Audiobook12 hours
The Future of War: A History
Written by Lawrence Freedman
Narrated by Michael Page
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
4/5
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About this audiobook
In 1912, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, wrote a short story about a war fought from underwater submersibles that included the sinking of passenger ships. At the time, it was dismissed by the British generals and admirals of the day not because the idea of submarines was technically unfeasible, but because no one could imagine that any nation would be so depraved as to sink civilian merchant shipps. The future of war more often than not surprises us less because of some fantastic technical or engineering dimension but because of some human, political, or moral threshold that we had never imagined wanting to cross. As Lawrence Freedman shows, the future of war has a past and a present. Ideas of war, strategies for warfare and its practice, and organizing principles of war all have rich and varied origins which have shaped the minds of those who conceive the next war. Freedman shows how war can be studied systematically and empirically to provide a firm foundation for enlightened policy. The Future of War-which covers civil wars to as yet unknown nuclear conflicts, proxy wars (real) to the Cold War (not), fashionably small wars to the War to End All Wars (it didn't)-is filled with insight and fascinating nuggets of military history and culture from one of the most brilliant military and strategic historians of his generation.
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Reviews for The Future of War
Rating: 4.027777822222222 out of 5 stars
4/5
18 ratings1 review
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As the title implies, this is a history how the future of war was viewed, starting in the late 19th century all the way to the present, and how these predictions held up against the actual events. It shows how difficult it is to make predictions, especially, as the saying goes, when the future is concerned. Another theme is how the expectations about future war shape the decisions about whether or not to go to war.It is a thought provoking book, and raises a lot of questions rather than providing answers. Whether one finds this fascinating or frustrating, of course depends on what one expects to find.