New Books in Military History

Naval forces exist to control the seas and project power, often through the use of violence. This does not, however, include everything they have done or can do. Navies have always spent much of their time and resources engaged in operations that fall outside the traditional definitions of sea power. These activities have at times contributed far more to their respective nations' security and prosperity than kinetic actions but receive far less attention than their benefits merit. In J. Overton's edited volume Seapower by Other Means: Naval Contributions to National Objectives Beyond Sea Control, Power Projection, and Traditional Service Missions (Nomos, 2023), an international collection of historians and strategists share new, or re-learned, perspectives to serve as inspiration for further study and to broaden the discussion on what naval forces can do and be. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

The on-going war in Ukraine continues to highlight the distinct differences between how Russia operates large-scale military operations from the usual manner NATO military forces often engage themselves. What accounts for the Russian way of war? A common term used to describe Russian military strategy in the 21st century is "hybrid warfare" that seeks to subvert an enemy force in manners other than direct confrontation. Curtis L. Fox argues in his book Hybrid Warfare: The Russian Approach to Strategic Competition & Conventional Military Conflict (30 Press Publishing, 2023) that this approach to warfare is rooted in Russian history and explains much of Russia's conduct in the war in Ukraine thus far.Curtis L. Fox is a former Green Beret and served as a demolitions and combat engineering expert on a Special Forces Operational Detachment Alpha, as well as other operational duties and missions. He separated from the Army in 2016 to attend the MBA program at Georgetown before re-entering public service in the Department of Defense. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

In A Nasty Little War: The Western Fight to Reverse the Russian Revolution (Basic Books, 2024), award-winning reporter Anna Reid tells the extraordinary story of how the West tried to reverse the Russian Revolution.In the closing months of the First World War, Britain, America, France and Japan sent arms and 180,000 soldiers to Russia, with the aim of tipping the balance in her post-revolutionary Civil War. From Central Asia to the Arctic and from Poland to the Pacific, they joined anti-Bolshevik forces in trying to overthrow the new men in the Kremlin, in an astonishingly ambitious military adventure known as the Intervention.Fresh, in the case of the British, from the trenches, they found themselves in a mobile, multi-sided conflict as different as possible from the grim stasis of the Western Front. Criss-crossing the shattered Russian empire in trains, sleds and paddlesteamers, they bivouacked in snowbound cabins and Kirghiz yurts, torpedoed Red battleships from speedboats, improvised new currencies and the world’s first air-dropped chemical weapons, got caught up in mass retreats and a typhus epidemic, organised several coups and at least one assassination. Taking tea with warlords and princesses, they also turned a blind eye to their Russian allies’ numerous atrocities.Two years later they left again, filing glumly back onto their troopships as port after port fell to the Red Army. Later, American veterans compared the humiliation to Vietnam, and the politicians and generals responsible preferred to trivialise or forget. Drawing on previously unused diaries, letters and memoirs, A Nasty Little War brings an episode with echoes down the century since vividly to life.This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose forthcoming book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Charles Coutino discusses Ridley Scott's film "Napoleon" with military historian Jeremy Black. Is it accurate? Is it inaccurate? Does it matter? Listen in to the discussion. Charles Coutinho, PH. D., Associate Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, received his doctorate from New York University. His area of specialization is 19th and 20th-century European, American diplomatic and political history. He has written for Chatham House’s International Affairs, the Institute of Historical Research's Reviews in History and the University of Rouen's online periodical Cercles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East and West (Simon & Schuster, 2024) is the history of the secret war that Russia and the West have been waging for a century. Espionage, sabotage, and subversion were the Kremlin's means to equalize the imbalance of resources between the East and West before, during, and after the Cold War. There was nothing "unprecedented" about Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential election. It was simply business as usual, new means used for old ends.The Cold War started long before 1945. But the West fought back after World War II, mounting its own shadow war, using disinformation, vast intelligence networks, and new technologies against the Soviet Union. Spies is a "deeply researched and artfully crafted" (Fiona Hill, deputy assistant to the US President) story of the best and worst of mankind: bravery and honor, treachery and betrayal. The narrative shifts across continents and decades, from the freezing streets of St. Petersburg in 1917 to the bloody beaches of Normandy; from coups in faraway lands to present-day Moscow where troll farms, synthetic bots, and weaponized cyber-attacks being launched woefully unprepared West. It is about the rise and fall of Eastern superpowers: Russia's past and present and the global ascendance of China.Mining hitherto secret archives in multiple languages, Calder Walton shows that the Cold War started earlier than commonly assumed, that it continued even after the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, and that Britain and America's clandestine struggle with the Soviet government provided key lessons for countering China today. This "authoritative, sweeping" (Fredrik Logevall, Pulitzer Prize--winning author of Embers of War) history, combined with practical takeaways for our current great power struggles, make Spies a unique and essential addition to the history of the Cold War and the unrolling conflict between the United States and China that will dominate the 21st century. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

On 1 January 2006, soldiers from across Bosnia and Herzegovina gathered to mark the official formation of a unified army; and yet, little over a decade before, these men had been each other's adversaries during the vicious conflict which left the Balkan state divided and impoverished. Building a Multi-Ethnic Military in Post-Yugoslav Bosnia and Herzegovina (Bloomsbury, 2022) by Dr. Elliot Short offers the first analysis of the armed forces during times of peace-building in Bosnia and Herzegovina.This sophisticated study assesses Yugoslav efforts to build a multi-ethnic military during the socialist period, charts the developments of the armies that fought in the war, and offers a detailed account of the post-war international initiatives that led to the creation of the Armed Forces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. At this point, the military became the largest multi-ethnic institution in the country and was regarded as a model for the rest of Bosnian society to follow. As such, as Elliot Short adroitly contends, this multi-ethnic army became the most significant act in stabilising the country since the end of the Bosnian War.Drawing upon a wealth of primary sources – including interviews with leading diplomats and archival documents made available in English for the first time – this book explores the social and political role of the Bosnian military and in doing so provides fresh insight into the Yugoslav Wars, statehood and national identity, and peace-building in modern European history.This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose forthcoming book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

For decades scholars have pored over Hitler's autobiographical journey/political treatise, debating if Mein Kampf has genocidal overtones and arguably led to the Holocaust. For the first time, Hitler’s ‘Mein Kampf’ and the Holocaust: A Prelude to Genocide (Bloomsbury, 2022) sees celebrated international scholars analyse the book from various angles to demonstrate how it laid the groundwork for the Shoah through Hitler's venomous attack on the Jews in his text.Split into three main sections which focus on 'contexts', 'eugenics' and 'religion', the book reflects carefully on the point at which the Fuhrer's actions and policies turn genocidal during the Third Reich and whether Mein Kampf presaged Nazi Germany's descent into genocide. There are contributions from leading academics from across the United States and Germany, including Magnus Brechtken, Susannah Heschel and Nathan Stoltzfus, along with totally new insights into the source material in light of the 2016 German critical edition of Mein Kampf. Hitler's views on Marxism, violence, and leadership, as well as his anti-Semitic rhetoric are examined in detail as you are taken down the disturbing path from a hateful book to the Holocaust. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Throughout much of the 21st century thus far, the common argument among military pundits was that war has or will soon be radically changed in manners that exist beyond imagination. The main catalyst for such extraordinary changes would be new advancements in technology and weaponry. With the on-going war in Ukraine, one fundamental surprise that has stunned many military analysts is that in spite of major technological advancements such as drones and open-source intelligence (OSINT) via social media, the main character of the conflict seems more akin to World War I (1914-1918) style trench warfare. What can explain this perplexing paradox?Peter Roberts and Paddy Walker explain in their co-authored book War's Changed Landscape?: A Primer on Conflict's Forms and Norms (Howgate Publishing Limited, 2023) that all change in war is often outweighed by continuity in military history. Even when change does occur, it is often a slow evolution of norms rather than a sudden rupture. The role of technology in such is often grossly exaggerated in the popular media.Peter Roberts is a Senior Associate Fellow for the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), having been Director of Military Sciences there between January 2014 and November 2021.Paddy Walker is Managing Director of the Leon Group, a senior research Fellow in Modern War Studies at The University of Buckingham, an Associate Fellow at RUSI and previously London chair of NGO Human Rights Watch.Stephen Satkiewicz is an independent scholar whose research areas are related to Civilizational Analysis, Social Complexity, Big History, Historical Sociology, military history, War studies, International Relations, Geopolitics, as well as Russian and East European history. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Kondo the Barbarian: A Japanese Adventurer and Indigenous Taiwan's Bloodiest Uprising (Eastbridge Books, 2023) is a gripping and revealing account of the colonial Japanese era in Taiwan, focusing on the Musha Rebellion and its brutal suppression by the Japanese military. The book presents the translated account of Kondō Katsusaburō, a Japanese adventurer who married into an indigenous Taiwanese family. Kondō's journals offer an intimate and personal perspective on the events, though they can also be unreliable and prone to sensationalism.To help readers navigate Kondō's account, Barclay has provided a deeply-researched introduction, extensive notes, and context essential to understanding what really happened during the Musha Rebellion. The book sheds light on the cultural clashes and sporadic violence that characterized Taiwan during this period. Through the writing of Kondō, interpreted and contextualized by Barclay, readers gain insight into the complexities of colonialism, imperialism, and indigenous resistance.The Musha Rebellion was a pivotal moment in the relationship between the indigenous people and the Japanese colonial government. In 1930, after years of oppression, the Seediq people of central Taiwan, led by Mona Rudao, attacked a gathering of Japanese people at a local school, slaughtering over one hundred men, women, and children. The Japanese military responded with overwhelming force, employing tactics including poison gas, artillery, and aerial bombardment to quell the rebellion.Barclay's book offers a fresh and engaging perspective on a tragic chapter in Taiwan's past, and the notes and context provided help readers understand the complexities of the events. The book is an important addition to the growing body of literature on Taiwan's history, and it underscores the power of personal narratives to illuminate broader historical themes. Kondo the Barbarian is a must-read for anyone interested in the history of Taiwan, the contradictions of colonialism, and the challenges of interpreting personal accounts of historical events.Ran Zwigenberg is an associate professor at Pennsylvania State University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Nicholas Morton’s The Crusader States and their Neighbours: A Military History, 1099-1187 (Oxford UP, 2020) explores the military history of the medieval Near East, piecing together the fault-lines of conflict which entangled this much-contested region. This was an area where ethnic, religious, dynastic, and commercial interests collided and the causes of war could be numerous. Conflicts persisted for decades and were fought out between many groups including Kurds, Turks, Armenians, Arabs, and the Crusaders themselves. Nic Morton recreates this world, exploring how each faction sought to advance its own interests by any means possible, adapting its warcraft to better respond to the threats posed by their rivals. Strategies and tactics employed by the pastoral societies of the Central Asian steppe were pitted against the armies of the agricultural societies of Western Christendom, Byzantium, and the Islamic World, galvanising commanders to adapt their practices in response to their foes. In this episode, Nic joins me again to discuss histories of nomadic peoples fighting with and against the Crusader armies; what military history can tell us about the economic, social, and cultural history of the medieval Near East; and why Crusader history is still relevant to us today.Maggie Freeman is a PhD candidate in the School of Architecture at MIT. She researches uses of architecture by nomadic peoples and historical interactions of nomads and empires, with a focus on the modern Middle East. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history