While many books examine specific wars, few study the history of war worldwide and from an evolutionary perspective. A Global History of War is one of the first works to focus not on the impact of war on civilizations, but rather on how civilizations impact the art and execution of war. World-renowned scholar Gérard Chaliand concentrates on the peoples and cultures who have determined how war is conducted and reveals the lasting historical consequences of combat, offering a unique picture of the major geopolitical and civilizational clashes that have rocked our common history and made us who we are today. Chaliand’s questions provoke a new understanding of the development of armed conflict. How did the foremost non-European empires rise and fall? What critical role did the nomads of the Eurasian steppes and their descendants play? Chaliand illuminates the military cultures and martial traditions of the great Eurasian empires, including Turkey, China, Iran, and Mongolia. Based on fifteen years of research, this book provides a novel military and strategic perspective on the crises and conflicts that have shaped the current world order.

This book addresses the global history of technology, warfare and state formation from the Stone Age to the Information Age. Using a combination of top-down and bottom-up methodologies, it examines both interstate and intrastate conflicts with a focus on Eurasian technology and warfare. It shows how human agency and structural factors have intertwined, creating a complex web of technology and warfare. It also explores the interplay between technological and non-technological factors to chart the evolution of warfare from its origins to the present day, arguing that the interactions between civilian and military sectors have shaped the use of technology in warfare. Given its scope and depth, it is a valuable resource for researchers in fields such as world history, history of science and technology, history of warfare and imperialism and international relations.

A monumental, groundbreaking work, now in paperback, that shows how technological and strategic revolutions have transformed the battlefield Combining gripping narrative history with wide-ranging analysis, War Made New focuses on four "revolutions" in military affairs and describes how inventions ranging from gunpowder to GPS-guided air strikes have remade the field of battle—and shaped the rise and fall of empires. War Made New begins with the Gunpowder Revolution and explains warfare's evolution from ritualistic, drawn-out engagements to much deadlier events, precipitating the rise of the modern nation-state. He next explores the triumph of steel and steam during the Industrial Revolution, showing how it powered the spread of European colonial empires. Moving into the twentieth century and the Second Industrial Revolution, Boot examines three critical clashes of World War II to illustrate how new technology such as the tank, radio, and airplane ushered in terrifying new forms of warfare and the rise of centralized, and even totalitarian, world powers. Finally, Boot focuses on the Gulf War, the invasion of Afghanistan, and the Iraq War—arguing that even as cutting-edge technologies have made America the greatest military power in world history, advanced communications systems have allowed decentralized, "irregular" forces to become an increasingly significant threat.

From the invention of the wheel to the mapping of the genome, technology has always been deeply intertwined with the course of human history. Now, this fascinating set explores the role technology has played in eighteen separate cultures in world history, and reveals the many ways people use technology to control their environment, express religious values, deploy political power, confer social status, and afford themselves varying degrees of pleasure, comfort, and security. Whether focusing on Egyptian pyramids or medieval cathedrals, the Mayan astronomical calendar or the internet, Technology in World History illuminates the amazing array of technologies that humans have developed to shape and give meaning to their lives.

This book provides a wide-ranging and comprehensive coverage of warfare across times and cultures. Its main strengths are its ability to provide context for each period discussed, comparison between developments in Europe, Asia, and the colonized world, and critical and up-to-date bibliographies that allow the reader to pursue subjects in greater depth. - Jacket flap.

In this new history, David Edgerton invites us to rethink how technology is used. For instance, horses contributed more to Nazi conquests than the V2. In influence, IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad matches Bill Gates. And corrugated iron is not dead yet.

The Technology of World War I explores the dramatic developments in military technology during World War I. It shows how the Industrial Revolution changed the tools of war, from the production of high-grade iron and steel for warships to the lethal products created by the chemical industry. This book also examines how the superiority of defensive weapons led to the lack of movement and resulting stalemate on the front lines during World War I. It looks at the horrors of trench warfare and considers how the combination of larger armies and improved weaponry was to lead to unprecedented numbers of casualties. Finally, it discusses the far-reaching effects of the war's technological advances in medicine, transportation, and communications and looks at the cost of the war-- in financial and human terms-- to the countries involved.