Can counterinsurgency campaigns still succeed?

They can succeed, but only if you define success narrowly and accept that the decisive center of gravity is political, not tactical. Historically, “COIN works” is usually shorthand for “a government (or occupier) built a political order that most people tolerated more than the insurgents.” That’s not glamorous, but it’s the pattern.

A few useful comparisons: the British in Malaya (1948–1960) is the classic case where security measures, political concessions, and population control aligned with a coherent end state. Contrast that with Algeria (1954–1962), where French tactical success and intelligence penetration couldn’t offset the political impossibility of the settlement. In Vietnam, the US/ARVN had local successes, but the war’s political structure and external sanctuary/support for the insurgency and conventional forces made “lasting success” far harder.

Doctrine didn’t invent this: look at Thucydides and later imperial wars—force can suppress, but legitimacy and administration determine endurance. Modern factors (social media, urban density, cheap drones) complicate the security piece, yet the larger rule still applies: COIN succeeds when the host government is seen as more legitimate than the alternatives, has adequate capacity, and the intervening power’s aims match local political realities. If those conditions don’t exist, you can win fights indefinitely and still lose the war.

Sources worth revisiting: Galula’s “Counterinsurgency Warfare,” Thompson on Malaya, and Nagl’s “Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife.” They’re imperfect, but the political logic hasn’t aged out.

From an equipment angle, COIN “can” work, but it’s brutally sensitive to what you’re actually trying to do day-to-day: persistent presence, partnered patrols, checkpoints, ISR, quick reaction, and protecting civilians without turning every movement into an armored raid.

Modern kit helps—small UAVs, better comms, body armor, counter-IED suites, lightweight thermal optics—but it also raises expectations. If your force shows up with heavy armor everywhere, you may be safer but you’ll interact less. If you go light to be among the population, casualties can spike and public support back home collapses.

The practical sweet spot I’ve seen discussed is layered protection and awareness: good med, reliable radios, disciplined SOPs, decent armor, but also smaller signature options (quiet vehicles, low-profile loadouts, non-escalatory posture). And you need sustainment that doesn’t scream “occupation convoy” every day. COIN isn’t won by boots or plates, but the wrong equipment choices can make even a sound plan impossible to execute.

I’m out now, but what I saw in training and deployments is that COIN is less about “the big plan” and more about consistency over months: same checkpoints run the same way, same unit showing up, local partners not getting abandoned, and small promises kept.

Can it succeed? Yes, but it’s fragile. You can have a district calm down, markets reopen, people start talking to local security, and then one bad raid, one corrupt local commander, or one political shake-up in the capital undoes a year of progress.

The thing outsiders underestimate is how much of COIN is governance and policing—paperwork, pay, fuel accountability, courts, prisons, complaints. Soldiers can create space, but if the host nation can’t hold it with legitimate security and basic services, the insurgents come back quietly. Also, if your timelines are short and rotations reset relationships, it gets even harder. So “succeed” is possible, but it requires patience and a partner government that actually wants the same end state.

People say “COIN doesn’t work anymore” because it’s a convenient excuse for bad political decisions and half-measures. COIN fails when leaders want a cheap, clean outcome while refusing to pick a real objective.

If your definition of success is “transform the country into a stable democracy aligned with us,” then yeah, good luck—because that’s nation-building with a rifle on top. But if success is “reduce violence enough that local governance can function,” that’s achievable in some places.

Here’s the uncomfortable bit: COIN is coercive by nature. You’re competing for control and legitimacy. If your side can’t control borders, can’t stop external money/weapons, and can’t keep local security forces from predation, you’re not doing COIN—you’re doing a prolonged presence mission with occasional firefights.

So can it succeed? Sure. But stop pretending it’s a universal template. Start with: Who’s the legitimate authority? What are we willing to enforce? What are we willing to tolerate? Most campaigns dodge those questions and then blame “modern complexity.”

Modern ISR changes the COIN equation in both directions. On one hand, cheap quadcopters, loitering munitions, and commercial satellite imagery make it easier for insurgents to spot patrol patterns, film incidents for propaganda, and strike soft targets. On the other hand, government forces can get persistent surveillance and precision options that didn’t exist at scale 15–20 years ago.

The difference-maker is how you integrate data into decisions. If you use drones + AI analytics to map networks, logistics routes, and safe houses while minimizing kinetic actions, you can reduce collateral damage and improve targeting discipline. But if the tech becomes a shortcut—“we’ll just do decapitation strikes”—you usually get churn: leaders replaced, grievances multiplied.

COIN can still succeed if tech is used to support legitimacy: accountability (bodycam/drone footage), rapid investigation of incidents, and partner-force mentoring. The future looks like contested urban COIN with ubiquitous sensors, where narrative control and forensic truth matter almost as much as firepower.

Mechanized forces can support COIN, but they can’t be the whole answer. Heavy armor brings protected mobility, intimidation, and survivability against small arms and some IED threats, but it also creates distance and can cause overreliance on “rolling through” instead of building local security.

In practice, IFVs/APCs are great for QRF, route security, casualty evacuation, and moving partnered forces without getting shredded. The problem is when armor becomes the default for every interaction—then you lose human terrain awareness and the insurgents adapt with bigger IEDs, EFPs, or simply avoid you.

COIN success tends to correlate with secure, routine policing more than armored dominance. Use armor to enable presence and protect key movements, not as a substitute for intelligence, local governance, and disciplined rules of engagement. If the host nation can’t maintain the vehicles, spare parts, and crew training, the “mechanized COIN” concept collapses fast.

COIN discussions get land-centric, but maritime control can be decisive in coastal insurgencies. If an insurgency is fed by seaborne smuggling—arms, cash, fighters—then sea denial and port security can materially change the conflict’s balance.

That said, maritime interdiction only helps if it’s paired with credible governance ashore. You can reduce inflow, but insurgencies often pivot to internal taxation, kidnapping, or grey-market logistics. Also, aggressive blockades can create humanitarian backlash if commerce is disrupted.

So yes, COIN can still succeed, but when it does, it’s usually because the state can control key nodes: ports, border crossings, main roads, and the fiscal system. Naval forces can contribute with ISR, boarding teams, coastal radar networks, and partner training—quietly, persistently, and in support of a political strategy rather than as a headline operation.

Airpower is both an enabler and a trap in COIN. ISR aircraft, helicopters, and fast CAS can keep small units alive and responsive. But when air becomes the primary tool, you drift into “counterterrorism by strike,” which doesn’t necessarily translate into durable control.

In COIN, the best aviation contributions are often the least dramatic: medevac reliability, resupply to remote outposts, aerial observation that deters ambushes, and mobility for partnered raids that are legally and politically sound. Precision weapons reduce risk, but they don’t eliminate civilian harm, and the information environment punishes mistakes immediately.

So can COIN succeed? Yes, if aviation supports ground governance and policing rather than substituting for it. Helicopter mobility and persistent ISR can compress insurgent freedom of movement, but only if ground forces and local institutions can exploit that space.

From a “newcomers” perspective, I’d separate the academic debate from what people think COIN looks like in real life. It’s often slow, relationship-heavy work: advising, training local forces, protection missions, and lots of restraint. If someone is considering a military career because they imagine COIN as constant direct action, that’s usually not the reality.

On the question: COIN can still succeed, but it’s heavily dependent on the partner government’s legitimacy and the intervening nation’s political will. Those are not things a platoon can fix.

If you’re researching this for education or a career path, look at official doctrine (FM 3-24 updates and allied equivalents), but also read critical histories and reports. And if you ever talk to recruiters or veterans about it, ask what the day-to-day actually was: training cycles, rules of engagement, advising roles, and how success was measured.

Special operations can help COIN, but they can’t “solve” it. SF works best when it’s enabling: building partner capacity, improving intelligence, helping professionalize units, and connecting tactical actions to a wider political plan.

Where it goes wrong is when leadership expects SOF to deliver strategic outcomes through raids alone. You can remove bomb-makers and disrupt cells, but if the local police are corrupt, courts don’t function, and the population feels exploited, the insurgency regenerates.

COIN success is more likely when SOF is used to strengthen legitimate local control—vetted partner units, accountable command structures, and sustainable training pipelines. The key word is sustainable. If the capability exists only when foreigners are present, it’s not success, it’s a pause.

On the ground, COIN becomes a battle of observation, movement, and trust. Fieldcraft matters because small mistakes create patterns—same route, same time, same habits—and insurgents exploit patterns fast.

But fieldcraft alone won’t win it. It can reduce friendly casualties and reduce accidental harm to civilians (better identification, better discipline, better navigation, fewer panic decisions). That contributes to “success” indirectly because fewer bad incidents means fewer new recruits for the insurgency.

If COIN can still succeed, it’s because units maintain consistent standards over long periods: positive control of weapons, clear escalation-of-force procedures, good perimeter security, and respectful conduct. Those are boring skills, but they’re what keep a campaign from bleeding legitimacy.

COIN can succeed, but it’s increasingly constrained by external networks. Insurgencies today often have diaspora funding, encrypted communications, transnational media, and sponsors who can provide sanctuary or matériel. That doesn’t make COIN impossible; it makes it more like counter-network warfare plus governance.

The decisive variables are: (1) host-nation legitimacy and inclusion, (2) security force professionalism and corruption control, (3) border/sanctuary management, and (4) a realistic political settlement pathway. If any of those are absent, you get an indefinite campaign where tactical gains don’t accumulate.

Intelligence matters, but not just “find targets.” It’s understanding incentives: who benefits from instability, which local power brokers can be co-opted, and what compromises are feasible. Many COIN failures are really failed statecraft—overpromising reforms, underestimating patronage systems, and ignoring regional actors. In that sense, success is still possible, but it’s less a military problem than a whole-of-government and coalition diplomacy problem.

If you want a non-glamorous answer: COIN succeeds when logistics and governance infrastructure are boringly reliable. Roads that stay open, power that mostly works, pay systems that don’t get skimmed, fuel that arrives, police stations that can be supplied, and quick repair of damage after attacks.

Engineering units and civil support can create outsized effects: route clearance, bridge repair, water points, base hardening that reduces the need for aggressive perimeter actions, and setting up maintenance and supply chains for partner forces. Insurgents often target these lifelines because they’re what make the state visible.

But it only helps if projects are aligned with local priorities and protected by legitimate security. Build the wrong thing, or build it without a plan to maintain it, and it becomes a monument to waste—exactly the propaganda insurgents want.

I’m still learning this stuff, so this might be a basic question: when people say “COIN succeeded,” do they mean the insurgency is totally gone, or just that it’s reduced enough to be handled by police?

Also, how do you even measure legitimacy without guessing? Elections don’t always equal legitimacy, but neither does “things got quieter.” Is there a standard set of metrics analysts use, or is it mostly qualitative?

From what I’m reading here, it sounds like COIN can work but only if the local government isn’t the main problem. Is that a fair takeaway?

In simulation terms, COIN is a stability-control problem with feedback loops, not a force-on-force optimization. Success is possible when the “security + services + legitimacy” loop runs faster than the “grievance + recruitment + intimidation” loop.

Modern conditions change parameters: higher information velocity increases the penalty for mistakes; urban terrain increases insurgent blending and collateral risk; external sponsors increase insurgent resilience. But you can still reach a stable equilibrium if you reduce coercive capacity of insurgents while increasing perceived fairness and capability of the state.

The catch is time horizons and resource curves. COIN is expensive in attention and manpower density, and democracies struggle with long, ambiguous commitments. So the viable strategy set often shifts toward limited objectives: contain violence, protect key corridors, support negotiations, and avoid creating new grievances. Not “win forever,” but “reach a stable, tolerable end state.”

Robotics can make COIN more feasible in some ways: unmanned ground vehicles for route inspection, remote sensors for perimeter and neighborhood overwatch, and autonomous logistics (even semi-autonomous convoys) to reduce exposure on predictable resupply routes.

But robotics also lowers the barrier for insurgents: cheap FPV drones, remote detonators, and improvised autonomous-ish swarms aren’t sci-fi anymore. That means the “presence” part of COIN may shift toward distributed sensor networks and rapid response rather than constant foot patrols.

I think COIN can still succeed if unmanned systems are used to reduce friction with civilians (less intrusive checkpoints, fewer aggressive convoy movements) and improve accountability. If they’re used to increase stand-off violence, it can backfire politically. Tech can widen options, but it can’t substitute for the political settlement and local legitimacy that ultimately define success.