Hans von Dach (19272003)[1] was a Swiss military theorist.

He was the author of

the influential seven-volume 1957 guerrilla warfare manual Total Resistance(Der
totale Widerstand: Eine Kleinkriegsanleitung fr Jedermann), which made him the
internationally best-known Swiss tactical theorist. [2]
Von Dach, a Bernese, was employed from 1970 to 1980 in the training division of
the Swiss Defence Department. His emphasis on broadly based irregular warfare
was not shared by senior Army leaders, who preferred to focus Switzerland's Cold
War defence efforts on conventional combined-arms tactics and equipment.
Consequently, his views had no influence on army strategy.[3]
Despite the wide readership found by Total Resistance, von Dach was not promoted
beyond the relatively junior rank of Major which he attained in 1963, 25 years before
his retirement in 1988. This may have been to make it easier for the army to disclaim
responsibility for his writings, which were criticized as advocating conduct that
violated the laws of war.[2] In 1974, the Chief of the General Staff vetoed the
publication of Total Resistance, then very popular among officers, as an army
manual, partly because of these concerns.[3] Von Dach dismissed them by
responding that the Soviet Union, considered the most likely occupying force during
the Cold War, would as a totalitarian regime have no regard for the legalities of
war in any case. He did enjoy tacit support for his authorial work by his military
superiors, because the implicit threat of a sustained defensive guerrilla warfare effort
represented by his writings was considered to contribute to the overarching Swiss
defence strategy of deterrence (dissuasion).[2]
In addition to Total Resistance, von Dach authored more than a hundred publications
about tactics,[2] including army manuals, defence journal articles and books, such
as Gefechtstechnik ("Combat technique", various editions from 1958 to
1957), Kampfbeispiele ("Combat examples", 1977) and Kampfverfahren der
Verteidigung ("Defensive combat techniques", 1959). A gifted draftsman, he
illustrated many of his own works.[3]
In his private life, von Dach was engaged in social work for the homeless as a
member of the Salvation Army.