Understanding War

Christian P. Potholm is the DeAlva Stanwood Alexander Professor of Government at Bowdoin College. He has studied and taught about war for over 50 years. His major works on war include Winning at War: Seven Keys to Military Victory Throughout History, War Wisdom: A Cross Cultural Sampling, Liberation and Exploitation and Strategy and Conflict.

• PrefacePart I Analyzing Warfare Why Study Military Matters?“Eros and Mars: The Nature of Humankind” -or- “Making Love AND War”The Search for Fundamental Truths about War: Sun Tzu, Kautilya, Thucydides, Jomini, Clausewitz and Other Military Thinkers and Students of WarGeopolitics and the Long Shadow of GeographyThe Template of Mars “Superior Weapons Technology”“Superior Discipline”“Sustained but Controlled Ruthlessness”“Receptivity to Military and Integrative Innovation”“The Ability and Willingness to Protect Capital from People and Rulers”“The Centrality of Superior Will”“The Belief That There Will Always Be another War”“The Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb” -or- “Hiroshima as Seen Through the Lens of Mars”“Mars is a Jealous God”: Part I The Lessons of Iraq War I-or-“Clausewitz Vindicated—For the Last Time?”“Is the Template Obsolete in the Face of Insurgencies?”Theoreticians and PractitionersOverviews of InsurgencySome Illustrative Case Studies: Showing the Experience of Insurgency and Counter Insurgency Across Cross-Cultural LinesThe American “Empire” and the Dangers Which Lie AheadThe Empire as Empire (or Hegemon)The Nuclear DimensionChinaFailed and Fragile StatesIslamic Radical Salafists and Local and Global InsurgenciesAfghanistan: Watch on the Danube ReduxPart II Topics in WarEarly WarfareClassical Infantry: GreekClassical Infantry: Roman“The Horsemen Commeth”: The Centrality of Mounted WarcraftPart I: The Mounted Horsemen of the SteppesPart II: European Heavy Horse: Feudalism and Knighthood, Power Diffusion and Its Consequences and Later Power CentralizationPart III: ByzantiumPart IV: African Heavy Horse: Power Centralization and Power DiffusionPart V: Arab Light(er) Horse: Flow and Ebb, Ebb and FlowPart VI: Japanese and ChinesePart VII: Parthian and SassanianPart VIII: Mongol and Later Turkic Asian HorsemenPart IX: Indian and South AsianThe VikingsThe Gunpowder and Discipline Revolution and The Expansion of the Gunpowder EmpiresEra of the European Great CaptainsMaurice of Nassau (1567-1625)Gustavus Adolphus (1594-1632)Charles XII (1682-1718)Louis XIVThe Duke of Marlborough (1650-1722)Frederick the Great (1712-1786)Warfare on the Periphery and The Expansion of the European Gunpowder EmpiresRevolution and Civil WarThe Real United States Is BornAmerican Military History (General)War of 1812The Mexican WarFurther Democratization of War: The French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars Spread Nationalism to Prussia, Austria and Especially Russia“The American Civil War: Fratricide in Living Color”Civil Wars in PerspectiveSome Illustrative ExamplesPrecursors to 20th Century WarWorld War I: “The Hypertrophy of War and the Triumph of the Defense”Transition Within the Continuum: The Interwar YearsThe Battle of Nomonhan/Khalkin Gol“The Triumph of the Offense”: The War in EuropeWorld War II: “Warcraft in the Pacific: 1941–1945”The Cold War and Nuclear Weapons 1946–1992The Korean War: or “The Forgotten War of Great Irony”Vietnam: “People’s War, Long War”“Mars is a Jealous God” Part II, The Lessons of Afghanistan I and II, and Iraq II and IIIAfghanistan I and IIIraq Wars II and IIIWeapons in War Logistics in War“The Daughters of Mars:” Women at WarHomosexuality and WarfareWarriorhoodThe Return of WarriorsOther WarsWar Novels, Short Stories, Memoires and PoetryWar and Anti-War Films Including Revolutionary WarfareJust War/Moral WarEnd note