Tribal Guerrilla Warfare Against a Colonial Power

Abstract

The guerrilla war in Afghanistan pits tribes against a colonial power. This form of guerrilla war is put into perspective and used to develop a simple dynamic mathematical model describing (1) the macrocombat interactions between the Afghan guerrilla forces and the Soviet and Afghan regular armies, and (2) the support of the guerrillas by the population. We perform various simulations using parameter values derived from guerrilla wars in South Sudan, Malaysia, and Yugoslavia. Most of our scenarios show that the guerrillas are relatively successful during the period retained for analysis (1980-1985) and inflict relatively heavy losses on Soviet forces. Only a very large Soviet escalation (over 300,000 troops) could make a difference, and even then, the resistance would be hard to eradicate because of the support of the population and the primitive state of the country.