Strange Warfellows

Trends in Contemporary Conflicts

Benjamin West General Johnson Saving a Wounded French Officer

I prefer the historical to the theoretical, the concrete to the conceptual, and the actual to the ethereal. In keeping with this inclination, I reserve an especially flea-ridden corner of my intellectual doghouse for acronym-laden prophecies of ‘changes that change everything’.

Major trends often travel in different directions. Thus, to employ the example at the heart of The Last of the Mohicans, the tendency within Europe towards well-disciplined (and, by historical standards, remarkably well-behaved) armies, which hit its high point towards the end of the eighteenth century, coincided with the colonization of North America, which put Europeans in close contact with people who fought by very different rules.

Now that I have deployed my disclaimers, I hope that you, Gentle Readers, will allow me to make some broad-bore observations, not only about conflicts that took place in the recent past and those taking place at the present time, but also - gangway for the fools rushing in - the near future.