[1] Jeffrey Race, War Comes to Long An: Revolutionary Conflict in a Vietnamese Province, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972, p. 9. [2] Ted Robed Gurr, Why Men Rebel, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1971. [3] Stanley Karnow, Vietnam: A History, New York: Penguin, 1984, p. 135. [4] Georges Sorel, Reflections on Violence, New York: Collier, 1961. [5] Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, New York: Grove, 1963. [6] See the essays on France, Great Britain, and the United States in Ian F.W. Beckett, ed., The Roots of Counter-insurgency. Armies and Gueriffia Warfare, 1900-1945, London: Blandford, 1988. [7] On American involvement in the Huk rebellion, see Robert B. Asprey, War in the Shadows: The Guerrilla in History, New York: William Morrow, 1994, pp. 527-542; Douglas S. Blaufarb, The Counterinsurgency Era: U.S. Doctrine and Performance 1950 to the Present, New York: Free Press, 1977, pp. 22-40; Wray R. Johnson and Paul J. Dimech, "Foreign Internal Defense and the Hukbalahap: A Model Counter-insurgency," Small Wars and Insurgencies, Vol. 4, No. 1, Spring/Summer 1993, pp. 29-52; and, D. Michael Shafer, Deadly Paradigms: The Failure of U.S. Counterinsurgency Policy, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988. On the British activity in Malaya, see Asprey, War in the Shadows, pp. 563-574; Edgar O'Ballance, Malaya: The Communist Insurgent War, 1948-1960, Hamden, CT: Archon, 1966; and, Richard L. Clutterbuck, The Long, Long War. Counterinsurgency in Malaya and Vietnam, New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1966. [8] Peter Paret, French Revolutionary Warfare from Indochina to Algeria: The Analysis of a Political and Military Doctrine, New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1964, pp. 20-79. [9] Robert Thompson, Defeating Communist Insurgency. The Lessons of Malaya and Vietnam, New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1966. [10] Small Wars Manual, Washington, DC: Headquarters, United States Marine Corps, Department of the Navy, 1940. [11] See Steven Metz, Eisenhower as Strategist The Coherent Use of Military Power in War and Peace, Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 1993. [12] Bernard Brodie, Strategy in the Missile Age, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1959, pp. 305-357; Robert Endicott Osgood, Limited War. The Challenge to American Strategy, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957, pp. 4-8; and Henry A. Kissinger, Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy, New York: Harper and Brothers, 1957, pp. 132-173. [13] Blaufarb, The Counterinsurgency Era, pp. 52-53. [14] Charles Maechling, Jr., "Counterinsurgency: The First Ordeal by Fire," in Michael T. Klare and Peter Kombluh, eds., Low Intensity Warfare: Counterinsurgency, Proinsurgency, and Antiterrorism in the Eighties, New York: Pantheon, 1988, pp. 26-27. [15] Asprey, War in the Shadows, p. 736. [1] See U. Alexis Johnson, "Internal Defense and the Foreign Service," Foreign Service Journal, July 1962, pp. 21- 22; and, Henry C. Ramsey,"The Modernization Process and Insurgency," Foreign Service Journal, June 1962, pp. 21-23. [17] U.S. Interdepartmental Committee on Overseas Internal Defense Policy, U.S. Overseas Internal Defense Policy, July 24, 1962, pp. 2-3. [18] Ibid. [19] Ibid., p. 5. [20] Ibid., p. 8. [21] Ibid., p. 19. [22] Ronald H. Spector, The United States Army in Vietnam-Advice and Support. The Early Years 1941-1960, Washington, DC: United States Army Center of Military History, 1985. [23] Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr., The Army and Vietnam, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986, p. 4. [24] Larry Cable, Unholy Grail. The US and the Wars in Vietnam, 1965-8, London: Routledge, 1991, p. 133. [25] Quoted in Asprey, War in the Shadows, p. 724. [2]6 John M. Newman, JFK And Vietnam: Deception, Intrigue, and the Struggle for Power, New York: Warner Books, 1992, p. 456; William J. Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1985, p. 181; and, Roger Hilsman, To Move a Nation: The Politics of Foreign Policy in the Administration of John F. Kennedy, Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1967, p. 536. [27] Douglas Pike, PAVN. People's Army of Vietnam, Novato, CA: Presidio, 1986, pp. 240-252. [28] See William C. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1976, pp. 350-362 and passim. [29] On CORDS see Robert W. Komer, Bureaucracy at War: U.S. Performance in the Vietnam Conflict, Boulder, CO: Westview, 1986, pp. 118-121. Ambassador Komer was director of the CORDS program. [30] Phillip B. Davidson, Vietnam at War. The Histoty. 1946-1975, Novato, CA: Presidio, 1988, p. 795. [31] On the Army's inattention to counterinsurgency and foreign internal defense during this period, see Donald B. Vought, "Preparing for the Wrong War?" Military Review, Vol. 57, No. 5, May 1977, pp. 16-34. [32] FM 100-20, Low-Intensity Conflict, Washington, DC: Headquarters, Department of the Army, January 1981. [33] Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, Dictatorships and Double Standards: Rationalism and Reason in Politics, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982, p. 51. [34] Secretary Haig, "Interview on the 'MacNeil/Lehrer Report'," March 13, 1981, reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, May 1981, p. 1. [35] Secretary Haig, "Peaceful Progress in Developing Nations," commencement address at Fairfield University, May 21, 1981, reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, July 1981, p. 8. [36] John D. Waghelstein, "Post- Vietnam Counterinsurgency Doctrine," Military Review, Vol. 65, No. 5, May 1985, p. 42. [37] The Army Low-Intensity Proponency Office was headed by a colonel and housed at the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth. See the description of this organization in Military Review, Vol. 71, No. 6, June 1991, pp. 24-25. [38] Christopher M. Lehman, "Protracted Insurgent Warfare: The Development of an Appropriate U.S. Doctrine," in Richard H. Shultz, Jr., et. al., eds., Guerrilla Warfare and Counterinsurgency. U.S.-Soviet Policy in the Third World, Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1989, p. 129. The Executive agencies involved resisted many of the programs of the Armed Services Committee. The Department of Defense only appointed an Assistant Secretary to head SOLIC with great reluctance, and the Low Intensity Conflict Board of the National Security Council was never activated. [39] See the papers by Richard H. Shultz, Jr. and B. Hugh Tovar in Roy Godson, ed., Intelligence Requirements for the 1990s: Collection, Analysis, Counterintelligence, and Covert Action, Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1989, pp. 165-236. [40] For example, Douglas S. Blaufarb and George K. Tanham, Who Will Win? A Key to the Puzzle of Revolutionary War, New York: Crane Russak, 1989; Max G. Manwaring, ed., Uncomfortable Wars: Towarda New Paradigm of Low Intensity Conflict, Boulder, CO: Westview, 1991; Rod Paschall, LIC 2010: Special Operations and Unconventional Warfare in the Next Century, Washington: Brassey's, 1990; Bard E. O'Neill, Insurgency and Terrorism: Inside Modem Revolutionary Warfare, Washington: Brassey's, 1990; and John M. Collins, America's Small Wars: Lessons for the Future, Washington: Brassey's, 1991. The Arroyo Center of the RAND Corporation was especially active. For a survey, see Steven Metz, The Literature of Low-Intensity Conflict: A Selected Bibliography and Suggestions forFuture Research, Langley AFB, VA: Army-Air Force Center for Low-Intensity Conflict, 1988. [41] See, for example, Supporting U.S. Strategy For Third World Conflict, Report by the Regional Conflict Working Group of the Commission on Integrated Long-Term Strategy, Washington, DC: The Pentagon, June 1988; Joint Low-Intensity Conflict Project Final Report, Fort Monroe, VA: U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, 1986; and Robert H. Kupperman Associates, Low Intensity Conflict, Report Prepared for the U. S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, Volume 1: Main Report, Fort Monroe, VA: U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, July 30,1983. [42] Soviet Posture in the Western Hemisphere, hearing before the House Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere Affairs, February 28, 1985, 99th cong., 1st sess.; U.S. Policy Toward Anti-Communist Insurgencies, hearing before the Senate Subcommittee on Foreign Operations Appropriations, May 8, 1985, 99th cong., 1st sess.; To Combat Terrorism and Other Forms of Unconventional Warfare, hearing before the Senate Subcommittee on Sea Power and Force Projection, August 5, 1986, 99th cong., 2d sess.; and the testimony of General Paul F. Gorman in National Security Strategy, hearings before the Senate Armed Services Committee, January 28, 1987, 100th cong., 1st sess., pp. 749-801. [43] This did have its critics, particularly on the political left. See, for example, Klare and Kombluh, eds., Low Intensity Warfare. [44] George Shultz, "Low- Intensity Warfare: The Challenge of Ambiguity," address before the Low- Intensity Warfare Conference at the National Defense University, January 15, 1986, reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, March 1986, p. 15. Note the similarities to Johnson, "Internal Defense and the Foreign Service." [45] Ronald Reagan, National Security Strategy of the United States, Washington, DC: The White House, January 1987, p. 32. [46] Lehman, "Protracted Insurgent Warfare," pp. 126-128. Two primary innovations of the Reagan strategy for low-intensity conflict were the addition of support for insurgency or proinsurgency to the array of available tools, and focusing counterterrorism on international supporters of terrorism like Libya, Syria, and Iran. [47] Reagan, National Security Strategy of the United States, 1987, p. 33. [4] Ronald Reagan, National Security Strategy of the United States, Washington, DC: The White House, January 1988, p. 34. Emphapis added. [49] Field Manual 100-20/Air Force Pamphlet 3-20, Military Operations in Low Intensity Conflict, Washington, DC: Headquarters, Departments of the Army and the Air Force, December 5, 1990, p. 1-5. See also Stephen T. Hosmer, The Army's Role in Counterinsurgency and Insurgency, Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1990. Confirming the beliefs of the French counterinsurgent theorists, the "imperatives" from FM 100-20 mirrored Mao's principles of revolutionary war. [50] FM 100-20,1990, p. 2-18. [51] FM 90-8, Counterguerrilla Operations, Washington, DC: Headquarters, Department of the Army, August 1986, p. 1-6. [52] Quoted in Max G. Manwaring and Court Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War. An Oral History of Conflict from the 1979 Insurrection to the Present, Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1988, p. 7. [53] Victor M. Rosello, "Vietnam's Support to El Salvador's FMLN: Successful Tactics in Central America," Military Review, Vol. 70, No. 1, January 1990, p. 71. On Hanoi's involvement, see also The Challenge to Democracy in Central America, Washington, DC: Department of State and Department of Defense, June 1986, pp. 48-49; and John D. Waghelstein, 'We Traced Weapons Back to Vietnam," in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War, p. 92. Waghelstein commanded the U.S. Military Group in El Salvador from 1982 to 1983. [54] General Jaime Abdul Guti6rrez, "They Had Introduced 600 Tons of Weapons into the Country," in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War, p. 91. [55] See the comments of Colonel James J. Steele, commander of the U.S. Military Group in El Salvador, 1984- 86, in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War, p. 145; and Colonel Joseph S. Stringham III, 'The Military Situation from the Fall of 1983 to the Turning Point," in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War, pp. 148- 151. Stringham commanded the El Salvador Military Group from 1983 to 1984. [56] William M. LeoGrande, "A Splendid Little War: Drawing the Line in El Salvador," International Security, Vol. 6, No. 1, Summer 1981, p. 27. [5] "Communist Interference in El Salvador," a State Department special report, reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, March 1981, p. 7. This report was highly controversial. [58] "Secretary Haig Discusses Foreign Assistance," remarks to reporters, February 27,1981, reprinted in Departmentof State Bulletin, April 1981, p. 21; and Secretary Haig, "Interview on 'Meet the Press'," March 29, 1981, reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, May 1981, p. 5. [59] Jack Child, "US Policies Toward Insurgencies in Latin America," in Georges Fauriol, ed., Latin American Insurgencies, Washington, DC: Georgetown University Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1985, p. 133. For history and background on U.S.-Latin American defense cooperation, see Dennis F. Caffrey, "The Inter-American Military System: Rhetoric versus Reality," in Georges Fauriol, ed., Security in the Americas, Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1989. [60] See Thomas 0. Enders, "El Salvador: The Search for Peace," address before the World Affairs Council, Washington, DC, July 19, 1981, reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, September 1981, pp. 70-74. [61] A.J. Bacevich, James D. Hallums, Richard H. White, and Thomas F. Young, American Military Policy in Small Wars: The Case of El Salvador, Washington, DC: Pergamon-Brassey's, 1988, p. 1. [62] Report of the National Bipartisan Commission on Central America, Washington, DC: National Bipartisan Commission on Central America, January 1984, p. 96. [63] Americas Watch, El Salvador's Decade of Terror. Human Rights Since the Assassination of Archbishop Romero, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991, p. 141. [64] Michael J. Hennelly, "US Policy in El Salvador: Creating Beauty or the Beast?," Parameters, Vol. 23, No. 1, Spring 1993, p. 59. [65] Bacevich, et. al., American Military Policy in Small Wars, p. 6. See also General Fred F. Woemer, "Fundamental Objective: Develop a Military Strategy," in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War, pp. 114-116. [66] For a brilliant (and chilling) description, see Mark Danner, "The Truth of El Mozote," The New Yorker, December 6,1993, pp. 50-133. [67] See Americas Watch, El Salvador's Decade of Terror, and Amnesty International, El Salvador "Death Squads' --A Government Strategy, London: Amnesty International, 1988. [68] Mexico, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, for instance, provided publication outlets for the FMLN (Comments of Colonel Orlando Zepeda in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvaddrat War, p. 93). In the United States, political and financial support for the FMLN were engineered by an organization called the Committee on Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES). See J. Michael Waller, The Third Current of Revolution: Inside the "North American Front"of El Salvador's Guerrilla War, Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1991. [69] See the comments of General Adolfo Blandon, Colonel Joseph S. Stringham III, and Ambassador Thomas Pickering in Manwaring and Prisk, eds., El Salvador at War, pp. 212-215. [7] Bacevich, et al., American Militaty Policy in Small Wars, p. 5. [71] Jorge Guerrero Luna, "Where Does Villalobos Want to Go?" News Gazette (San Salvador), November 4- 10,1994, pp. 1, 14. [73] Victor M. Rosello, "Lessons From El Salvador," Parameters, Vol. 23, No. 4, Winter 1993-94, p. 101. [74] Benjamin C. Schwarz, American Counterinsurgency Doctrine and El Salvador. The Frustration of Reform and the Illusions of Nation Building, Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1991, p. 2. [75] Barbara Crossette, "Peace Program Is in Danger, Salvadorans Tell the U.N.'s Chief," New York Times, January 5,1995, p. AT [76] Schwarz, American Counterinsurgency Doctrine and El Salvador, p. 83. Emphasis added. [77] Rosello, "Lessons From El Salvador," p. 102. [77] Samuel P. Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1968. [78] See Larry Diamond, ed., The Democratic Revolution: Struggles for Freedom and Pluralism in the Developing World, New York: Freedom House, 1991; and Larry Diamond and Marc F. Planner, eds., The Global Resurgence of Democracy, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993. [79] Robert D. Kaplan, 'The Coming Anarchy," Atlantic Monthly, February 1994, p. 48. [80] Tim Weiner, "Blowback From the Afghan Battlefield," New York Times Magazine, March 13,1994, p. 53. [81] Larry Cable, "Reinventing the Round Wheel: Insurgency, Counter-Insurgency, and Peacekeeping Post Cold War," Small Wars and Insurgencies, Vol. 4, No. 2, Autumn 1993, p. 229. [82] This is explored in Steven Metz, The Future of Insurgency, Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 1993, pp. 13-15. [83] See Max G. Manwaring, ed., Gray Area Phenomena: Confronting the New World Disorder, Boulder, CO: Westview, 1993. The phrase first appeared in Peter Lupsha, "Gray Area Phenomenon: New Threats and Policy Dilemmas," a paper presented at the High Intensity Crime/Low Intensity Conflict Conference, Chicago, September 1992. [84] Benjamin C. Schwarz, "A Dubious Strategy in Pursuit of a Dubious Enemy: A Critique of U.S. Post-Cold War Security Policy in the Third World," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, Vol. 16, No. 1, 1993, pp. 269, 270. [85] William J. Clinton, A National Security Strategy of Engagement and Enlargement, Washington, DC: The White House, July 1994. [86] Philip Shenon, "U.S. Considers Providing Arms To Cambodia to Fight Guerrillas," New York Times, January 30,1995, p. A2. [87] Martin van Creveld, The Transformation of War, New York: Free Press, 1991, p. 215. [88] See Bruce Hoffman, Holy Terror. The Implications of Terrorism Motivated by a Religious Imperative, Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1993. [89] FM 100-20, Operations Other Than War, Initial Draft, Washington, DC: Headquarters, Department of the Army, September 30, 1994, p. 4-20. This draft is for review purposes and does not represent approved Department of the Army doctrine. [90] Ralph Peters, "The New Warrior Class," Parameters, Vol 24, No. 2, Summer 1994, p. 16. [91] Hans Magnus Enzensberger, Civil Wars: From L.A. to Bosnia, New York: New Press, 1994, pp. 17, 30. Emphasis in original. [9] John Keegan, A History of Warfare, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993. [93] Joint Pub 3-07, Joint Doctrine for Military Operations Other Than War, Washington, DC: The Joint Staff, 1994, p. 111-6. [94] Collins, America's Small Wars, p. 79. [95] Paschall, LIC2010, p. 125. Back to Table of Contents Counterinsurgency Strategy Back to SSI List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 1995 by US Army War College. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com