The Scientific Way of Warfare: Order and Chaos on the Battlefields of Modernity Book

Great book that got off to a bit of a slow start.

Bousquet's stated aim is to track the interaction between scientific ideas, and the theories and practices of western warfare. (3) However, the underlying focus appears to be the critique of Network Centric Warfare (NCW) as a perpetuation of the cybernetic approach to warfare, not the chaoplexic approach that it advocates. (232) I think he achieves both aims well.

A key theme established at the outset of the book and clearly evident throughout is the metaphor as the means through which the interaction between science and warfare occurs. (25) To this end, the book divides the analysis into four distinct scientific "regimes" with associated metaphors:
(1) Mechanistic - Clockwork
(2) Thermodynamic - Combustion engine
(3) Cybernetic - Computers
(4) Chaoplexity - Ants

In each chapter Bousquet does an excellent job of first explaining the scientific advances that led to the change of regime, and then switches to identifying how changing scientific perspectives moulded military thoughts. The fact that he focuses on the actually concept of how war should be fought, not the necessarily the tools that are used to fight them, made this book more useful and not just a list of how military hardware has improved.

Perhaps the best aspect of the book was its accessibility. Bousquet does an excellent job in explaining difficult concepts without appearing to "dumb it down" too much. I actually walked away with a better understanding of chaos and complexity theory, as well as the theories of John Boyd, based on the small chapters devoted to this, then from a book read earlier that was focused solely on the topic.

In summ: Great book. On the "to be read when I actually have time to absorb it more fully list"