CounterInsurgency (reading reference) part 1

Brendan McQuade: The Return of Domestic CounterInsurgency?: "What is Counterinsurgency?

In the terms of Petraeus' celebrated manual, counterinsurgency is the 'military, paramilitary, political, economic, psychological and civic actions taken by a government to defeat insurgency.' Petraeus describes 'insurgency' as 'an organized protracted politico-military struggle to weaken the control of and legitimacy of an established government, occupying power or other political authority while increasing insurgent control.'

More critically and historically, counterinsurgency involves a powerful state intervening into a militarily weak (and formerly colonized) society. In contrast to the traditional military war aim, defeating the rival army, counterinsurgency has political goals: building a regime supportive to that more powerful state's political project and, usually, destroying the revolutionary movement that challenges it. On lower level, counterinsurgency begins with an intelligence effort, gathering information on the politics and culture of the society begin targeted. The goal is to penetrate into the intimate corners of a society—to get agents inside civil society organizations, families, and social networks—and figure out who is 'the wrong side.'

With this intelligence on hand, the task becomes neutralizing political rivals by turning, capturing, or killing them."