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The Chinese Journal of International Politics Advance Access originally published online on April 29, 2009
The Chinese Journal of International Politics 2009 2(3):335-371; doi:10.1093/cjip/pop004
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Reproduced from the Quarterly Journal of International Politics, with kind permission of the authors and the Institute of International Studies, Tsinghua University

How Can Weak Powers Win?

Yang Shaohua*

Yang Shaohua is an Assistant Professor at China Executive Leadership Academy, Jinggangshan.

* Corresponding author. Email: sanbahuo@126.com

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Although the history of war can be characterized as the strong defeating the weak and the many defeating the few, there are examples throughout history of ‘Davids defeating Goliaths’. They include the guerilla war against Napoleon's occupation of Spain, the American war of independence, Yugoslavian guerilla attacks against Nazi fascism, the Chinese Communist Party's war of resistance against the Japanese, the American war in Vietnam, and the present wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. All are examples of asymmetric conflicts, and of the tendency on the part of the weak to defeat the powerful (or to be more precise, of the inability of the powerful to defeat the weak) in such conflict. Asymmetric conflicts constitute the majority in the post-World War II period, according to available statistics. As international armed conflict and its outcomes are important phenomena in international relations, and taking into account how many instances there have been in . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   Current Explanations and their Limitations
 
The Perspective of Power

The Perspective of Motivations

The Perspective of Strategy


   An Empirical Evaluation of Modern Asymmetric Conflict
 
A Statistical Test of Four Theoretical Explanations

Test of Strategic Choice as Controlling Other Factors


   Basic Logic of the Strategic Victory
 
Logic of Interaction Between Belligerents

Cost Analysis of the Two Strategies


   A Case Analysis of the Iraq War
 
American Strategy

Strategy of Anti-American Militants

A Theoretical Consideration of the Iraq War


   Conclusion
 

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