The determinants of nonstate military methods

For generations, most analysts treated state and nonstate war making as a dichotomy, with states employing high-intensity 'conventional' methods centered on seizing and holding ground, but with nonstate actors using low-intensity 'irregular' methods such as roadside bombings, ambushes, and assassinations. This article, by contrast, argues that many nonstate actors have adopted substantially conventional warfighting styles, and that more are likely to do so over time. Increasingly, the best predictor of a combatant's military methods is not its status as a state as opposed to a nonstate actor, but its internal politics - and especially its institutional maturity and war aims.