Podcast: What is Irregular Warfare?
December 17, 2025- This conversation is published by the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s “Overheard Podcast”
Host: Philip Wasielewski
Featuring: Mark Grdovic
Col. (Ret.) David Maxwell, Editor-at-Large of Small Wars Journal, provided the following commentary about this podcast:
Few know doctrine or how to think about doctrine as well as Mark Grdovic.
I would just add my fundamental view (synthesized with Sun Tzu)
“What is of supreme importance is to attack the enemy’s strategy. Irregular warfare activities are how we can attack strategies.
Large scale combat operations (LSCO) win through maneuver and attrition. Irregular, unconventional, and political warfare win through exhaustion.”
-Sun Tzu (and me)
“What is Irregular Warfare and why in the Pentagon is it traditionally a subject of cyclical phases of either great enthusiasm or inattention over the decades? Phil Wasielewski talks with retired Special Forces Lieutenant Colonel Mark Grdovic, author of the recent book Those Who Face Death: The Untold Story of Special Forces and the Iraqi Kurdish Resistance, as well as a just released FPRI article, Breaking the Glass Ceiling of Irregular Warfare. They will discuss the different definitions for Irregular Warfare that exist even within the Pentagon, the consequences of getting definitions wrong, and recommendations for a better understanding of what Irregular Warfare is, and possibly, what it is not.”
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