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How effective were Apache guerrilla warfare techniques?

Apache war parties were consummate masters of the techniques of

guerrilla warfare.1 The tactical ability of Apache chiefs and their warriors
prolonged the conflict with the US Army for longer than the other Native
American peoples managed and cost their opponent hundreds of lives and
millions of dollars during the conflict.2 Apache methods of warfare should
be examined by historians as they were relatively unique and distinct from
the techniques employed by other enemies of the US Army and were
certainly effective in inflicting large amounts of damage whilst suffering
fairly low casualty rates in return.3 However, it is also true that the
Apaches suffered from two unfortunate flaws that hampered the
effectiveness of their war parties; the first being a lack of coordination and
organisation and the second, related to the first, being without any form of
strategic planning. Apache guerrillas were further reduced in efficiency by
the adaptations made by the US Army to combat the advantages the
guerrillas possessed; the most important of these adaptations were the
employment of allied Apache scouts and the use of pack mules for supply
trains, both of which were developed by General Crook during his time
fighting the Apaches.4 This essay will examine the effectiveness of the
guerrilla techniques of the Apaches; firstly by looking at the advantages
that the Apaches enjoyed when employing their preferred methods, then
by considering the inherent disadvantages that the Apaches suffered
from. Finally the use of anti-Apache techniques will be explored, in order
1 J.J. Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency, Masters thesis (Fort Leavenworth, 1993), p. 6
2 D. Thrapp, Victorio and the Mimbres Apaches (University of Oklahoma Press,
1974), p. 314
3 P. Wellman, Death in the Desert: The Fifty Years War for the Great Southwest
(University of Nebraska Press, 1987), pp. 204-205
4 W.L. Greenberg, General Crook and Counterinsurgency Warfare, Masters
thesis, (Fort Leavenworth, 2001), p. 102
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to see how the Apache guerrilla warriors were eventually outmatched and
defeated by the US Army.

Like other Native American groups the Apaches loathed taking casualties,
but this was taken to an extreme in their guerrilla attacks.5 Apache groups
were small, usually made up of extended families, and as a result their
war bands were very rarely larger than a hundred or so warriors most if
not all the men of fighting age from neighbouring groups of Apaches.6
Small parties of Apache warriors were able to travel swiftly through the
mountains and survive on what they scavenged, eliminating the need for
logistical support and increasing their speed even further.7 The speed of
the Apaches allowed them to strike at civilian settlements within enemy
territory and escape before troops could be mobilised to strike back. 8 The
mobility of Apache war parties, coupled with their ability to hide their
movements from US troops, allowed them to set up ambushes which
would increase the effectiveness of their warriors whilst allowing them to
shelter in carefully chosen defensive positions this would maximise the
casualties of the enemy and minimise friendly losses.9 Every Apache
attack would be carefully considered for days at a time; the war party
5 J.W. Smith, Colonel Ranald Slidell Mackenzie and the Apache Problem, 18811883, Masters thesis (Texas Tech University, 1973), p. 23
6 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency, p. 21
7 Ibid., p. 48
8 Ibid., p. 49
9 E.A. Bode, A Dose of Frontier Soldiering: The Memoirs of Corporal E.A. Bode,
Frontier Regular Infantry, 1877-1882 (University of Nebraska Press, 1994), p. 144
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would wait until the enemy was in an ambush position where the Apache
warriors could fire clear shots at the targets, with defensible positions and
clear escape routes.10 If the fight went badly then the Apaches were
always prepared to slip away in small groups to reform at a predetermined
point; it was close to impossible to pursue the Apaches along these routes
due to the speed and stamina of the warriors and the large number of
potential paths to follow.11
As a result of these factors the Apaches were extremely capable guerrilla
warriors. Apache war bands could strike quickly at isolated settlements,
stealing supplies and killing anyone who resisted them, and could
manoeuvre freely within enemy territory especially inside mountainous
terrain, which they favoured for its high vantage points and defensible
positions.12 The Apache warriors could evade any troops attempting to
bring them into a pitched battle, in which the Apaches smaller numbers
and avoidance of casualties would count against them, and instead set up
carefully planned ambushes in which the Apaches could even the odds by
surprising their enemies and by using terrain to shield themselves from
return fire.13 If the Apaches began or were about to begin suffering
casualties, such as during the Battle of Apache Pass the US troops fired
their mountain howitzers on the Apache positions, they could easily fall
back along pre-planned routes and be confident that their enemies would
fail to catch them.14 Apache guerrilla warriors were thus able to strike
against the US virtually wherever and whenever they wanted, and there
10 Smith, Colonel Ranald Slidell Mackenzie and the Apache Problem, 18811883, p. 33
11 Ibid., p. 34
12 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency,
p. 49
13 L. Ludwig, The Battle at K-H Butte: Apache Outbreak 1881: Arizona Territory
(Westernlore Press, 1993),
p. 76
14 Wellman, Death in the Desert, pp. 76-77
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was little fear of reprisal as there were many secure hideouts in the
mountains that only the Apaches could find.15

It could be considered that the Apache techniques of guerrilla warfare

were exceedingly effective, and to an extent they were. However, Apache
guerrillas were only capable of tactical successes; the tactics that the
Apache warriors used were highly effective at damaging the US whilst
protecting themselves from harm, but tactical success needs to be put
towards strategic goals in order to be truly effective. When the
effectiveness of Apache guerrilla warfare is considered it should be borne
in mind that the Apaches were fighting for the survival of their culture and
for their independent way of life they were trying to achieve strategic
goals, not score tactical victories.16 Consequently the effectiveness of
Apache guerrilla warfare in achieving these strategic aims is what needs
to be analysed; tactical ability is useful but will not achieve strategic ends
alone.

Apache warfare was inherently flawed, and its flaws limited the ability of
the Apache guerrillas to achieve their strategic goal of protecting their
way of life. It was predominantly the nature of the Apaches as small,
relatively independent groups that undermined their military efforts; lack
of coordination between the scattered groups of Apaches meant that they
would very rarely unite to face the forces of the US Army together. The
15 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency,
p. 49
16 Ibid., p. 4
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aforementioned Battle of Apache Pass was one of the few occasions where
the Apaches grouped together to fight against US troops, with the majority
of Apache war parties consisting of small numbers from only a few
groups.17 This lack of coordination meant that the Apaches could never
muster the numbers needed to wage guerrilla war against the US on a
scale that might have forced the US government to back down.18 Powerful
leaders like Mangas Coloradas and Victorio possessed the influence to
mobilise more support, but such influential leadership was rare.19 The lack
of unity amongst the Apaches also meant that the Apaches lacked an
overarching strategy; without central leadership the war bands all worked
individually for purely tactical success rather than looking at the overall
state of affairs.20 The Apaches underestimated the need for strategic
planning and worked in small groups to try to stalemate the US with raids
and ambushes whilst avoiding direct confrontations, but without a unified
strategy the tactical victories of the Apaches meant little whereas the
victories of the US worked steadily towards strategic victory.21 The raids of
Nana in 1881 evaded over a thousand hostile troops to inflict serious
damage to settlements in Arizona, but the raids did little to convince the
US to leave the Apaches alone had Nanas efforts been coordinated with
other attacks a greater impact may have been made.22 Ultimately Apache
guerrilla warfare techniques were highly effective in securing tactical
17 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency,
p. 33
18 Ibid., p. 46
19 Wellman, Death in the Desert, pp. 80, 195
20 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency, pp. 48-49
21 Ibid., p. 52
22 Smith, Colonel Ranald Slidell Mackenzie and the Apache Problem, 18811883, p. 86
ID: 1030075

victory but were useless in achieving the strategic aims of the Apaches
because the Apaches lacked specific plans on how to achieve those aims.

Even the tactical effectiveness of the Apache techniques of guerrilla

warfare steadily became less pronounced; over time the US Army
developed ways of adapting to fighting the irregular Apache forces and
limited the power of the Apache guerrilla warrior.23 Two developments will
be focused on in particular, both of which can be attributed to General
Crook during his time fighting the Apaches.
Crook recognised that the US Army desperately needed to increase its
speed and mobility in order to keep pace with the Apaches so that they
could be brought to battle. To this end Crook replaced horse-drawn wagon
trains with trains of pack mules; the mules were faster over rough terrain
and didnt need special fodder, freeing up space for more supplies and so
increasing the range of US Army units.24 Crook also continued the
technique of using multiple mobile columns of troops to find and confront
the Apaches, with columns converging to destroy hostile war bands if
necessary.25 Columns of troops with greater mobility and range could
pursue the Apaches for longer and would have a better chance of bringing
them to battle, which meant that the Apache ability to avoid US forces at
will was compromised.
The second development was the employment of friendly Apaches as
scouts for the US Army. By using Apache scouts Crooks columns were
able to track the hostile Apaches and even to come across their camps;
23 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency, pp. 152-153
24 Greenberg, General Crook and Counterinsurgency Warfare, p. 42
25 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency,
p. 111
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the Battles of Turret Mountain and Salt River Cave are examples of
incredibly successful attacks on Apache camps that were only made
possible by the skills of friendly Apache scouts.26 The power of the US
Apache scouts to track down and find hostile Apache war bands was not
only militarily invaluable but also a potent psychological weapon; many
hostile chiefs such as Chihuahua were dismayed to find that they were no
longer able to hide from their enemies and decided to accept reservation
lives rather than continue the conflict.27 The employment of Apache
scouts by the US was only possible because of the natural division
between Apache groups; had the Apaches been united against the US
then the war parties might have continued to elude their pursuers without
difficulty.28

The Apaches were extremely capable guerrilla fighters; they exploited the
terrain they fought in and were able to strike at the US quickly and then
withdraw and elude their pursuers. The Apaches managed to maximise
the effect that their small numbers of warriors could have on the far larger
US Army and achieved many tactical successes throughout the time they
spent at war with the US. The Apache guerrilla techniques were not able
to achieve the strategic aims of the Apaches, however, as the Apaches
lacked unity and centralised leadership and thus had no grand strategy.
The Apaches were effective guerrilla warriors on a tactical level
nonetheless, though their effectiveness on a tactical level reduced as the
US Army began using more mobile columns with allied Apache scouts to
hunt down them down. It must be concluded that Apache guerrilla warfare
techniques were extremely effective at achieving tactical success but not
at the strategic level, and that as the US Army and officers like Crook built
26 Ibid., p. 103
27 Greenberg, General Crook and Counterinsurgency Warfare, p. 83
28 J. Bigelow, On the Bloody Trail of Geronimo (Westernlore Press, 1986), p. xiii
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up experience of fighting the Apaches methods were developed that

ultimately defeated the Apache guerrillas.29

Essay length:
-

2099 words including references

1751 words without including references

Bibliography
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Bigelow, J., On the Bloody Trail of Geronimo (Westernlore Press,

1986)
Bode, E.A., A Dose of Frontier Soldiering: The Memoirs of Corporal
E.A. Bode, Frontier Regular Infantry, 1877-1882 (University of

Nebraska Press, 1994)

Greenberg, W.L., General Crook and Counterinsurgency Warfare,

Masters thesis, (Fort Leavenworth, 2001)

Ludwig, L., The Battle at K-H Butte: Apache Outbreak 1881:

Arizona Territory (Westernlore Press, 1993)

Smith, J.W., Colonel Ranald Slidell Mackenzie and the Apache

Problem, 1881-1883, Masters thesis (Texas Tech University, 1973)

Stewart, J.J., The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 18711876: A Case Study in Counterinsurgency, Masters thesis (Fort

Leavenworth, 1993)
Thrapp, D., Victorio and the Mimbres Apaches (University of
Oklahoma Press, 1974)

29 Stewart, The U.S. Government and the Apache Indians, 1871-1876: A Case
Study in Counterinsurgency,
pp. 152-153
ID: 1030075

9
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Wellman, P., Death in the Desert: The Fifty Years War for the Great
Southwest (University of Nebraska Press, 1987)

ID: 1030075