Articles
Our articles cut through the noise on irregular warfare to connect strategic theory to operational reality and translate complexity into insight for practitioners and policymakers. No time to read? Check out our podcast, "Insider: Short of War," which transforms our articles into concise, engaging audio pieces you can listen to anywhere. Available directly in most of our articles and on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all major platforms.
NATO’s Latest Doctrine on Security Force Assistance: What’s New?
Editor’s Note: Readers will be aware of the latest tensions surrounding NATO following recent U.S. statements on tariffs and alliance commitments. This article was drafted and edited before those developments emerged, and therefore does not address them directly. In August 2025, NATO published the second edition of the
From Paper to Permafrost: Applying Irregular Warfare Doctrine to Arctic Homeland Defense
Editor’s Note: this article is being republished with the permission of Small Wars Journal as part of a republishing arrangement between IWI and SWJ. The original article was published on 12.02.2025 and is available here. Abstract The American Arctic is the shortest avenue of approach to the
Iran, Ukraine, and the Realities of “Resistance” & “Regime Change”
This article, published in Small Wars Journal in mid-2025, examines the limits of externally driven regime-change strategies through a comparative analysis of Iran and Ukraine. Drawing on Ukraine’s experience of bottom-up resistance, the authors argue that durable political transformation depends on long-term civic mobilisation rather
The Shadow War Within the Larger Conflict
How U.S. Special Forces Must Posture for Deep Area Operations in Large-Scale Combat Operations “While the main armies clash, it is in the shadows—deep in the enemy’s rear—that wars are often decided.” Operation Overlord (D-Day), the largest military operation in modern history, is remembered
The Northern Ireland Peace Process: From Armed Conflict to Brexit, by Eamonn O’Kane
Editor's Note: This article is a book review of The Northern Ireland Peace Process: From Armed Conflict to Brexit by Eamonn O’Kane, examining the author’s analysis of how peace in Northern Ireland has evolved long after the Good Friday Agreement. When did the conflict in Northern
Cognitive Warfare and the Indo-Pacific
Editor’s Note: This article was submitted as part of the Irregular Warfare Initiative’s 2025 Writing Contest, in which authors were invited to explore how the United States and its partners can use irregular warfare to strengthen security cooperation, build trust, and enhance resilience among Indo-Pacific nations. This
Beyond Lethality: The Primacy of Influence in Cognitive Warfare
“The decisive battles of modern warfare are no longer fought primarily on terrain, but in the minds of populations.” Introduction Twentieth-century warfare was defined by industrial-scale lethality: mass mobilization, mechanized destruction, and the pursuit of decisive battlefield supremacy. In contrast, the strategic environment of the twenty-first century
Q & A: Karl Marlantes on Vietnam, Leadership, and the Lessons America Still Hasn’t Learned
✉️ Email header below is auto-generated from this post’s author tag. It only appears in the newsletter — please don’t edit or delete it. Editor’s Note: This article is presented in a question-and-answer format, with the Irregular Warfare Initiative interviewing Karl Marlantes. This piece has been
Angle of Attack: Apache Attack Helicopters in Unmanned Skies
United States Army Aviation, at a crossroads of equipment and identity as aerial warfare increasingly emphasizes unmanned systems, faces a difficult reckoning akin to a historical quote by General (Ret.) Eric Shinseki, “if you don’t like change, you’ll like irrelevance even less.” To maintain utility in modernizing skies,
Choke Points: Critical Minerals and Irregular Warfare in the Gray Zone
Introduction In the situation rooms of Washington and the chancelleries of Europe, the future of warfare is often visualized as a contest of high-velocity hardware: the silent glide of a hypersonic vehicle, the swarm logic of autonomous drones, or the cryptographic shield of quantum computing. Yet, this fixation on
Bridging the gap between irregular warfare scholars, practitioners, and policymakers.
