Ripples of battle : how wars of the past still determine how we fight, how we live, and how we think

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Title:

Author:

Hanson, Victor Davis.

ISBN:

9780385504003

Personal Author:

Hanson, Victor Davis.

Edition:

1st ed.

Publication Information:

New York : Doubleday, 2003.

Physical Description:

p. cm.

Contents:

Ch. 1. The Wages of Suicide: Okinawa, April 1-July 2, 1945 -- Recipe for a Holocaust -- The Laboratory of Suicide -- Divine Wind -- The Military Lessons -- Epilogue: The Men of Okinawa -- Ch. 2. Shiloh's Ghosts, April 6-7, 1862 -- Morning: The Birth of Uncle Billy -- Afternoon: The Myth of the Lost Opportunity -- Evening: Ben-Hur -- Night: The Klansman -- Postmortem -- Ch. 3. The Culture of Delium, November 424 B. C. -- The Battle -- Euripides and the Rotting Dead -- Thespian Tragedies -- The Faces of Delium -- Socrates Slain? -- Beauty from the Dead -- The Birth of Tactics -- What Was Delium? -- Epilogue: The Imprint of Battle.

Abstract:

"In Ripples of Battle, military historian Victor Davis Hanson looks at three important battles that changed the course of Western history in order to show how battles fought long ago and far away can still affect the way we think, fight, and express ourselves through culture. In one of these - Okinawa - Hanson lost an uncle, also named Victor Hanson, and this leads him to focus first and foremost on the human costs of war: the husbands, brothers, sons, and fathers missing from their families' lives. These are the first ripples that spread out from every battle. But there are also military, political, and cultural ripples, and in this regard some battles are more significant than others."--BOOK JACKET.

Subject Term:

Military art and science.

Civilization, Western.

World War, 1939-1945 -- Campaigns -- Japan -- Okinawa Island.

Shiloh, Battle of, Tenn., 1862.

Delium, Battle of, Greece, 424 B.C.

World War, 1939-1945 -- Influence.

Geographic Term:

United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Influence.

Greece -- History -- Peloponnesian War, 431-404 B.C. -- Influence.

Electronic Access:

Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/description/random0414/2003044043.html

Copies:

Available:*

Library	Material Type	Item Barcode	Shelf Number	Copy	Status
Searching... 1:IIEMSA	1:GEN-BOOK	33168015735257	355.02 H251R 2003	1	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

What defines a "watershed event," a moment in history that changes the world forever? Victor Davis Hanson tackles this intriguing question in RIPPLES OF BATTLE, an eye-opening look at three great military encounters: Okinawa, Shiloh, and Delium, an obscure battle of the Peloponnesian War. A master of military detail, Hanson describes the strategies and tactics, and the terrible cost in human life, of each battle. These vivid accounts set the stage for a wider inquiry into the long-term, often unintended, consequences of war. RIPPLES OF BATTLE begins with the most recent battle and works backward in time, starting with Okinawa (1945) and its legacy. While many have drawn comparisons between the 9/11 pilots and the Japanese kamikazes, Hanson argues that the real significance of the battle was the heightening of America's resolve to win the war at any cost. The failure of suicide tactics was also a vital catalyst in ending Japan's militarist leadership and setting the country on the path toward democracy. Next, Hanson explains how the death of Confederate Commander-in-Chief Albert Sidney Johnston at Shiloh (1862), long considered a turning point in the Civil War, gave birth to the myth of the Lost Cause--the belief that only a tragic accident of fate destroyed the South's noble dream. The stubborn devotion to this reactionary view would slow Southern progress for a century. Turning to the battle of Delium (424 B.C.), Hanson shows how the ripples of each battle spread and deepen with the passage of time. Little remembered today, the battle inspired a tragedy by Euripides, profoundly altered the direction of Western philosophy (Socrates was one of the few Athenians to survive), and virtually created Western infantry tactics. Employing the lens of the past to bring the present into focus, RIPPLES OF BATTLE is a work of penetrating insight and profound understanding of the human cost and consequence of war.