Paramilitary Totally Explained

Everything about Paramilitaries totally explained

Paramilitary designates forces whose function and organization are similar to those of a professional military force, but which are not regarded as having the same status. The term uses the Greek/Latin prefix para- ("beside"), also seen in words such as paramedic.
The term paramilitary is subjective, depending on what is considered similar to a military force, and what status a force is considered to have. The nature of paramilitary forces therefore varies greatly according to the speaker and the context. For instance, in Northern Ireland, paramilitary refers to any illegally armed group with a political purpose, but in Colombia, paramilitary refers specifically to illegally armed groups which are considered right-wing (for example AUC), while illegally armed groups considered left-wing, such as FARC, are referred to as guerrillas.
Depending on context, paramilitaries can include:

Armed Forces outside the Military, for example gendarmeries and forces such as the Chinese People's Armed Police. The reason for paramilitary units' existence outside of the regular military can be for several reasons. For example, a paramilitary unit's role may differ from the military's, or offer a special service. Pakistan's Northern Light Infantry (now a part of the army) was trained and conditioned to fight at altitudes of 20,000 feet and greater.
Some National Intelligence Services units that are composed of civilian agents tasked with covert action in areas that are difficult or sometimes illegal for Military Forces to operate, such as the Special Activities Division of the US Central Intelligence Agency.
Some Internal Security, Border Protection and Law Enforcement organizations that are not considered part of the regular Military but are similar in training, equipment and/or organization, such as the Internal Troops of the Russian Interior Ministry (MVD), or the Egyptian Central Security Forces. There is some overlap between these and the first example mentioned, and indeed that's often one of the reasons why these may be administratively separate from the military, especially in countries where the military is forbidden or restricted in law enforcement.
Illegal forces which consider themselves military but which governments consider terrorist, for example Provisional IRA, Ulster Volunteer Force, AUC, guerrillas.
Private armies and militias.
Militarized preexisting government agencies, such as SWAT teams and Black Cats.
Auxiliary services of regular armed forces, such as the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary and the Civil Air Patrol.
Youth groups and movements that can be considered 'militarized' to various degrees, the Hitler Youth movement being perhaps the most notorious example. Modern examples include military cadet movements such as the British Army Cadet Force, the Australian Defence Force Cadets, the Royal Canadian Army Cadets, the Royal Canadian Air Cadets, the Royal Canadian Sea Cadets, the American Civil Air Patrol and the United States Naval Sea Cadet Corps and India's National Cadet Corps.

Further Information

Get more info on 'Paramilitaries'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://paramilitary.totallyexplained.com">Paramilitary Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.