Irregular Warfare Podcast
The Irregular Warfare Podcast explores an important component of war throughout history. Small wars, drone strikes, special operations forces, counterterrorism, proxies—this podcast covers the full range of topics related to irregular war and features in-depth conversations with guests from the military, academia, and the policy community. The podcast is a collaboration between the Modern War Institute at West Point and Princeton University’s Empirical Studies of Conflict Project.
Episodes
Episode 147 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast examines the past, present, and future of America’s defense industrial base—and why its strength may determine the outcome of the next era of great power competition. Drawing on historical experience and contemporary reforms, the episode argues that American military advantage has long depended on close collaboration between government and industry. From Roosevelt’s wartime mobilization ...
Description:
Episode 146 examines the impact of external military assistance on civil wars.
Summary
This conversation delves into the complexities of competitive intervention in civil wars, exploring the types of military aid provided, how external support influences conflict dynamics, and implications for practitioners and policymakers. The discussion highlights the prevalence of external interventions, the escalation dynamics in...
Episode 145 examines the role of foreign fighters in war.
Our guests begin by highlighting the long history of foreign fighters in conflict, from the early United States and the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s to contemporary cases such as the International Legion in Ukraine and the role of foreign fighters in ISIS. The conversation then turns to why individuals risk their lives for others in far away lands, with motivations rangin...
Episode 144 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast continues the Future of War series with a sharp focus on strategic sabotage, indirect action, and deterrence below the threshold of armed conflict. The episode centers on “Special Delivery,” a near-future short story by August Cole set in 2037 amid intensifying U.S.–China competition. The story follows a small U.S. Special Operations team operating near Peru’s Port of Chancay, tasked wit...
As we close out the year, we're re-releasing our most popular episode of 2025: Ukraine's Hidden Front--The Strategic Impact of Resistance Operations. In this episode, we explore the cost and benefits of Ukrainian partisan activity and what resistance operations mean for Ukraine's broader war aims. As always, thanks for listening, and keep warfare irregular.
Episode 143 examines what enables certain guerrilla and insurgent forces to develop genuine military effectiveness on the battlefield.
Our guests discuss why ideological cohesion, social ties, and material resources alone are insufficient for insurgents to successfully implement guerrilla strategies. Drawing on historical examples and a detailed analysis of the Taliban’s evolution in Afghanistan, they ar...
Episode 142 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast features Dr. Jonathan Schroden, Mick Crnkovich, and Dave Maxwell for a deep dive into the Pentagon’s new irregular warfare policy instruction—DoD Instruction 3000.07—and what it signals about how the U.S. military understands, organizes for, and competes in irregular conflict.
The discussion opens with why the Department of Defense updated its irregular warfare guidance after two decades...
Episode 141 examines what the role of resistance operations are in the context of the broader war in Ukraine. Our guests begin by discussing whether resistance in occupied Ukraine has been effective. They argue that “Random Acts of Resistance” are not effective. Instead, resistance activities are most impactful when well synchronized with conventional military operations. The effective use of resistance activities fac...
Episode 140 is a bonus episode built out of conversations held with panelists from the 2025 Irregular Warfare Initiative and Special Operations Association of America South America in Competition Conference.
The South America in Competition Conference brought together over 250 researchers, practitioners, and members of industry for two days at the Carahsoft Headquarters in the DC area. The first day included panel discussions on i...
Episode 139 examines how supply chains have become instruments of strategic competition and the implications for U.S. defense capabilities. Our guests discuss how China gained control over critical drone components originally invented in the United States and what this means for economic security and irregular warfare.
Our guests begin by analyzing the "anatomy of a drone" to reveal how China leveraged consumer electronics manufact...
Episode 138 is a bonus episode built out of conversations held with panelists from the 2025 Irregular Warfare Initiative and Special Operations Association of America South America in Competition Conference.
The South America in Competition Conference brought together over 250 researchers, practitioners, and members of industry for two days at the Carahsoft Headquarters in the DC area. The first day included panel discussions on i...
Episode 137 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast continues our four-part series on the future of war, pairing renowned author and futurist August Cole with senior special operations leaders to explore how tomorrow’s conflicts may unfold.
Our conversation centers on Cole’s short story On Their Own, which imagines U.S. Army Special Operations Forces advising a newly formed Thai commando unit amid Chinese-backed proxies, pervasive survei...
Episode 136 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast examines the fate of victorious rebel groups after civil wars—and why some remain loyal to post-war governments while others fragment, defect, or even overthrow the regimes they helped create.
Our guests begin by exploring the core puzzle: conventional wisdom suggests that decisive victory produces stability, yet evidence shows that in more than half of cases, post-war militaries face cr...
Episode 135 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast kicks off a four-part series on the future of war, pairing renowned author and futurist August Cole with senior special operations leaders to explore how tomorrow’s conflicts may unfold.
Our conversation centers on Cole’s short story Safe Harbor II, which envisions Marine Raiders operating in a near-future environment saturated with proxy terrorism, relentless information warfare, and AI...
Episode 134 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast explores the rising risks of conflict over Taiwan and how the United States and its allies can strengthen deterrence against Beijing.
Our guests begin by assessing why deterrence is faltering globally, from the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and how those events inform Chinese perceptions of American resolve. They then discuss the stakes of a Taiwan con...
Episode 133 is the second installment in our two-part series exploring how the United States can leverage non-kinetic instruments of power to compete effectively without resorting to military force.
Building on our previous discussion, our guests examine America's strategic blind spots in treating economics and information as support tools rather than primary domains of competition. They discuss the integration challenges across U....
Episode 132 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast explores how strategic culture shapes approaches to irregular warfare and competition in the gray zone. This is part one of a two-part series examining why nations conceptualize irregular warfare differently and how cultural biases affect competition below the threshold of armed conflict.
Our guests discuss why irregular warfare m...
Episode 132 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast explores how strategic culture shapes approaches to irregular warfare and competition in the gray zone. This is part one of a two-part series examining why nations conceptualize irregular warfare differently and how cultural biases affect competition below the threshold of armed conflict.
Our guests discuss why irregular warfare m...
Episode 130 of the Irregular Warfare Podcast takes listeners inside Operation Spider’s Web—Ukraine’s bold campaign of long-range drone strikes targeting Russian military and industrial infrastructure.
Our guests begin by examining why Ukrainian defense planners opted for this unprecedented strike operation and how it was designed to disrupt Russian strategic depth. They then unpack the technical, operational, and strategic conside...
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