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I INSURGENTS, INCUBATION, and SURVIVAL

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I INSURGENTS, INCUBATION, and SURVIVAL i INSURGENTS, INCUBATION, AND SURVIVAL: HOW PREWAR PREPARATION FACILITATES LENGTHY INTRASTATE CONFLICTS A Dissertation Submitted to the Temple University Graduate Board In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Joel John Blaxland December 2018 Examining Committee Members: Hillel David Soifer, Advisory Chair, Department of Political Science––Temple University Ryan J. Vander Wielen, Department of Political Science––Temple University Jane Vaynman, Department of Political Science––Temple University Janet I. Lewis, Political Science Department––United States Naval Academy ii ABSTRACT Since 1945, insurgents around the globe have increasingly dragged comparatively larger, better funded, and militarily superior regimes into protracted intrastate conflicts. The theory posited in this dissertation claims insurgents are able to do so because of choices made before large-scale conflict erupted––or during a period of time I call, incubation–– because it prepares them to endure conflict. After controlling for standard explanations, I offer statistical evidence that proto-insurgent incubation duration is statistically significant and positively related to conflict duration. Using case studies of Latin American insurgencies––Sendero Luminoso, the MIR, and the FMLN––I demonstrate the capacity to endure conflict long-term was a direct cause of both length and quality of prewar preparation. Sendero and the FMLN used incubation to set up efficient processes for tasks like recruitment, combat training, and coordinating personnel, which prepared them for wartime, and consequently, facilitated lengthy intrastate conflicts. The MIR however, squandered its time in incubation. Despite failing to adequately accomplish most of the prewar preparation tasks outlined in this dissertation, this insurgency challenged the government anyway; and was thus defeated brutally and swiftly. This dissertation turns our attention to insurgents before conflict and the important role antecedent behaviors play later on during conflict. Before now, precious few conflict scholars have taken the prewar time period seriously or even considered the ways this segment of time can condition insurgent behavior during wartime. By turning attention backwards in time to the prewar period, this dissertation provides a new approach for explaining insurgent war duration. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge the enduring patience and support of my committee, cohort, friends, and family during this dissertation’s construction. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT………………………………………………………………………………ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS………………………………………………………………iii LIST OF TABLES………………………………………………………………………...v LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………………………………vi CHAPTERS 1. INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………...1 2. INCUBATION, HOW IT IS MISSED, WHY THAT MATTERS, AND HOW TO (HELP) FIX THE PROBLEM………………………………………..13 3. THE THEORY OF INCUBATION……………………………………………...36 4. CODING AND TESTING INCUBATION……………………………………...89 5. SENDERO LUMINOSO……………………………………………………….111 6. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE MIR AND THE FMLN……………..157 7. CONCLUSIONS……………………………………………………………….212 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………………221 APPENDICES A. CHAPTER 4……………………………………………………………………237 B. BIBLIOGRAPHY: INSURGENT GROUPS…………………………………..245 v LIST OF TABLES Table 2.1 Conflict Duration Measures: M23 (DRC) v. Al-Shabaab (Somalia)…………....19 4.1 Probability of Exit………………………………………………………………102 A.1 Outcome…………………………………..…………………………………….237 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 4.1 Relationship Between Incubation Duration and Conflict Duration…………..…94 4.2 Exit as a Function of Incubation………………………………………………..103 4.3 Incubation and Conflict Duration 2x2………………………………………….107 5.1 Sendero’s Geographic Expansion During the War……………………………..116 A.1 Terrain at the 10th percentile………………………………………………...….238 A.2 Terrain at the 75th percentile………………………..…………………………..239 A.3 Terrain at the 90th percentile………………...……………………………….…239 A.4 Robust State Capacity………………………………………………………..…240 A.5 Weak State Capacity……………………………………………………………240 A.6 Robust state capacity; terrain at 25th percentile………………………………...241 A.7 Robust state capacity; terrain at 75th percentile………………………………...242 A.8 Weak state capacity; terrain at 25th percentile………………………….………243 A.9 Weak state capacity; terrain at 75th percentile…………………………….....…243 A.10 GDP per capita 25th percentile…………….…………………….……………...244 A.11 GDP per capita 75th percentile…….………………………….………………...244 vii Page intentionally left blank 1 CHAPTER 1––INTRODUCTION Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara’s 1967 Bolivian insurgency should have been a success. Yet without sufficient planning even the world’s most experienced, skilled, and crafty insurgent in a setting particularly suited for insurgency was still destined to fail. Jump- starting an insurgency from the ground up1 was not a particularly flawed proposition per se. The FSLN2 in Nicaragua and the FAR3 in Guatemala had done this only a few years prior. Geographically, Bolivia was also an insurgent’s dream. There were “five borders, valleys and mountains, tropical and snow-covered regions;”4 a near perfect environment for hiding basecamps and establishing nearby cross-border sanctuaries.5 There were already established bases of support in Bolivia;6 revolutionary sympathizers there had supplied material backing during the early days of the July Twenty-Sixth Movement.7 Bolivia was also significantly underdeveloped8 and the military regime helmed by General René Barrientos Ortuño was weak and unstable.9 The story from here is remarkably well known and has been elsewhere chronicled in meticulous detail. Despite a setting where he should have been successful for so many reasons––favorable geography, sympathetic comrades, widespread poverty, and a weak government––Che was killed and his insurgency vanquished less than a year after it was launched. Could his missteps have been avoided? Would the Bolivian foco succeeded 1 According to Castañeda (1997, 339), “Che and the Cubans did not sweep down upon Bolivia to join a 2 Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (Sandinista National Liberation Front) 3 Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes (Rebel Armed Forces) 4 Castañeda (1997, 334) 5 For a discussion on terrain favorable to insurgency, see Fearon and Laitin (2001). For a discussion on cross-border sanctuaries as favorable to insurgency, see Salehyan, Idean (2009) Rebels without Borders: Transnational Insurgencies in World Politics, Cornell University Press 6 According to Castañeda (332), there was already “within the Communist Party (PCB), a nucleus of cadres linked with Cuba. Similarly, a small group of Bolivian students had received training in Cuba in 1965.” 7 McCormick (1997, 12) 8 Library of Congress, Federal Research Division, Country Profile: Bolivia, January (2006, 4) 9 Biggeman et al. (2014, 262) 2 had its helmsman prepared differently? In this dissertation I argue that prewar preparation is one of the most important factors for explaining long-lasting, durable insurgency. 1.1 The Puzzle of Protracted Insurgent War Intrastate conflicts over the last half-century have become bloodier, longer, and have seldom ended neatly, if at all10––take the ongoing insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan as cursory examples. “The average civil war lasts over six times longer than the average international war.”11 This is compounded by the fact the average duration of intrastate conflict has steadily increased from two years in 1945 to more than 16 years today.12 While intrastate conflict outbreak has remained steady at around 2.3 per year since 1945,13 they conclude at a far less rate.14 What has resulted is an “almost linear accumulation of unresolved conflicts since 1945.”15 This puzzle––how comparatively weak insurgents survive for years or even decades against state-backed armed forces–– has preoccupied the minds of many conflict and civil war scholars. This dissertation joins the debate by introducing a novel concept to explain insurgent wartime survivability; a theory I call, incubation. At its core, I claim incubating advantages the aspiring insurgent (proto-insurgent16 hereafter) and facilitates protracted conflict. The notion that then drives this dissertation is rather simple: it is always better to be prepared. More specifically, I claim a proto- insurgent that takes a longer period of time to prepare for conflict will last longer than a proto-insurgent that takes less time, and unquestionably longer than one that forgoes 10 See, Lyall and Wilson (2009); Lyall (2010); Fearon and Laitin (2003) 11 Collier, Hoeffler and Söderbom (2004, 253) 12 Fearon and Laitin (2001, 1) 13 From the paper presented by Fearon and Laitin (2001, 1) at the 2001 Annual Meetings of the American Political Science Association, San Francisco, CA, August 30-September 2 14 According to Fearon and Laitin (2001, 1), only 1.7 conflicts end per year, on average. 15 Fearon and Laitin (2001, 1) 16 I borrowed this term from Daniel Byman (2008). 3 prewar preparation altogether. Wartime survivability is thus a function of the proto- insurgent’s behavior during the prewar period. Insurgent goals vary widely. While many harbored lofty ambitions of producing a revolution where the incumbent will be ousted, I begin with the assumption that insurgents do not necessarily have to topple the state in order to ‘win.’ To be sure, there have been cases of all-out insurgent victory––take the aforementioned July Twenty-Sixth Movement as a classic example. But there are a growing number of cases where insurgents have either failed to topple a government17
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