“Political power comes out of the barrel of a gun” said Mao in 1938. Mao Tse-tung was a Chinese communist revolutionary and the founding father of the PRC who wrote the famous book On Guerrilla Warfare in 1937. The book is known to be one of the most important books on learning how to wage a revolution in developing countries. Up until the 1930s-1940s, guerrilla tactics were mostly revolving around the military, with no real political goal. Mao’s addition to insurgency caused asymmetric warfare to shift from a military perspective to a more strategic and political one. Mao was able to bring changes to the way insurgencies were previously conducted by mobilizing the rural population, gaining their support, and using local grievances in order to achieve a political goal. The innovations that Mao brought to insurgency, such as the three-phase approach, are still very relevant, and even help explain how today’s insurgencies work.
Mao established the importance of the organizational side of insurgencies by delineating essential steps that are necessary to reach the insurgents’ political goal. He considered that the first and most important step to start a guerrilla warfare is to slowly and patiently win the population’s support by tapping into their grievances and using those as a means to mobilize and organize the people. He made it clear that the people’s support and their political goals cannot be dismissed if one wants to start an insurgency: “guerrilla warfare basically derives from the masses and is supported by them, it can neither exist nor flourish if it separates itself from their sympathies and cooperation”. Mao’s agrarian program was mostly based on land reform, as he promised free land to all, and was therefore able to rally the support of the masses. Uniting the population under a party with a political aim, and establishing an infrastructure before starting guerrilla operations was the first phase of Mao’s three-phase approach on how to start a revolution. He established the precept that insurgents most importantly needed to organize themselves politically rather than militarily, as this would make it harder for the enemy to beat the insurgents with military force alone. The second phase would enable the revolution to transition from an armed political action into guerrilla warfare. Violence was perceived as a necessary means that would allow the insurgents to achieve their political goals. Mao strongly emphasized the need for attacking the government when it’s weak, refusing battle when the opponent is strong, and conducting hit-and-run operations, a tactic that has been employed by many insurgents since. Overall, Mao established the idea that the local grievances of the rural population need to be strategically combined to bigger political solutions in order to create a revolutionary society.
Mao created different steps that need to be followed in a linear progression in order to wage a successful guerrilla warfare. After organizing, consolidating the people, and “achieving internal unification politically”, the transition from the political revolution into guerrilla warfare happens, where bases are implemented and the population becomes armed. In this phase, regular fighting units are created, in order to prepare the insurgents for the final phase, which is when the guerrilla warfare changes into a conventional warfare. The combination of regular and irregular army units pursuing irregular operations is one of Mao’s innovations, and one that is still used by insurgents nowadays. Additionally, in the second phase of his plan, Mao highlighted the need for insurgents to establish a revolutionary administration that can rival with the enemy, which would also helps with the transition into the third and final step. Indeed, once the revolutionary administration is created, the insurgents can wage a conventional warfare against the opponent and seize the government, as well as urban areas, which are the overall final targets. The second phase of the program was designed to achieve strategic stalemate through terror, protracted guerrilla warfare, but also through the use of the “regular” units. As insurgents grow stronger, the goal is to take down the opponent’s military and move on to the final phase, where insurgents take the offense and wage a mobile conventional warfare. Mao knew that the transition from guerrilla warfare to regular warfare was necessary as guerrilla warfare could never be conclusive. Overall, Mao’s contribution to insurgency and his strategic approach on how to wage a successful guerrilla warfare is based on the combination of an organizational approach with the agricultural areas.
Although, most insurgencies today mirror the classic three phase approach established by Mao, there are some revolutionary guerrilla warfares that veer from it, and are still successful. For instance, during the Afghanistan insurgency against the Soviet Union from 1979 to 1989, the mujahideen did not follow the three phases. Indeed, because the mujahideen were composed of several religious and ethnic groups, the insurgents did not rally behind a clear political goal, rather they rallied behind a military one, which was to get the USSR out of Afghanistan. Additionally, because the insurgents came from different backgrounds, there was no structural unity amongst them, and therefore creating a revolutionary administration or regular fighting units was out of question. Even though they did not follow the three-phase program that Mao had established, the revolutionary guerrilla warfare was still successful in pushing the Soviets out of Afghanistan. Some scholars have argued that today’s insurgencies often skip the first phase of rallying the people under a political party, and instead they “let armed conflict speak for itself, filling in around the edges with subversion, terrorism, dispute resolution, and, at times, humanitarian aid to enhance the appeal of their arms”. Therefore, although Mao’s innovations to insurgency are still relevant in many cases, some insurgencies might not have to neatly pass through all of the three phases to be successful.
The Afghanistan insurgency is one of the few examples where insurgents did not follow Mao’s precepts, as many insurgents today still act in accordance with the three-phase approach. One famous example of an insurgents following Mao’s three-step approach to guerrilla warfare is Viet Congs against the US. Ho Chi Minh had gained the support of the masses in contested territories, and conducted hit-and-run operations on the US forces. He clearly tried to organize and create “regular” fighting units in order to switch to a more conventional type of warfare, and move from phase two to the final phase, which he tried to do during the Tet Offensive in 1968. Although the large scale attack wasn’t conclusive, Ho used the three phase approach, shifting between the phases depending on the status of the insurgency, as well as used the combination of regular (The Tet Offensive) and irregular operations in order to defeat the US and South Vietnamese. Scholars have also argued that Al Qaeda’s approach also follows the three-phase approach. Indeed, Al Qaeda members first use small groups in rural areas and conduct guerrilla operations to weaken the government, before settling down in villages and building up their power. The final phase arrives after they unite with other similar groups and end up controlling larger areas until they are able to overthrow the government. Even though Al Qaeda’s efforts have ultimately not been successful, the group has tried to stick to the Maoist steps, and such efforts were undertaken in North Africa, the Sinai, Syria, Iraq, etc. Like for Mao, Al Qaeda uses violence in order to achieve a political objective. Since Mao established the importance of having a political goal when conducting a guerrilla warfare, the nature of insurgencies has completely shifted from a military aspect to a more political one. Therefore, the changes that Mao has brought to insurgency are still very relevant today, as we can see with the Viet Congs and Al Qaeda.
Mao has changed the essence of insurgency by grounding the revolution into the rural population and using their grievances in order to rally them under a party with specific political objectives. He created a three-phase approach on how to conduct a successful revolution, by one organizing and consolidating the people, two creating “regular” army units, implementing an administration, and conducting regular and irregular operations to destabilize the opponent, and finally transitioning from a guerrilla warfare to a conventional one in order to overthrow the government and take over urban areas. Although there have been cases where insurgencies have not followed the Maoist steps and have still been successful, most insurgencies today follow them and have not veered from the changes Mao brought to insurgency.