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Alter, William C., "The French Resistance: Learning from the Past to Improve Joint Doctrine," GCPME/ACSC, 2021, 58 pgs.
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Alter explicitly answers the question by evaluating the French Resistance to recommend improvements to US military counterinsurgency (COIN) doctrine. The paper argues that successful resistance relies on a powerful unifying "catalyst" (such as foreign occupation) that overcomes the differences between highly diverse factions, alongside third-party support that provides both resources and global legitimacy. To successfully counter an insurgency, Alter advises governments to use Social Network Analysis (SNA) to weigh the strength of this catalyst rather than merely targeting network nodes, and to closely monitor foreign diaspora communities that may harbor or support insurgents. Furthermore, the paper warns that purely confrontational military actions and escalating reprisals—such as the cycle of executions between Germans and communists—are highly counterproductive because they generate popular resentment and create martyrs.
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Benson, Kari, "Role of Cognitive Change on Grief, Vulnerability and Reconciliation," ACSC elective paper (Revolutions of 1989), 2022, 12 pgs.
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Benson addresses the question by focusing on the cognitive dimensions of ideological transitions, showing that nonviolent civil resistance is most successful when it acts as a social movement focused on addressing people's actual needs rather than forcing a political ideology. For example, the Polish Solidarity movement peacefully succeeded by utilizing unions as spaces for free speech, which diffused anger and kept the movement below the threshold of violence. Conversely, violent conflicts emerge when a population has been subjected to totalitarian "tyranny of the mind" and subsequent politicians exploit the people's resulting grief and vulnerability by manipulating ethnic identities into weaponized ideologies, which was the primary catalyst for the violent wars in Yugoslavia.
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Bernero, Stephen R., "The Folly of Maslow's Hammer: Organizational Identity's Effect on US Strategy Assessment," SAASS thesis, 2024, 117 pgs.
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Using U.S. interventions in 1960s Brazil and the War in Afghanistan as case studies, the author demonstrates that government agencies (like the DoD, CIA, and USAID) suffer from deep-seated organizational biases—referred to as "Maslow's Hammer"—and "bounded rationality." These biases cause agencies to generate overly optimistic or fundamentally flawed strategy assessments that ignore the on-the-ground reality of the insurgency, which directly contributes to recurring strategic failures.
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Brewer, Capt. Jonathan T., "Beyond the Endgame: Sustaining SOF Success with Infinite Game Tactics," AFGC thesis, 2025, 46 pgs.
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Provides a deep analysis of what makes counterinsurgency and resistance efforts succeed or fail, contrasting "finite" strategies with "infinite" ones. Least Successful/Counterproductive Approaches: The author argues that traditional, finite military strategies—which focus on short-term tactical wins, metrics (like enemy body counts), and direct action/high-value target elimination—are ultimately counterproductive. In case studies of Afghanistan and the Phoenix Program in Vietnam, these approaches failed because they ignored the root causes of instability, such as governance deficiencies, social fragmentation, and civilian grievances. Most Successful Approaches: To successfully counter armed resistance or sustain a friendly resistance (like Ukraine against Russia), governments must adopt "infinite game" principles. This involves prioritizing long-term resilience, strategic patience, trust-building with local populations, and sustained partner capacity-building rather than purely kinetic military victories.
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Caudill, Dylan Lyle, "Blood in the Boondocks: American Counterinsurgency Strategy in the Philippine War, 1899-1902," SAASS thesis, 2025, 110 pgs.
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This paper explores successful versus counterproductive counterinsurgency (COIN) methods and how modern constraints contribute to government failures. It argues that traditional "enemy-centric" approaches—focusing on conventional battles and destroying insurgent fighters—ultimately fail because they underestimate the enemy's adaptive capacity and do not dismantle the political and social networks sustaining the insurgency. Instead, the author shows that the most successful approach in the Philippines was a "population-centric" strategy where forces assumed operational risk by dispersing into small, embedded garrisons to exert continuous control over the civilian population, isolating them from insurgent influence. Furthermore, the paper highlights that modern constraints contribute to government failure today; the Philippine campaign succeeded largely because the US Army operated in a permissive political environment without the domestic political pressure, media scrutiny, and strict force-protection constraints that severely limit the use of coercive population control in contemporary conflicts.
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DiCapua, Lt. Col. Nicholas, "Soviet Airpower in Afghanistan," AWC EL, 2020, 9 pgs.
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Specifically addresses which counterinsurgency approaches and methods have proven to be the least successful or counterproductive. By examining the Soviet Union's use of airpower in Afghanistan, the author demonstrates that using firepower for punitive action, coercing the local populace, and conducting indiscriminate bombing campaigns against civilian population centers are highly counterproductive strategies that incite even greater resistance rather than pacifying the population. To be more successful, the paper notes that a tried and true counterinsurgency strategy is for the occupying or host-nation force to prioritize protecting the civilian population from insurgent violence and providing legitimate security. The ultimate objective must be to legitimize the standing government while delegitimizing the insurgency.
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Gipper, Daniel P., "Innovate with Caution: Culture, (Mis)calculation, and (In)capacity," SAASS thesis, 2022, 155 pgs.
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Addresses the political-military parameters for insurgent success and the constraints of domestic political capacity in COIN. The paper highlights that resistance movements can succeed simply by outlasting the political will of the counterinsurgent, utilizing low-cost asymmetric tactics—such as blending into the population—to exhaust the occupying force over a protracted period. Gipper evaluates the U.S. Army's population-centric FM 3-24 doctrine ("clear, hold, and build"), noting that while it is designed to secure the population and build host-nation legitimacy, it demands vast resources, a high troop-to-population ratio, and immense strategic patience. The U.S. failure in Afghanistan was largely due to the constraint of domestic political will; by imposing rigid withdrawal timetables, the government provided the Taliban with a clear path to counter the strategy by simply waiting for foreign forces to depart, ultimately leading to the collapse of the U.S.-backed government.
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Hagemeyer, Lt. Col. Christopher M., "History Repeating Itself: An Analysis of U.S. Involvement in Irregular Warfare and Recommendations for the Future," AWC SSP, 2020, 24 pgs.
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Explores the most and least successful COIN methods by establishing four historical guiding principles for government forces. Hagemeyer argues that counterproductive approaches involve "hard war" policies—such as the dehumanization of the enemy, targeting culturally or religiously significant sites, and inflicting civilian casualties. Historically, from the Seminole War to Vietnam, harsh retaliatory policies and collective punishments only served to unite the population against the occupying force and fuel the insurgency's growth. Conversely, successful COIN approaches require a disciplined adherence to avoiding civilian casualties at all costs, even at the risk of the mission, to maintain the moral high ground. Hagemeyer emphasizes that once a cycle of violence begins against a population, it is nearly impossible to reverse, making restraint and cultural respect paramount to preventing or defeating armed resistance.
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Hawkins, Maj. Matthew, "The Democracy Dilemma: How Democracies Can Effectively Cope with National-Separatist Terrorism," ACSC EL. 2020, 42 pgs.
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Answers how democratic governments can navigate legal constraints to successfully counter national-separatist resistance. Democracies face the "Shabad/Ramo Paradox," where using extralegal means or extreme military violence to suppress a movement undermines the nation's democratic principles and alienates the populace, ultimately proving counterproductive (as seen with the British response to the PIRA and Spain with the ETA). Instead, Hawkins demonstrates that the most successful government approaches treat the resistance as a criminal activity rather than a military threat. Success in countering these movements relies on patience, conciliatory policies, legal reform, and utilizing existing legal frameworks with federal police forces to infiltrate and dismantle groups from within, rather than using heavy-handed military force that feeds the insurgents' political narrative.
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Martin, Maj. Jeremy A., "The Missing Variable: The Role of Legal Culture in Counterinsurgency Operations," AFGC 2019, 54 pgs.
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Examines the constraints that lead to government failure in COIN, arguing that a failure to incorporate differences in legal culture into strategy is the primary cause of campaign losses. Martin notes that the root causes of a resistance movement often stem from unresolved grievances regarding a society's legal and dispute resolution systems. Counterproductive COIN efforts focus merely on military force or attempt to impose foreign legal models, which populations reject. Successful approaches, conversely, recognize that legitimacy is the center of gravity and require governments to adapt their strategies to the host nation's existing legal culture. Implementing reforms that restore rights and access to justice—as seen in the eventual defeat of the Sri Lankan Tamil insurgency and the Philippine Huk rebellion—effectively removes the resistance's cause and successfully pacifies the population without relying solely on violent suppression.
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Martin, Maj. Tyler, "Setting the Agean Aflame: Occupation and Resistance Entanglement Igniting the Greek Civil War," SAASS thesis, 2022, 72 pgs.
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Illustrates the political-military parameters that lead to resistance success against occupational forces. The paper demonstrates that resistance movements thrive when they can exploit harsh geographic terrain for concealment to conduct sabotage operations against a superior military force. During the Axis occupation of Greece, Nazi policies of brutal, indiscriminate violence and collective reprisals against civilians were highly counterproductive. Instead of deterring the insurgency through terror, the brutality unified a previously politically fractured Greek populace at the macro level and swelled the ranks of the resistance, as the population felt martyrdom was more honorable than yielding. The Greek resistance succeeded by employing guerrilla hit-and-run tactics, refusing to cooperate with the occupiers, and securing support from outside patron forces (the British Special Operations Executive), proving that oppressive government violence often catalyzes rather than defeats armed uprisings
- Moncier, Lt. Col. Benjamin S., "The Least Worst Reality: Responsibly Ensuring Partner Conflict Civilian Casualty Mitigation," AFGC thesis, 2023, 37 pgs.
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Directly addresses the constraints and parameters that lead to government failure in proxy or partner counterinsurgency conflicts. Constraints on Government Success: A major constraint leading to strategic failure in COIN is the infliction of civilian casualties (CIVCAS). The paper notes that twenty years of U.S. counterinsurgency warfare demonstrated that failing to protect populations in conflict zones undermines the entire military effort. Most Successful Approaches: To be more successful in countering armed resistance—especially when working through partner forces (e.g., Saudi Arabia in Yemen)—governments must prioritize civilian harm mitigation. The paper advocates for a whole-of-government approach that explicitly ties security cooperation, military sales, and training incentives to the partner nation's strict adherence to protecting civilians.
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Satchell, Bachar N., "Alabama to Afghanistan: Optimizing Counterinsurgency through a Strategy of Organizing," SAASS thesis, 2024, 114 pgs.
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This study answers how governments can be more successful in countering insurgencies and nonviolent movements by contrasting top-down COIN strategies (like the Strategic Hamlet Program in Vietnam and PRTs in Afghanistan) with decentralized grassroots organizing (such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee during the Civil Rights Movement in Lowndes County). The author finds that centralized, top-down COIN approaches are often counterproductive due to a lack of cultural insight, misaligned objectives with host nations, and forced population control that alienates civilians and drives them toward the insurgency. To successfully counter armed or civil resistance, the paper recommends incorporating decentralized "organizing" strategies that empower local communities, address emergent population-defined grievances rather than top-down directives, and focus on winning "hearts and minds" to spark organic collective action from the bottom up.
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Scott, Michael C., "Designing Genius: Design Thinking Education for Military Strategy," SAASS thesis, 2024, 110 pgs.
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Explores how governments can be more successful in countering insurgencies by utilizing empathetic "design thinking," using David Galula’s historical success in Algeria as a primary case study. Most Successful Approaches: Galula succeeded by rejecting standard military eradication strategies and instead framing the problem around population support. His successful COIN method involved building trust and providing the physical and societal infrastructure the population needed (e.g., building schools, establishing pharmacies, organizing self-defense forces). He concluded that victory is achieved when the counterinsurgent forces can safely withdraw because the local population can take care of itself. Least Successful Approaches: The paper contrasts this with failed approaches: the "warrior" approach that relies on relentless, destructive military force, and the "psychologist" approach that merely seeks to manipulate the population with puppet leaders.
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Swick, LCDR Collin D., "Resistance Movements: Studying the Past for Clues about the Future," GCPME paper, 2024, 41 pgs.
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Answers the question by identifying "enduring elements" of successful resistance movements across the American Revolution, the French Resistance, and the Viet Cong: effective messaging, proper organization, and crucial third-party support. The paper demonstrates that governments fail and inadvertently fuel insurgencies when they engage in oppressive actions—such as British troops firing on colonists during the Boston Massacre or the Diem regime displacing Vietnamese villagers into "Strategic Hamlets"—which provide the resistance with powerful propaganda to mobilize the population. To counter armed insurgencies successfully, Swick advises that military leaders must track where third-party support is coming from to understand the movement's goals, while continuously monitoring the information environment to avoid being outpaced by modern, instantaneous resistance messaging.
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Taylor, Stephanie, "The Moral Hazard and Coercive Capabilities of Drones in Insurgent Warfare," SAASS thesis, 2024, 99 pgs.
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Examines the constraints and technological pitfalls that contribute to government failure in modern counterinsurgencies, focusing on the use of drones in Iraq and Syria (Ramadi, Mosul, Raqqa). Constraints on Government Success: The author highlights that coercing an insurgent group from the air is incredibly difficult because it relies on communicating through the local population. If an insurgent group (like ISIS) is indifferent to civilian suffering, punishing the population fails to coerce the insurgents and instead alienates the civilians. Counterproductive Methods: The paper argues that an over-reliance on drones and dynamic targeting cells drastically increases the "moral hazard" of an operation. As seen in the battle of Raqqa, relying heavily on remote strikes escalated the use of brute force and civilian harm, ultimately hindering the coalition's ability to apply effective, long-term coercive pressure to defeat the insurgency.
- Tomczak, Maj. Joseph R., "Parallel Lives in the Indo-Pacific: Edward Lansdale, Donald Wurster and the Irregular Warfare Mind-set," SAASS, 2023, 116 pgs.
- Answers how governments can be more successful in countering insurgencies by highlighting the necessity of an "irregular warfare mindset" that pragmatically blends both population-centric and enemy-centric approaches. Looking at historical US support to the Philippines against insurgent movements, the paper shows that successful counterinsurgency requires treating the conflict as a competition of strategic narratives. Governments must communicate a compelling counter-narrative to the population and ensure the partner government has the actual capacity to follow through on its promised reforms so the public witnesses the improvements firsthand. Furthermore, success relies on the selective, nuanced use of force—such as limited direct action against insurgent leadership combined with indirect capacity-building—to weaken the insurgency without alienating the local population.