Martin van Creveld

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Martin van Creveld (born 1946) is an Israeli military historian and theorist. He was born in the Netherlands but has lived in Israel since shortly after his birth. He holds degrees from the London School of Economics and The Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where he has been on the faculty since 1971. He is the author of fifteen books on military history and strategy, of which Command in War (1985), Supplying War (1977, 2nd edition 2004), The Transformation of War (1991), The Sword and the Olive (1998) and The Rise and Decline of the State (1999) are among the best known. Van Creveld has lectured or taught at virtually every strategic institute, military or civilian, in the Western world, including the U.S. Naval War College, most recently in December, 1999 and January, 2000.

Contents

[edit] The Transformation of War

In this treatise of military theory, van Creveld develops what he calls the non-trinitarian theory of warfare, which he juxtaposes to the famous work by Clausewitz, On War [1]

Clausewitz's trinitarian model of war (a term of van Creveld's) distinguishes between the affairs of the population, the army, and the government. Van Creveld criticizes this philosophy as too narrow and state-focused, thus inapplicable to the study of those conflicts involving one or more non-state actors. Instead, he proposes five key issues of war:

  1. By whom war is fought - whether by states or by non-state actors
  2. What is war all about - the relationships between the actors, and between them and the non-combatants
  3. How war is fought - issues of strategy and tactics
  4. What war is fought for - whether to enhance national power, or as an end to itself
  5. Why war is fought - the motivations of the individual soldier.

Van Creveld notes that many of the wars after-1945 were low-intensity conflicts (LICs), in which, paradoxically, seemingly powerful states lost. The book argues that we are seeing a decline of the nation-state, without a comparable decline in organized violence. Moreover, in his view, national armies consistently train and equip to fight a conventional war, rather than the LIC they are likely to face. Consequently, it is imperative that nation states change their army training and rethink their expensive weapon procurement programs.

The book's significance is attested by its inclusion into the list of required reading for US Army officers, and the only non-American entry on the list.[2].

[edit] Views on current affairs

In addition to writing on military history, he also comments, often pointedly, on contemporary societies and politics.

In a TV interview,[3], he expressed doubts as to the ability of the Israeli army to defeat the Palestinians, and argued that one would inevitably be perceived as cowardly:

I agree with you. They [Israeli soldiers] are very brave people... they are idealists... they want to serve their country and they want to prove themselves. The problem is that you cannot prove yourself against someone who is much weaker than yourself. They are in a lose/lose situation. If you are strong and fighting the weak, then if you kill your opponent then you are a scoundrel... if you let him kill you, then you are an idiot. So here is a dilemma which others have suffered before us, and for which as far as I can see there is simply no escape. Now the Israeli army has not by any means been the worst of the lot. It has not done what for instance the Americans did in Vietnam... it did not use napalm, it did not kill millions of people. So everything is relative, but by definition, to return to what I said earlier, if you are strong and you are fighting the weak, then anything you do is criminal.

In 2005, van Creveld made headlines when he said in an interview that the 2003 Invasion of Iraq was "the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 BC sent his legions into Germany and lost them", an apparent reference to the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, which actually took place in 9 AD. His analysis included harsh criticism of the Bush Administration, comparing the war to the Vietnam war. Moreover, he said that "Bush deserves to be impeached and, once he has been removed from office, put on trial." [4]

In a February 2006 editorial by John Pilger, van Creveld is quoted: "Obviously, we don't want Iran to have nuclear weapons and I don't know if they're developing them, but if they're not developing them, they're crazy." [5]

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ Major K. M. French United States Marine Corps, "Clausewitz vs. the Scholar: Martin Van Creveld's Expanded Theory Of War".
  2. ^ Brian Whitaker, "Nowhere to run", November 29, The Guardian, 2005
  3. ^ Jennifer Byrne, "Interview with Martin van Creveld" March 20, ABC, 2002
  4. ^ Brian Whitaker, "Nowhere to run", November 29, The Guardian, 2005
  5. ^ John Pilger, "The Next War - Crossing the Rubicon", truthout.org editorial about the prospects of an invasion of Iran, 10 February 2006

[edit] Published works

Books
  • Hitler's strategy 1940-1941; the Balkan clue, Cambridge University Press, 1973, ISBN 0-521-20143-8
  • Military lessons of the Yom Kippur War : historical perspectives, Beverly Hills : Sage Publications, 1975, ISBN 0-8039-0562-9
  • Supplying war : logistics from Wallenstein to Patton, Cambridge University Press, 1977, ISBN 0-521-21730-X (2nd ed, 2004, ISBN 0-521-54657-5)
  • Fighting power : German and US Army performance, 1939-1945, Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 1982, ISBN 0-313-23333-0
  • Command in war, Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 1985, ISBN 0-674-14440-6
  • (German)Kampfkraft : militärische Organisation und militärische Leistung, 1939-1945, Freiburg : Verlag Rombach, 1989, ISBN 3-7930-0189-X
  • Technology and war : from 2000 B.C. to the present, New York : Free Press, 1989, ISBN 0-02-933151-X (free paperback, 2001, ISBN 0-02-933153-6)
  • The training of officers : from military professionalism to irrelevance, New York : Free Press, 1990, ISBN 0-02-933152-8
  • The transformation of war, New York : Free Press, 1991, ISBN 0-02-933155-2
  • Nuclear proliferation and the future of conflict, New York : Free Press, 1993, ISBN 0-02-933156-0
  • Air power and maneuver warfare, with contributions from Kenneth S. Brower and Steven L. Canby, Alabama : Air University Press, 1994, ISBN
  • The encyclopedia of revolutions and revolutionaries : from anarchism to Zhou Enlai, New York : Facts on File, 1996, ISBN 0-8160-3236-X
  • The sword and the olive : a critical history of the Israeli defense force, New York : Public Affairs, 1998, ISBN 1-891620-05-3
  • The rise and decline of the state, Cambridge University Press, 1999, ISBN 0-521-65629-X
  • The art of war : war and military thought, London : Cassell, 2000, ISBN 0-304-35264-0 (also New York : Collins/Smithsonian, 2005, ISBN 0-06-083853-1)
  • Men, women, and war, London : Cassell & Co., 2001, ISBN 0-304-35959-9
  • Moshe Dayan, London : Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2004 ISBN 0-297-84669-8
  • Defending Israel : a controversial plan toward peace, New York : Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin’s Press, 2004, ISBN 0-312-32866-4
  • Countering modern terrorism : history, current issues, and future threats : proceedings of the second International Security Conference, Berlin, 15-17 December 2004, with Katharina von Knop and Heinrich Neisser, Bielefeld : Wbv, W. Bertelsmann Verlag, 2005, ISBN 3-7639-3309-3
  • The changing face of war : lessons of combat, from the Marne to Iraq, New York : Presidio Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0-89141-901-3
Selected articles

[edit] External links

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