the bonds of social discipline and the norms of civility. Also, it provides favourable
opportunities for well-organized criminal violence. Many an insurgent movement has
been dependent upon working alliances with criminal organizations for reason of logistic
needs. Since most states regard insurgents as criminals, especially when they function in
terrorist mode, it can be difficult to identify the dividing line between irregular warfare
and criminal violence. In theory, the distinction is crystal clear: to be classed as warfare,
violence must be motivated by politics, not profit, as is the case with criminal behaviour.
In practice, though, the political and the criminal tend to merge. For one example, the
unquestionably political irregular war waged by Nationalist and Unionist secret armies
in Northern Ireland was conducted in tandem with organized crime. In operational terms,
crime and guerrilla warfare are near-perfect partners.
Guerrilla warfare and terrorism are simply military techniques that anyone can learn.
Insurgency, in contrast, is not a military technique. While military competence is
essential, it is but a minor aspect to the process. A similar judgement necessarily applies
to counter-insurgency. In small – but again essential – part, it requires military prowess,
but the skills that matter most contribute to public safety, good governance and cultural
empathy. For a clear example of a historical insurgency, consider the campaign waged in
South Vietnam by the Viet Cong (under North Vietnamese direction) in the 1960s. The
Viet Cong insurgents engaged in bloody and brutal acts of terrorism; they waged
guerrilla warfare; and occasionally they resorted to open regular warfare when the
military context was highly favourable. As categories of warfare, regular and irregular
sound neat and exclusive. But in practice, insurgent movements shift back and forth
between guerrilla and conventional tactics. The best explanation of the tactical flexibility
needed by insurgent strategy is to be found in the writings of Mao Tse-tung. In a classic
manual, he explained that
This protracted war will pass through three stages. The first stage covers the period
of the enemy’s strategic offensive and our strategic defensive. The second stage
will be the period of the enemy’s strategic consolidation and our preparation for
the counter-offensive. The third stage will be the period of our strategic counter-
offensive and the enemy’s strategic retreat.
(Mao, 1963: 210–11)Mao was careful to emphasize the need for tactical flexibility in the face of a changing
strategic context. Also, he warned explicitly against regarding the resort to guerrilla
warfare as being anything other than an instrumental necessity. In China, as elsewhere,
many guerrilla fighters forgot that guerrilla tactics were simply an expedient means to a
political end: they had no merit in and of themselves. Mao could hardly have been more
direct on this matter:
The concept that guerrilla warfare is an end in itself and that guerrilla activities can
be divorced from those of the regular forces is incorrect. If we assume that guerrilla
warfare does not progress from beginning to end beyond its elementary forms, we
have failed to recognize the fact that guerrilla hostilities can, under specific
conditions, develop and assume orthodox characteristics.
(Mao, 1961: 55–6)250 War, peace and international relations