Guerrilla warfare (the word guerrilla comes from the Spanish meaning “little war”) is often the means used by weaker nations or military organizations against a larger, stronger foe. Fought largely by independent, irregular bands, sometimes linked to regular forces, it is a warfare of harassment through surprise. It features the use of ambushes, hit‐and‐run raids, sabotage, and, on occasion, terrorism to wear down the enemy. Typically, a small guerrilla force seeks to concentrate its strength against the weaker portions of the enemy’s forces, such as outposts or lines of communication and logistics, to strike suddenly, and then to disappear into the surrounding countryside. In the American experience, this type of warfare has been used since the French and Indian War (1754–63), when colonists adopted American Indian tactics to strike back against French forces and their Indian allies. Maj. Robert Rogers of Connecticut, considered a founder of the guerrilla tradition in America, organized Rogers’s Royal American Rangers in 1756 and trained them to carry the war deep into enemy territory. His doctrine, published as Rogers’ Rules for Ranging (1757), is considered a classic and is still issued to all soldiers attending the school for U.S. Army Rangers (Fort Benning, Georgia).
During the Revolutionary War, the guerrilla legacy was reflected in Col. Ethan Allen’s capture of Ticonderoga (1775); Col. Francis Marion‘s operations against Col. Bonastre Tarleton’s cavalry (1780); and Brig. Gen. Daniel Morgan‘s victory at the Battle of Cowpens (1781). Gen. Nathanael Greene even developed principles of guerrilla warfare in his successful campaign against the British in the South (1780–81). During the Civil War, the outnumbered Confederate forces featured several guerrilla leaders, including Col. John Singleton Mosby and Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest. A particularly fierce guerrilla war was waged in the border states of Kansas and Missouri, where Southern sympathizers organized into partisan bands that attacked Federal supply trains and harassed Union sympathizers. The more prominent partisan leaders were William Quantrill and William “Bloody Bill” Anderson. The former is best known for his daylight raid and destruction of the city of Lawrence, Kansas (1863), and the fact that his followers included Frank and Jesse James and the Younger brothers, destined to become prominent outlaws in the postwar years.
After the Civil War, the much‐reduced regular army was fully engaged in supporting the westward expansion of the United States, a mission that entailed years of fighting against American Indian tribes that opposed encroachment. Considered one of the premier practitioners of guerrilla warfare, the American Indian proved a formidable and elusive foe. Before being ultimately defeated, the Indians occasionally inflicted stunning reverses on units of the regular army—in the Fetterman fight (1866) for example, and the defeat of Custer’s 7th Cavalry at the Battle of the Little Bighorn (1876). Those army officers who were most successful at countering the Indians did so primarily through their adoption of unconventional tactics. Among these innovators were Gen. George Crook, who pioneered the use of pack mules to enhance the mobility of his columns and employed Apache Indian scouts against hostile Apache clans led by Geronimo; and Gen. Nelson Miles, who struck at hostile tribes during the winter months when the warriors’ mobility was restricted by deep snows and lack of forage for their ponies. Significantly, although the Plains Indians Wars lasted well over thirty years, the army regarded this sort of warfare as a temporary condition and never developed a coherent doctrine for countering a guerrilla foe. Even protracted operations against Philippine insurrectos in the Philippine War (1899–1902) and Mexican general Francisco “Pancho” Villa’s irregular forces (1915–16) failed to engage the interest of army theorists.
It was the U.S. Marine Corps, engaged in a number of expeditionary missions in Asia and Latin America during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, that began to codify the techniques, tactics, and procedures necessary for conducting counterguerrilla operations. The Marine’s efforts culminated in the publication of the Small Wars Manual (1940), a work that is still issued to Marine officers.
In World War II, some U.S. servicemen in the Philippines retreated into the hills after the Japanese conquest, set up guerrilla organizations, and continued to harass the enemy throughout the occupation. At the same time, the army and Marine Corps began to form and train units for irregular or guerrilla war operations, most notably Brig. Gen. Frank Merrill’s “Marauders” and Col. William “Wild Bill” Donovan’s Office of Strategic Services. The latter fielded a number of three‐man “Jedburgh Teams” (contrary to more romantic theories, “Jedburgh” was selected from a series of randomly generated code names), who were inserted behind Axis lines in Asia and Europe to perform covert operations, organize and advise resistance groups, conduct acts of sabotage, and collect military and political intelligence.
After World War II, the American military gave little thought to guerrilla war theory, despite the examples of the French in Indochina and Algeria, the British in Malaya, and the defeat of the Huks in the Philippines. Even the brief involvement of U.S. military advisers from the fledgling Special Operations Forces (formed by direction of President Eisenhower in June 1952) in the Greek civil war made little impression on American military thought. It was not until the United States had become engaged in Southeast Asia that military planners began grappling seriously with the problem of guerrilla warfare and counterinsurgency. The immediate result was President John F. Kennedy‘s decision to expand the U.S. Special Forces (1961). Called “Green Berets” because of their distinctive headgear, these are carefully selected and highly trained troops organized into ten‐man operational “A‐Teams” (logistics and other support activities being handled by larger “B‐Teams”). Each soldier was required to be an accomplished parachutist and capable of speaking at least one foreign language. Additionally, each team member was cross‐trained in two military occupational specialties (e.g., a radio operator might also be certified as a demolitions expert). Special Forces operational teams were organized and trained to act as advisers and planners for indigenous guerrilla units and achieved some measure of success, especially among the Hmong and Montagnard tribesmen of the Vietnamese highlands. These minor successes were not enough to turn the tide of battle, and with the end of the Vietnam War (1975), the Special Forces were relegated to a secondary status in the armed forces.
In the 1980s, in response to increased guerrilla activity in Central and South America, the U.S. military experienced a resurgence of interest in the problem of guerrilla warfare, now under the rubric of Low‐Intensity Conflict (LIC)—in turn superseded by Operations Other Than War(OOTW), and then by Military Operations Other Than War (MOOTW), encompassing peacekeeping, peace enforcement and humanitarian assistance, or stability and support operations—which resulted in the formation of a separate Special Operations Command (SOCOM), and the establishment of a separate source of funding to support special operations missions, training, and equipment.
[See also Caribbean and Latin America. U.S. Military Involvement in the; Counterinsurgency; Covert Operations; Terrorism and Counterterrorism.]
Bibliography
NAVMC 2890 , Small Wars Manual, 1940.
Robert Utley , Frontier Regulars, 1973.
Robert Asprey , War in the Shadows, 1975.
U.S. Army Field Manual 90‐8, Counterguerilla Operations, 1986.
U.S. Army Field Manual 100‐20, Low‐Intensity Conflict, 1990.
Joint Publication 3‐0, Joint Operations, 1994.
Joint Publication 3‐7, Military Operations Other Than War, 1995.
U.S. Army Field Manual 100‐5 (Draft), Stability and Support Operations, 1997.
Frederick J. Chiaventone
Good read. Over coffee.besides. I kinda feel like a gorilla this morning.