South Africa and Contemporary Counterinsurgency: Roots, Practices, Prospects

This book has been compiled with the goal of stimulating thought and debate about insurgency and counterinsurgency from a South African perspective and with a focus on Sub-Saharan Africa. In this book, insurgency and counterinsurgency are discussed with reference to theory and practice, as well as the main case studies in existing literature. From a historical perspective, the evolution of counterinsurgency in Africa since colonial times receives attention, while a futures perspective considers evolving patterns and future trends. There are several chapters on South Africa, including counterinsurgency in Namibia, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) strategy during the liberation struggle, and the erosion of counterinsurgency expertise after democratisation in 1994. The case study on the Democratic Republic of Congo highlights the difficulties to stop insurgency within the confines of United Nations and multilateral peace missions, while the chapter on Afghanistan describes how advanced military forces became bogged down against resilient and adaptive insurgents in tough terrain during the Global War on Terror. The last section is a discussion on how to prepare for and conduct counterinsurgency. The book indicates that there is no clear distinction between robust peace operations and counterinsurgency, and that African countries require counterinsurgency capabilities to deal with widespread low-intensity conflicts on the continent. The book, however, underlines the limits of what military efforts can achieve, and emphasises the importance of political solutions, good governance, development, policing and social justice, interdisciplinary approaches, as well as collaboration between various national and international role-players. This book was a collaborative effort between South African, Australian and Canadian researchers.