The Rhizome Theory of Guerilla War

Guerillas and soldiers can be poets too...

When I travelled in China in 1998 two things struck me. One was the dreadful air pollution in cities like Hangzhou, Shanghai and Beijing. A dry white mist blotted out the sky, shrouding temples, trees, roads and buildings. The air was foul and gritty.

The other was the proliferation of Mao Zedong paraphernalia. Capitalism was in full swing but street stalls were crammed with souvenirs of the Great Helmsman: Mao's 'Little Red Book', tracts about 'Mao Zedong Thought', lapel badges with Mao's smiling face. I returned home with a brass bust of Mao. It sits on my desk, a reminder of the powerful impact that an individual can have, and how easily power turns to tyranny.

Mao was one of the greatest theorists and practitioners of guerilla warfare. Most of us have heard his famous dictum of guerillas as fish swimming in the sea of the peasantry. The analogy is simple, powerful and poetic, like the writing of Sun-tzu, the ancient Chinese strategist who wrote The Art of War, a work which greatly influenced Mao.

Another military thinker influenced by Sun-tzu is General Sir Rupert Smith, a British army commander who commanded UN forces in Bosnia in 1995. Under Smith's command, UN forces broke the Bosnian Serb siege of Sarajevo, a decisive act that lead to a ceasefire and to the Dayton Peace Accords.

Now retired, Smith has written The Utility of Force (2005). One of his key ideas is that Western militaries are organized to fight 'interstate industrial wars' (such as WWII), now rare, as opposed to 'wars amongst the people' (guerilla conflicts, civil wars), which are all too common. Another is that whereas Western governments use force to try to achieve quick and decisive political results, in 'wars amongst the people' such results are generally not possible.

Smith describes the command structure of guerilla and terrorist networks as 'rhizomatic'. Rhizomatic plants propagate partly through their roots. The guerilla's rhizomatic command structure has a hierarchal system 'above ground' (visible and expendable), and a true system hidden 'below ground'. The latter is a horizontal system with many discrete groups or cells spread throughout the civilian population and doing the dirty work (fighting, terrorizing). The rhizomatic command system "is difficult to attack, just as rhizomatic weeds are difficult to eradicate".

Why is this? Leadership, motivation, expertise and resources are spread throughout the system, rather than being concentrated and vulnerable in the centre or at an apex (as say in a conventional army). Once the system has propagated sufficiently, the centre may simply issue general directions that are in line with the terrorist movement's overall aim, and let the individual cells carry out the orders as they see fit. Even if the security forces eradicate one part of the system, other parts are left to carry on. The activities of some cells may distract the security forces, while other cells are left to plan or action other attacks in relative safety and obscurity.

Referring to Mao, Smith says that the civilian population is to the guerilla group as the soil is to the rhizome. Smith's analogy may be less poetic than Mao's 'fish swimming in the sea', but it provides a brilliant insight into the workings of guerilla and terrorist organizations.

Comments

[Yours Truly]

Rhizome?Have you ever read the works of Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari?Can't really figure out what they're trying to covey though.

[Kotare]

No I haven't, although I've read books written in a similar vein, Foucault for example, and Said ("Culture and History"). Because I couldn't make sense of them, I gave up reading such books long ago. Give me someone who writes simply and in plain language anyday.