Customer Reviews

An Instinct for War: Scenes from the Battlefields of History

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Well, these days it's very difficult NOT to find books about war whenever you enter your favorite bookstore, especially about World War II, but also most other wars ever fought by mankind. People seem unable to get enough of books about how we manage to kill each other left and right, always have and always will, and few people doubt that as long as there are people on this planet there'll be wars, as well.

So, among all these books about war, will any of them be a real necessity? Sure. An Instinct for War definitely is.

For without a moment of doubt I feel perfectly honest when I say that Roger Spiller's book is the most fascinating book about war I've ever read. Period. Not only that, it's also the most unique book about war I've ever read; or in other words, An Instinct for War is just as different as it is worth reading. And I still mourn the fact that I've already finished it...

So what, then, makes this book so special? Well, because all stories are fiction. Or, perhaps not really fiction in the true sense of the word. Spiller's very first sentence goes as follows: "Some of this actually happened an some of it didn't, but all of it is as true as I can make it." With this, Spiller means that his stories - about different wars throughout history - all are meant to show how mankind has viewed war and warfare, its nature, shape, and conduct.

For instance, the reader will follow a surgeon in the Napoleon Wars and a soldier's last days during the Civil War, but it's the last story, The Discovery of Kansas, that is the highlight of the book. Here an eerie, yet fully believable, scenario of the future is painted, where modern warfare, which isn't about man-to-man combat in the battlefield, in all its horrors. It's a gloomy vision, much darker than what both Aldous Huxley and George Orwell ever thought up, but it's so good that this story in itself is worth every single penny you paid for the book.

Buy An Instinct for War, read the stories, and be amazed of how bizarre the human animal really is.

The author is an established military historian who taught at the US Army Command and Staff College. This unconventional book is an effort to capture varied aspects of wartime experience across the ages. Rather than a systematic treatise, Spiller has written a series of fictional vignettes, some based on real episodes or involving historical personages, to convey different aspects of war associated experience. The pieces vary in quality; some are very good, some merely good, all are interesting. Spiller is a good writer who draws on his extensive knowledge of military history to produce a nice variety of vignettes.

Topics include the experience of combat, the difficulties of command, cultural factors in warfare, the role of soldiers in the state, moral issues related to war, and the clash of the demands of modern technology with traditional values. Perhaps not surprising given Spiller's profession, a disproportionate number feature historians of warfare.

Since the quality of writing is good, this book is accessible to a wide audience. Its real audience, however, is people with considerable knowledge of history and military history in particular. The first vignette, for example, is drawn from the life of the great Han dynasty historian Sima Qian, not someone known to the general reading public, even those with a good general knowledge of history. The same is true for several of the other vignettes. How many people will know the influence of the 19th century theorist Jomini on our Civil War or be familiar with the Russo-Japanese War? This is not a defect of Spiller's writing or technique in general. What really makes the vignettes work is his ability to ground the issues raised in each vignette in specific, realistic historical circumstances.

Finally, its a brave man who attempts to imitate the style of Thucydides and Spiller carries this off fairly well.