Sir Graeme Lamb speaks on how to engage with terrorists

Sir Graeme Lamb has visited the Department to share his insights on reaching out to insurgents. As the former Director of the UK Special Forces, Lamb can claim to have played an important part in the initiative that pacified large parts of Iraq after 2006. Much of what he argued for is now part of the official US counterinsurgency strategy. He discussed why insurgents use violence, whether it is possible to negotiate with them, and how one can separate those who are reconcilable - who are fighting because they have some kind of grievance that can potentially be addressed - from the irreconcilables.

Dr Jan Lemnitzer, Director of Studies at the Changing Character of War programme, has written about Lambs discussion for the Politics Inspires blog.

Lamb spoke as part of Emma Skys seminar series on Post 9/11 Interventions: National Security or Imperial Hubris? on 25 October, jointly hosted by the Changing Character of War programme and the Centre for International Studies.