Just Finished re-Reading: The War of the Flea – A Study of Guerrilla Warfare Theory & Practice by Robert Taber (FP: 1965/1969)

After reading this rich and well-argued little book (a mere 160 pages in my 1970 Paladin edition) I was no longer surprised that the entire first edition printed in the US was purchased by various branches of the military then engaged in a deadly guerrilla war in Vietnam. Not that it helped them win because, as the author himself cogently argued, it was probably already too late in 1965 never mind in 19775 when the war officially ended.

The author, neither a military man nor an academic, was a journalist and, by all accounts a damned good one. From reading this impressive analysis of the weak fighting against the strong (and sometimes seemingly the impossibly strong) I became more and more impressed as to the remarkable diagnostic focus he gave to modern conflicts were apparently weak enemies consistently beat much stronger ones – the classic example (still on-going at the time of publication) being that of Vietnam. But, as everyone should know, what we know as the Vietnam war was in fact the second such conflict in that region and, arguably, simply a continuation of the first complete with the same mistakes. Where the French failed after WW2 the Americans failed in the 1960’s and 1970’s. But although the two Vietnam conflicts garnered a substantial proportion of this book the authors analysis went much broader using examples from Malaya, Cyprus, Algeria, Ireland (from the Easter Rising in 1916 onwards), Greece (after WW2), Cuba and, of course, the Chinese Revolution/Civil War masterminded by Mao – the godfather of countless revolutions afterwards.

It was a lot of ground to cover and the author did so with little wasted effort and, more often than not, with pin-point accuracy not unlike his subjects the guerrilla fighters themselves. Most of the successful case studies followed the same progression through various stages from the founding of the guerrilla group up until final victory years or even decades later. Most rebellions, or wars of National Liberation, worked because the underlying conditions made them practically inevitable. His case studies of guerrilla wars that failed – most notably the Communist insurgency in Greece and the failed uprising in British Malaya – illustrated his points all the more starkly as each failed to follow Mao’s recommendations and sometimes actively worked against them.

This is an area of study of particular interest to me – how the weak can fight and even defeat a much stronger opponent (at least on paper). Fleas, it seems, can debilitate a much bigger and stronger dog one small bite at a time. But when the dog retaliates it strikes at nothing and slowly bleeds into inactivity and finally death. We still see it today – when Superpowers, no matter what they do short of genocide, seem helpless in the face of opponents with little more than the AK-47 they carry. Afghanistan is rightly renowned as being the grave site of empires and imperial ambitions. Alexander the Great couldn’t subdue it, neither could the British Empire, the Soviet Union or the USA. It is an example of the war of the flea – par excellence! Not only has this excellent little book rekindled my interest in this type of warfare it has also altered and sharpened my focus of my approach to the R4 label. In future there will be somewhat less revolution and somewhat more guerrilla activity in the bush. Much more to come.