ABSTRACT
The interest in the topics of insurgency and counterinsurgency has been far from consistent. Several times insurgency has been declared dead and buried; Steven Metz wrote in 1995 that ‘[t] he insurgents of the world are sleeping’ (Metz 1995: 1). Walter Laqueur concluded in 1998 that ‘[g]uerrilla war may not entirely disappear but, seen in historical perspective, it is on the decline’ (Laqueur 1998). The interest in counterinsurgency has suffered a similar fate. Preferably forgotten after the Vietnam War, after the recent spike in interest, it has now again been declared beyond its peak and even useless for explaining current violence.
