David H. Ucko - The Insurgents Dilemma

One of the most important books on insurgency and political violence to appear in decades. Uckos analysis, based on historical vignettes, is clear and compelling. This book will help readers understand how to think about insurgent and terrorist organisations as the first step towards developing strategies in response to them.

H.R. McMaster, former US National Security Advisor and author of Battlegrounds: The Fight to Defend the Free World

A brilliant effort. David Ucko has produced a compelling account of emerging trends in insurgency, as guerrillas adapt to changing social and political norms and technologies in an increasingly urban and connected world. For anyone interested in the future of insurgency, and in the evolving strategic approaches that insurgents are pioneering, this book is a must-read.

David Kilcullen, co-author of The Ledger: Accounting for Failure in Afghanistan

Iraq and Afghanistan may be past, but the threat of insurgency remains and will be weaponised by adversarial states. Ucko provides a strategic blueprint for how to defeat the twenty-first-century insurgent, challenging orthodox assumptions. Groundbreaking.

Sean McFate, Adjunct Associate Professor, Center for Security Studies, Georgetown University, and author of The New Rules of War

Insurgents are very agile in adapting to changing circumstances; in his masterful analysis, Ucko outlines the most likely adaptations we can expect in insurgent strategy and for which we need to prepare urgently. An absolute must-read!

Isabelle Duyvesteyn, Professor of International Studies and Global History, Leiden University

This is required reading for both scholars of insurgency and counterinsurgency strategists. After decades of stasis, the analytical literature on insurgency is experiencing a renaissance, driven by major shifts in the security environment and innovation by insurgent actors. Erudite, persuasive, and an important contribution.

Steve Metz, Professor of National Security and Strategy,US Army War College

This book puts insurgency into a much wider strategic context, offering an analysis that ought to make readers think carefully about what leads to success in twenty-first-century irregular warfare.

Matthew Ford, Senior Lecturer in International Relations, University of Sussex, and co-author of Radical War

An important new entry into the ongoing debate in military and strategic studies over the last twenty or more years. This is a useful exercise in rethinking the nature of insurgencies and counter-insurgency, especially with its discussion of state theory.

Paul B. Rich, consultant for TRENDS Research & Advisory, and editor, Small Wars and Insurgencies

THE INSURGENTS DILEMMA

DAVID H. UCKO

The Insurgents
Dilemma

A Struggle to Prevail

Oxford University Press is a department of the
University of Oxford. It furthers the Universitys objective
of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide.

Oxford New York
Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi
Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi
New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto

With offices in
Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece
Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore
South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam

Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press
in the UK and certain other countries.

Published in the United States of America by

Oxford University Press

198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016

Copyright David H. Ucko, 2022

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press,
or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with
the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning
reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the
Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above.

You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available

ISBN: 9780197651681

Printed in the United Kingdom.

CONTENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

David H. Ucko is Professor and Department Chair at the College of International Security Affairs (CISA), National Defense University, Washington DC. He is also an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University and a senior visiting research fellow in the Department of War Studies, King's College London.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The thoughts and ideas within this book speak to an intellectual journey undertaken over several years. As my itinerary developed, I benefited from the guidance of othersthose who pointed me in new directions and helped me when I got stuck. Much as I hope this book may inform the paths of future travelers, it is important for me to acknowledge those who showed me the way and inspired me to keep going.

The core of my thinking about insurgency and political violence has been powerfully molded by my many years at the College of International Security Affairs of the National Defense University. In particular, it has been a joy and privilege to work so closely with Thomas A. Marks, a veritable giant in the field and someone who has greatly expanded my academic horizons. I should also thank the many colleagues at NDU, both past and present, who have inspired my writing, including Kirklin Bateman, David Oakley, Frank Hoffman, Hassan Abbas, Sean McFate, Carlos Ospina-Ovalle, Michael Sullivan, David Spencer, Kevin Whitaker, John Creamer, Geoffrey Gresh, Peter Eltsov, and T. X. Hammes. Much of what is in this book reflects my conversations and collaboration with these fine thinkers and doers.

Still at CISA, this book would have been impossible were it not for the daily interactions with our international student body: senior practitioners from around the world, with first-hand experience in addressing both insurgency and instability. I wish to thank all our alumni for their willingness to engage on difficult topics, for sharing their stories, and for teaching me all the while I sought to teach them.

The topic of this book stems from a June 2018 session of the RAND Insurgency Board on the future of insurgency. I would therefore be remiss if I did not thank Ambassador James Dobbins and Patrick Johnston for commissioning me to write, and David Kilcullen, Steve Metz, Kimberley Kagan, Austin Long, and Bryan Frederi for their comments on the paper that ensued.

My thinking then evolved via several opportunities to brief preliminary findings and engage with different audiences. For these opportunities, I would like to thank the organizers of the 2018 Colombo Defence Seminar, in particular Brigadier Shewanth Kulatunge of the Sri Lankan Army; the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore, in particular Rohan Gunaratna, Sabariah Hussin, and Wei Chong Ong; and Tim Huxley of the International Institute for Strategic StudiesAsia, also in Singapore. I want to thank Major General Kurt Sonntag for taking an interest in my work and inviting me to share my paper with the special operations community under the auspices of a US Army Special Operations Command workshop on resistance. I was also fortunate to be able to share my thinking at the National Defense University 2018 Global Alumni Summit in Rabat, Morocco, for which I thank my institution and colleagues. Finally, I extend my gratitude to the Bangladeshi National Defence College for inviting me to present and discuss my findings with its faculty and students.