A History of Military Thought From the Enlightenment to the Cold War

From the ideas of Clausewitz to contemporary doctrines of containment and cold war, this is a definitive history of modern military thought. A one-volume collection of Azar Gat's acclaimed trilogy, it traces the quest for a general theory of war from its origins in the Enlightenment. Beginning with a provocative critique of Clausewitz's classic work On War, the author unravels the endemic difficulties in Clausewitz's work that have baffled scholars for so long, clearly explaining the development of his ideas against the background of the Napoleonic revolution in war and the Romantic critique of the Enlightenment. He continues the story through the strategic ideas of the Prussian-German military school during the nineteenth century, the factors that shaped the 'cult of the offensive' in the French Army before the First World War, and the competing doctrines which dominated naval warfare during the ages of sail and steam. In the final part of the trilogy, he shows how theories of mechanized war emerged throughout the industrial world in the first decades of the twentieth century and explains why their leading exponents were associated with fascism. Drastically re-evaluating B.H. Liddell Hart's contribution to strategic theory, the author argues that in the wake of the trauma of the First World War, and in response to the Axis challenge, Liddell Hart developed the doctrine of containment and cold war long before the advent of nuclear weapons. He reveals Liddell Hart as a pioneer of the modern western liberal way in warfare which is still with us today.

1 - Montecuccoli: The Impact of Proto-Science on Military Theory
2 - The Military Thinkers of the French Enlightenment: The Quest for a General Theory of War
3 - The Military Thinkers of the German 'Aufklarung'
4 - Through the Napoleonic Age
5 - The Reaction Against the Enlightenment: New Perspectives on Military Theory
6 - Clausewitz: Demolishing and Rebuilding the Theoretical Ideal
7 - Clausewitz: The Nature of War
8 - Conclusion
9 - Clausewitz's Final Notes Revisited
10 - Positivism, Romanticism, and Military Theory 1815-1870
11 - The German Military School: Its World-View and Conception of War 1815-1914
12 - The Cult of the Offensive: The Sources of French Military Doctrine 1871-1914
13 - From Sail to Steam: Naval Theory and the Military Parallel 1882-1914
14 - Marxism, Clausewitz, and Military Theory 1848 to the Nuclear Age
15 - Introduction: The 'Janus Face' of Fascism
16 - J. F. C. Fuller: Positivism, Evolution, Fascism, and Future Warfare
17 - Futurism, Proto-Fascist Italian Culture, and the Sources of Douhetism
18 - German Right-Wing Radicalism, Strategic Adventurism, and Mechanized Warfare
19 - Comparisons and Contrasts (I): American Populism, Progressivism, and Mid-West Technological Modernism
20 - Comparisons and Contrasts (II): Marxism, Modernism, and the Doctrine of 'Deep Battle'
21 - Introduction
22 - Background: The First World War in Western Consciousness
23 - Theory: The Lmited War, Moderate Peace, and the Strategy of Indirect Approach
24 - Policy: Defence of the West (I): Containment in the 1930s
25 - Policy: Defence of the West II: Hot War-Cold War
26 - Conclusion: 'The Western Way in Warfare', Past and Future