Asymmetric warfare

There are two different viewpoints on the relationship between asymmetric warfare and terrorism. In the modern context, asymmetric warfare is increasingly considered a component of fourth generation warfare. When practiced outside the laws of war, it is often defined as terrorism, though rarely by its practitioners or their supporters.[15] The other view is that asymmetric warfare does not coincide with terrorism.

From its initiation, the American Revolutionary War was, necessarily, a showcase for asymmetric techniques. In the 1920s, Harold Murdock of Boston attempted to solve the puzzle of the first shots fired on Lexington Green, and came to the suspicion that the few score militia men who gathered before sunrise to await the arrival of hundreds of well-prepared British soldiers were sent specifically to provoke an incident which could be used for Patriot propaganda purposes.[18] The return of the British force to Boston following the search operations at Concord was subject to constant skirmishing, using partisan forces gathered from communities all along the route, making maximum use of the terrain (particularly trees and stone field walls) to overcome the limitations of their weapons – muskets with an effective range of only about 50–70 metres. Throughout the war, skirmishing tactics against British troops on the move continued to be a key factor in the Patriots' success; particularly in the Western theater of the American Revolutionary War.[19][20][21][22]

Another feature of the long march from Concord was the urban warfare technique of using buildings along the route as additional cover for snipers. When revolutionary forces forced their way into Norfolk, Virginia, and used waterfront buildings as cover for shots at British vessels out in the river, the response of destruction of those buildings was ingeniously used to the advantage of the rebels, who encouraged the spread of fire throughout the largely Loyalist town, and spread propaganda blaming it on the British. Shortly afterwards they destroyed the remaining houses, on the grounds that they might provide cover for British soldiers.[23][24][25]

The rebels also adopted a form of asymmetric sea warfare, by using small, fast vessels to avoid the Royal Navy, and capturing or sinking large numbers of merchant ships; however the Crown responded by issuing letters of marque permitting private armed vessels to undertake similar attacks on Patriot shipping. John Paul Jones became notorious in Britain for his expedition from France in the little sloop of war Ranger in April 1778, during which, in addition to his attacks on merchant shipping, he made two landings on British soil.[26] The effect of these raids, particularly when coupled with his capture of the Royal Navy's HMS Drake – the first such success in British waters, but not Jones' last – was to force the British government to increase resources for coastal defense, and to create a climate of fear among the British public which was subsequently fed by press reports of his preparations for the 1779 Bonhomme Richard mission.[26]

From 1776, the conflict turned increasingly into a proxy war on behalf of France, following a strategy proposed in the 1760s but initially resisted by the idealistic young King Louis XVI, who came to the throne at the age of 19 a few months before Lexington. France ultimately drove Great Britain to the brink of defeat by entering the war(s) directly, on several fronts throughout the world.[26]

The American Civil War saw the rise of asymmetric warfare in the Border States, and in particular on the US Western Territorial Border after the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 opened the territories to voting on the expansion of slavery beyond the Missouri Compromise lines. Political implications of this broken 1820s compromise were nothing less than the potential expansion of slavery all across the North American continent, including the northern reaches of the annexed Mexican territories to California and Oregon. So the stakes were high and it caused a flood of immigration to the border: some to grab land and expand slavery west, others to grab land and vote down the expansion of slavery. The pro-slavery land grabbers began asymmetric violent attacks against the more pacifist abolitionists who had settled Lawrence and other territorial towns for suppressing slavery. John Brown, the abolitionist, traveled to Osawatomie in the Kansas Territory expressly to foment retaliatory attacks back against the pro-slavery guerrillas who, by 1858, had twice ransacked both Lawrence and Osawatomie (where one of Brown's sons was shot dead).

The abolitionists would not return the attacks and Brown theorized that a violent spark set off on "the Border" would be a way to finally ignite his long hoped-for slave rebellion.[27] Brown had broad-sworded slave owners at Potawatomi Creek, so the bloody civilian violence was initially symmetrical; however, once the American Civil War ignited in 1861, and when the state of Missouri voted overwhelmingly not to secede from the Union, the pro-slavers on the MO-KS border were driven either south to Arkansas and Texas, or underground—where they became guerrilla fighters and "Bushwhackers" living in the bushy ravines throughout northwest Missouri across the (now) state line from Kansas. The bloody "Border War" lasted all during the Civil War (and long after with guerrilla partisans like the James brothers cynically robbing and murdering, aided and abetted by lingering lost causers[28]). Tragically the Western Border War was an asymmetric war: pro-slavery guerrillas and paramilitary partisans on the pro-Confederate side attacking pro-Union townspeople and commissioned Union military units; with the Union army trying to keep both in check: blocking Kansans and pro-Union Missourians from organizing militarily against the marauding Bushwhackers.

The worst act of domestic terror in US history came in August 1863 when paramilitary guerrillas amassed 350 strong and rode all night 50 miles across eastern Kansas to the abolitionist stronghold of Lawrence (a political target) and destroyed the town, gunning down 150 civilians. The Confederate officer whose company had joined Quantrill's Raiders that day witnessed the civilian slaughter and forbade his soldiers from joining in the carnage. The commissioned officer refused to participate in Quantrill's asymmetric warfare on civilians.[29]

The Philippine–American War (1899–1902) was an armed conflict between the United States and Filipino revolutionaries. Estimates of the Filipino forces vary between 100,000 and 1,000,000, with tens of thousands of auxiliaries.[30] Lack of weapons and ammunition was a significant impediment to the Filipinos, so most of the forces were only armed with bolo knives, bows and arrows, spears and other primitive weapons that, in practice, proved vastly inferior to U.S. firepower.

Remnants of rifles used by Filipino soldiers during the War on display at Clark Museum

The goal, or end-state, sought by the First Philippine Republic was a sovereign, independent, socially stable Philippines led by the ilustrado (intellectual) oligarchy.[31] Local chieftains, landowners, and businessmen were the principales who controlled local politics. The war was strongest when illustrados, principales, and peasants were unified in opposition to annexation.[31] The peasants, who provided the bulk of guerrilla manpower, had interests different from their illustrado leaders and the principales of their villages.[31] Coupled with the ethnic and geographic fragmentation, unity was a daunting task. The challenge for Aguinaldo and his generals was to sustain unified Filipino public opposition; this was the revolutionaries' strategic center of gravity.[31] The Filipino operational center of gravity was the ability to sustain its force of 100,000 irregulars in the field.[32] The Filipino general Francisco Macabulos described the Filipinos' war aim as, "not to vanquish the U.S. Army but to inflict on them constant losses." They initially sought to use conventional tactics and an increasing toll of U.S. casualties to contribute to McKinley's defeat in the 1900 presidential election.[32] Their hope was that as president the avowedly anti-imperialist future Secretary of state William Jennings Bryan would withdraw from the Philippines.[32] They pursued this short-term goal with guerrilla tactics better suited to a protracted struggle.[32] While targeting McKinley motivated the revolutionaries in the short term, his victory demoralized them and convinced many undecided Filipinos that the United States would not depart precipitously.[32] For most of 1899, the revolutionary leadership had viewed guerrilla warfare strategically only as a tactical option of final recourse, not as a means of operation which better suited their disadvantaged situation. On November 13, 1899, Emilio Aguinaldo decreed that guerrilla war would henceforth be the strategy. This made American occupation of the Philippine archipelago all the more difficult over the next few years. In fact, during just the first four months of the guerrilla war, the Americans had nearly 500 casualties. The Philippine Revolutionary Army began staging bloody ambushes and raids, such as the guerrilla victories at Paye, Catubig, Makahambus, Pulang Lupa, Balangiga and Mabitac. At first, it even seemed as if the Filipinos would fight the Americans to a stalemate and force them to withdraw. President McKinley even considered this at the beginning of the phase. The shift to guerrilla warfare drove the US Army to adopt counter-insurgency tactics. Civilians were given identification and forced into concentration camps with a publicly announced deadline after which all persons found outside of camps without identification would be shot on sight. Thousands of civilians died in these camps due to poor conditions.

Asymmetric warfare featured prominently during the Second Boer War. After an initial phase, which was fought by both sides as a conventional war, the British captured Johannesburg, the Boers' largest city, and captured the capitals of the two Boer Republics. The British then expected the Boers to accept peace as dictated by them in the traditional European manner. However instead of capitulating, the Boers fought a protracted guerrilla war. 20,000-30,000 Boer guerrillas were only defeated after the British brought to bear 450,000 imperial troops, about ten times as many as were used in the conventional phase of the war. The British began constructing blockhouses built within machine gun range of one another and flanked by barbed wire to slow the Boers' movement across the countryside and block paths to valuable targets. Such tactics eventually evolved into today's counterinsurgency tactics.[33]

The Boer commando raids deep into the Cape Colony, which were organized and commanded by Jan Smuts, resonated throughout the century as the British adopted and adapted the tactics first used against them by the Boers.[33]

• Lawrence of Arabia and British support for the Arab uprising against the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans were the stronger power, the Arabs the weaker.
• Austria-Hungary's invasion of Serbia, August 1914. Austria-Hungary was the stronger power, Serbia the weaker.
• Germany's invasion of Belgium, August 1914. Germany was the stronger power, Belgium the weaker.

• Abd el-Krim led resistance in Morocco from 1920 to 1924 against French and Spanish colonial armies ten times as strong as the guerrilla force, led by General Philippe Pétain.
• TIGR, the first anti-fascist national-defensive organization in Europe, fought against Benito Mussolini's regime in northeast Italy.
• Anglo-Irish War (Irish War of Independence) fought between the Irish Republican Army and the Black and Tans/Auxiliaries. Lloyd George (Prime Minister at the time) attempted to persuade other nations that it was not a war by refusing to use the army and using the Black and Tans instead but the conflict was conducted as an asymmetric guerrilla war and was registered as a war with the League of Nations by the Irish Free State.

• Philippine resistance against Japan – During the Japanese occupation in World War II, there was an extensive Philippine resistance movement, which opposed the Japanese with active underground and guerrilla activity that increased over the years.

Improvised molotov cocktails

• Winter War – Finland was invaded by the much larger mechanized military units of the Soviet Union. Although the Soviets captured 8% of Finland, they suffered enormous casualties versus much lower losses for the Finns. Soviet vehicles were confined to narrow forest roads by terrain and snow, while the Finns used ski tactics around them unseen through the trees. They cut the advancing Soviet column into what they called motti (a cubic metre of firewood), and then destroyed the cut off sections one by one. Many of the Soviets were shot by snipers, had their throats cut from behind, or froze to death due to inadequate clothing and lack of camouflage and shelter. The Finns also devised a petrol bomb they called the Molotov cocktail to destroy Soviet tanks.
• Soviet partisans – resistance movement which fought in the German occupied parts of the Soviet Union.
• Warsaw Uprising – Poland (Home Army, Armia Krajowa) rose up against the German occupation.
• Germany's occupation of Yugoslavia, 1941–45 (Germany vs. Tito's Partisans and Mihailović's Chetniks).

• British Commandos and European coastal raids. German countermeasures and the notorious Commando Order.
• Long Range Desert Group and the Special Air Service in Africa and later in Europe.
• South East Asian Theatre: Wingate, Chindits, Force 136, V Force
• Special Operations Executive (SOE)
• Provisional Irish Republican Army against British security forces in the Northern Campaign.

• Office of Strategic Services (OSS)
• China Burma India Theatre: Merrill's Marauders and OSS Detachment 101.

• First Indochina War (1946-1954) and Algerian War of Independence (1954-1962); both against France
• The Cuban Revolution of 1953-1958 became a template of asymmetric warfare.[34]
• The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 (or "Russo-Hungarian" war[35]) saw makeshift forces improvising lopsided tactics against Soviet tanks.
• Libyan support to the Provisional Irish Republican Army during the Troubles (1960s to 1998) and collusion between British security forces and Ulster loyalist paramilitaries.
• United States Military Assistance Command Studies and Observations Group (US MAC-V SOG) (1964-1972) and Viet Cong in Vietnam.
• The South African Border War, otherwise known as the Namibian War of Independence (1966-1990) between the South African Defence Force and People's Liberation Army of Namibia.
• United States support of the Nicaraguan Contras (1979-1990).

The end of World War II established the two most powerful victors, the United States of America (United States, or just the U.S.) and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR, or just the Soviet Union) as the two dominant world superpowers.

In Southeast Asia, specifically Vietnam, the Viet Minh, NLF and other insurgencies engaged in asymmetrical guerrilla warfare with France. The war between the mujahideen and the Soviet Armed Forces during the Soviet–Afghan War of 1979 to 1989, though claimed as a source of the term "asymmetric warfare",[36] occurred years after Mack wrote of "asymmetric conflict". (Note that the term "asymmetric warfare" became well known in the West only in the 1990s.[37]) The aid given by the U.S. to the mujahideen during the war was only covert at the tactical level; the Reagan Administration told the world that it was helping the "freedom-loving people of Afghanistan". Many countries, including the US, participated in this proxy war against the USSR during the Cold War. It was considered cost-effective and politically successful,[38] as it caused a drain on the resources and manpower of the USSR and turned out to be a contributing factor to the collapse of that polity in 1991.

The Kosovo War, which pitted Yugoslav security forces (Serbian police and Yugoslav Army) against Albanian separatists of the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army, is an example of asymmetric warfare, due to Yugoslav forces' superior firepower and manpower, and due to the nature of insurgency/counter-insurgency operations. The NATO bombing of Yugoslavia (1999), which pitted NATO airpower against the Yugoslav armed forces during Kosovo war, can also be classified as asymmetric, exemplifying international conflict with asymmetry in weapons and strategy/tactics.[39]

The ongoing conflict between Israel and some Palestinian organizations (such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad) is a classic case of asymmetric warfare. Israel has a powerful army, air force and navy, while the Palestinian organizations have no access to large-scale military equipment with which to conduct operations;[40] instead, they utilize asymmetric tactics, such as: knife attacks, small gunfights, cross-border sniping, rocket attacks,[41] and suicide bombings.[42][43]

The Sri Lankan Civil War, which raged on and off from 1983 to 2009, between the Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) saw large-scale asymmetric warfare. The war started as an insurgency and progressed to a large-scale conflict with the mixture of guerrilla and conventional warfare, seeing the LTTE use suicide bombing (male/female suicide bombers) both on and off battlefield use of explosive-filled boats for suicide attacks on military shipping; and use of light aircraft targeting military installations.

This Cougar in Al Anbar, Iraq, was hit by a directed charge IED approximately 300–500 lb (140–230 kg) in size.

The victory by the US-led coalition forces in the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq, demonstrated that training, tactics and technology can provide overwhelming victories in the field of battle during modern conventional warfare. After Saddam Hussein's regime was removed from power, the Iraq campaign moved into a different type of asymmetric warfare where the coalition's use of superior conventional warfare training, tactics and technology was of much less use against continued opposition from the various partisan groups operating inside Iraq.

Much of the 2012–present Syrian Civil War has been asymmetrical. The Syrian National Coalition, Mujahideen, and Kurdish Democratic Union Party have been engaging with the forces of the Syrian government through asymmetric means. The conflict has seen large-scale asymmetric warfare across the country, with the forces opposed to the government unable to engage symmetrically with the Syrian government and resorting instead to other asymmetric tactics such as suicide bombings[44][45] and targeted assassinations.

The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine has resulted in a classical asymmetrical warfare scenario. Russia's superior military might, including its vast nuclear arsenal and seemingly superior armored forces has not helped Russia surmount fierce opposition from the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which has inflicted severe blows against the Russian Armed Forces by relying on technologically advanced weaponry supplied by the west and the determination of its people.[46][47][48][49][50]

• Compiled by Joan T. Phillips Bibliographer at Air University Library: A Bibliography of Asymmetric Warfare, August 2005.
• Asymmetric Warfare and the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) Debate sponsored by the Project on Defense Alternatives

• Arreguin-Toft, Ivan, How the Weak Win Wars: A Theory of Asymmetric Conflict, New York & Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005 ISBN 0-521-54869-1
• Beckett, I. F. W. (15 September 2009). Encyclopedia of Guerrilla Warfare (Hardcover). Santa Barbara, California: Abc-Clio Inc. ISBN 978-0874369298. ISBN 9780874369298* Barnett, Roger W., Asymmetrical Warfare: Today's Challenge to U.S. Military Power, Washington, D.C., Brassey's, 2003 ISBN 1-57488-563-4
• Friedman, George, America's Secret War: Inside the Hidden Worldwide Struggle between the United States and Its Enemies, London, Little, Brown, 2004 ISBN 0-316-72862-4
• T.V. Paul, Asymmetric Conflicts: War Initiation by Weaker Powers, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1994, ISBN 0-521-45117-5
• J. Schroefl, Political Asymmetries in the Era of Globalization, Peter Lang, 2007, ISBN 978-3-631-56820-0
• Kaplan, Robert D., Warrior Politics: Why Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos, New York, Vintage, 2003 ISBN 0-375-72627-6
• Levy, Bert "Yank"; Wintringham, Tom (Foreword) (1964). Guerrilla Warfare (PDF). Paladin Press. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-04-12. Retrieved 2014-04-15.
• Merom, Gil, How Democracies Lose Small Wars, New York, Cambridge, 2003 ISBN 0-521-80403-5
• Metz, Steven and Douglas V. Johnson II, Asymmetry and U.S. Military Strategy: Definition, Background, and Strategic Concepts, Carlisle Barracks, Strategic Studies Institute/U.S. Army War College, 2001 ISBN 1-58487-041-9
• J. Schroefl, S.M. Cox, T. Pankratz, Winning the Asymmetric War: Political, Social and Military Responses, Peter Lang, 2009, ISBN 978-3-631-57249-8
• Record, Jeffrey, Beating Goliath: Why Insurgencies Win, Washington, D.C., Potomac Books, 2007, ISBN 978-1-59797-090-7
• Gagliano Giuseppe,Introduzione alla conflittualita' non convenzionale, New Press,2001
• Resnick, Uri. Dynamics of Asymmetric Territorial Conflict: the evolution of patience. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave-Macmillan, 2013.
• Sobelman, Daniel, New Rules of the Game: Israel and Hizbollah after the Withdrawal from Lebanon, Tel-Aviv University, Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, 2004 [www.inss.org.il/upload/(FILE)1190276456.pdf]
• Sobelman, Daniel, 'Hizbollah—from Terror to Resistance: Towards a National Defence Strategy, in Clive Jones and Sergio Catignani (eds.), Israel and Hizbollah An Asymmetric Conflict in Historical and Comparative Perspective, Routledge, 2010 (pp. 49–66)
• Sobelman, Daniel. "Learning to Deter: Deterrence Failure and Success in the Israel-Hezbollah Conflict, 2006–2016," International Security Vol. 41, No. 3 (Winter, 2016/2017).

• Bryant, G. J. "Asymmetric Warfare: The British Experience in Eighteenth-Century India," Journal of Military History (2004) 68#2 pp 431–469. in Project Muse(subscription required)
• Ivan Arreguin-Toft, "How the Weak Win Wars: A Theory of Asymmetric Conflict", International Security, Vol. 26, No. 1 (Summer 2001), pp. 93–128.
• J. Paul Dunne, et al., "Managing Asymmetric Conflict," Oxford Economic Papers, Vol. 58 (2006), pp. 183–208.
• Fowler, C. A. "Bert" (March 2006). "Asymmetric Warfare: A Primer". IEEE Spectrum. Archived from the original on 2008-01-04. Retrieved 2006-03-05. A mathematical approach to the concept.
• Marcus Corbin Reshaping the Military for Asymmetric Warfare CDI website October 5, 2001.
• Deady, Timothy K. (2005). "Lessons from a Successful Counterinsurgency: The Philippines, 1899–1902" (PDF). Parameters. 35 (1): 53–68. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-12-10. Retrieved 2018-01-13.
• Vincent J. Goulding Jr."Back to the Future with Asymmetric Warfare". Archived from the original on 2004-02-10. Retrieved 2006-06-12.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) From Parameters, Winter 2000–01, pp. 21–30.
• Andrew J.R. Mack, "Why Big Nations Lose Small Wars: The Politics of Asymmetric Conflict", World Politics, Vol. 27, No. 2 (January 1975), pp. 175–200.
• Montgomery C. Meigs Unorthodox Thoughts about Asymmetric Warfare (PDF)
• Richard Norton-Taylor Asymmetric Warfare: Military Planners Are Only Beginning to Grasp the Implications of September 11 for Future Deterrence Strategy, in The Guardian, October 3, 2001
• Michael Novak, "Asymmetrical Warfare" & Just War: A Moral Obligation in NRO, February 10, 2003
• Toni Pfanner, "Asymmetrical Warfare from the Perspective of Humanitarian Law and Humanitarian Action", International Review of the Red Cross Vol. 87 No. 857 (March 2005), p. 149–174.
• Sullivan, Patricia. 2007. "War Aims and War Outcomes: Why Powerful States Lose Limited Wars", Journal of Conflict Resolution, 51 (3):496–524.
• Jonathan B. Tucker Asymmetric Warfare, a 6-page analysis, Summer 1999.
• Asymmetry and other fables, Jane's Defence Weekly, 18 August 2006
• David Buffaloe 'Defining Asymmetric Warfare' September 2006
• Gates Assails Pentagon on Resources for Battlefields The Washington Post April 22, 2008
• Mandel, Robert. "Reassessing Victory in Warfare." Armed Forces & Society, Jul 2007; vol. 33: pp. 461–495. Mandel, Robert (2007). "SAGE Journals: Your gateway to world-class journal research". Armed Forces & Society. 33 (4): 461–495. doi:10.1177/0095327X06295515. S2CID 145246391.
• Mandel, Robert. "The Wartime Utility of Precision Versus Brute Force in Weaponry." Armed Forces & Society, Jan 2004; vol. 30: pp. 171–201. Mandel, Robert (2004). "SAGE Journals: Your gateway to world-class journal research". Armed Forces & Society. 30 (2): 171–201. doi:10.1177/0095327X0403000203. S2CID 110384704.