The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern Book

This collection of essays will probably be read only by students of history, but its wisdom would benefit us all.

The author, a Stanford professor and renowned scholar, examines the question of why wars exist: Why did wars occur in the past? The present? Most important, will they continue to exist in the future?

With remarkable breadth of knowledge, Hanson reaches back to ancient times, to the Peloponnesian War between Greece and Sparta, then walks us through history'Caesar, Napoleon, the American Civil War, the World Wars of the twentieth century, the present-day war on terror'and draws correlations that provide us the answers.

There is far too much here to touch on in a blog post or review, but I can list a few select highlights:

-The field of military history itself is of vast importance, yet it is increasingly isolated and hard to find in today's college environment. As a formal academic discipline it is atrophied, shunned by political correctness that finds the subject distasteful. Yet only by objectively studying past military conflict can we prevent or minimize future conflict.

-The balance between war and democracy, freedom and security. Are dictatorships, with their command structure, innately superior in fighting wars? Fortunately, no. The political and economic freedoms of the United States, and the resulting innovation and dynamism, have produced the world's finest fighting forces.

-The rise of "utopian pacifism." This is the belief that wars are the result of a misunderstanding, and that future wars can be eliminated through reason, education, and diplomacy. Such a myth has cycled throughout history, as it appeals to the romantic yearning for the perfectibility of human nature. Such beliefs are prevalent again today, despite the disconnect from reality.

The truth is that war has always been a part of the human condition, and always will be. War should always be a last resort, but will always be necessary for the survival of civilization. As the author points out, the United States of America was "born through war, reunited in war, and saved from destruction by war." Moreover,

"Our freedom is not entirely our own, in some sense it is mortgaged by those who paid the ultimate price for its continuance."

America today, with its prosperity and its principles of personal freedom, market capitalism, and constitutional government, is ipso facto envied and hated by the various warlords, dictators, and tribalists that litter the globe. For this reason, our continued existence is best assured by military preparedness, deterrence-based diplomacy, and the courage to fight and defeat our enemies.