CDFs and Popular Support for Rebels Sample Clauses

CDFs and Popular Support for Rebels. ‌ Finally, CDF deployment may help incumbents reduce civilian support for rebels by instigating conflict between insurgents and civilians. Since rebels typically per- ceive even pro forma government supporters as a grave threat to their political and military aims, CDFs often fall prey to vicious rebel attacks (Xxxxxx 2005, 70; Kalyvas 2006, 109). Turning the civilian support problem on its head, such attacks have the potential to instigate conflict between insurgents and civilians and in doing so reduce a rebel movement’s popular support (Xxxxxxx 2010, 198). In accordance with this, Miranda and Xxxxxxx (1993) describe the thinking of Nicaraguan government officials on this matter as follows: The Sandinistas often reported [CDF] losses [. . . ] as civilian casualties from Contra attacks [. . . ] At times, civilians were killed [. . . ] and the fact is that [Minister of Defense] Xxxxxxxx Xxxxxx was pleased when this happened because of its enormous propaganda value. [. . . ] Xxxxxx realized that the killing of those civilians contributed more to the ultimate defeat of the Contras than [army] attacks on rebel fighters ever could (Miranda and Xxxxxxx 1993, 93). In another illustrative example, the British-sponsored CDFs in Kenya suffered a similar fate at the hands of Xxx Xxx rebels during the 1950s. On March 26, 1953, not long after the formation of first native Kikuyu home guard units, the Xxx Xxx organized a ferocious attack on the village of Lari. Due to sheer happenstance, much of its home guard had been dispatched to a patrol in a nearby forest, leaving the settlement vulnerable. When the insurgents attacked, they proceeded to set ablaze most of the huts in the village, trapping their residents inside and burning alive nearly 100 people — most of whom were women and children (Xxxxxxx 2000, 180). As observers noted, “many corpses were so completely hacked apart and scattered around that the count was questionable” (Alao 2006, 48). “The brutality and savagery of the attack on the loyalist Kikuyu guard post appalled whites and Africans alike” (Mumford 2005, 79), and the British used the event as a propaganda tool to rally public opinion and justify a crackdown of the rebels (Xxxxxxxx 2005, 133). These are certainly not isolated incidents, for the argument has been made in the case of other, well-known CDF deployments. Thus, Kurdish civilian casualties resulting from PKK attacks on Village Guards are thought to have undermined the insurgent organization’s p...