STEPHEN COUGHLIN: "Negotiated Settlements" are insurgency victories

Negotiated Settlement. https://t.co/iYbhnQGWDs pic.twitter.com/Q5rUmdnqI4

— Stephen Coughlin (@S_Coughlin_DC) February 5, 2026

The diagram in the image is an adapted version of the SORO (Special Operations Research Office) Resistance Pyramid, a model originally developed in the 1960s to illustrate the progression of insurgency or resistance activities from clandestine beginnings to overt actions. The title emphasizes the perspective that "Negotiated Settlements" represent victories for insurgencies, framing the pyramid's objective as achieving such a settlement through escalating dialectical events (discussions or conflicts).

Negotiated Settlement

Large Scale Military and Paramilitary Actions

Minor Military and Paramilitary Actions

Shadow government activities 

Increased political violence, terror, and sabotage

Negotiations with government representatives.

Intense sapping of government, administration, police, and military.

Increased underground activities to demonstrate strength of revolutionary organization. 

Sabotage and terror to demonstrate weakness of government.

Overt and covert pressures against government; strikes, riots, and disorders.  

Intensification of propaganda, increase in disaffection, psychological preparation for revolt.

Expansion of and coordination among resistance networks.

Establishment of formalized resistance elements; appeal to extraterritorial support infrastructure.  

Spreading subversive organizations into all sectors of life in a country/region.

Penetration into professional, social, and political organizations and into all parts of society.

Recruitment of like-minded individuals and others; indoctrination and use of these for organizational purposes. 

Infiltration of foreign agents and agitators, and foreign propaganda material, money, weapons, and equipment.

Increased agitation, unrest, and disaffection, infiltration of administration, police, and military and national organizations, and slowdowns and strikes.

Assassination, forming favorable public opinion (advocating national cause), creation of atmosphere of wider discontent through propaganda, likes, and political.

Creation of atmosphere of wider discontent through propaganda, lies, and political and psychological effort: discerning government, police, and military authorities.

Dissatisfaction with political, economic, social, administrative, and/or other conditions; national aspiration  (independence) or desire for ideological and  other changes. 

SORO Pyramid: Special Operations Research Office [1966 version] Special Warfare Center and School, Fort Bragg