Why Leaders Choose War

Author : Jonathan Renshon
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN 13 : 0313081468
Total Pages : 239 pages
Book Rating : 4.60/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why Leaders Choose War written by Jonathan Renshon and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2006-05-30 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Preventive war has a long history in international politics, but until it became an instrumental part of the Bush Doctrine, it was mostly overlooked. Renshon argues that the best avenue for understanding decisions to initiate preventive action is through a close examination of the individual leader responsible for such decisions. In this work, he develops a theory of psychological motivations for preventive action. By examining five situations, including the Iraq war, he pinpoints the factors that matter most in decisions to take preventive military action. There have been preventive wars throughout history, but the motivations behind them have remained elusive, and many crucial questions remain unanswered. What exactly constitutes preventive action? What differentiates preventive action from pre-emptive action? Are there significant differences between preventive strikes and full-on preventive wars? What is the relationship of preventive action to traditional concepts of deterrence, compellence, and international law? Finally, why do states initiate preventive action? Renshon argues that the best avenue for understanding decisions to initiate preventive action is through a close examination of the individual leader responsible for such decisions.

Author : Michael C. Horowitz
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1107022932
Total Pages : 229 pages
Book Rating : 4.35/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why Leaders Fight written by Michael C. Horowitz and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2015-09-29 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using in-depth research on famous leaders, this book explores how their life experiences fundamentally shape the reasons why nations go to war.

Author : Michael Beschloss
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 0307409619
Total Pages : 754 pages
Book Rating : 4.14/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Presidents of War written by Michael Beschloss and published by Crown. This book was released on 2019-10-22 with total page 754 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From a preeminent presidential historian comes a “superb and important” (The New York Times Book Review) saga of America’s wartime chief executives “Fascinating and heartbreaking . . . timely . . . Beschloss’s broad scope lets you draw important crosscutting lessons about presidential leadership.”—Bill Gates Widely acclaimed and ten years in the making, Michael Beschloss’s Presidents of War is an intimate and irresistibly readable chronicle of the Chief Executives who took the United States into conflict and mobilized it for victory. From the War of 1812 to Vietnam, we see these leaders considering the difficult decision to send hundreds of thousands of Americans to their deaths; struggling with Congress, the courts, the press, and antiwar protesters; seeking comfort from their spouses and friends; and dropping to their knees in prayer. Through Beschloss’s interviews with surviving participants and findings in original letters and once-classified national security documents, we come to understand how these Presidents were able to withstand the pressures of war—or were broken by them. Presidents of War combines this sense of immediacy with the overarching context of two centuries of American history, traveling from the time of our Founders, who tried to constrain presidential power, to our modern day, when a single leader has the potential to launch nuclear weapons that can destroy much of the human race. Praise for Presidents of War "A marvelous narrative. . . . As Beschloss explains, the greatest wartime presidents successfully leaven military action with moral concerns. . . . Beschloss’s writing is clean and concise, and he admirably draws upon new documents. Some of the more titillating tidbits in the book are in the footnotes. . . . There are fascinating nuggets on virtually every page of Presidents of War. It is a superb and important book, superbly rendered.”—Jay Winik, The New York Times Book Review "Sparkle and bite. . . . Valuable and engrossing study of how our chief executives have discharged the most significant of all their duties. . . . Excellent. . . . A fluent narrative that covers two centuries of national conflict.” —Richard Snow, The Wall Street Journal

Author : Margaret MacMillan
Publisher : Random House
ISBN 13 : 1984856146
Total Pages : 332 pages
Book Rating : 4.42/5 ( download)

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Download or read book War: How Conflict Shaped Us written by Margaret MacMillan and published by Random House. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is peace an aberration? The New York Times bestselling author of Paris 1919 offers a provocative view of war as an essential component of humanity. NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW “Margaret MacMillan has produced another seminal work. . . . She is right that we must, more than ever, think about war. And she has shown us how in this brilliant, elegantly written book.”—H.R. McMaster, author of Dereliction of Duty and Battlegrounds: The Fight to Defend the Free World The instinct to fight may be innate in human nature, but war—organized violence—comes with organized society. War has shaped humanity’s history, its social and political institutions, its values and ideas. Our very language, our public spaces, our private memories, and some of our greatest cultural treasures reflect the glory and the misery of war. War is an uncomfortable and challenging subject not least because it brings out both the vilest and the noblest aspects of humanity. Margaret MacMillan looks at the ways in which war has influenced human society and how, in turn, changes in political organization, technology, or ideologies have affected how and why we fight. War: How Conflict Shaped Us explores such much-debated and controversial questions as: When did war first start? Does human nature doom us to fight one another? Why has war been described as the most organized of all human activities? Why are warriors almost always men? Is war ever within our control? Drawing on lessons from wars throughout the past, from classical history to the present day, MacMillan reveals the many faces of war—the way it has determined our past, our future, our views of the world, and our very conception of ourselves.

Author : Elizabeth N. Saunders
Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780801461477
Total Pages : 312 pages
Book Rating : 4.72/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Leaders at War written by Elizabeth N. Saunders and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2011-05-27 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the most contentious issues in contemporary foreign policy—especially in the United States—is the use of military force to intervene in the domestic affairs of other states. Some military interventions explicitly try to transform the domestic institutions of the states they target; others do not, instead attempting only to reverse foreign policies or resolve disputes without trying to reshape the internal landscape of the target state. In Leaders at War, Elizabeth N. Saunders provides a framework for understanding when and why great powers seek to transform foreign institutions and societies through military interventions. She highlights a crucial but often-overlooked factor in international relations: the role of individual leaders. Saunders argues that leaders’ threat perceptions—specifically, whether they believe that threats ultimately originate from the internal characteristics of other states—influence both the decision to intervene and the choice of intervention strategy. These perceptions affect the degree to which leaders use intervention to remake the domestic institutions of target states. Using archival and historical sources, Saunders concentrates on U.S. military interventions during the Cold War, focusing on the presidencies of Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson. After demonstrating the importance of leaders in this period, she also explores the theory’s applicability to other historical and contemporary settings including the post–Cold War period and the war in Iraq.

Author : Andrew Roberts
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0525522395
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.93/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Leadership in War written by Andrew Roberts and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2019-10-29 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comparison of nine leaders who led their nations through the greatest wars the world has ever seen and whose unique strengths—and weaknesses—shaped the course of human history, from the bestselling, award-winning author of Churchill, Napoleon, and The Last King of America “Has the enjoyable feel of a lively dinner table conversation with an opinionated guest.” —The New York Times Book Review Taking us from the French Revolution to the Cold War, Andrew Roberts presents a bracingly honest and deeply insightful look at nine major figures in modern history: Napoleon Bonaparte, Horatio Nelson, Winston Churchill, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, George C. Marshall, Charles de Gaulle, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Margaret Thatcher. Each of these leaders fundamentally shaped the outcome of the war in which their nation was embroiled. Is war leadership unique, or did these leaders have something in common, traits and techniques that transcend time and place and can be applied to the essential nature of conflict? Meticulously researched and compellingly written, Leadership in War presents readers with fresh, complex portraits of leaders who approached war with different tactics and weapons, but with the common goal of success in the face of battle. Both inspiring and cautionary, these portraits offer important lessons on leadership in times of struggle, unease, and discord. With his trademark verve and incisive observation, Roberts reveals the qualities that doom even the most promising leaders to failure, as well as the traits that lead to victory.

Author : Carl von Clausewitz
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 388 pages
Book Rating : 4.87/5 ( download)

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Download or read book On War written by Carl von Clausewitz and published by . This book was released on 1908 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Greg Cashman
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN 13 : 0742566528
Total Pages : 621 pages
Book Rating : 4.21/5 ( download)

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Download or read book What Causes War? written by Greg Cashman and published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. This book was released on 2013-07-29 with total page 621 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now in a thoroughly revised and updated edition, this classic text presents a comprehensive survey of the many alternative theories that attempt to explain the causes of interstate war. For each theory, Greg Cashman examines the arguments and counterarguments, considers the empirical evidence and counterevidence generated by social-science research, looks at historical applications of the theory, and discusses the theory’s implications for restraining international violence. Among the questions he explores are: Are humans aggressive by nature? Do individual differences among leaders matter? How might poor decision making procedures lead to war? Why do leaders engage in seemingly risky and irrational policies that end in war? Why do states with internal conflicts seem to become entangled in wars with their neighbors? What roles do nationalism and ethnicity play in international conflict? What kinds of countries are most likely to become involved in war? Why have certain pairs of countries been particularly war-prone over the centuries? Can strong states deter war? Can we find any patterns in the way that war breaks out? How do balances of power or changes in balances of power make war more likely? Do social scientists currently have an answer to the question of what causes war? Cashman examines theories of war at the individual, substate, nation-state, dyadic, and international systems level of analysis. Written in a clear and accessible style, this interdisciplinary text will be essential reading for all students of international relations.

Author : Sarah E. Croco
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781316319925
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.2X/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Peace at what Price? written by Sarah E. Croco and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : John J. Mearsheimer
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0199975450
Total Pages : 155 pages
Book Rating : 4.57/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why Leaders Lie written by John J. Mearsheimer and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 155 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents an analysis of the lying behavior of political leaders, discussing the reasons why it occurs, the different types of lies, and the costs and benefits to the public and other countries that result from it, with examples from the recent past.