ABSTRACT
For an insurgent actor like al-Qaeda, Jemaah Islamiah, or Lashkar-e-Taiba, there are many factors which can affect the likely intensity and success of its campaign. These include: the group’s access to resources; the proficiency of its leadership; and the extent of its territorial control. Perhaps one of the most important factors, however, is the strength of the insurgent actor’s capacity to regenerate (i.e. its ability to replace lost personnel with new recruits). While a strong regenerative capacity will allow the group to withstand opposing security force pressure and (at the very least) persist with its armed struggle; a weak regenerative capacity will trigger a contraction in the group’s membership – threatening its ability to conduct operations and, eventually, the very existence of the group itself. Thus, from a government perspective, attempting to weaken an insurgent actor’s capacity to regenerate is a seemingly intuitive and attractive means of managing, if not outright defeating, the insurgent actor. However, being able to affect insurgent regeneration is far from a simple undertaking; one that a number of governments – including, most notably, the Bush Administration in relation to al-Qaeda – have struggled to realise. The primary objective of this book is to provide scholars and officials with a greater understanding of how governments can favourably influence the capacity to regenerate of an insurgent actor. It sought to achieve this by exploring: why do the regenerative capacities of insurgent actors weaken? The exploration of this question took the form of a two-tier examination of three insurgent actors whose capacity to regenerate weakened in the past – namely, the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) of Canada, the Movimiento de Liberación Nacional – Tupamaros (MLN-T) of Uruguay, and the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) of Northern Ireland. The findings and implications of this examination will be discussed below. This will include general deductions for academics and policy-makers, followed by specific recommendations for liberal democratic governments to improve their ability to manage jihadi insurgent actors.
