Are there any historical examples of a guerrilla force being defeated by regular troops? I’m speaking of forces that fight on their own territory, without waging direct battles. And while there may be local defeats, I’m referring to “defeat” in terms of wars, not individual small-unit engagements.
With my limited knowledge of history, I can come up with only two examples:
The Boer War, where the British ceded to the majority of the Orange Free State and Transvaal demands and then delcared victory anyway. It could easily be argued that the guerrilla Boers won the war, so it’s not a great example.
The Wehrwolf forces in Germany at the close of WWII, which were not supported by the populace and were pretty much ineffectual.
Tupamaros in Uruguay
Montaneros in Argentina
The post WWII communist insurgency in Malaysia
The communist insurgency in Indonesia
It depends on what you mean by “defeated” too. In one of Ringo’s examples, the Sendero Luminoso has mostly been defeated at this point, but continues to hang on in remote areas. If Peru’s economy slides badly, who knows, they could come back.
Thanks for the responses. It’ll take me a bit to read up on them. Except for the Huks; thanks for the link Colibri.
Some of the answers weren’t quite what I was looking for, which is my own fault because I wasn’t sufficiently specific in my question. I’ll amend it by saying that I’m more interested in the regular military being a foreign power on foreign soil. (Which may be the case in many of the examples listed, as I said I’m not well versed in history)
As for the definition of “defeated” I guess I’m not entirely sure. “Reduced to a nuisance” probably counts as “defeated.”
Soviet Army vs partisans in eastern europe after WW2.
Franco vs all sorts of guerillas in the Spanish Civil War
British vs Sepoy Mutiny in India
Western powers vs Boxer Rebellion
Saddam Hussein vs rebels after Gulf War I
Heck, any number of dictators or central governments vs any number of rebellions. If the OP is under the apprehension that Guerillas always win they are suffering from selection bias. Sure, in the cases they’ve heard about the guerrillas won…because otherwise they’d be a footnote.
Usually the foreign power is in alliance with at least some local interests, so it may be difficult to determine whether an insurgency was defeated by the foreign troops or the local government supported by those troops.
Of the examples above, one might include:
U.S. suppression of Philippine rebels after the Spanish American war.
British troops against Malaysian communists post WWII
Foreign troops against the Boxers in China
British vs Sepoy Mutiny
Soviets vs Eastern European uprisings
Suppression of the Khmer Rouge by Vietnamese troops
One could also add to this the U.S. campaign against Sandino in Nicaragua in the 1930s, although Sandino was not killed until after the marines pulled out.
There’s winning and then there’s winning. France effectively defeated the rebels in Algeria but still relented on independence. Ditto Britain against the Mau Maus in Kenya, but a former Mau Mau became Kenya’s first prime minister.
There was considerable irregular resistance to the Union army during the American Civil War, especially in Missouri and other semi-frontier regions. The Union army learned to form special cavalry units to track and pursue mounted bands of “partisans” and “bushwackers”. Those that weren’t hunted down and killed either disbanded or went west and became outlaws.
Although in this case it’s hard to say whether the guerrillas were destroyed by direct action, or if they simply gave up when it became apparent that their cause- an independent Confederacy and slavery- was lost.
An interesting footnote to the U.S. Civil War is that there was also some guerilla resistance to Confederate forces in Confederate states (West Virginia is the best known source of resistance to the Confederacy, but fighting also took place in eastern Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi; and considerable numbers of irregulars joined Sherman during his march to the sea). These episodes provide an interesting contrast to how the Civil War is usually portrayed in American History texts & classrooms, but are not terribly relevant to the situation the OP is asking about… sorry for the hijack!
A recent book, Combating Terrorism, hails the Peruvian example with Sendero Luminoso as an excellent example of how to defeat guerillas… but that was not a foreign power. Surely the British Empire was replete with examples of either defeated guerillas or those reduced to an ‘acceptable’ level, but again, this was usually with the aid of local allies.
