Counterinsurgency

An overview of modern Western militaries’ response to armed rebellion, from Indochina to Northern Ireland to Iraq. Counterinsurgency—or efforts to defeat and confine a rebellion against a constituted authority—has become a buzzword in recent times, but the term is as old as society itself. This concise history covers the development of modern counterinsurgency over the last two hundred years, from the concept of “small wars” and colonial warfare to the ideas of early insurgents like Clausewitz a