War Made New
Max Boot is a Power Line reader and, more importantly, the author of the new military history War Made New: Technology, Warfare and the Course of History: 1500 to Today. I asked Max if he would write briefly about the book for our readers, and he has kindly responded:
I wrote War Made New to provide historical perspective on the challenges we face in coping with warfare in the Information Age. Ever since America’s victory in the 1991 Gulf War—a victory made possible by stealth aircraft, smart bombs, GPS locators, and other advanced technologies—there has been a lot of heated debate over how and whether the U.S. military should transform itself to meet future threats. I don’t have any easy answers, but I do try to introduce ordinary readers to this important discussion by looking at how previous Great Powers have coped with epochal changes—the Gunpowder Revolution (1500-1700), the First Industrial Revolution (1850-1914), the Second Industrial Revolution (1917-1945), and now the Information Revolution (1970 to the present). To make this debate more vivid and less theoretical, I build my narrative around a series of battles, starting with the French invasion of Italy in 1494 and concluding with the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, which illustrate the changing nature of warfare.The subject of military transformation is one that is difficult to make interesting -- some think it impossible -- but the book is not just interesting, it is compelling.My major conclusion? Simply that it’s not enough to acquire first-class technology. You also need the right organizational structures, training, and leadership to take advantage of that technology. Today, the U.S. is the undisputed leader in high-tech hardware but our government bureaucracy is still designed to fight mirror-image adversaries from the Industrial Age—not nimble, decentralized foes like Al Qaeda. We need to transform the government in order to realize the potential of Information Age warfare and avoid the fate of previous superpowers, from the Ottomans to the British, which saw their influence wane because they couldn’t keep pace with Revolutions in Military Affairs.
Also out this month is a book by Tom Wheeler that illustrates Max Boot's theme, Mr. Lincoln's T-Mails: The Untold Story of How Abraham Lincoln Used the Telegraph to Win the Civil War. Wheeler is a telecom investor and former executive as well as chairman and president of the Foundation for the National Archives. Reading the book, I was reminded of the time in 1864 when Lincoln's wife and son Tad went on a shopping trip to New York. Mrs. Lincoln wrote asking for $50. She also asked how the president was doing and conveyed Tad's inquiry concerning Tad's pet goats. Wheeler includes a photograph of Lincoln's response to Tad: "Tell Tad the goats and father are very well -- especially the goats." I think there's more than one lesson in that story.
PAUL adds: One of the problems of being a full-time lawyer and a conscientious blogger is that it doesn't leave much time to read books, especially lengthy, serious ones like Max Boot's. However, I read a few chapters of War Made New over the weekend, and I agree with Scott's assessment. The book made me regret even more that I'm reading so little history these days.
