guerrilla warfare

Introduction
History
- Early history
- Origins of modern guerrilla warfare
- The Cold War period
- The post-Cold War period
Principles
- Purpose and motivation
- Popular support
- Leaders and recruits
- Organization and unity of command
- Arms
- Sanctuary and support
- Terror
Strategy and tactics
Counterguerrilla warfare

References & Edit History Related Topics

Images & Videos

A masked person in military clothing stands in a desert landscape holding a black flag with white Arabic script associated with the Islamic State.

Rashīd al-Dīn: Mongol warriors from History of the World

Ilya Yefimovich Repin: Zaporozhian Cossacks

Engraved portrait of General Francis Marion in military uniform with epaulettes and a tricorn hat, facing slightly to the left.

Pancho Villa rides a horse at the front of a group of armed followers and horse-drawn wagons during a raid in a dusty, rural landscape, 1916.

Quizzes

Louis IX of France (St. Louis), stained glass window of Louis IX during the Crusades. (Unknown location.)

World Wars

Related Questions

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History Wars, Battles & Armed Conflicts

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External Websites

ABC listen - Politics Now - Guerrilla warfare in the midst
Army University Press - Guerrilla Warfare
Columbia University Press - CIAO Database - Conceptualisation of Guerrilla Warfare
New Georgia Encyclopedia - Guerrilla Warfare during the Civil War
American Battlefield Trust - Guerrilla Warfare
Royal United Services Institute - Blurring victory in guerrilla warfare
PhilArchive - An Analysis of Guerilla Warfare: From Carl von Clausewitz to T.E. Lawrence (PDF)
ABC listen - Late Night Live - Guerrilla warfare; Henry Reynolds on Tasmania.
PBS - Guerrilla Tactics
U.S. Naval Institute - Guerilla Warfare

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Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students.

guerrilla warfare - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)

guerrilla warfare

military tactics

Written by

Robert Brown Asprey

Military historian and biographer. Author of War in the Shadows and others.

Robert Brown Asprey

Fact-checked by

Britannica Editors

Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....

Britannica Editors

Last updated

Oct. 19, 2026 •History

guerrilla warfare, type of warfare fought by irregulars in fast-moving, small-scale actions against orthodox military and police forces and, on occasion, against rival insurgent forces, either independently or in conjunction with a larger political-military strategy. The word guerrilla (the diminutive of Spanish guerra, “war”) stems from the duke of Wellington’s campaigns during the Peninsular War (1808–14), in which Spanish and Portuguese irregulars, or guerrilleros, helped drive the French from the Iberian Peninsula. Over the centuries...

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