The British Way to War, 1980 to Now
This course is no longer available.
Sun Tzu said that war was a matter of life and death for all nations, and a subject requiring urgent study. Currently, the British armed forces are busier than they have been in decades, committed to major military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and others, less publicized but no less important, in other parts of the globe. This course teaches the role of armed force in modern international politics, and how the British government uses different types of force to achieve the aims of policy.
The course investigates the role of armies, navies, and air forces in modern military operations, as carried out by states, and of guerrilla warfare and terrorism as an instrument of both states and non-state actors, with particular reference to the UK since 1980. The course does this through studying the historical development of each form of warfare since the period of the World Wars—followed by detailed case studies of recent British military operations—in order to give some indication of the state of that particular arm as used by the British forces now. Themes running through the course are the relationship between human and technological factors in modern military operations, how the British armed forces in particular have adapted to different enemies and environments, and, perhaps most importantly, what happens when things go wrong, and why. By the end of the course, students will be able to understand why the British government applies military force in the ways that it has done under Margaret Thatcher, John Major, and Tony Blair.
Tutor biography
Simon Anglim, M.A., Ph.D., is the author of several studies on the Gulf War of 1991 and others on manoeuvre warfare, counterinsurgency, and covert operations. He lectures on military history and strategic studies at the University of Reading and at Brunel University.
Field trips
Field trip information will be added later.
Reading lists
Baylis, John and James J. Wirtz, Colin S. Gray, and Eliot Cohen. Strategy in the Contemporary World: An Introduction to Strategic Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press, second ed., 2006.
Gray, Colin S. Modern Strategy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.
Hammes, Col. Thomas X. , USMC. The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century. St. Paul, Minn: Zenith Press, 2006.
Kampfner, John. Blair's Wars. London: Free Press, 2002.
Luttwak, Edward N. Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1987.
Smith, General Sir Rupert. The Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World. London: Penguin, 2005.
Credit and Enrollment Information
X403 (3 semester units in Political Science)
(EDP 284232)