Strategy Strikes Back

Max Brooks is a writer, public speaker, nonresident fellow at the Modern War Institute at West Point, and senior resident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Art of Future Warfare project. He is the author of World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War and the coauthor (with John Amble, ML Cavanaugh, and Jaym Gates) of Winning Westeros: How Game of Thrones Explains Modern Military Conflict (Potomac, 2019). John Amble is the editorial director of the Modern War Institute. A former U.S. Army military intelligence officer, he is a veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. ML Cavanaugh is a nonresident fellow at the Modern War Institute and a U.S. Army strategist with global experience. Jaym Gates is a science fiction editor and author, with more than a dozen anthologies to her credit. Stanley McChrystal is a U.S. Army general (ret.) who led the Joint Special Operations Command in Iraq during the Persian Gulf wars and was top commander of American forces in Afghanistan.  

Foreword
Stanley McChrystal
Preface
ML Cavanaugh
Introduction
Max Brooks
Part 1. Society and War
1. The Case for Planet Building on Endor
Max Brooks
2. The Jedi and the Senate
Jim Golby
3. Distant Warriors: Are Clones and Troops Too Separate from the Societies They Serve?
Crispin J. Burke
4. On Destroying Alderaan
Mick Cook
5. Civil-Military Relationships in Star Wars
Daniel D. Maurer
6. How General Grievous and Vulture Droids Foreshadow Conflict’s Fast Future
Raq Winchester and Fran Wilde
7. From Princess to General: The On- and Offscreen Rise of the Woman Warrior
Erica Iverson
Part 2. Preparation for War
8. Tarkin Doctrine: The Empire’s Theory of Victory
Kelsey D. Atherton
9. How Not to Build an Army: The Empire’s Flawed Military Force
Mick Ryan
10. The Jedi and the Profession of Arms
Steve Leonard
11. The Right Fleet: Starships for Strategic Purpose
BJ Armstrong
12. Why We Need Space Marines
B. A. Friedman
13. Jedi Mind Tricks: From the Reel to the Real
Jean Marie Ward
14. Lightsabers and Death Stars: Military-Technology Lessons from Star Wars
Dan Ward
Part 3. Waging a War
15. Hybrid Star Wars: The Battle of Endor
James Stavridis and Colin Steele
16. Han, Greedo, and a Strategy of Prevention
Chuck Bies
17. The Logic of Strategy in Space
Steve Metz
18. Darth Vader and Mission Command
Jonathan Bratten
19. The Battle of Hoth: A Critical Analysis
Andrew Liptak
20. Why Military Forces Adapt, Even in a Galaxy Far, Far Away
Chuck Bies
21. Dispatch from Hoth: When the Blood Runs Cold
August Cole
Part 4. Assessment of War
22. Darth Vader’s Failed Counterinsurgency Strategy
Liam Collins
23. Why the Jedi Won Fights, Not Wars
John Spencer
24. Why the Galactic Republic Fell: An Imperial-Network Perspective
Van Jackson
25. Why the Empire Failed
Theresa Hitchens
26. Star Wars, Cyclical History, and Implications for Strategy
Kathleen J. McInnis
27. Suffer, the Weak Must: A History of the Galactic Civil War
Craig Whiteside
28. A Strategist, Yoda Was Not
ML Cavanaugh
Epilogue: The Lessons of Star Wars
ML Cavanaugh
Contributors