Overview

Have globalisation, virulent ethnic differences, and globally operating insurgents fundamentally changed the nature of war in the last decades? Interpretations of war as driven by politics and state rationale, formulated most importantly by the nineteenth century practitioner Carl von Clausewitz, have received strong criticism. Political explanations have been said to fall short in explaining conflicts in the Balkans, Africa, Asia and the attacks of 11 September 2001 in the United States. This book aims to re-evaluate these criticisms by not only carefully scrutinising Clausewitz's arguments and their applicability, but also by a careful reading of the criticism itself. In doing so, the contributions on this book present empirical evidence on the basis of several case studies, addressing various aspects of modern war, such as the actors, conduct and purposes of war. The book concludes that while the debate on the nature of war has far from run its course, the interpretation of war as postulated by Clausewitz is not as inapplicable as some have claimed. Furthermore, the label a war receives, such as civil war, does not necessarily say much about the way this war is fought.; Civil wars are not always irregular or unconventional wars. Changes in the conduct of war have unmistakeably occurred but change should not overshadow the important continuities that exist in the nature of war and warfare.

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9781280100321

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