Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age

Book Overview

"Authoritative and convincing."--New York Times Book Review
The classic reference on the theory and practice of war

The essays in this volume analyze war, its strategic characterisitics, and its political and social functions over the past five centuries. The diversity of its themes and the broad perspectives applied to them make the book a work of general history as much as a history of the theory and practice of war from...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0691027641
• ISBN13: 9780691027647
• Release Date: March 1986
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 952 Pages
• Weight: 2.82 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.8" x 6.2" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Falling apart

The binding is terrible and the pages are actually falling out. If it wasn’t required for a class currently being taken I would have immediately sent it back.

A good anthology

Normally I find essay collections insufficient in depth and scope,but this one has agreably surprised me, I concur with other rewiers that the earlier ediction was better, but the essays here are intelligent and up to the point, the piece on Mahan, who was in my opinion a greatly overrated military thinker,is particularly good.

Mandatory Reading for Army Staff Majors

As the title indicates, the Army's Command & General Staff College requires students to read Makers of Modern Strategy in the core history class. Professors can make best use of this book as a supplement. As other reviewers have noted, the chapters are disjointed with each other. Taken separately, however, many of the chapters help the history student or enthusiast to develop a depth of understanding on a particular subject. Authors such as John Shy, Douglas Porch, Michael Howard, and Condoleeza Rice, just to name a few, explore many of the strategic issues involved with the evolution of military thought. From Machiavelli and Clausewitz to strategies of world wars and colonial wars, Makers of Modern Strategy adds value to any serious study of warfare. The high quality academic research and thought that underlies many of the articles is worth the price of the book. Highly recommended.

Still, this is a good book.....

Although I agree with the reviewer preceeding me that this might not be as strong of a book as was the masterpiece which preceeded it (by Earle), it is still a strong book and does (generally) what it sets out to do: to provide an accounting of major developments in military thought (i.e. western military thought) from the Renassance to the modern age. As a text or as a reference, this is still a powerful and useful book. Each of the chapters discusses a major figure's thought in a fashion that can be dealt with easily in a sitting: for those people who don't want to sit and sort through Jomini (though everyone reading this should sit down with Clausewitz! ) or Douhet, to see their rights and wrongs....I like this book. I bought my copy for $8.00 in NYC and have had it with me through a number of moves since....

Good book for general military history

This book gives the reader a good general overview of the development of modern military history. There are many good essays on (in my opinion too many) the 17th and 18th century. The modern reader concerned with more recent developments might find the last part of the book more beneficial