Clausewitz Roundtable

Clausewitz, On War, Book 1: Closing Comments and Section 28

by

At this point in what has been a fascinating round table, I think it useful to consider the comment that Sir Michael Howard made during the Clausewitz Conference of 2005, that being that “Clausewitz is a Rorschach Test”, meaning that readers tend to see in him what ever they are looking for. Translations indicate this as well, with the various English translations of On War reflecting what were the dominate strategic emphasis or concern at the time of translation.

There is nothing especially surprising about this, more the nature of human inquiry. How On War is approached will depend very much on the specific epoch, concerns and culture of the reader. Still there are three points which must be considered in reading On War imo since they do relate to the nature of the work.

First, a knowledge of Napoleonic warfare, and Prussian history and culture is very useful, including the concept of Bildung, for which there is no direct English translation. Consider it self-education and development. For instance On War is expected to contribute to the Bildung of a military commander, allow him a theory in which to develop his sense of judgment in which to make tactical, or rather strategic command decisions.

Read more

Clausewitz, On War, Book II: The Intellectual Style of the Military Genius

by

Last week Lexington Green and I wrote on the virtues intrinsic to military genius. These virtues were categorized as intellectual, or psychological, or both. The truths revealed came from Chapter 3, Book I of On War.

Book II of On War attempts to serve as bedrock to the theory of war, and in doing so, provides a guide to the kinds of knowledge that belongs in the intellect of the military genius. Book II also explains how that knowledge ought to be learned, and used, and ultimately the intellectual style of the military genius. This supplements the lengthy treatment I gave to psychological, emotional, and moral factors that help describe the military genius.

How does the commander go about learning what he must? What is his intellectual style and what are his habits? What must he learn? How must he learn it? Should have be a disinterested third party with respect to his knowledge? Must he internalize his military knowledge? Is his knowledge derived mainly from experience, or from study? What are the pitfalls of the intellectual methods of the military mind?

Read more

Clausewitz, On War, Book I: The Enduring Value of Clausewitz’s Articulation of the Nature of War

by

(Herein are a few thoughts on Book I, at the 11th hour of this weeks discussion. I made many points in comments, but I have a few more left … .)

On War is an ambitious book. In fact, it is over-ambitious, as Clausewitz himself seems to have recognized. But because his reach exceeded his grasp, in fact exceeded the graspable, he went very far. How well did he do? As many of our contributors have noted, there are criticisms one can level at his depiction of the nature of war. Yet it remains Clauzewitz’s statement of the nature of war that is our starting point, though we turn also to Sun Tzu, to Thucydides, and others. To change the metaphor, he cast his javelin to strike down Mars himself, and failed to do so, as he was bound to, as he knew he would fail. But he cast it so far and so hard that it is still flying almost two centuries later, and we can follow in its path.

Another observation: The only other writer who is berated, almost two centuries after he wrote, for failing to comprehensively understand, discuss and predict absolutely everything, is Tocqueville. Democracy in America, like On War, so dominates its own field that we perversely end up taking for granted the amazing feat of writing a still-relevant book. We are a tough audience, and we are disappointed and even indignant that the author is not omniscient, and failed to fully explain everything that happened in the times since. This alone shows that each of them still remain dominant in their fields, and that any serious effort to cover the same ground must come to grips with their books.

Read more

Clausewitz Roundtable, On War: Week of January 11, 2009

by

This link– CLICK HERE –opens a Grazr Window. It loads an OPML file, which, in this instance, is a structured container providing a list of links–this week’s posts categorized Clausewitz Roundtable.

It’s also a sidebar navigation tool. How so? Open the link. Bookmark it, then edit its properties to open in sidebar. Easy?

You can GO HERE to get embed code. I put it in my WordPress 2.7 blog, like this.

If you have questions, suggestions, comments about this tool, please Leave a Reply.