Alessandra Nisch
Putin’s Wars: Testing Boyd’s Strategy of ...

President Putin made three foundational assumptions in launching his war against Ukraine that should have been correct but were not. First, Putin assumed the invasion of Ukraine would be a quick and easy fight. Second, he assumed the world would denounce the invasion but tacitly allow it. Third, Putin assumed the war would deter NATO expansion.

Putin’s Wars: Testing Boyd’s Strategy of Applied Friction

#Reviewing

America’s Conflicted Approach to the World: #Reviewing The Sovereignty Wars

America’s Conflicted Approach to the World: #Reviewing The Sovereignty Wars

Terms that endure tend to grow more capacious over time; if they do not adapt to evolving political realities, social norms, and technological forces, after all, they risk fading into obsolescence. To the extent that they become part of a widely shared vocabulary, they can facilitate communication. Unfortunately, though, they can also become victims of their own success: a term can become sufficiently elastic that its usage comes to obscure more than clarify; worse, it can be consciously misappropriated.

#Reviewing Does My Suicide Vest Make Me Look Fat?

#Reviewing Does My Suicide Vest Make Me Look Fat?

Ready offers a necessary antidote to the lionization of American military service, as well as an honest picture of the challenges of coming home to normal life. This is a book that will speak to anyone who’s worked in a large, complex bureaucracy, anyone who had to explain to their guys that they were taking an ‘operational pause’ because somebody forgot to pack enough batteries, and anyone who’s had a useless boss in any job, not just the military.

#Reviewing Ways of War: American Military History from the Colonial Era to the Twenty-First Century

#Reviewing Ways of War: American Military History from the Colonial Era to the Twenty-First Century

Overall, Ways of War provides a solid history of the military and warfare in the United States from the colonial era to the present. It is not without its shortcomings, though considering its objectives as a textbook for survey classes, needing to provide enough information for students to become knowledgeable in the field while also not losing them in the details and keeping the amount of material manageable for the time constraints of a course, it accomplishes a lot

#Reviewing Hubris: The Tragedy of War in the Twentieth Century

#Reviewing Hubris: The Tragedy of War in the Twentieth Century

In Hubris: The Tragedy of War in the Twentieth Century, British historian Alistair Horne ties together five key battles in the first part of the twentieth century with one word—hubris. Horne focuses on “those conflicts that have affected future history powerfully in ways that transcended the actual war in which the conflict was set.” This is the last book Horne published before passing away in 2017, Hubris is the final word by a writer who spent more sixty years writing about modern warfare, a fitting epitaph for warfare in the twentieth century.

#Reviewing The Road Not Taken

#Reviewing The Road Not Taken

Lansdale was a colorful figure, who revealed in his maverick status and his disdain for the sprawling national security apparatus. Perhaps if Lansdale had been a bit more of an adept bureaucratic knife fighter he would have been more successful. Yet, if he had, it is likely that he would never have been the agile advisor who helped Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay defeat the Hukbalahap rebellion.

#Reviewing The Battle of the Somme

#Reviewing The Battle of the Somme

German troops to the southeast, at Verdun, were advancing further into French territory and the French Army was hurling itself at their lines to try and force the Germans to retreat. The entire idea behind the Somme offensive was to take pressure off the French forces at Verdun, while success or failure at the Somme was almost an afterthought. If there was any doubt in Foch’s mind, there does not seem so to those looking at the Somme from the remove of a century.

#Reviewing War As Paradox

#Reviewing War As Paradox

We must rethink our reading of Clausewitz's work as a search for and a description of eternal principles for an objective understanding of war. The nature of war is one thing, but war as instantiated in actual conflict and combat is another thing altogether; yet, both must somehow be held together in order to understand war. It is in this paradox that Cormier thinks we must locate, evaluate, and apply Clausewitz's ideas.

#Reviewing Tiger Check

#Reviewing Tiger Check

In the beginning, being a fighter pilot was all about having what later came to be called “the right stuff:” good eyesight, excellent hand-eye coordination, good stick and rudder skills, and aggressiveness. Fino goes to great lengths to demonstrate that over the course of next three decades these skills did not necessarily change, but they did evolve as pilots had to contend with increasingly complex aircraft systems. The history of fighter aviation rapidly became the struggle to understand automation.

#Reviewing Jihad & Co.

#Reviewing Jihad & Co.

Through a nuanced understanding of historical ties between jihadist groups and business people, policymakers and academics can more rationally assess incentives, supply chains, and other ways in in which the economic mingles with the political in fragile and civil war environments. Ahmad’s book can provide them with a useful point of departure for such endeavors.

#Reviewing Titan: The Art of British Power in the Age of Revolution and Napoleon

#Reviewing Titan: The Art of British Power in the Age of Revolution and Napoleon

The titanic struggle between Britain and France (and their respective allies) has been told many times, but the narrow focus here on Britain’s use of power is a welcome addition indeed, and Titan builds a compelling case for what made British victory possible. It will certainly prove useful to strategists and foreign policy practitioners, for while much has changed in the realm of war and diplomacy since the early nineteenth century, the need for smart power will not be ending anytime soon.

#Reviewing The Southern Flank of NATO: Strategy-Making on Rocky Ground

#Reviewing The Southern Flank of NATO: Strategy-Making on Rocky Ground

This work closes a gap in the historical research with a comprehensive and extremely detailed look at NATO consolidation during the 1950s. Beneath the surface of that project, the reader can find some fascinating and challenging presentations of a very different world which tempts one to wrestle with an of a number of could-have-beens.

#Reviewing Earning the Rockies

#Reviewing Earning the Rockies

It was America’s good fortune—Manifest Destiny if you will—to rise on a temperate continent with abundant resources. Great Britain ceded its empire in part because it could trust and rely on the United States. America does not share this luxury. Pragmatism must be America’s watchword, for neither isolationism nor unilateralism will work.

#Reviewing The Life and Work of General Andrew J. Goodpaster: Best Practices in National Security Affairs

#Reviewing The Life and Work of General Andrew J. Goodpaster: Best Practices in National Security Affairs

National security officials who want to know more about the formation of the American national security state or who are searching for a role model in conducting public service may be interested in this book. In his effort to pass on Goodpaster’s insights regarding national security affairs to subsequent generations of officials, Nelson strikes the tone of a how-to guide: how to become Goodpaster, or at least emulate this thoughtfulness and charisma.

#Reviewing Churchill's Secret War with Lenin

#Reviewing Churchill's Secret War with Lenin

Modern readers will find parallels and similarities between the intervention of a century ago and those more recent. Churchill’s Secret War with Lenin engagingly illuminates the history of a small war that served as both part of the Great War and the dawn of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West. Wright masterfully presents the history of a failed campaign in compelling human and strategic terms through his use of primary sources, synthesis of other works, and his own analysis. Strategists, planners, and tacticians will all take something away from the work.

#Reviewing By More Than Providence

#Reviewing By More Than Providence

An appropriate grand strategy, one that has a regional focus on deterrence, trade, and values will go a long way towards the peaceful management of the balance of power in the Pacific. Green’s work is timely, and decision makers, practitioners, or students of grand strategy and statecraft would do well to add it to their reading list.