Food for Thought

Week 15: Tuesday, May 4

Eliot Cohen, "A Revolution in Warfare" (Section A: Bonaventure to Florence; Section B: Allwarden to DiConza)

1) What are the most important developments driving forward the contemporary revolution in military affairs?

2) What will this revolution allow generals to do that they could not do before?

3) How will the nature of war change as a result of this revolution?

4) Technology is very important for the development of this revolution in military affairs, but what will determine the direction of this revolution?

Williamson Murray and MacGregor Knox, "The Future Behind Us" (Section A: Greaney to Joseph; Section B: Ebbeling to Johnson)

1) Why are both Murray and Knox so sceptical about the ability of a modern military revolution to reduce war to an "essentially frictionless engineering exercise"?

2) Why has it proved so difficult for the United States to provide some direction or coherence to the contemporary revolution in military affairs?

3) What lay at the heart of the victory of the United States in the Second Gulf War against Iraq in 1991?

4) What conclusions do Murray and MacGregor draw from their reading of the history of military revolutions?

Martin van Creveld, The Transformation of War (Section A: June to Maloney; Section B: Landri to Morong)

1) According to Creveld, what major institution will disappear due to the changing nature of warfare in the future?

2) What will war be about in the future?

3) How will war be fought in the future?

4) What will war be fought for in the future?

John Keegan, The Face of Battle (Section A: Mansfield to Snell; Section B: Muzamil to Ziino)

1) In what ways will battle change in the future?

2) Why is it significant that "the divergence between the facts of everyday and of battlefield existence is not only greater than ever before but is widening year by year"? In what ways is this divergence taking place? What are the consequences of this divergence?

3) Why does Keegan believe that battle will abolish itself?