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    Castles, Battles, and Bombs: How Economics Explains Military History
    Castles, Battles, and Bombs: How Economics Explains Military History
    Castles, Battles, and Bombs: How Economics Explains Military History
    Ebook358 pages11 hours

    Castles, Battles, and Bombs: How Economics Explains Military History

    By Jurgen Brauer and Hubert van Tuyll

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    About this ebook

    Castles, Battles, and Bombs reconsiders key episodes of military history from the point of view of economics—with dramatically insightful results. For example, when looked at as a question of sheer cost, the building of castles in the High Middle Ages seems almost inevitable: though stunningly expensive, a strong castle was far cheaper to maintain than a standing army. The authors also reexamine the strategic bombing of Germany in World War II and provide new insights into France’s decision to develop nuclear weapons. Drawing on these examples and more, Brauer and Van Tuyll suggest lessons for today’s military, from counterterrorist strategy and military manpower planning to the use of private military companies in Afghanistan and Iraq.

     

    "In bringing economics into assessments of military history, [the authors] also bring illumination. . . . [The authors] turn their interdisciplinary lens on the mercenary arrangements of Renaissance Italy; the wars of Marlborough, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon; Grant's campaigns in the Civil War; and the strategic bombings of World War II. The results are invariably stimulating."—Martin Walker, Wilson Quarterly

     

    "This study is serious, creative, important. As an economist I am happy to see economics so professionally applied to illuminate major decisions in the history of warfare."—Thomas C. Schelling, Winner of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Economics

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateNov 15, 2008
    ISBN9780226071657
    Castles, Battles, and Bombs: How Economics Explains Military History

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    • 2/5
      Like other reviewers who were disappointed in this book, I expected much more than I got -- and have gotten so little that I do not expect to finish the book. In the first place, Mr. Brauer's examination of certain key situations or events in military history was not, for me at least, nearly as interesting as it should have been. I am an economist by training, but have read a fair amount of military history, and found some of it enthralling. This is not. Second, it seems to me that Mr. Brauer attempts to force history into something that matches his theories. He focusses on instances that prove his points, and ignores those that do not. Indeed, one of his aims is to infuse non-theoretical bias of current historical studies with a good dose of theory -- economic theory. As someone who feels that much of the theoretical work in economics over the last thirty years has moved us away from the real world of political economy into a self regarding sphere of mathematical pseudo-science, I cannot believe that applying the same approach to history will be highly productive.

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    Castles, Battles, and Bombs - Jurgen Brauer

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