The first year of my two-year MA in War Studies program at Royal Military College has come to a close. This has been by far the busiest and most enjoyable year in all of my academic history. I came into the program without a scholarly background in history or political science. I was a linguistics major in my undergrad, and was the odd-man out and lowest common denominator in all my War Studies classes. At first I was truly apprehensive, but my reading habits, interest in world affairs and personal experience proved invaluable and I had no problems keeping up to the rest of my colleagues.
This year was not only challenging in its massive amount of work (in total I had three classes, wrote more than 220 pages, and read at least 500 pages a week) but it also challenged me conceptually. My first interest in the field began about five years ago, and I was immediately attracted to the cutting edge. I was all about the Revolution in Military Affairs, 4GW, and the so-called “transformation of war.” I realize now that since I had no grounding in the classics I could not effectively judge these latest developments in any practical manner.
My first year at milcol taught me to examine the theorists closely before judging the theories themselves. There are a million and one reasons for writing about war and politics that have nothing to do with war, and lots to do with politics. I gained much respect for classic writers such as Clausewitz, and learned that guys like van Creveld do not measure up. I have become more skeptical and discerning of the theorists I read now. I have gained a raw sense of practicality and reality, honed by the personal experiences of my fellow classmates and professors who have spent time on the ground getting shot at in Bosnia, Afghanistan, Congo etc. An important question I learned to ask was “How will this help a decision maker?”
Interaction with the close-knit group in Cavalry House (our office) — with our endless discussions of war and peace, and our late-night multi-lingual sessions of Risk — has taught me more than any book. My friendship with these people will be long-lasting. Some of them will most likely become my professional colleagues in the future.
War Studies has been the best scholarly experience I have ever had, with the most academic freedom I have felt at any of the three universities I have been at in the past. This summer I continue with a course on special operations, while doing research for DND. Next year I will be delving into my thesis, which will pose a whole new set of challenges.
I would like to close with a short list of probably the top three mind-bending books I read this year:
“*On War*”:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0691056579/ref=sr_11_1/103-9175032-8820660?%5Fencoding=UTF8 _by Carl von Clausewitz (Paret edition)_
This is of course one of the mainstays of war colleges around the world. They say there are two kinds of people in this world: those who talk about Clausewitz’s book, and those that have actually read it.
“*A Canticle for Liebowitz*”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Canticle_for_Leibowitz _by Walter M. Miller, Jr._
This was the first book assigned by my military history prof and gives you an appreciation for historiography, and iterative interpretations of history. A very cool book written in an interesting time.
“*Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis*”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essence_of_Decision _by Graham T. Allison_
Using the Cuban Missile Crisis Allison illustrates three models of analysis to explain a single event coming to three different conclusions. Highly recommended for those examining any type of event or country.
All of these books really deserve deep discussion during/after reading. I learned much more from the class discussions than from simply reading the books. _On War_ especially should be done in some sort of class environment. For those interested, a more complete WS reading list can be found “here”:http://www.cominganarchy.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/ws_readinglist.txt.
does anyone else ever get depressed when they think how many good books there are to read, and no matter how hard you try you’ll never be able to read them all?
i guess all you can do is give it your best shot.
That’s why I have a massive Amazon wish list so I never forget them. Of course, I usally add books faster than I can read them, but look on the bright side, it means there’s no shortage of quality reading to be done. Can’t say the same about a lot of other things.
Younghusband, a link with interesting photos and some narrative from a junior legionnaire’s perspective. Go to the “Missions” sector of the sidebar and open the links. If you wish to get into the middle east this next year, I strongly recommend B. H. Liddel-Hart’s “Colonel Lawrence”. And hum a few bars of “I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier” with your Van Doo counterparts for me.
http://www.kepi.cncplusplus.com/
“I gained much respect for classic writers such as Clausewitz, and learned that guys like van Creveld do not measure up.”
Very wise words, but not half as wise as plugging Canticle.
All I can say is I’m insanely jealous. So are you (or are you planning to join ) in the military? Maybe I missed something or didn’t infer what I should have from the article. However all that sounds interesting. I’ve been meaning to give Clausewitz a go, that’ll be after I reread The Prince though (like that will take long…)
*Rommel*, I am not planning on going into the CF, but I am planning on going full time into DND or Foreign Affairs. Also, The Prince is definitely recommended reading, but you should keep in mind _why_ he wrote it.
*Dr. Dan*, thanks for the comment. One of the three courses I took this year was a “Christ to Khruschev” polisci course, which “The Duck”:http://duckofminerva.blogspot.com/ got me through.
*Lirelou*, Liddel-Hart is also one of the classics we were highly exposed to. Though I don’t really agree with his interpretation of Clausewitz, he is definitely one of shining stars of 20th century military thought.
On that note, there are a number of “new” writers/theorists that I had to re-evaluate my opinion on after completing the first year of the program. I was enraptured by guys like Thomas Barnett, John Boyd, Arthur Cebrowski, etc. Now that I have a conceptual background to work upon, I have a much more sober view of their work. I think you can see this development in my blogging over the past year and a half. To quote a friend, “My paradigm has been shifted!”
If you are interested in shifting paradigms check out work by a guy named Robert Leonhard. Specifically “Principles of War for the Information Age”. He doesn’t disagree with guys like Clausewitz and Jomini among others so much as he explores how our principles of war should reflect how warfare is changed. I just wish he would give a little more attention to 4GW and asymmetric warfare.
Very interesting to see “A Canticle For Leibowitz” on the list. It’s a great book, but I didn’t expect to see a novel on there. Still, it’s a nice surprise that they would be smart enough to pick up on a book like that, which is barely known outside of SF genre readers like me.
“does anyone else ever get depressed …”
Yes.
But I too keep a list. Not on Amazon, though, just an enormous Word document, organized as tables. I no longer think of it as a list of books I will ever actually buy or read, but as a list of books that have been reliably recommended, organized by topic. That way, when I do get a chance to read something I have a place to look for what is a good book on the topic. Also, I have been able to help other people to find reliable books on various topics by keeping a list.
I find that I have been buying books 5 to 10 times faster than I can read them. (Rising income is inversely correlated with available reading time. Which is deeply wrong, but not surprising.) The list grows at 5 to 10 times the rate of purchasing.
I have only read parts of Clausewitz, in college. There it sits on the shelf. I think it would be good to get a group to go through it as a book club. Read it in maybe 5 to 10 pieces. Some friends and I read Tocqueville’s Democracy in America that way and it was very good.
Congratulations on finishing the course.
Thanks for sharing the reading list Younghusband, there seems to be a wealth of worthy books on it for future purchase. Would you consider a seperate post in the future about “A Canticle For Leibowitz”Â? and iterative history? (I never heard of it until now, but its certainly being added to my summer deployment reading list).
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