Reviews for The Culture of War

The average rating for The Culture of War based on 2 reviews is 2.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2010-01-15 00:00:00 David Quinterto Encyclopedic in narrative detail, but sometimes skimpy and arbitrary in analysis. Professor Van Creveld is one of the world's leading authorities on military affairs, but this is not one of his better books - he has a point in his message that political correctness is often unrealistic and can be very bad when trying to win a war, but it's also possible to go too far in the direction of being contrary for the sake of being contrary, and he does. In particular, I believe, based on my experience during twenty years on active duty in the U.S. Marine Corps, that he goes too far in basically dismissing women as being useless in combat. It is absolutely valid that there are physical requirements a combat soldier should be able to meet, and that a lower percentage of women than men may be able to do so; however, there are athletic women who are more than capable of keeping up with most men, and there are a lot of men who can't hack it. I knew some women Marines who I would have trusted completely to keep up on the march, shoot straight, hold their own in a fight, and stand watch while I was asleep. I'd suggest to the author that he go do some observation of women in the armed forces of the U.S. and other countries today, and do so with his eyes and mind open.

Review # 2 was written on 2017-03-18 00:00:00 Luis Vieyra Van Creveld states in his introduction that the purpose of this book is to advance the serious study of warfare as an integral and universal part of the human experience, and to defend a long military tradition from the pernicious attacks of its enemies: pacifists, feminists, and pernicious neo-Clausewitzian battlespace managers. The result is sweeping, but also uneven and arbitrary. The book starts quite well, with an examination of the importance of pomp, ritual, and ceremony in military affairs. As it moves on, it becomes clear that Van Creveld's best depth of sources are in the Classical world and the Napoleonic conflicts. World War 1 is mentioned in terms of its suprisingly militaristic poets, even Siegfried Sassoon loved the thrill of life in the trenches, and anything past 1940 seems to disappear from view. All examples of tribal warfare come from Fadiman's 1982 An Oral History of Tribal Warfare: The Meru of Mt. Kenya. The final chapters on collapses in military culture resulting from mob violence, roboticism, loss of bravery, and feminism are "old man yells at cloud" bad. I'm someone inclined to be favorable to Van Creveld's arguments. Just look at my "war" shelf, or the airpower pictures I post weekly on Facebook. However, this book is a mess. For an good take on the topic, I strongly recommend Shannon French's The Code of the Warrior: Exploring Warrior Values Past and Present.