List of civil wars

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The Latin term bellum civile was first used of the Roman civil wars of the 1st century BC. The term civilis here had the very specific meaning of "Roman citizen". The English term civil war was first used in 1651 to refer to the English Civil War. Since the 17th century, the term has also been applied retroactively to other historical conflicts where at least one side claims to represent the country's civil society (rather than a feudal dynasty or an imperial power).

The terms intestine war and domestic war are often used interchangeably with "civil war", but "intestine war" can be used in a wider meaning, referring to any conflict within a single state, regardless of the participation of civil forces. Thus, any war of succession is by definition an intestine war, but not necessarily a civil war. In modern geopolitics since 1945, "civil war" is also used in a loose sense to refer to any large scale military conflict within a single country (i.e. used as a strict synonym of the generic term "intestine war"), creating terminological overlap with insurgencies or coups d'état.

Past civil wars

Further information: Wars of succession, List of peasant revolts, and List of revolutions and rebellions

Ancient and medieval

Further information: Warring States period, Sengoku period, Warlord, Feudalism, and Internecine war

Only civil wars involving popular or civil forces are listed here. Not covered are wars between clans, warlords or dynasties, wars of succession, etc. Such wars of succession are sometimes also described as "Civil Wars" in modern literature, see e.g. Ottoman Civil War or Islamic Civil War.

• Roman Civil Wars (a list of numerous civil wars in the late Roman Republic and in the Roman Empire, between 100 BC and AD 400)
• An Shi Rebellion, December 16, 755-February 17, 763
• Civil war era in Norway, 1130–1240
• The Anarchy, 1135–1153 (refers to the disorder during the reign of King Stephen of England)
• Civil war in the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem between King Baldwin III and dowager Queen Melisende (1152–1153).
• Armagnac–Burgundian Civil War, 1407-1435
• Hussite Wars (Bohemia), 1420–1434
• Great Feudal War in Russia, 1425–1453
• Wars of the Roses in England, 1455-1487
• Ōnin War (Japan), 1467–1477
• Sengoku Period (Japan), 1467–1615
• Popular revolt in late medieval Europe
• German Peasants' War, 1524–1525
• War of the Two Brothers, 1529-1532 in the Inca Empire

Early Modern (1550–1800)

• French Wars of Religion, 1562–1598
• Rokosz of Zebrzydowski, 1606–1609 in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
• Thirty Years' War, 1618–1648 between Protestants and Catholics in the Holy Roman Empire
• Khmelnytsky Uprising 1648-1657
• Wars of the Three Kingdoms (England, Ireland, Scotland) 1639–1651 involved a number of civil wars:
  • Irish Confederate Wars some parts of which were a civil war.
  • Scotland in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, to some extent a civil war, 1644–1652
  • English Civil War, 1642–1651
    • First English Civil War 1642–1646
    • Second English Civil War 1648–1649
    • Third English Civil War 1650–1651
• Rokosz of Lubomirski, 1665–1666 in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
• American Revolutionary War 1775-1783
• War in the Vendée France, 1793-1804 fought between Royalist and Republican forces, part of the French Revolutionary Wars

Modern (1800–1945)

• South American wars of independence, 1808–1829
• Argentine Civil War, 1814–1880
• Zulu Civil War, 1817–1819
• Liberal Wars (Portuguese Civil War), 1828–1834.
• Chilean Civil War of 1829, 1829-1830
• Carlist Wars, 1833–1839, 1846–1849, 1872–1876 in Spain
• Uruguayan Civil War, 1839-1851
• Māori War (New Zealand) 1845–1872
• Sonderbund war (Switzerland), November 1847
• Revolution of 1851 (Chile)
• Taiping Rebellion (China), 1851–1864
• Bleeding Kansas, 1854–1858
• War of Reform (Mexico) 1857–1861
• American Civil War, 1861–1865
• Klang War; also known as Selangor Civil War, 1867–1874
• Boshin War (Japan), 1868–1869
• Satsuma Rebellion (Japan), 1877
• Jementah Civil War, 1879
• Chilean Civil War, 1891
• Thousand Days War, 1899-1902 in Colombia
• Mexican Revolution, 1910-1920
• Russian Civil War, 1917–1921
• Finnish Civil War, 1918
• Irish Civil War, 1922–1923
• Chinese Civil War, 1928–1937, 1945–1949
• Austrian Civil War, February 12 to February 16, 1934
• Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939

Post-WWII (1945 to present)

• Greek Civil War, 1946–1949
• Paraguayan Civil War, 1947
• Palestinian Civil War, 1947–48
• Costa Rican Civil War, 1948
• La Violencia (Colombia), 1948–1958
• Korean War, 1950-1953 between North and South Korea
• Laotian Secret War 1953-1975
• Guatemalan Civil War, 1960–1996
• Congo Crisis, 1960-1966
• Puerto Rican Drug War since 1970
• North Yemen Civil War 1962-1970
• Dominican Civil War, 1963
• Rhodesian Bush War, 1965–1980
• Cypriot Civil War, 1967–1974
• Nigerian Civil War, 1967–1970
• The Troubles (Northern Ireland), 1969–1998, considered ongoing by extremist minority groups
• Cambodian Civil War 1970-1975
• Pakistani Civil War, 1971
• Lebanese Civil War, 1975–1990
• Mozambican Civil War, 1975–1992
• Angolan Civil War, 1975-2002
• War in Cambodia, 1978–1993
• Nicaraguan Civil War, 1979–1990
• Salvadoran Civil War (El Salvador), 1979–1991
• Internal conflict in Peru, 1980–2000
• Second Sudanese Civil War, 1983-2005
• Sri Lankan Civil War, 1983–2009
• First Liberian Civil War, 1989-1996
• Rwandan Civil War, 1990–1993
• Casamance Conflict (Senegal), 1990–2006
• Yugoslav Wars, 1991-1995
• Georgian Civil War, 1991-1993
• Sierra Leone Civil War, 1991–2002
• Algerian Civil War, 1991–2002, conflicts persist
• Civil war in Tajikistan, 1992-1997
• Burundi Civil War, 1993–2005
• 1994 civil war in Yemen, 1994
• First Chechen War, 1994-1996
• Iraqi Kurdish Civil War, 1994–1997
• First Congo War, 1996–1997
• Clashes in Cambodia, 1997
• Nepalese Civil War, 1996–2006
• Rebellion in Albania, 1997
• Republic of the Congo Civil War, 1997-1999
• Guinea-Bissau Civil War, 1998–1999
• Kosovo War, 1998–1999
• Second Congo War, 1998-2003
• Second Liberian Civil War, 1999-2003
• Second Chechen War, 1999-2009
• Albanian rebellion in Macedonia, 2001
• Ivorian Civil War, 2002-2007, conflicts persist
• War in Darfur, 2003-2009
• 2004 Haitian rebellion, 2004
• Fourth Chadian Civil War, 2005-2010
• Fatah–Hamas conflict (third Palestinian Civil War), 2006–2009, tensions ongoing
• Libyan civil war, 2011

Ongoing civil wars

The following civil wars are ongoing as of 2011. Only ongoing conflicts meeting the definition of a civil war are listed. See list of ongoing military conflicts and lists of active separatist movements for lists with a wider scope.

• Colombian armed conflict, since 1964.
• Afghan civil war, since 1978.
• Ugandan Civil War, since 1987.
• Somali Civil War, since 1991.
• Sa'dah insurgency, since 2004 in Yemen
• Civil war in Iraq, since ca. 2007, part of the larger War in Iraq (since 2003).
• Internal conflict in Burma since 1949, restarted 8–9 November 2010

See also

• List of coups d'état and coup attempts
• List of revolutions and rebellions
• List of wars of independence (national liberation)
• List of Roman civil wars
• List of English civil wars
• Ongoing wars
• Exclusive mandate