Jo Bonner Quotes

Irregular war is far more intellectual than a bayonet charge.

Maybe it's the spy novelist in me looking for a future plot, but I hope the U.S. and its allies are thinking how to operate 'unconventionally' in Iraq and Syria in ways that undermine the Islamic State.

Demoralize the enemy from within by surprise, terror, sabotage, assassination. This is the war of the future.

The conventional army loses if it does not win. The guerilla wins if he does not lose.

Throughout most of our species’ long and bloody slog, warfare has primarily been carried out by bands of loosely organized, ill-disciplined, and lightly armed volunteers who distained open battle in favor of stealthy raids and ambushes: the strategies of both tribal warriors and modern guerrillas and terrorists. In fact, conventional warfare is the relatively recent invention.

A counter-insurgency is won by intelligence—not by bombardment.

Air power will not defeat ISIS. It has not been able to deny ISIS freedom of maneuver and the ability to attack at will.

I think we would find, if you study the conduct of guerilla-type wars, that the Obama Administration has hit more targets on a broader scale than the Nixon Administration ever did.

The resistance will be exclusively conducted by only one group. This new group will be defined soon by me.

Guerrilla war is a kind of war waged by the few but dependent on the support of many.

You can't talk about defeating insurgencies in the same way that you can with a conventional army.

Al-Qa'ida does not follow a traditional command structure, wear uniforms, carry its arms openly, or mass its troops at the borders of the nations it attacks. Nonetheless, it possesses the demonstrated capability to strike with little notice and cause significant civilian or military casualties.

We used to fight the LRA with only one dimensional force that only walks on foot, but now, we have got multiple forces to fight the rebels.

You will kill 10 of our men, and we will kill 1 of yours, and in the end it will be you who tire of it.

You know as well as I do that counterinsurgency is a very nuanced type of military operation.

An insurgency is the most difficult to fight of all military activities.

We cannot afford to be idle, and though weaker than our opponents in men and military equipments, must endeavor to harass if we cannot destroy them.

If we were fighting an army, the work would be comparatively easy. We are fighting a secret revolutionary organization.

Divide our forces to arouse the masses, concentrate our forces to deal with the enemy. The enemy advances, we retreat; the enemy camps, we harass; the enemy tires, we attack; the enemy retreats, we pursue. To extend stable base areas, employ the policy of advancing in waves; when pursued by a powerful enemy, employ the policy of circling around. Arouse the largest numbers of the masses in the shortest possible time and by the best possible methods.

Counter insurgency is something we can’t do, can’t do well, and shouldn’t be doing.

We fought a military war; our opponents fought a political one… The North Vietnamese used their armed forces the way a bull-fighter uses his cape — to keep us lunging in areas of marginal political importance.

The consequences of U. S. superiority is that its opponents, both state and non-state actors, will have little choice but to resort to guerilla tactics and urban warfare because they simply cannot confront U. S. forces head on..

Our enemies should take note. Arial attacks, stupendous in their mass effect, surprise, terror, sabotage, assassination from within, the murder of leading men, overwhelming attacks on all weak points in the enemies defense, sudden attacks, all in the same second without regard for reserves or losses.

Terrorism is a strategy of provocation.

We want to make the insurgents come to us. Make them be the aggressors. What I want to do is get on the inside looking out - instead of being on the outside looking in.