The Future of War: A History
By Tim Schultz
May 14, 2018
Historian of science Richard Rhodes tells how Niels Bohr viewed physics not in terms of universal principles but as “a way of asking questions about Nature.†Similarly, Lawrence Freedman portrays history as a way of asking questions about the Future, particularly the future of war. What makes his compelling book different from the chattering volumes about futurology is that it provides usable insights from how our predecessors have perceived and misperceived future conflict. Freedman reminds us that history “is made by people who do not know what is going to happen next.†People in every age were woefully inept at predicting the future since they, like us, were imprisoned by their own experiences, anxieties, and biases. Sometimes they asked the right questions; often they made spectacularly wrong assumptions. So, this is a valuable book for those interested in how people in the past have thought about the future of war and how those thoughts guided and misguided their actions then and, perhaps, now.
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2018/05/14/the_future_of_war_a_history_113443.html
