Strategy Notes: Guerrilla Warfare 01

[Obligatory PC disclaimer: Live Free And Die is, of course, just a game and these supplementary notes are being added for the amusement and education of the players. Anyone who attempts to start an insurgent movement in the real world is probably being very silly and will likely die or spend the rest of their life behind bars, having accomplished nothing in the process. Neither I nor my family would officially condone such behavior. Carry on.]

The United States is one the most heavily-armed, militaristic societies the world has ever known, with over 700 military bases in 63 countries worldwide... so naturally we spend a great deal of time worrying about the possibility of an enemy force operating on our soil. This is nothing new; Invasion Literature was quite popular among the English at the height of their empire.

So let's say that, for whatever reason, you feel the need to take up arms against the local authorities: maybe it's an invading army, maybe your government has pushed you too far, or maybe you're fighting something altogether different...

...whatever you're fighting and whatever the reason; that's up to you. I'm here more for the how's than the why's. Most of us have seen Red Dawn (Patrick Swayze's first great acting role) and The Patriot (Mel Gibson's last) and so I'll assume we all have some idea of what to do when we the shooting starts: grab our guns, load up our classmates/drinking buddies, hit the local sporting goods store on our way to the mountains and gear up for open season on commie invaders or oppressive stormtroopers.

Well, that's a start, but do remember that most of the characters in those movies died.We don't want that to happen to us, so perhaps a little bit more study would be expedient.

What is guerrilla warfare?
The term was first coined to refer to the rebellions of Spanish and Russian citizens who fought against the invading armies of Napoleon, but the concept is much, much older. Ancient Israel saw at least two guerrilla rebellions in the time before and after the life of Christ, one described in the apocryphal Book of Maccabees.

Guerrilla warfare is a favoured strategy of peasant and tribal societies, and in this manner harkens to the very origins of organized warfare. It's also a useful strategy in a situation of power and wealth disparity, and in this manner harkens to the likely future of organized warfare.

A guerrilla fighter must often operate without the benefit of orthodox training, sufficient logistics, heavy weaponry, clear chains of command, modern safety or medical technology or the protections of international law. Willingness to die for their cause is often one of the biggest advantages they have, as much as the more-lauded advantages of mobility, defense, and knowledge of the terrain. It is an anonymous, unheroic form of war more befitting a thief or an assassin than a knight or a hero.

What isn't guerrilla warfare?
Good question, being as the term tends to be as anamorphic as the usual strategies...

It could be defined as war without battles, only raids and ambushes. Mao Zedung, arguably it's most successful strategist, felt that guerrilla warfare in and of itself could not topple an existing regime; guerrillas, in his opinion, must grow into a conventional army before they could win a conventional victory. This is what happened in China and later Vietnam. On the other hand, the Boers and Irish started as conventional armies and eventually transitioned into guerrilla forces.

"War of  the Flea" is one definition; "War of the Loser" might be a better one ("underdog" if you want to be charitable, and I don't). Paul Emil von Lettow-Vorbeck and Thomas Edward Lawrence, two highly successful Europeans commanding native troops on opposite sides in the First World War, were both classically trained officers who adapted tactics of "tribal" or raider war upon the realization that they could never follow the Clausewitzian formula and have any hope of winning.

Some would say that there's a difference between guerrilla warfare and terrorism. I would argue that the difference between an Urban Guerrilla and a Terrorist is often sentiment at best.

Interestingly, guerrilla warfare played a relatively minor role in America's two most famous revolutions, the War of Independence and the War Between the States. These were mostly conventional wars involving conventional armies fighting each other in set-piece battles, with guerrilla actions being rare and peripheral.

The Texas Revolution, from what little I know about it, was also less guerrilla and more a war of Fabian maneuver, with the Mexican Army forced to march beyond their ability to supply or coordinate themselves, allowing for their defeat by the numerically-inferior Texans.

Any wars in your backyard and in your lifetime will likely be guerrilla in nature, simply because any military force that can conquer the whole continent is probably far too mighty to be engaged conventionally.