Replication data for: Draining The Sea: Mass Killing and Guerrilla Warfare

Why do some armed conflicts result in the intentional killing of large numbers of civilians? In this article we examine the incidence of mass killing in all large-scale armed conflicts from 1945-2000. We find that mass killing during armed conflicts is often a calculated military strategy used by regimes attempting to defeat major guerrilla insurgencies. Unlike conventional military forces, guerrilla armies often rely directly on the local civilian population for logistical support. Because guerrilla forces are very difficult to defeat directly, governments facing major guerrilla insurgencies have strong incentives to target the guerrillas’ civilian base of support. We find that mass killing is significantly more likely during guerrilla wars than during other kinds of conflict. In addition, we find that the likelihood of mass killing among guerrilla conflicts is greatly increased when the guerrillas receive high levels of active support from the local population and/or when the insurgency poses a major military threat to the regime.