The long-term effects of COIN operations on military regime stability: Lessons from Sudan and Algeria.

This study aims to investigate the long-term effects of counterinsurgency (COIN) operations on the stability of military-dominated regimes. Suppressing insurgents implies the growing employment of military specialised units and a further militarisation of these regimes, which in turn may favour the fragmentation of the armed forces and factionalism within the regimes themselves that are potentially conducive to their destabilisation. This hypothesis will be tested through a comparative case study approach of two military regimes, Sudan and Algeria, which have a long history of COIN operations, utilising qualitative data from historical records, government documents and expert interviews. The study found that military fragmentation and regime factionalism are not sufficient conditions for causing instability unless differences in terms of the military direction of the COIN operations are taken into consideration. While COIN operations conducted under a strong and certain chain of command do not affect the regime stability notwithstanding the cost of human rights abuses, in the long-term lack of leadership and strong command in COIN operations jeopardise the regime stability and transform factional competition for the top military positions in a destabilising factor.