The following article comes from the unfortunately defunct website Spy & Counterspy. It is presented for informational purposes only. Resistance TTPs are another one of my many unorthodox interests, and someday it may be necessary to use these methods.

How to organize a resistance movement…

If you agree that life, liberty, and property should be the right of every citizen, then you probably already realize that surveillance and suppression by government goon-squads is incompatible with these three basic human dignities.

Getting involved. Organizing and activating your own resistance movement can be an exciting and rewarding experience – especially if you yearn to do something meaningful about the unfairness you observe around you every day.

Like the heroes and heroines of the American revolution, you may choose to answer the call to idealism and sacrifice.

If you love your country but fear your government, becoming an underground activist may give you the mechanism you need to start making a difference.

Becoming aware. As the saying goes, freedom is sustained by three boxes – the ballot box, the jury box, and the ammo box. Unfortunately, more and more concerned citizens are becoming increasingly alarmed by what they see as the dangerously weakened condition of the ballot box and the jury box.

Reliable sources. The article you are reading is based on information obtained from our contacts in a number of resistance movements. The information in the article is also based on official counter-insurgency training manuals leaked by our contacts in intelligence agencies and security services.

This article is intended as an introduction to organizing and activating a resistance movement. Other articles and tutorials at our Web site can provide you with hands-on skills.

NOTE – Spy & CounterSpy does not endorse, recommend, or suggest that you commit any illegal act. This article is provided for information, education, entertainment, and research purposes only.

Step 1: Create your commando…

Become focused. Get a sense of direction and purpose. Create a leadership team. Develop a strategic plan, an order of battle, or a manifesto. Start building the commando leadership cadre. As the saying goes, plan your work and then work your plan. Become invisible. Go underground. Create an identity that cannot be traced, located, or discovered by the authorities. Adopt a nom de guerre. Become independent by being self-funding and self-supporting. You can continue to live your normal life if you wish, but you must have an underground persona for your resistance work. Your normal life can provide cover for your underground life. Set up communications. Establish secure methods for one-way communications. You’ll need to communicate with the population, with the media, with the authorities, with other cells, and with other resistance movements. Set up anonymous cyber-cafe email accounts. Set up dead-letter boxes in your neighborhood. Acquire anonymous prepaid calling cards for telephone communications. Develop skills in elliptical conversation. Recruit members. The longer you’ve known them, the better. Encourage them to establish cells. Whenever a cell has more than ten members, divide the cell. Then form circles from groups of cells. Appoint circle leaders. Communicate with the circle leaders (but also maintain some direct links to individual cells for sensitive operations). Form sections from groups of circles. Appoint section leaders.

Step 2: Become active…

Begin propaganda. Inform your cells about the misinformation campaigns of the authorities. Also inform the general population. The authorities will spread lies about you, about your group, about your motives, and about your actions. This is standard operating procedure for a corrupt and repressive government. Begin defensive operations. Assist persecuted persons by warning them, by hiding them, or by providing escape routes. You can also assist persecuted persons by publicizing the repressive actions of the government’s goons. Expect the goons to react. Begin political operations. Inform the general population about how to behave towards the authorities. For a typical resistance movement this may include civil disobedience, non-fraternization, protest, non-cooperation, and so on. Each person in the general population will fit a profile – activist, supporter, sympathizer, undecided, collaborator, or traitor. A government’s terror campaign of no-knock warrants, confiscation of property, national ID cards, secret internment camps, corrupt officials, etc. will move people’s attitudes along this continuum. Most people will start out undecided – you want to convert these people into sympathizers, supporters, and activists. Begin counterintelligence operations. Isolate informers, agent-provocateurs, moles, passive-aggressive types, toadies, collaborators, cowards, honeypots, and so on. Ostracize these individuals so they cannot damage your resistance movement. Instruct the general population to shun these individuals. Distribute their identities and modus operandi to all cells.

Step 3: Begin guerrilla operations…

Go on the offensive. This may involve lawful action like protest, civil disobedience, tax resistance, a letter-to-the-editor, work slowdown, embargo, consumer boycott, agitation, silent non-cooperation, noisy non-cooperation, unprovable minor acts of sabotage disguised as oversight or accident, ostracizing employees of government agencies, setting up alternative self-sufficient communities, and so on. In addition, however, a typical resistance movement in today’s world often undertakes unlawful operations like terror, sabotage, assassination, and seccession. Enforce cooperation. A resistance movement will often need to use counterterror to intimidate traitors, collaborators, and informers. The goal is to make it dangerous to cooperate with the authorities.

About your long-term strategy…

According to the official counter-insurgency training manuals of various intelligence agencies and security services, a successful resistance movement always follows the same sequence of events.

First comes passive resistance. This eventually leads to active resistance, which in turn leads to guerrilla operations. This escalates to open insurrection by insurgents – which inevitably results in civil war.

This process can be interrupted at any stage by a government willing to make concessions to the population. Unfortunately, however, the antisocial bureaucrats behind repressive governments are rarely willing to compromise on their policies.

Strategic resistance. A typical resistance movement uses both active and passive resistance until the situation deteriorates to a point when urban guerrilla warfare can be initiated.

Guerrilla warfare. As the situation becomes more volatile, a typical resistance movement uses hit-and-run guerrilla tactics until open insurrection can be initiated.

Insurgency. As the government begins to lose control of significant elements in the country, a typical resistance movement will use the insurrection to provoke civil war. It then uses civil war to force fundamental change in society.