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Battle
What are the critical factors that determine the outcome of battles? Which is more decisive in a clash of arms: armies or the societies they represent? How important is the leadership of the commanders, the terrain over which the armies fight, the weapons they use and the supplies they depend on? And what about the rules of war and the strategic thinking and tactics of the time? These are among the questions Graeme Callister and Rachael Whitbread seek to answer as they demonstrate the breadth of factors that need to be taken into account to truly understand battle. Their book traces the evolution of warfare over time, exploring the changing influence of the social, political, technological a...
War, Public Opinion and Policy in Britain, France and the Netherlands, 1785-1815
This book offers a detailed investigation of the influence of public opinion and national identity on the foreign policies of France, Britain and the Netherlands in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The quarter-century of upheaval and warfare in Europe between the outbreak of the French Revolution and fall of Napoleon saw important developments in understandings of nation, public, and popular sovereignty, which spilled over into how people viewed their governments—and how governments viewed their people. By investigating the ideas and impulses behind Dutch, French and British foreign policy in a comparative context across a range of royal, revolutionary and republican regimes, this book offers new insights into the importance of public opinion and national identities to international relations at the end of the long eighteenth century.
Napoleon's Conscripts
Over the course of the Napoleonic wars, the French emperor mobilised over two million fighting men - most of them conscripts. Napoleon's Conscripts tells their story. Exploring the system of conscription and soldiers' experiences of service, it sheds light on the lives of ordinary men who marched beneath the emperor's eagles. From its introduction in 1798 until the fall of the empire in 1815, conscription provided Napoleon with the manpower for the almost incessant military campaigns that saw French troops fight across Europe from the Atlantic coast to the edge of the Russian steppes, the deserts of North Africa, and the islands of the West Indies. Conscription influenced not only who was in...
In Different Times
This is the first attempt to bring together diverse scholars, using different lenses, to study South Africa’s Border War. As a book, it is critical in approach, provides deeper reflection, and focuses specifically on the SADF experience of the war. The result is a more complex picture of the war’s dynamics and its legacies. Although South Africa is a vastly different country today, the study of the Border War opens a range of questions, also relevant to contemporary deployments such as in Lesotho (1998) and the Central African Republic (2013). It includes the debate on participation in foreign conflicts; on the deployment, design and preparation of appropriate, modern armed forces and their use as foreign policy instruments in far‑off theatres; on military planning; and, as the historical controversies regarding the battles at Cuito Cuanavale and Bangui illustrate, on the interface between foreign campaigning and domestic politics.
Enlightened Religion
The history of the relation between religion and Enlightenment has been virtually rewritten In recent decades. The idea of a fairly unidirectional ‘rise of paganism’, or ‘secularisation’, has been replaced by a much more variegated panorama of interlocking changes—not least in the nature of both religion and rationalism. This volume explores developments in various cultural fields—from lexicology to geographical exploration, and from philosophy and history to theology, media and the arts—involved in the transformation of worldviews in the decades around 1700. The main focus is on the Dutch Republic, where discussion culture was more inclusive than in most other countries, and where people from very different walks of life joined the conversation. Contributors include: Wiep van Bunge, Frank Daudeij, Martin Gierl, Albert Gootjes, Trudelien van ‘t Hof, Jonathan Israel, Henri Krop, Fred van Lieburg, Jaap Nieuwstraten, Joke Spaans, Jetze Touber, and Arthur Weststeijn.
Contemporary Gothic and Horror Film
This book looks at contemporary Gothic cinema within a transnational approach. With a focus on the aesthetic and philosophical roots which lie at the heart of the Gothic, the study invokes its literary as well as filmic forebears by exploring how these styles informed strands of the modern filmic Gothic: the ghost narrative, folk horror, the vampire movie, cosmic horror and, finally, the zombie film. In recent years, the concept of transnationalism has ‘trans’-cended its original boundaries, perhaps excessively in the minds of some. Originally defined in the wake of the rise of globalisation in the 1990s, as a way to study cinema beyond national boundaries, where the look and the story of a film reflected the input of more than one nation, or region, or culture. It was considered too confining to study national cinemas in an age of internationalization, witnessing the fusions of cultures, and post-colonialism, exile and diasporas. The concept allows us to appreciate the broader range of forces from a wider international perspective while at the same time also engaging with concepts of nationalism, identity and an acknowledgement of cinema itself.
Should I Fight?
Since its organization in 1863 the Seventh-day Adventist Church has been counter cultural. In its Christian witness to modern society it has advocated keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, vegetarianism, abstinence from tobacco and alcohol and refusal of its members to bear arms. But the stance on the refusal to bear arms has seen a metamorphous in modern times. Today more Seventh-day Adventist young people have voluntarily joined the military than in any previous generation of the Church's history. This volume is a compliation of essays that were presented at a conference called to discuss the Adventist Church's position on concientious objection. The presenters considered the history of the Church's stand and the changing views. These discussions were not limited to American context but considered other countries including South Africa and Canada.
The École Royale Militaire
This book explores the Paris Ecole Militaire as an institution, arguing for its importance as a school that presented itself as a model for reform during a key moment in the movement towards military professionalism as well as state-run secular education. The school is distinguished for being an Enlightenment project, one of its founders publishing an article on it in the Encyclopédie in 1755. Its curriculum broke completely with the Latin pedagogy of the dominant Jesuit system, while adapting the legacy of seventeenth-century riding academies. Its status touches on the nature of absolutism, as it was conceived to glorify the Bourbon dynasty in a similar way to the girls’ school at Saint Cyr and the Invalides. It was also a dispensary of royal charity calculated to ally the nobility more closely to royal interests through military service. In the army, its proofs of nobility were the model for the much debated 1781 Ségur decree, often described as a notable cause of the French Revolution.
South Africa's Post-Apartheid Military
This timely book examines how the South African National Defence Force has adapted to the country’s new security, political and social environment since 1994. In South Africa’s changed political state, how has civilian control of the military been implemented and what does this mean for ‘defence in a democracy’? This book presents an overview of the security environment, how the mission focus of the military has changed and the implications for force procurement, force preparation, force employment and force sustainability. The author addresses other issues, such as: · the effect of integrating former revolutionary soldiers into a professional armed force · the effect of affirmativ...
Elon Musk
'How did a bullied, introverted Pretoria schoolboy become the world's richest person and arguably humanity's greatest change agent? Vlismas's extensively researched biography does a great job of unwrapping Elon Musk's remarkable life story.'– TOBY SHAPSHAK. Often in the news for his entrepreneurial exploits and his controversial tweets, Elon Musk is one of the richest and best-known people on earth. In 2022 he made headlines worldwide with his bid to buy Twitter. Who is this boundary-pushing billionaire with grand plans of inhabiting Mars, and what lies at the heart of his vision? Why is he so utterly unafraid of risk? As an awkward Pretoria schoolboy who loved comics and science fiction, ...
