Home › Features › Essays › Unconventional Warfare in Communist Strategy

Unconventional Warfare in Communist Strategy

By Raymond L. Garthoff
July 1962
Article Summary and Author Biography

Unconventional warfare has become all too conventional, even if it is not yet adequately understood. It is paradoxical that the coming of mighty engines of war that literally extend war "out of this world" and threaten violence measured in megadeaths should, in fact, lend strength to the resurgence of a kind of hostilities marked by poisoned bamboo spears, bazooka ambushes and civil war. In a recent article in these pages, the nature and dimensions of the problem have been thoughtfully analyzed.1 In the present discussion, I should like to focus attention on a series of 12 propositions derived from study of Communist theory and practice regarding the seizure of power by unconventional warfare.

Print Email
Login or Register to leave a comment.

Sign-up for free weekly updates from ForeignAffairs.com.

Unconventional warfare has become all too conventional, even if it is not yet adequately understood. It is paradoxical that the coming of mighty engines of war that literally extend war "out of this world" and threaten violence measured in megadeaths should, in fact, lend strength to the resurgence of a kind of hostilities marked by poisoned bamboo spears, bazooka ambushes and civil war. In a recent article in these pages, the nature and dimensions of the problem have been thoughtfully analyzed.1 In the present discussion, I should like to focus attention on a series of 12 propositions derived from study of Communist theory and practice regarding the seizure of power by unconventional warfare.

Our starting point should be the fundamental role that internal war and unconventional warfare play in general Communist world strategy. On that foundation, we can examine Communist views on the expediency of waging unconventional warfare under various conditions, and on operational strategies likely to be used in cases where it is deemed feasible and desirable. Finally, it will be useful to take a closer look at guerrilla warfare in particular as a technique, in past and future Communist practice, for waging internal war. Thus we shall move from looking at unconventional war in Communist doctrine to looking at Communist doctrine on unconventional warfare.

II

Very simply, "internal," "unconventional," "irregular"-"class"-war is of the essence of Marxist-Leninist theory, hence at least theoretically at the base of Communist strategy. We became so accustomed to Stalin's reliance on the Red Army and the Soviet intelligence services as the most conspicuous elements of force in international politics that it takes a moment to place in focus the older-and newer-more fundamental Communist reliance on man?uvring and manipulating power on an indigenous political fulcrum. This is my first proposition.

This is a premium article

You must be a logged in Foreign Affairs subscriber to continue reading. If you wish to continue reading this article please subscribe , or activate your online account to get full online access.

Buy PDF

Buy a premium PDF reprint of this article.

Related

Essay, Jan 1964
Polycentrism and Western Policy
George F. Kennan

Much of the discussion in Western countries today of the problem of relations with world Communism centers around the recent disintegration of that extreme concentration of power in Moscow which characterized the Communist bloc in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, and the emergence in its place of a plurality of independent or partially independent centers of political authority within the bloc: the growth, in other words, of what has come to be described as "polycentrism." There is widespread recognition that this process represents a fundamental change in the nature of world Communism as a political force on the world scene; and there is an instinctive awareness throughout Western opinion that no change of this order could fail to have important connotations for Western policy. But just what these connotations are is a question on which much uncertainty and confusion still prevail.

Read
Essay, Jul/Aug 2007
The Return of Authoritarian Great Powers
Azar Gat

Liberal democracy, led by the United States, may have emerged triumphant from the great struggles of the twentieth century. But the post-Cold War rise of economically successful -- and nondemocratic -- China and Russia may represent a viable alternative path to modernity that leaves liberal democracy's ultimate victory and future dominance in doubt.

Read
Essay, Winter 1988
The Next Four Years: Introduction
FA editors

The election campaign failed to shed much light on the probable course of American foreign policy over the next four years. Domestic issues and personalities dominated the presidential contest; there was no urgent issue comparable to Korea in 1952, the Berlin and Cuban confrontations of the 1960s, Vietnam in the 1970s or even the Iran hostage crisis of 1980. President George Bush will probably not be confronted with a burning foreign policy problem in his first hundred days.

Read