The Transformation of War: The Most Radical Reinterpretation of Armed Conflict Since Clausewitz First Edition

The most important book written about military theory since Clausewitz. I am the "give peace a chance" antiwar generation. This book completely changed my view on war and soldiers. I found it indispensable when I was teaching High School students the _Iliad_: Agamemnon forgets than no one will die for the interests of another. Odysseus forgets than no one will die for his _own_ interests. Achilles forgets that the "I" must become a "we". Chapters 5 & 6 "What War Is Fought For" and "Why War is Fought", respectively, were written in Paradise.

"Transformed war", what Van Creveld calls "non-trinitarian war", is now with us. William Lind calls it "Fourth Generation War". Van Creveld's book is the original and best study of this kind of war, done magisterially in his last chapter.

This book, and Van Creveld's Rise and Decline of The State are essential reading. Both books changed my life.

Van Creveld has one idea to advance: the old state-run military strategy, as articulated by Clausewitz, is being overtaken by "low-intensity conflict". All the old rules, he argues, need to be thrown out because they are ineffective, prohibitively expensive, and too dangerous. The ultimate upshot, he speculates, is that the state itself will deteriorate in favor of the rise of feudal robber barons, frontiers will disappear, and identity politics will dominate amorphous regions. There is a lot to this line of reasoning, but I simply cannot accept the degree to which he ratchets up the volume.

On the one hand, there is Clausewitz's classic formulation of modern strategy. Following the horrendous carnage that took place in the 30-year war - the last gasp of the feudal order, in which various entities fought chaotically, as based on personal obligation and ambition with an overlay of religious fanaticism - the emerging absolutist monarchies imposed a new order on Europe. From then on, the state became the principal actor in international relations, a kind of locus for intelligent, rational decisionmaking. To wage war, three groups emerged: the state itself, the armed forces, and the general population. As the rules evolved, so long as the general population stayed out of it (i.e. not attacking the other side), it became illegal to kill, enslave, pillage, and rape them.

As a result, war became a professional activity, a "continuation of politics by other means", with clear goals that were largely territorial as well as uniforms to distinguish their identities and a separate tradition of law. Other consequences were the development of a capacity to mobilize the armed forces, requiring not only manufacturing capability but also an administrative infrastructure of unprecedented exactitude, better means of communications, and logistics. Strategy consisted of defense and/or attacking in the right place at the right time (i.e. massing forces at a weak point); its dangers included uncertainty (e.g. deception by the adversary), inflexibility (inability to adapt on the field), and friction (one part failing and impacting the function of the whole).

On the other hand, as the power of weapons increased with R&D (e.g. thermo-nuclear devices) and the capability of mobilization extended to entire societies for "total war", the political value of military conflict declined precipitously - total annihilation or complete ruin of economic resources did not appear desirable to potential aggressors. Moreover, as mutual assured destruction (MAD) moved the battle grounds to the periphery in, say, Vietnam or Afghanistan, adversaries created a new kind of counter-strategy, the low-intensity conflict. Rather than mass forces, the Vietcong and Mujahideen attacked with guerilla tactics; their weapons were light and cheap; without uniform, they could melt into local populations, which often directly participated in actions; and their goals were not traditionally "political" - they were ideological, religious, even ethnic, targeting not the acquisition of territory, but rather, radical self-determination. As a result, the weapons of the traditional powers were ill-adapted and are becoming too expensive to maintain. You cannot defeat terrorists with bombs or even search and destroy missions, you cannot kill ideas or traditions. Just look at the stalemate on the West Bank and Gaza, territories that van Creveld (who is Israeli) asserts are not worth fighting for.

This is a very valuable analysis, even if the book was written at the time that the USSR still existed. Van Creveld claims that his conclusions are original, a fundamental and complete repudiation of Clauswitz's universe, which perhaps was true at the time. I agree with a lot of this, but I believe that he goes a bit too easily into predictions that are, at the very least, apocalyptic.

While he acknowledges that "the new rules are yet to be written", he argues that the state will break down almost completely. What will emerge, he argues, are unstable territories controlled by gangs, robber barons, and privately hired mercenary forces. This is a frightening vision and though I cannot disprove it, I remain skeptical. It would seem he is going back to something on a par with the 30-Years War, perhaps much worse. Certainly there is awful carnage in many areas, such as the Middle East, but whether or not the ethnic populists like Trump or Le Pen will win out in the developed world remains an open question.

This is an important book for understanding how the world is evolving. Its reasoning is tight and elegant, the historical examples detailed and fun to read. Van Creveld covers a huge range of ideas, such as war psychology, whereby adversaries come to resemble each other over time, undermining the mission of military conflict if the actions of commanders egregiously violate the norms of their side and their initial purpose - that is what happened in Vietnam and in Irak, Afghanistan, and Pakistan with Obama's drones. But there are many, many other ideas covered here.

I recommend the book for a careful read, though do not endorse his predictions of complete anarchy and all-encompassing brutality.

This is one of the best books that I have read on war. The book covers history, government, religion, economics, law (both domestic and international). All of these areas are apart of warmaking. The author writes the book with the assuption that the reader as an indepth understanding of all these areas. If you do not have a good understanding of each of these areas, then reasoning of this book will be lost on you.

The age of this book having been written in the early 90's is what caught my eye. That made this author not one of the current glut of the new trend of writting on counterinsurgency, Islam, and the current trends of warfare now. The author speaks of many of the same techniques as the new Army/Marine's counterinsurgency manual. Again this was written 16 years ago.

I only gave this four stars because with the obvious knowledge that the author has, the conclution that the modern state and its military is going to come crumbling down is completely wrong. Even given the date of this book I find the conclusion too large of a stretch, making it an emotional arguement and one not based on sound scholary work. Which completely surprizes me with it being set in the middle of such an amazing work.

Over all this an excellent work and is a must read for those who want to learn about war and how it is wage. It is also superior to most of all the new books that have been published in the last five years.

This book tells you why and how war is fought, what for and by whom and what war is all about. It covers the crucial role of the law of war and why state armies have been keeping losing wars against insurgents since World War II.

P.S. Martin van Creveld has actually annotated the books he listed under Selected Bibliography. Very informative to read his comments of these books.

If you know your history then half of this book is not very engaging. The writer explains how conduct of war has developed starting from end to beginning. It's confusing and not all is particularly insightful.

However, the real meat is in the beginning and in the end: the future of war. Van Creveld absolutely nails it. After reading this you'll think very differently about conflicts today.

Excellent book highly informative