddell Hart. both quotations on p. Regular Armies and Insurgency (London: Croom Helm. 42. Michael Howard. 30. first line. 153. 6. Johns Hopkins University. vol.9–10. 15. “The Victors and the Vanquished: The Role of Military Factors in the Outcome of Modern African Insurgencies. Japanese Operations Against Guerrilla Forces (Chevy Chase. 1985). 353. 1986). 33. 1899–1930). “People’s War. 409.” in The American Way of War (Bloomington. Arts of Power.” 29. See Victor Young.. Jomini’s first principle of war is “to obtain by free and rapid movements the advantage of bringing the mass of the troops against fractions of the enemy”: Antoine-Henri Jomini.” The Histories. Compare Polybius:


uprising can be effective: (1) The war must be fought in the interior of the country. 30. Greene. Life of Nathanael Greene (Cambridge. X. In 1928. because of mountains. 33. Mao wrote: “The existence of a regular Red Army of adequate strength is a necessary condition for the existence of Red political power. Rienner. Gabriel H. He was active in organizing the United Nations. The vast sums available to Colombian guerrillas through the international narcotics trade are an important and ominous variation on this theme of outside help to insurgents. p. Revolutionary Guerrilla Warfare: The Countryside Version (Harmondsworth. . Becoming a proponent of cooperation with the British.” Art of War. Thomas Gray. Mosby’s Rangers (New York: Simon and Schuster. Mosby. 39. Memoirs. Napoleon and the Birth of ModernSpain (New York: New York University. NJ: Transaction.” 25. 489. p. Mosby (Nashville: J. Bass.” Geoffrey Fairbairn. 1995). and again from 1939 to 1948. 332. Sanders. p. p.S. 270. John Lawrence Tone. 709. Christopher Ward. DEA. 1959). 38. MA: Hurd and Houghton. 1962). p. vol.

1967. 54. both articles in Charles Bergquist. CO: Westview. CA: University of California. 53. Fernando Cubides. The French Army: A Military-Political History (New York: George Braziller.” in David Scott Palmer. From the Barrel of a Gun: Armies and Revolution (Washington. CO: Westview. Saigon. 408. 1992). DE: Scholarly Resources. 1972). 12–13. Penaranda and G. 1967). See Anthony James Joes. A1. 55.” Washington Post. 50. November 25. Brian McAlister Linn. The Philippine War. p. Eric M. The Communist Road to Power in Viet Nam (Boulder. Bergerud.


1973). The Magsaysay Story (New York: John Day. 1978). Brian Kelly. 12. 1985). vol.266
Notes to Pages 24–27
CHAPTER 2: SOME WELLSPRINGS OF INSURGENCY
1.). p. it must be remembered. 1. Counter-Guerrilla Operations: The Philippine Experience (New York: Praeger. The Mexican Revolution and the Catholic Church (Bloomington. For sources on the Vendean revolt. 421–22. Quirk. p. 1962). Jones (New York: Random House. Yesterday in Mexico. Lloyd Mecham. The Cristero Rebellion (Ph. Gray. University of New Mexico. NJ: Princeton University.” Journal of Church and State. Ethnic Groups in Conflict (Berkeley. Huntington. 1973). 13. 1972). p. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution (New York: Knopf. and another a permanent minority. Brown. 351. p. Ernesto Guevara. Horowitz. AZ: University of Arizona. 86. Where one well-defined group comprises a permanent majority. 1880–1964 (Boston.. NC:University of North Carolina. Kerkvliet. CA: University of California. 525–26. 1982). 2. Guerrilla Warfare (New York: Vintage. CT: Yale University. American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur. vol. 1919–1936 (Austin. free elections can lead to civil war. translated by A. Samuel P. “The Meaning of the Cristero Religious War Against the Mexican Revolution. 265. Dulles. pp. James W. Then he forgot his insight. and Albert Soboul. Wilkie. p. 267.D. see also Napoleon Valeriano and Charles T. 1989). Meyer. J. The Cristero Rebellion (New York: Cambridge University. p. Dulles. See also Georges Lefebvre. 14. 5. William Doyle. the most democratic and honest elections can be the occasion for exacerbating cleavages. p. ed. 1960). 10. Quirk. 4. 9. MA: Little. Bohannan. 8. Holy War in Los Altos: A Regional Analysis of Mexico’s Cristero


Rebellion (Tucson. TX: University of Texas. 1968). 8 (1966). 1966. 1989). In the Midst of Wars: An American’s Mission to Southeast Asia (New York: Harper and Row. pp. See Jean A. The Huk Rebellion: A Study of Peasant Revolt in the Philippines (Berkeley. Robert E. dissertation. Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven. 177. 1975). The Coming of the French Revolution (Princeton.F. pp. 644–46. 241. David Bailey. only a small minority to begin with) actually voted. 275.P. rev. Robert E. Romulo and Marvin M. Jim Tuck. The fate of the other principal demand of the Maderistas—clean elections—is well known. Crusade in Asia (New York: John Day.
. The French Revolution 1788–1799. William Manchester. 1977). CA: University of California. Edward Lansdale. 11. 6. 342ff. John W. Romulo. Viva Cristo Rey!(Austin. 1976). see footnotes in chapter 3 of this book. Church and State in Latin America (Chapel Hill. TX: University of Texas. as in Northern Ireland. 7. The Oxford History of the French Revolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press. In states afflicted with deep ethnic or religious divisions. Carlos P. Carlos P. The Mexican Revolution and the Catholic Church (Bloomington. Ibid. Simon Schama writes that only 6 percent of those eligible (who were. 1974).

17. and He Who Rides the Tiger (New York: Praeger. 104. 26. “Explaining Revolutions in the Contemporary Third World. 16. Double Betrayal: Repression and Insurgency in Kashmir (Washington: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Balraj Puri. 1995). 1998). The Failure of Union: Central America. 2000). “The Kashmir Insurgency: As bad as it gets. 42. and Thomas L.


5. 1973 [orig. 1967). For analysis of the 1953 campaign and results. Utopia Unarmed: The Latin American Left after the Cold War (New York: Vintage. Duarte: My Story (New York: Putnam’s 1986). Elections and Democracy in Central America (Chapel Hill. 11. 25. vol. no. p. 1 (Spring 2000). Magsaysay and the Philippine Peasantry (Berkeley.. 98–99. 4 (1989). 27. Kashmir and Tibet (NY: Routledge. LA: Louisiana State University. Margolis. 15–16. See José Napoleon Duarte. 21. p. 1961). Rajagopalan. Patterns of Development in Latin America: Poverty. the M-19 insurgent effort arose in Colombia in large measure because of the widespread belief that former President Rojas Pinilla had been cheated out of his victory in the presidential election of 1970.S. See also Timothy Wickham-Crowley. Cynthia McClintock places great stress on thestolen 1972 elections as an explanation for the emergence of the FMLN several years later. 1988). In a similar fashion.Notes to Pages 27–29
267
15. Central America: A Nation Divided (New York: Oxford University. see Ralph Lee Woodward. NJ: Princeton University. For historical background on Central America. see Eric S. see Frances Lucille Starner. 1979). Henry Kissinger et al. See Jeff Goodwin and Theda Skocpol. 24. Born of the People (Westport. eds. Report of the Bipartisan Commission on Central America (Washington. The Lost Rebellion (New Delhi: Penguin. R. chapters 3. On the relationship between poverty and the system of landownership in El Salvador. Power in the Isthmus: A Political History of Modern Central America (New York: Verso. NC: University of North Carolina. Manoj Joshi. 11. Karnes. DC: U.
. 4 and


(Moscow: Progress Publishers. 1967). 26.I. 1770–1798 (Oxford: Oxford University. CO: Lynne Rienner. Albert Mathiez writes of “the opposition and discontent which were seething among the mass of the populace throughout the whole of France. 193. For a Vietnamese with a European education. see especially chapter 6. 1928]). 1971). Viet Nam: A Political History (New York: Praeger. “The Accession of the Extremists. “Doing Well Out of Civil War. The Dynamics of Defeat: The Viet Nam War in Hau Nghia Province (Boulder.” Parameters XXV. The theme of frustrated upward mobility is prominent in Eric M. Duncanson. pp. Robert Scalapino. 55. 659. CA: University of California. p. IL: Peacock. 35. One example is Crane Brinton’s classic. 31. 2 (Summer 1997). 1985).” The Chouans: The Social Origins of Popular Counterrevolution in UpperBrittany. McAlister. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution (New York: Knopf. The Two Viet Nams: A Political and Military Analysis. v. pp. pp. 1995). 60. 1989). p. Donald Sutherland writes: “By 1795 at the latest. 73. 1968). Bernard Fall. William Doyle. 67. eds. For more on the minority nature of the French Revolutionary regimes. CO: Westview. Duiker. and the Modern Historical Experience (New York:
. 241–42. Two Viet Nams. 65.” 52. 56. 6–9. The Oxford History of the French Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press. pp. Greed And Grievance: Economic Agendas in Civil Wars (Boulder. 2000). Viet Nam: Anatomy of a Conflict (Itasca. no. V. Joseph Buttinger. 1989). 1966).” William J. Wesley Fishel. see Mats Berdal and David Malone. and “Our Old New Enemies. The Communist Road to


Occupation (Princeton.272
Notes to Pages 41–45
88. Tilford. Chechnya: Calamity in the Caucasus (New York: New York University Press. S. On the Ghetto rising see Dan Kurzman. 1998). 1950). MA. 97.” Dunlop.” Lieven. v. Resistance: The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (New York: Houghton Mifflin. This conflict is not the rising of the Warsaw Ghetto. John B. “Kabul to Grozny: A Critique of Soviet (Russian) Counterinsurgency Doctrine.” Steven J. 1998). 100. See New York Times. p.3. 1948–1960 (New York: Crane. In Nicaragua.H. See also Jan Gross. Japan’s Role in Southeast Asian Nationalist Movements 1940– 1945 (Cambridge. Elsbree. rather. 1998). The Uses of Adversity (New York: Vintage. 101. Israel Gutman. Lieven. Malaya.H. Shmuel Krakowski. which occurred in 1943. Woodburn Kirby. KY: University Press of
. Chechnya. p. The Second Chechen War (Camberley. 1953). WinstonChurchill. the army of the Somoza regime was not defeated. 9 (1996).” Journal of Slavic Military Studies. England: Conflict Studies Research Center. 1994). p. 1976]). The Bravest Battle: The 28 Days of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (New York: Da Capo 1993 [orig. 134. Japanese-Trained Armies in Southeast Asia: Independence and Volunteer Forces in World War II (New York: Columbia University. 58–69. p. 1977). 1979). Hearts and Minds in Guerrilla Warfare: The Malayan Emergency. Liddell Hart. pp. Joyce Lebra. Dunlop. 94. corruption. “It is hard to believe that the Russian Army has found it so difficult to overwhelm and defeat the Chechen rebels. 99. see Richard Stubbs. and rampant inefficiency of the Russian military.. Anatol Lieven. 2000). The Chechen campaigns exposed the “demoralization. Russak. 213. 90. after most of


the Ghetto’s population had been expelled by the Nazis. The War of the Doomed: Jewish Armed Resistance in Poland 1942–1944 (New York: Holmes and Meier 1984}. 324. Singapore: The Chain of Disaster (New York: Macmillan. July 12. 1990). pp. 95. See also Anne Aldis. “The victory of the Chechen separatist forces over Russia has been one of the greatest epics of colonial resistance of the past century. The Hinge of Fate (Boston. 1979. Chechnya. The Communist Insurrection in Malaya. 92. Russia Confronts Chechnya. p. 1999 [orig. 1948–1960 (New York: Oxford University. MA: Houghton Mifflin. 321. 160. B. For serious irregularities in the behavior of returning British forces toward the Chinese in Malaya. 4. PA: Strategic Studies Institute. and Carl Van Dyke. became the Federation of Malaysia in 1963.Chechnya: Tombstone of Russian Power (New Haven. 93. Russia Confronts Chechnya: Roots of a Separatist Conflict (Oxford: Clarendon Press. CT: Yale University. Blank and Earl H. NJ: Princeton University Press. 1970]). The Forgotten Holocaust (Lexington. History of the Second World War (New York: Da Capo. See W. 91. 89. the Carter administration negotiated an agreement between that army and the Sandinista insurgents. along with some other formerly British territories in the area. 96. 98. 92. 1971). 1989).

136. but unlike the Vendeans they received substantial foreign aid and operated in close to ideal terrain. MA: Harvard University. 1. As the British ships drew near the enemy fleet. La Vendée et la France. the Afghan insurgency did well enough without the presence of friendly troops. 8. Armies of the First


725–28. Rod of Iron: French Counterinsurgency Policy in Aragon During the Peninsular War (Wilmington. 292. By 1815. see Thomas R. Solé. 1963). Fortescue. p. 19. 98. 135. 125. for his efforts see Chassin. Black Jacobins: Toussaint L’Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution. (New York: New York University. Questions of the French Revolution. 1985). pp. p. Napoleon. 117. Lefebvre. De la Vendée militaire (Paris: J.

171–77. pp. Quirk. but two years later Wilson sent forces under General Pershing into northern Mexico against the protests of President Carranza. Meyer.” in Frank Brandenburg. 37. 395. Meyer. p. 28. 182. Cristero Rebellion. PA: Lippincott. See. See the discussion of the “psychopathology of the Catholic [sic] in Mexico. Meyer. 32. consult the following works by pro-regime observers: Ernest Gruening. 1973). 149. American and Mexicana non-governmental organization with 35. Seven Years in Tibet (New York: Dutton.
.282
Notes to Pages 82–83
ers. 92. Peissel. Ibid. 103. 1954). The Dalai Lama correctly noted that the U. 86. DC: USGPO. As early as July 11. Chapter 10 and passim. Smith.” Mullik. the State Department inquired of the U. 1962). pp. p. Tibetan Nation. see his Freedom in Exile (New York: Harper Perennial. General Secretary of the Indian Commission of Jurists. p. Smith. Smith. xxvii. 1950. . 613 and 618. George N. Mullik. the Indian government declared that the “invasion by Chinese troops of Tibet cannot but be regarded as deplorable. Requiem for Tibet (London: Aurum.S. 1973). watched events in Tibet with interest. p. Smith. . Patterson. My Land and My People (New York: McGraw-Hill. 108. Ambassador in


and the Rule of Law (Geneva: The International Commission of Jurists. 121–22. Smith. pp. 96. pp. and has consultative status to the United Nations. 109. Requiem. 156–58. Vol. 1950. Tibetan Nation. stated that “consideration could be given to recognition of Tibet as an independent State.” The Question of Tibet and the Rule of Law (Geneva: International Commission of Jurists. p. According to one hostile but well-informed Indian observer. The U. 402. 79–80. 599.. pp. 1990). 101.000 members in 53 countries. My Years. Michel Peissel says that 250 monasteries were destroyed. For an account of this journey. . p. On the public torture and killing of monks see Smith. p. on October 26. 98. VI: East Asia and the Pacific (Washington. 105. p. 597–98. Nevertheless. 220. This International Commissionto wane. p. 131. Tibetan Nation. 139ff. Secret War. Secret War. p. pp. the Great Rebellion and its Aftermath (New Delhi: Asia Publishing House 1960). KS: University Press of Kansas. Mullik agrees with these figures. p. 1960). p. Kenneth Conboy and James Morrison. The CIA’s Secret War in Tibet (Lawrence. In June 1959 a press statement issued by the International Commission of Jurists estimated that at least 65. There may have been 5. My Land and My People (New York: McGraw-Hill. Patterson. 116. in the techniques of guerrilla warfare. And see discussions as to the possible repercussions of U. 67. Avedon.S. p. Secret War. 222. Secret War.. 1987). 114. p. Patterson. ed. 216. Patterson.” Shakya.S. 115. As a matter of fact. Secret War. My Years. Freedom in Exile.


Peissel. 117.S. “The revolt was essentially in defense of the value system of the ordinary men and women. 126. Requiem. 1999). to which the Dalai lama was central. 1958–1960 (Washington. Mullik.000 guerrillas in the Lhoka district.000 Tibetans. p. See also the Dalai Lama. Peissel. p. The Agency also supported NVDA raids with their Civil Air Transport company. Smith. The CIA recruited Tibetans in Darjeeling and Kalimpong and trained them on Saipan and at a camp near Leadville. p. 335–36. the majority of the agricultural population owned land. 187. The Revolt in Tibet (New York: Macmillan. This epic drama has been well captured in the film masterpiece Kundun. Mullik. Orphans of the Cold War: Americans and the Tibetan Struggle for Survival (New York: Public Affairs. Warriors of Tibet (London:A Critical
. Eritrea in Revolution (doctoral dissertation. 156. Douglas H. 1987). Iowa State University. Francis Mading Deng.” Burr and Collins.” John Lewis Gaddis. 596.A. New York Times. “Chinese military assistance was critical to the Viet Minh in their war against the French.” in M. “Broken Bridges and Empty Baskets: The Political and Economic Background of the Sudanese Civil War. March 1983. Burr and Collins. “War of Visions for the Middle East. 60. Small Wars. Requiem. Edgar O’Ballance. 122. 166. chapter 10. p. 85–110. 148). China and the Viet Nam Wars 1950–1975 (Chapel Hill. 3. 161. but later from the Americans. Civil War in the Sudan. v. pp. p. See also Xiaoming Zhang. John Garang Speaks (London: KPI. Johnson and Gerard Prunier. 160. 7. Southern Sudanese insurgents at various


Special Forces in Latin America (Westport. 1–276. pp. Trends in Outside Support for Insurgent Movements (Santa Monica. Gravel Edition (Boston: Beacon Press. 2001). 1995). The Northern Frontiers of Roman Britain (New York: St. 1996). Aerial Interdiction: Air Power and the Land Battle in Three American Wars (Washington. Juárez and his Mexico (New York: Viking.” Ph. PA: Strategic Studies Institute. 15. Leonard Wood (New York: Harper. 1994). Lessons. Herman Hagedorn. T. David J. IV. see Joes. 12. The French Army in Mexico. Jack Autrey Dabbs. 10. 1985. Jasper Ridley. CA: RAND. 62 (June 1982). 1861–1867 (The Hague: Mouton 1963). Strategy at the Crossroads (Carlisle Barracks. CT: Praeger. On help to the Salvadoran guerrillas see James LeMoyne. Jornacion. Colombia’s Three Wars: U. The Naval Air War in Korea (Baltimore. Jamesboth in Korea and in Vietnam (at least until 1972 in the latter case). 1961). 66–73. 1980). David E. 14. 240–42. 2 vols. The Myth of Inevitable U. Breeze and B. CT: Yale University. 13. CT: Praeger. Percy F.S. and José Luis Blasio. KS: University Press of Kansas.. 3d ed. Black Jack: The Life and Times of General John J.” Foreign Affairs. Frank E. DC: Center for Air Force History.

Christiaan Rudolf De Wet. 38. 17. 22. 1861. 472. p. Three Years’ War (New York: Scribner’s. David Divine. On War. By Sea and by River: The Naval History of the Civil War (New York: Knopf. 1971). 1971). 36.” in Practical Essays on American Government (New York: Longmans. War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the


Union and Confederate Armies. p. 108ff. The Boer War (New York: Random House.D. 260.. pp. p. p. 1966). p. Counterrevolution in China: The Nationalists in Jiangxi During the Soviet Period (Ann Arbor. 277. p. 103–4. pp. The Real War (Boston: Little Brown. The War for the Union: The Organized War to Victory 1864–1865 (New York: Scribner’s. p. 1976). 1963 [orig. Clausewitz. The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University. These are the essence of
. 232. 626. Street Without Joy (Harrisburg. Revolution and Peace. 1897). Luttwak. 21. 29. vol. 569. The Oxford History of the American People (New York: Oxford University Press. pp. MI: University of Michigan. Series 1. The Rise of American Naval Power. The guerrilla must be fought with his own tactics. 1964). 1930]).(London: Macdonald. 1965). Allan Nevins. The Emancipation of French Indochina (London: Oxford University. 1985). Morison. See William Wei. 272. CA: Hoover Institution on War. 25. 218. p. The Confederate States of America. Chapter Four. Long War: Counterinsurgency in Malaya and Viet Nam (New York: Praeger. The Japanese also employed lines of blockhouses. The War for the Union: The Improvised War 1861–1862 (New York: Scribner’s. 37. pp. 18. Owen Glendower (London: Oxford University Press. John S. Harold and Margaret Sprout. Small Wars.
CHAPTER 6: ESTABLISHING CIVILIAN SECURITY
1. See. LA: Louisiana State University. 642–45. 26. 1979). Samuel Eliot Morison. chapter 2. 34. p. 2. 36.369–70 and 386–87. Clutterbuck. Book Eight. 28. 1776–1918 (Princeton. p. 1893). 1861–1865 (Baton Rouge. see also “Sea Power and the War. 1950). Modern Guerrilla Warfare. 20. p.


Allied Publications 1974) and Roger Beaumont. Gabriel H. 573. 255. 9. Karens. Brian McAlister Linn. p. 14. The Loyalists. 1978). Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Algeria (Bloomington: Indiana University Press.” French Revolutionary Warfare from Indochina to Algeria: The Analysis of a Political and Military Doctrine (New York: Praeger. xiii. CT: Archon. CT: Greenwood. 128.
. and vol. The Algerian Insurrection. Sword of the Raj: The British Army in India 1747–1947 (Indianapolis. p. Les Harkis au service de la France (Paris: Editions France Empire. Cohen. MA: Harvard University. Edgar O’Ballance. 12. Loyalists in North Carolina. p. The American Tory. vol. 179. 2. Spain. 10. p.S. 1979. ch. Napoleon and the Birth of Modern Spain (New York: New York University. These figures do not of course include or take account of theroughly 180. Moore. 1987). Defeat into Victory (London: Cassell. Loyalists in North Carolina. Van Tyne. 2000). The U. Smith. SC: University of South Carolina. 16. The War for America 1775–1783 (Cambridge. J. p. 1963). 102 and passim. 1. 17. The Loyalists. Demond. 9. 19. 185. 15. Stephen P. See the classic account of the Burma war by Field Marshall Viscount William Slim. Van Tyne. p. 13. chapter vii. Battle Cry of Freedom (New York: Oxford University. 1924). and others. 2. Gurkhas. p. pp. 22. Conscription and Conflict in the Confederacy (New York: Macmillan. McPherson. July 3. 1965). p. see also Brian McAlister Linn. Memories of Two Wars: Cuban and Philippine Experiences (New York: Scribner’s. pp. See intriguing details of this famous capture in Frederick Funston. 11. IN: Bobbs


South Carolina Loyalists in the American Revolution (Columbia. 1965). 299. 1967). 1899–1902 (Chapel Hill. Slim’s ultimately victorious forces included Burmans. v. Raymond Carr. 1971). Longer. Lovett.

p. 1971). p. “French Algeria: The Victory and Crucifixion of an Army. 32. Fifty-nine million barrels in 1940. Afghanistan: Three Years of Occupation (Washington.” in Josef Silverstein. chapter 8. pp. Martin’s. Benda. The Dutch Colonial Army in Transition (Rotterdam: Erasmus University. 1961–1974. 1961–1974 (Westport. p.. Viet Nam: Origins of Revolution (Garden City. 1982). 38. 1980). War in Afghanistan (New York: St. CT: Yale University. 41. 32n. Nationalists. Gérard Chaliand (Berkeley. Cann. see John T. From Empire to Nation. In addition to Ambonese. Wheeler. Ibid.” Journal of The Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies. Portugal: The Last Empire (New York: Wiley. Ibid. DepartmentBlue-Eyed Enemy: Japan Against the West in Java and Luzon 1942–1945 (Princeton. 1959). See Theodore Friend. DC: U. “African Elements in Portugal’s Armies in Africa. Counterinsurgency in Africa: The Portuguese Way of War. NY: Cornell University. Neil Bruce. while the Japanese occupation relied on ethnic Burmans. 27. The Portuguese retained control of the eastern part of Timor until late in the twentieth century. ed. McAlister. Afghanistan: The Soviet War (New York: St. Kachins. War Since 1945 (New York: Putnam’s. 1966). For comparative examples of this process. From the Barrel of a Gun. From Empire to Nation (Cambridge. Douglas L. 40. 73. 1977). 1988). Richard Chauvel. the British recruited Karens. 111. 1990). See Thomas H. Panikkar. 26. Afghanistan: Seven Years of Soviet Occupation (Washington. and John Furnivall. and Emerson.”