Carl von Clausewitz

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 Main topic

• Who was Carl von Clausewitz?

• Why is he so famous?
• What are Clausewitz's ideas?
• What Have We Learned
• Conclusion

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 Carl von Clausewitz

– Prussian officer born in 1780.

– He came from a middle-class
social background.
– Clausewitz first entered combat
as a cadet at the age of 13.
– He served as a staff officer, and
as a prominent military educator.
– rose to the rank of Major-
General at 38.

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 Cont…

– Married and moved in Berlin.

– wrote a military philosophy book “ On War”.
– Resigned his commission in 1812 and joined
the Russian Army to fight Napoleon.
– Idea’s of “on war” were heavily influenced by
the mass popular warfare of the French
Revolutionary period.
– Died in 1831 and his wife published his On
War in 1832.

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 Why is he so famous?

• Clausewitz's fame is largely due to the

importance and influence of his book ”On War”.
• He wrote on the theory of warfare and strategy
that stressed the moral and political aspects of
war.
• His theories attract the interest of many.

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 What are Clausewitz's
ideas?
• Pure War: Elimination or Complete Subjugation
of the Enemy by Force.
• Real War: All conditions and factors that impede
or block the realization of “Pure War”.
• The political objectives of using force by the
state is typically the principal constraint or limit to
“Pure War”.
• “Pure War” as such is politically and morally
without sense or meaning because all other
human values, interests, or preferences are
excluded.
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 Cont…

• A system of nation-states, the monopoly of

violence under conditions in which no power or
authority rules the system, has implicitly a
tendency to move toward pure war if conflict
arises between states.
• “War of all against all” is projected by Clausewitz
from an individual or group level to state
relations and conflict.

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 Cont..

• Force is the means of war, but to impose our will

on the enemy is its object.
• To secure that object we must render the enemy
powerless, and that in theory, is the true aim of
warfare.
• That aim takes the place of the object,
discarding it as something not actually part of
war itself.

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 What Have We Learned

• The state is the principal unit of political

organization of the world’s diverse and
divided populations.
• Each state claims to be sovereign: that is,
it is the final authority over the population
living within a defined territory over which
it rules.

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 Cont…

• The result is a state political system that is in

anarchy, since there is no world government
that has either the authority to rule the states
of the system.
• Thus the nation-state system is in principle a
warfare system.

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 Conclusion

• Clausewitz is a very talented leader

• He has came out with a great philosophy
that is being used until today.
• Clausewitz ideas have been widely
influential in military theory.

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 Q&A

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