The Changing Face of Warfare in the 21st Century

The Changing Face of Warfare in the 21st Century
Author: Gregory Simons
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2017-07-20
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1317039017

This study discusses salient trends demonstrated by contemporary warfare of these first years of the 21st century. The authors reinforce previous notions of Fourth Generation Warfare, but most importantly explore the workings of new components and how these have modified the theory and practice of warfare beyond the basic divisions of conventional and unconventional warfare as witnessed in the preceding century. Throughout history there has been a close interaction between politics, communication and armed conflict and a main line of investigation of this book is to track changes that are presumed to have occurred in the way and manner in which armed conflicts are waged. Using cogent examples drawn variously from conflicts of the Arab Spring, the Islamic State and Russian adventurism in South Ossetia, Crimea and Eastern Ukraine, the authors demonstrate the application of Information Warfare, the practice of Hybrid Warfare, and offensive use of diplomacy, communications, economics and international law to obtain political and military advantages against the status quo states of the international community. The authors combine a theoretical framework with concrete empirical examples in order to create a better understanding and comprehension of the current events and processes that shape the character of contemporary armed conflicts and how they are informed and perceived in a highly mediatised and politicised world.

The Changing Face of Old Regime Warfare

The Changing Face of Old Regime Warfare
Author: Alexander S. Burns
Publisher: Helion
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2022-06-15
Genre:
ISBN: 9781915070388

This book reflects on the historiographical contributions of world-renowned military historian Christopher Duffy. In 16 essays, the contributors continue Christopher's legacy of making first-rate historical research on eighteenth-century militaries accessible to the public.

The New Rules of War

The New Rules of War
Author: Sean McFate
Publisher: HarperCollins
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2019-01-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 0062843605

"Stunning. Sean McFate is a new Sun Tzu." -Admiral James Stavridis (retired), former Supreme Allied Commander at NATO An Economist Book of the Year 2019 Some of the principles of warfare are ancient, others are new, but all described in The New Rules of War will permanently shape war now and in the future. By following them Sean McFate argues, we can prevail. But if we do not, terrorists, rogue states, and others who do not fight conventionally will succeed—and rule the world. The New Rules of War is an urgent, fascinating exploration of war—past, present and future—and what we must do if we want to win today from an 82nd Airborne veteran, former private military contractor, and professor of war studies at the National Defense University. War is timeless. Some things change—weapons, tactics, technology, leadership, objectives—but our desire to go into battle does not. We are living in the age of Durable Disorder—a period of unrest created by numerous factors: China’s rise, Russia’s resurgence, America’s retreat, global terrorism, international criminal empires, climate change, dwindling natural resources, and bloody civil wars. Sean McFate has been on the front lines of deep state conflicts and has studied and taught the history and practice of war. He’s seen firsthand the horrors of battle and understands the depth and complexity of the current global military situation. This devastating turmoil has given rise to difficult questions. What is the future of war? How can we survive? If Americans are drawn into major armed conflict, can we win? McFate calls upon the legends of military study Carl von Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, and others, as well as his own experience, and carefully constructs the new rules for the future of military engagement, the ways we can fight and win in an age of entropy: one where corporations, mercenaries, and rogue states have more power and ‘nation states’ have less. With examples from the Roman conquest, World War II, Vietnam, Afghanistan and others, he tackles the differences between conventional and future war, the danger in believing that technology will save us, the genuine leverage of psychological and ‘shadow’ warfare, and much more. McFate’s new rules distill the essence of war today, describing what it is in the real world, not what we believe or wish it to be.

War: How Conflict Shaped Us

War: How Conflict Shaped Us
Author: Margaret MacMillan
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2020-10-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 1984856146

Is peace an aberration? The New York Times bestselling author of Paris 1919 offers a provocative view of war as an essential component of humanity. NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW “Margaret MacMillan has produced another seminal work. . . . She is right that we must, more than ever, think about war. And she has shown us how in this brilliant, elegantly written book.”—H.R. McMaster, author of Dereliction of Duty and Battlegrounds: The Fight to Defend the Free World The instinct to fight may be innate in human nature, but war—organized violence—comes with organized society. War has shaped humanity’s history, its social and political institutions, its values and ideas. Our very language, our public spaces, our private memories, and some of our greatest cultural treasures reflect the glory and the misery of war. War is an uncomfortable and challenging subject not least because it brings out both the vilest and the noblest aspects of humanity. Margaret MacMillan looks at the ways in which war has influenced human society and how, in turn, changes in political organization, technology, or ideologies have affected how and why we fight. War: How Conflict Shaped Us explores such much-debated and controversial questions as: When did war first start? Does human nature doom us to fight one another? Why has war been described as the most organized of all human activities? Why are warriors almost always men? Is war ever within our control? Drawing on lessons from wars throughout the past, from classical history to the present day, MacMillan reveals the many faces of war—the way it has determined our past, our future, our views of the world, and our very conception of ourselves.

King George's Army - British Regiments and the Men Who Led Them 1793-1815

King George's Army - British Regiments and the Men Who Led Them 1793-1815
Author: Steve Brown
Publisher: Helion and Company
Total Pages: 360
Release: 2023-08-29
Genre: History
ISBN: 1804516015

King George’s Army: British Regiments and the Men who Led Them 1793–1815 will contain five volumes, with coverage given to cavalry regiments (Volume 1), infantry regiments (Volumes 2–4), and Ordnance and other regiments (Volume 5). It is the natural extension to the web series of the same name by the same author which existed one Napoleon Series from 2009 until 2019, but greatly expanded to include substantially more biographical information including biographies of leading political gures concerned with the administration of the army as well as commanders in chief of all major commands. Volume 1 covers in great detail the cavalry regiments that comprised the army of King George III for the period of the Great War with France, and the men who commanded them. Regimental data provided includes shortform regimental lineages, service locations and dispositions for the era, battle honors won, tables of authorized establishments, demographics of the field officer cohorts and of the men. But the book is essentially concerned with the field officers, the lieutenant colonels and majors who commanded the regiments, and Volume 1 alone contains over 1,000 mini-biographies of men who commanded the regiments, including their dates of birth and death, parentage, education, career (including political), awards and honors, and places of residence. Volumes 2 to 5 will extend the coverage to ultimately record over 4,500 biographies across more than 200 regiments. These biographies will show the regimental system in action, officers routinely transferring between regiments for advancement or opportunity, captains who were also (brevet) colonels, many who retired early, some who stayed the distance to become major generals and beyond. Where it has been possible to accurately ascertain, advancement by purchase, exchange or promotion has also been noted. Readers with military ancestors will no doubt find much of interest within, and the author hopes that the work will allow readers to break down a few ‘brick walls’; either through connecting to the officers recorded, or through an understanding of the movements of the regiments around the world, or from the volunteering patterns of the militia regiments into the regular army. Encyclopedic in scope, and aimed to be a lasting source of reference material for the British army that fought the French Revolution and Napoleon between 1793 and 1815, King George’s Army: British Regiments and the Men who Led Them will be a necessary addition to every military and family history library for years to come.

Leuthen

Leuthen
Author: T. G. Otte
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2024-09-24
Genre: History
ISBN: 019269782X

Leuthen (1757) is one of the best-known battles of the Seven Years' War, the most consequential conflict in continental Europe between the Thirty Years' War and the wars of Revolutionary and then Napoleonic France. It was a victory against the odds, over a vastly superior Austrian enemy who held the initiative in the war. Leuthen confirmed the reputation of Frederick II ('the Great') of Prussia as one of history's greatest military commanders. His victory rested on superior drill and firepower, intelligent use of the terrain, and his perfecting of the 'oblique battle order'. But faulty intelligence and flawed decision-making on the Austrian side were no less important, as T.G. Otte shows in this reappraisal of events. Leuthen was of profound significance for the war and for the future course of European history. Frederick's victory reversed the military dynamic of the current conflict. It kept Prussia in the war, preserved the existence of the Prussian state, and laid the foundations of its further rise with consequences beyond Frederick's own times. It also ensured Britain's final commitment to what was becoming a global conflict. The significance of Prussia's victory extended beyond the military sphere. The 'Leuthen myth', encapsulated in the evocative image of Frederick's exhausted grenadiers intoning the church hymn 'Now thank ye all our Lord', shaped political and historical disputes in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Germany. It also influenced the intellectual assumptions that underpinned Prusso-German war planning before the First World War. The 'Chorale of Leuthen' provided the accompanying chords of German cultural developments up to the collapse of the Third Reich in the burning ruins of Berlin. But even to the present day its echo can still be heard. As with other great battles, Leuthen is constantly reassessed and rewritten as an element of national culture and identity.

The Oxford Handbook of the Seven Years' War

The Oxford Handbook of the Seven Years' War
Author: Trevor Burnard
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 785
Release: 2024
Genre: Seven Years' War, 1756-1763
ISBN: 0197622607

"This handbook contains 38 essays that provide up-to-date scholarship on all aspects of the globally important Seven Years' War (1756-1763). The volume carefully examines the three major areas of conflict in the war-Europe, South Asia, and the Americas-treating each theater as distinct from each other but often linked in ways that helped create a new geopolitics from the 1760s onward. Chapters trace the causes of the war in the interior of America; outline the triumphs of Britain and Prussia in fierce fighting across Europe; and explain how the British under the East India Company came to play an important role in South Asian politics and commerce. The handbook pays due attention to military conflict but does much more than this. It investigates social, cultural, and intellectual developments in a crucial period of reorientation during the mid-eighteenth century. The handbook is notably diverse in its authorship, with leading scholars on the Seven Years' War from Europe and South Asia as well as Britain and North America, providing perspectives from many areas outside an Anglo-American frame. It treats the Seven Years' War as a world-transformative event: important not only in its own right-in shaping commerce, politics, science, art, demography, religion, and gender during the conflict-but also central to the evolving history of South Asia, Europe, and the Americas in the second half of the eighteenth century"--