Contemporary forms of warfare – insurgency and counterinsurgency operations Case study: Syrian Arab Republic1,December 2022

Marija Bortek, Andrija Kozina

Insurgency and counterinsurgency, as modern forms of warfare, are presented
in the paper as two phenomena that are actually present in all phases of human
civilization. Due to the interest of a large number of experts, it can be considered a
modern phenomenon. Rebellion is one way of expressing dissatisfaction with a certain
situation. Some of the factors that encourage this dissatisfaction are economic and
social inequality and the violation of human rights and freedoms. Dissatisfaction can
be so strong that it encourages an uprising of rebels to overthrow the government. In
contrast to this is counterinsurgency, which includes all means of suppressing the
insurgency. It is carried out with conventional, regular means by forces trained for
this type of combat. Due to its complexity, the civil war in the Syrian Arab Republic
is taken as a case study. The paper explains the historical predispositions to the
outbreak of the conflict, its further development, the interests of individual external
and internal actors, and presents some of the possible solutions to the Syrian issue.