Founded in 1995, the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) is an Islamic terrorist organization in the Philippines. The ASG engages in kidnappings for ransom, bombings, assassinations, extortion, and other forms of violence. Its activities are financed by al-Qa’ida, the Qatari-based Islamic Jihad Research Bureau (QJBR), and other international jihadist backers throughout Europe and Asia. Its leadership has recently displayed a more radical and politicized agenda in its actions.

Modern insurgency attempts to erode state authority, make it unacceptable to the population, and create conditions for an alternative revolutionary government. Terrorism is the most visible method, but other tools include propaganda and rumor to discredit the state and its supporters, exacerbation of existing social conflicts between classes or racial, ethnic, or religious groups, political intrigue and manipulation to provoke clashes among different factions in the community, economic disruption and dislocation, and any other means that could destroy the existing society.

Integrated insurgent groups with a well-instituted central command and control over local units tend to be the most effective militarily, but they also are the most difficult to disrupt from the outside. A resolute and competent counterinsurgency can break them down through relentless, focused, and indiscriminate state violence, or by forcing them to split into parochial groups that must rely on shifting alliances in order to survive (such as the Provisional IRA and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, LTTE). A well-designed integrated insurgent group, however, will be hard to change unless it is shattered by violent internal strife or driven into disintegration by intensive, poorly coordinated military pressure.