Contributing factors to PKK’s failure to implement Mao’s protracted people’s war strategy

Nihat Ali Özcan and Erol Başaran Bural

Small Wars and Insurgencies, 2025, vol. 36, issue 6, 1207-1249

Abstract: This article investigates how and why Mao’s protracted people’s war strategy of three stages (strategic defence, strategic balance, and strategic offence) was chosen and implemented as the main strategy by PKK and why PKK failed in the first stage of this strategy. It explores this failure using an empirical content analysis of primary sources, specifically the documents published by the PKK. The comparative analysis of Mao’s strategy from a military perspective, along with the PKK’s implementation of it, is a main focus of this research. The principal question is ‘What factors contributed to PKK’s failure in implementing Mao’s protracted people’s war strategy, specifically in failing to move beyond the first stage?’ The analysis pinpoints six factors contributing to PKK’s military failure, with the most notable being the shift in Turkish Armed Forces’ strategic approach to counterterrorism, as implemented in 1993.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/09592318.2025.2501984

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