Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat

by Richard H. Shultz Jr. and Andrea J. Dew

Book Overview

Since the end of the Cold War, conventional militaries and their political leaders have confronted a new, brutal type of warfare in which non-state armed groups use asymmetrical tactics to successfully fight larger, technologically superior forces. In order to prevent future bloodshed and political chaos, it is crucial to understand how these unconventional armed groups think and to adapt to their methods of combat.

Richard H. Shultz Jr...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0231129831
• ISBN13: 9780231129831
• Release Date: October 2009
• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Length: 328 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.3" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

A useful guide for military planners

The book rely's on four case studies. Somalia, Chechnya, Afganistan and Iraq. The thesis is that after the end of the cold war, the wars will be fight in an unconventional scenario against clan based militias. It give a useful brief history in each case looking for learn about their way of fight had been and could be, who lead them and how, help for outsiders and how this tribe, ethnic groups and clan see war. The authors critizes military planners for not avoid surprises in opeations by ignoring the history of the area and group they will face and so not given the appropriate outlook to those would face them.

Sometimes rather dry, but also provides interesting perspectives

The book's thrust is that in all wars you need to know your enemy and many of the US's current and likely future enemies are very different from those of the cold war. Unfortunately the text can be a little slow going: it is sometimes rather dry and repetitive. But there is also a lot of interesting material and analysis, so it is worth persevering. The thesis is that in many traditional societies males are raised to be warriors. They are part of a culture of clans and tribes, where no man can stand alone, so solidarity with one's family and clan is essential to survival. And you demonstrate that solidarity by being willing to fight for your clan. These are cultures where fighting is regarded as a natural and manly activity and as a normal way of settling disputes. So regarding peace as a norm just strikes people as odd. But at the same time fighting is limited, and primarily comprises hit-and-run raids rather than conventional battles. There is a very strong emphasis on personal honour and on avenging insults or injuries to one's group. (This all seems very reminiscent of Scottish clan feuding of only a few centuries ago!) Much fighting is local, with clans squabbling over resources. But the clans unite if faced with an external threat, and at a larger scale the tribes will unite to fight a foreign oppressor. And all of Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Iraq have a history of facing foreign invaders. As the fight gets bigger and uglier, many of the traditional limits are discarded. So at a high level, an invader such as the US may see a traditional society as militarily weak, lacking an organized army or heavy weapons. But at another level almost every male regards themselves as a warrior, who will fight in a decentralized way, using hit-and-run tactics to fight off an invader. So the country can easily mobilize in lots of small guerilla bands. One minor weakness of the book is that it has focused on four tribal societies. It might have been interesting to include a non-tribal insurgency example, such as Malaya or Vietnam, for comparison. However, there are still many variations between the four cases studies. Iraq is more urbanized and less tribalized than Afghanistan. The Chechnyans were very successful at organizing urban guerilla warfare in Grozny. The Somalia military leadership was surprisingly sophisticated. The book is better at analysis than at suggesting solutions. The authors freely criticize US planners for not understanding the cultures they were facing. But even knowing the cultures, it isn't clear how the US military could or should have behaved differently in Somalia.

Analyzing the Enemy Foot Soldier

This small book is an excellent introduction to the new type of warriors that the conventional armies of the world are facing. It's not exactly a new subject, remember the stories of the Americans sniping at the British Red Coats from behind trees. But it represents a fundamental shift in the type of combat that conventional armies have been taught to fight. While this book talks quite a bit about the experiences of conventional armies, it's strengths lie more in its analysis of the tribal/clan/religious fighter. They concentrate on describing the doctrinal, tactical, and strategic advantages behind the motivation and success of the warriors of contemporary inconventional combat. The book concentrates on four specific conflicts: Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Iraq. This is an excellent choice of conflicts to study for today's world. In each of these, a conventional western army was pitted against a Islamic, non-state army. And unfortunately this looks like the kind of battles that our country will be facing in the future.

Good book for tribal-based insurgents, terrorist, militia

The strength of this book is its attempt to lay out a framework for analyzing tribal-based insurgents, terrorists, and militias in layman's terms. I believe other reviewers have missed the point of the book -- it's not meant to be a description of today's threat, but a methodology for militarily analyzing how and why tribal-based groups fight. The authors recommend the following criteria as a substitute for traditional Military Capabilities Analysis: the tribe's concept of warfare; its organization and command and control; its areas of operations; the types and targets of its operations; its constraints and limitations; and the role of outside actors. The authors make their argument by first discussing the differences between the western way of war and "primitive warfare," and then assessing the way wars have evolves since the end of the cold war. The third chapter specifically discusses tribes, clans, and groups based on lineage and kinship. They then use the "case study" approach to test their analytical construct with chapters on Somalia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and Iraq. At the end of each chapter they analyze those conflicts based on the analytical criteria noted above. Finally, in the last chapter, they again use their analytical criteria to establish analytical lessons-learned. All-in-all this is an excellent book for those who are interested in the analysis of tribal-based military threats. It makes the point very well that conventional analytical approaches are not suited for the analysis of tribes and clans, and recommends a different approach.

A good overview of Muslim fighters and methods of dealing with the problems

Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat (Hardcover) 4 Stars This isn't a bad book. I rated it four stars. Why? There are a lot of reasons. The biggest reason is Robert Kaplan has covered the subjects much more in depth in his series of books on the newly emerging post Cold War era. Indeed, a typical reader of "The Atlantic Monthly" will see that authors of Schultz and Dew are mostly giving their versions of the observations that Robert Kaplan has already written. So, the typical reader is left with a choice. They can either read this book or read Kapan's book, the best of the lot is "Imperial Grunts". Authors Schultz and Dew give a fine break down of the typical militia command structure most nations face when fighting against Muslims. However, the militia breakdown is much better covered in "Tactics of the Crescent Moon: Militant Muslim Combat Methods" by H. John Poole and Ray L. Smith. So, the results are Authors Schultz and Dew give sort of a Cliff notes version of militia structure, combat methods, weapons and equipment. The biggest problem that the West faces is a second guessing American media that has a never ending demand for news. The fact of the matter is the USA loses over 10,000 citizens per year in traffic accidents and has another 40,000 injured. Hardly anything is written in the by-lines of the local papers. Conversely, there is much hand-wringing over approximately American 2,500 war dead since 9-11 fighting. It should be noted that the Soviet Union was engaged in a series of savage civil wars from the time of its revolution in 1917 until the early 1920s. The Soviet Union united all the various states of that social republic under an iron willed fist. Conversely, when the Russian media was permitted to act like the American media in the mid-1980s then the Soviets quickly lost Afghanistan, lost their nation, and quickly become involved in warring in Chechnya. The fact of the matter is the old steel willed Soviet Union would have quickly cut off the Muslim terrorists, taken the territory back, and executed any and all who were involved with the rebels. A way must be found to get a nation's media to realize the problem the long term problem of insurgency and support the steps against insurgency. The Soviet Union could not get their media to support a war against Afghanistan. The result is they lost the war, their nation, and are now involved in fighting on their soil. Perhaps that is the biggest shame of this book. The West wants to have civilized meeting with the terrorists. However, terrorism is guerilla warfare. Guerilla warfare is done until conventional forces grain strength to attack using normal means. Note, in Vietnam the Viet Cong used hit and run tactics against the USA and the Army of the Republic of Vietnam during the 1960s. In 1975 the North Vietnamese Army took Saigon using normal Soviet block military tactics. The point is Guerilla war is done from weakness. Conventional war