Author: Lawrence Sondhaus
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135989753
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 161
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Book Description
This study will provide a badly-needed survey and synopsis of the scholarly literature on strategic culture and ways of war.
Author: Lawrence Sondhaus
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135989745
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 296
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Book Description
A much-needed survey and synopsis of literature on strategic culture and ways of war. It clearly shows how national strategies and approaches to warfare are, to a significant extent, culturally determined. The concept of national ‘ways of war’ dates from the 1930s, when Basil H. Liddell Hart theorized that there was a ‘British Way in Warfare’. The concept of "strategic culture" dates from the 1970s, when Jack Snyder introduced it to explain why leaders of the Soviet Union did not behave according to rational choice theory. These ideas have gained wide acceptance among historians of international politics and warfare, and remain controversial for political scientists seeking general or universal theoretical understanding of such subjects. Because political scientists have focused on strategic culture and historians on ways of war, this work will greatly benefit both audiences and provide each with valuable exposure to the ideas of the other.
Author: Hew Strachan
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107047854
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 337
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Book Description
A major contribution to our understanding of contemporary warfare and strategy by one of the world's leading military historians.
Author: Montgomery McFate
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190934727
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 503
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Book Description
In almost every military intervention in its history, the US has made cultural mistakes that hindered attainment of its policy goals. From the strategic bombing of Vietnam to the accidental burning of the Koran in Afghanistan, it has blundered around with little consideration of local cultural beliefs and for the long-term effects on the host nation's society. Cultural anthropology--the so-called "handmaiden of colonialism"--has historically served as an intellectual bridge between Western powers and local nationals. What light can it shed on the intersection of the US military and foreign societies today? This book tells the story of anthropologists who worked directly for the military, such as Ursula Graham Bower, the only woman to hold a British combat command during WWII. Each faced challenges including the negative outcomes of exporting Western political models and errors of perception. Ranging from the British colonial era in Africa to the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Military Anthropology illustrates the conceptual, cultural and practical barriers encountered by military organisations operating in societies vastly different from their own.
Author: Harry R. Yarger
Publisher: DIANE Publishing
ISBN: 1428916229
Category : Military doctrine
Languages : en
Pages : 93
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Book Description
Author: Antulio J. EchevarriaII
Publisher: Georgetown University Press
ISBN: 1626160686
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 230
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Book Description
Challenging several longstanding notions about the American way of war, this book examines US strategic and operational practice from 1775 to 2014. It surveys all major US wars from the War of Independence to the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as most smaller US conflicts to determine what patterns, if any, existed in American uses of force. Contrary to many popular sentiments, Echevarria finds that the American way of war is not astrategic, apolitical, or defined by the use of overwhelming force. Instead, the American way of war was driven more by political considerations than military ones, and the amount of force employed was rarely overwhelming or decisive. As a scholar of Clausewitz, Echevarria borrows explicitly from the Prussian to describe the American way of war not only as an extension of US policy by other means, but also the continuation of US politics by those means. The book’s focus on strategic and operational practice closes the gap between critiques of American strategic thinking and analyses of US campaigns. Echevarria discovers that most conceptions of American strategic culture fail to hold up to scrutiny, and that US operational practice has been closer to military science than to military art. Providing a fresh look at how America’s leaders have used military force historically and what that may mean for the future, this book should be of interest to military practitioners and policymakers, students and scholars of military history and security studies, and general readers interested in military history and the future of military power.
Author: Peter R. Mansoor
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108485731
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 485
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Book Description
Examines how military culture forms and changes, as well as its impact on the effectiveness of military organizations.
Author: Colin S. Gray
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Counterinsurgency
Languages : en
Pages : 84
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Book Description
The author offers a detailed comparison between the character of irregular warfare, insurgency in particular, and the principal enduring features of "the American way." He concludes that there is a serious mismatch between that "way" and the kind of behavior that is most effective in countering irregular foes. The author poses the question, Can the American way of war adapt to a strategic threat context dominated by irregular enemies? He suggests that the answer is "perhaps, but only with difficulty."
Author: Dmitry (Dima) Adamsky
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804773807
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 368
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Book Description
This book studies the impact of cultural factors on the course of military innovations. One would expect that countries accustomed to similar technologies would undergo analogous changes in their perception of and approach to warfare. However, the intellectual history of the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) in Russia, the US, and Israel indicates the opposite. The US developed technology and weaponry for about a decade without reconceptualizing the existing paradigm about the nature of warfare. Soviet 'new theory of victory' represented a conceptualization which chronologically preceded technological procurement. Israel was the first to utilize the weaponry on the battlefield, but was the last to develop a conceptual framework that acknowledged its revolutionary implications. Utilizing primary sources that had previously been completely inaccessible, and borrowing methods of analysis from political science, history, anthropology, and cognitive psychology, this book suggests a cultural explanation for this puzzling transformation in warfare. The Culture of Military Innovation offers a systematic, thorough, and unique analytical approach that may well be applicable in other perplexing strategic situations. Though framed in the context of specific historical experience, the insights of this book reveal important implications related to conventional, subconventional, and nonconventional security issues. It is therefore an ideal reference work for practitioners, scholars, teachers, and students of security studies.
Author: Iulia-Sabina Joja
Publisher: Ibidem Press
ISBN: 9783838212869
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 220
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Book Description
Romania's communist regime cultivated a thorny relationship with the Soviet Union, which facilitated the development of a national security narrative legitimizing a highly isolationist foreign policy. These factors have heavily weighed on Romanian postcommunist strategic thinking and complicated the transition process.
