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‘Hearts and Minds’: British Counterinsurgency Strategy in Northern Ireland

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The British Approach to Counterinsurgency

Abstract

Northern Ireland is seen as one of the few cases where the state’s armed forces have ‘defeated’ insurgents. The British state’s success in bringing to an end the Irish Republican Army’s (IRA) ‘armed struggle’ has enhanced the credibility and renewed interest in the British approach to counterinsurgency, particularly because of British and US involvement in insurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq. This chapter asks whether classical British counterinsurgency theory can explain the relatively successful outcome in Northern Ireland?

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© 2012 Paul Dixon

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Dixon, P. (2012). ‘Hearts and Minds’: British Counterinsurgency Strategy in Northern Ireland. In: Dixon, P. (eds) The British Approach to Counterinsurgency. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137284686_9

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