Small Wars and Insurgencies in Theory and Practice, 1500-1850

In early modern times, warfare in Europe took on many diverse and overlapping forms. Our modern notions of ‘regular’ and ‘irregular’ warfare, of ‘major war’ and ‘small war’, have their roots in much greater diversity than such binary notions allow for. Insurgencies have become conceptually fused with ‘small wars’. There is much overlap between the phenomena of irregular warfare in the sense of special operations alongside regular operations, and irregular warfare of insurgents against the regular forces of a state. This book demonstrates how long the two phenomena were in flux and fed on each other. It is based on a special issue of Small Wars & Insurgencies.