This field manual establishes doctrine for military operations in a counterinsurgency (COIN) environment. It is based on lessons learned from previous counterinsurgencies and contemporary operations. It is also based on existing interim doctrine and doctrine recently developed. Counterinsurgency operations generally have been neglected in broader American military doctrine and national security policies since the end of the Vietnam War over 40 years ago. This manual is designed to reverse that trend. It is also designed to merge traditional approaches to COIN with the realities of a new international arena shaped by technological advances, globalization, and the spread of extremist ideologies--some of them claiming the authority of a religious faith. This is a comprehensive manual that details every aspect of a successful COIN operation from intelligence to leadership to diplomacy. It also includes several useful appendices that provide important supplementary material.

Field Manual FM 3-24 MCWP 3-33.5 Insurgencies and Countering Insurgencies May 2014 provides doctrine for Army and Marine units that are countering an insurgency. It provides a doctrinal foundation for counterinsurgency and is a guide for units fighting or training for counterinsurgency operations.Part one, the “Strategic and Operational Context,” provides a framework for understanding the environment where a counterinsurgency exists. Part one consists of chapters one through three.Part two, “Insurgencies,” provides a doctrinal framework for understanding an insurgency. Part two consists of chapters four and five. Part three, “Counterinsurgencies,” describes how to plan and execute operations to enable a host nation to defeat an insurgency.Chapter 1, “Understanding the Strategic Context,” answers the questions of how and why U.S. forces might get involved in a counterinsurgency. Chapter 1 highlights that there are many different ways U.S. forces could counter an insurgency and that there are a range of various contexts in which an insurgency can occur. Chapter 2, “Understanding an Operational Environment,” provides context for an operational environment where an insurgency might be occurring. Chapter 3, “Culture,” describes the role of culture in counterinsurgency operations. Understanding culture is essential in any effort to support a counterinsurgency effort. Culture is of unique importance in understanding an operational environment.Chapter 4, “Insurgency Prerequisites and Fundamentals,” provides doctrine for understanding the prerequisites of an insurgency and the root causes that allow an insurgency to keep and gain legitimacy. Chapter 5, “Insurgency Threat Characteristics,” provides doctrine for understanding the threat characteristics of an insurgency.Chapter 6, “Command and Control and Mission Command,” provides doctrine for executing command and control under the philosophy of mission command. In a counterinsurgency effort, many units may perform many different tasks in decentralized operations. Understanding decentralized operations and ensuring these units are meeting the overall commander's intent is essential for successful counterinsurgency operations.Chapter 7, “Planning and Operational Considerations,” provides guidance on how commanders and staffs can work from conceptual planning to detailed planning in counterinsurgency operations. Chapter 8, “Intelligence,” provides considerations for intelligence in counterinsurgency. Because understanding the environment is essential in counterinsurgency, intelligence facilities successful operations.Chapter 9, “Direct Approaches to Counter an Insurgency,” provides guidance on how the Army and the Marine Corps directly counter an insurgency at the operational and tactical level. The operational philosophy behind the direct approach is shape-clear-hold-build-transition. Chapter 10, “Indirect Methods for Countering Insurgencies,” provides a framework for working with and through a host nation. While the U.S. may provide the primary counterinsurgent forces, it may also work indirectly through the host nation. There are also important indirect enablers.Chapter 11, “Working with Host-Nation Forces,” provides a foundation for understanding how security cooperation efforts are integrated into a counterinsurgency effort. Whether U.S. forces are, for a time, the primary counterinsurgent forces or they are working indirectly through a host nation, enabling the host nation through security cooperation activities is essential.Chapter 12, “Assessments,” provides doctrine for understanding how a counterinsurgency environment changes and determining if counterinsurgent actions are having an effect on achieving the desired end state. Chapter 13, “Legal Considerations” provides some legal considerations that are important for commanders and staffs to consider in all counterinsurgency operations.

This book explores how unconventional warfare tactics have opposed governments, from eighteenth-century guerrilla warfare to contemporary urban terrorism. The tactics of guerrilla leaders such as Lawrence, Mao, Guevara and Marighela are examined and the works of counter-insurgency theorists such as Galleni, Callwell, Thompson and Kitson are analysed.

This volume of case studies examines the rise in violent extremism, terrorism and insurgency in South and South East Asia, and subsequent state responses. The South and South East of Asia has experienced various forms of extremism and violence for years, with a growing demand for academic or policy-relevant work that will enhance understanding of the reasons behind this. The violent challenges in this area have taken a variety of forms and are often exacerbated by lack of governance, tie-ins to existing regional criminal networks, colonial legacies and a presence of international terrorist movements. Written by experts with field experience, this volume analyzes the key element of successful response as the appropriate application of doctrine following nuanced assessment of threat. In practice, this often means counterinsurgency doctrine. The essays also analyze the need for irregular war practitioners to systematically examine the changing character of intrastate violent irregular challenges. The volume fills a gap in the understanding of patterns, drivers, organizations and ideologies of various insurgent and terrorist groups, and state responses. It also provides a set of recommendations for addressing the unfolding situation. This book will be of much interest to students of terrorism and political violence, counterinsurgency and counterterrorism, Asian politics and security studies in general.

A study of the evolving 'national styles' of conducting insurgencies and counter-insurgency, as influenced by transnational trends, ideas and practices.

This timely book offers a world history of insurgencies and of counterinsurgency warfare. Jeremy Black moves beyond the conventional Western-centric narrative, arguing that it is crucial to ground contemporary experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq in a global framework. Unlike other studies that begin with the American and French revolutions, this book reaches back to antiquity to trace the pre-modern origins of war within states. Interweaving thematic and chronological narratives, Black probes the enduring linkages between beliefs, events, and people on the one hand and changes over time on the other hand. He shows the extent to which power politics, technologies, and ideologies have evolved, creating new parameters and paradigms that have framed both governmental and public views. Tracing insurgencies ranging from China to Africa to Latin America, Black highlights the widely differing military and political dimensions of each conflict. He weighs how, and why, lessons were “learned” or, rather, asserted, in both insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare. At every stage, he considers lessons learned by contemporaries, the ways in which norms developed within militaries and societies, and their impact on doctrine and policy. His sweeping study of insurrectionary warfare and its counterinsurgency counterpart will be essential reading for all students of military history.

"Field Manual (FM) 3-24/ Marine Corps Warfighting Publication (MCWP) 3-33.5 provides doctrine for Army and Marine units that are countering an insurgency. It provides a doctrinal foundation for counterinsurgency. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 is a guide for units fighting or training for counterinsurgency operations."--