This is coolbert: Hunter/Killer I.

In the years just subsequent to the end of World War Two [WW2], communist inspired guerilla warfare broke out all over the world.

Locales such as Malaya, Philippines, China, Indo-China, Greece, all saw outbreaks of communist style guerilla warfare.

And a variety of methods and techniques were employed by the western powers to combat these communist insurgencies. These included [in addition to conventional counter-guerilla military action] strategic hamlets, "Chieu Hoi [amnesty]", separating the guerillas from the sea they swim in, hearts and minds and civic action programs, etc.

All these methods and techniques had successes and failures, as well might be expected.

And in the cases of the five above mentioned insurgencies, the western powers were victorious in the cases of Malaya, Greece, and the Philippines, and vanquished in the cases of Indo-China and China. [When I say western powers, it should be understood the west was intimately involved in the combat actions in Malaya and Indo-China, involved by proxies in the Philippines and Greece, and only marginally involved in China]. But in all cases the western powers were involved to some extent.

It was also realized early in the game that these counter-insurgencies always had a political dimension to them. It was never enough to solely defeat the guerillas on the battlefield. The guerillas normally possessed an amazing capacity to regenerate themselves and field new units, no matter how many times they were defeated on the battlefield. Some sort of political compromise, reform, etc., usually had to accompany the battlefield victories.

Nonetheless, this was WAR! War as usually defined. Two parties, using violence, attempting to assert their will on the other. So there was always a very prominent military dimension to these conflicts, no matter what the scale or scope.

And it was also observed that conventional militaries were often woefully out of their league when fighting guerilla insurgents based upon the communist model.

Large units seemed to be too cumbersome and unwieldy to defeat small bands of guerillas. Just the movement of say a divisional size unit would alert a small guerilla band that something was afoot, alerting the guerillas so they could take measures to elude detection.

And the use of small counter-guerilla units was also not very effective. These units, comprised quite often of conscripts, were just not skilled enough or had enough firepower to find and destroy even small bands of guerillas. Quite often the opposite. These units themselves when searching for guerillas, became targets themselves.

A better solution had to be found to this dilemma.

One concept that seems to have worked is the hunter/killer battalion. A battalion sized unit [400-800 men], specially selected, trained, equipped for combating guerillas. Battalion troops are normally men with experience of combat or in fighting guerillas. Conscripts are not felt to be useful. Equipped with inordinate organic firepower. Have at their disposal whatever assets are necessary to do the job [transport, additional firepower, etc.]. Commander is chosen for exceptional ability. Commander is quite often given carte blanche authority to deal with a mission. These battalions can sustain themselves in the field for long periods of time if necessary, employing stealth and exceptional fieldcraft. Battalion is not used for security missions or "make work" type of duty. Reserved for strictly hunting/killing guerillas.

To be continued.

coolbert.