Dr Walter C. Ladwig III receives grant to analyse past U.S. counterinsurgency strategies

Congratulations to Walter C. Ladwig III, who was been awarded a John Fell OUP Research Fund grant to study U.S. counterinsurgency activities during the Cold War era.

The project, The Lesser of Two Evils? U.S. Indirect Intervention in Counterinsurgency, 1946-1991, is a comparative study of U.S. efforts to assist allied nations in counterinsurgency through indirect intervention, with a specific focus on how external aid can induce political, economic and military reform as part of a broader counterinsurgency strategy. Focusing on three case studies - the Hukbalahap Rebellion in the Philippines (1946-1953), Vietnam during the rule of Ngo Dinh Diem (1955-1963) and the Salvadorian Civil War (1979-1991) – Walter’s research explores how patron states seek to shape the counterinsurgency strategies of client governments they’re supporting.

The study looks at whether and how patron states can gain leverage via external assistance, and how different aid strategies can lead to different outcomes. The issues explored in the project have relevance for contemporary policy challenges faced by the U.S. and its NATO allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where western powers have unsuccessfully attempted to leverage reform via external assistance.

The grant will allow Walter to conduct field research in the United States and the Philippines. In the U.S. he will study a set of documents pertaining to U.S. policy in El Salvador and the Philippines held by the U.S. National Archives, the Library of Congress and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library that have recently been declassified by the U.S. government. In the Philippines he will study the personal papers of Philippine presidents Elpidio Quirino, Ramon Magsaysay and prominent senator Jose Laurel.