Guerilla warfare according to Mao Tse-Tung:

Organization Phase:
Build up a structure of ‘cadres’ to organize population support (‘agit-prop’ teams to develop popular awareness / use of ‘selective terror’ against government officials, to eliminate landlords and others the population disliked, and to deter informers.
Guerilla Phase:
Introduce guerilla attacks and ambushes (to acquire weapons and blow up infrastructure) à make it difficult for governments to maintain a military presence (creation of ‘liberated areas’)
Mobile War (Third Phase)
Amounted to civil war / force government forces to retreat to major cities until these were surrounded by a hostile countryside.

Facts about Guerilla Warfare:

Used where to engage in conventional warfare would mean defeat.
Developed in rural societies where Marxist style revolution was not possible b/c of the lack of a proletariat.
Guerrilla tactics are the ‘practical methods of achieving the strategic objectives’ (Che Guevara) including mobility, self-sufficiency, sabotage…
Must establish parallel structures of government

Aim must be the changing of an unjust society / shouldn’t be used until all peaceful methods of obtaining change have been exhausted (Che Guevara)
Must have support of people. (Mao’s metaphor of the guerilla fighter being the fish and the people the sea)
Most movements have a middle class leadership.

Struggle of Asian and African people against colonial rule which meant conventional warfare was out of the question.
The areas of decolonialisation were suited to its use.

Outlawing of war (through UN)
Development of nuclear weapons meant that guerilla warfare was used as a ‘war by proxy’ btw the great powers.

Development of the Mass Media ß prevents the government forces from using all methods at their disposal.