Saturday, August 26, 2006

Another from the Post

Another book on the WaPo fall list is Max Boot's War Made New. He is exploring the topic of military revolution or how innovations in technology and changes in society can change the war is fought. I imagine he will be popularizing/building upon the work of Geoffery Parker and William McNeill who have written seminal works on the subject. Boot is controversial for saying there is a revolution now, as seen in the rapid overthrow of the Taliban. Others like Stephen Biddle say nope. Boot is an engaging writer so I expect to like the book if not necessarily agree with many of its conclusions.

The study of military history is heavily Euro-centric, which has been fine until recently as the West was always winning. Andrew Bacevich argues that an Islamic way of war is arising that can defeat the technological focus of Western armies.

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