Hybrid Warfare: Fighting Complex Opponents from the Ancient World to the Present

by Williamson Murray (Editor), Peter R. Mansoor (Editor)

Hybrid warfare has been an integral part of the historical landscape since the ancient world, but only recently have analysts incorrectly categorized these conflicts as unique. Great powers throughout history have confronted opponents who used a combination of regular and irregular forces to negate the advantage of the great powers' superior conventional military strength. As this study shows, hybrid wars are labor-intensive and long-term affairs; they are difficult struggles that defy the domestic logic of opinion polls and election cycles. Hybrid wars are also the most likely conflicts of the twenty-first century, as competitors use hybrid forces to wear down America's military capabilities in extended campaigns of exhaustion. Nine historical examples of hybrid warfare, from ancient Rome to the modern world, provide readers with context by clarifying the various aspects of conflicts and examining how great powers have dealt with them in the past.

Genres: War, History, Military Fiction, Military History

336 pages, Hardcover

First published June 14, 2012

About the author

Williamson "Wick" Murray was an American historian and author. He authored numerous works on history and strategic studies, and served as an editor on other projects extensively. He was professor emeritus of history at Ohio State University from 2012 until his death.

Reviews

[Rachel Brune · Rating 5 out of 5]

As this book points out, "hybrid warfare" has been around for a long time. Starting with an examination of the Romans' incursions against the German tribes, and concluding with a (less than inspired) essay on the Vietnam war, each part of the book offers insights and historical lessons about the pitfalls-and sometimes the successes-of fighting different battles in the same war. I read this book as part of a self-directed course of study on the current question of COIN, and found that the authors made excellent points, not least of which is that as much as one would like to ignore COIN and remove it from the current military vocabulary, it's not going anywhere, so we may as well study historical examples and see what the lessons are that we should be learning.

I actually learned more from this book than from reading the Army's COIN manual, most likely because MOST (not all) of the authors addressed what happened, the decisions made, and the effects thereof, rather than spending their time "if, if, if"-ing. Definitely worth the read.

[Stingray · Rating 4 out of 5]

In „Hybrid Warfare“ edited by Williamson Murray and Peter R. Mansoor a number of authors describe historical campaigns from ancient times to the 20th century in which armies had to face a hybrid threat, by which the authors argue the hybrid to be anything but new but still largely misunderstood.

This edition was put together to put historical reality against the hype of the new buzzword of the hybrid threat. As the authors differ so do the approaches in the different pieces describing for example Roman campaigns in Germania, British campaigns in Ireland and the American colonies and concentrate on 19. Century warfare of Britain, Prussia and France. The general summary of British colonial warfare and the treatise on the American phase of the Vietnam War do stand apart from this as they are described more generally and less along campaign lines.

The descriptions of the different conflicts vary as background information and necessary detail differ, but all descriptions remain mere summaries. From these summaries the difficulties of hybrid warfare become somewhat clear, but the texts are more general conflict summary than specifically addressing the dilemmas of hybrid warfare. The emerging pattern is one of an established conventional power mainly fighting against an enemy employing conventional as well as paramilitary forces as well as conventional battle-oriented tactics as well as area denial and population control tactics. The resulting dilemma for the conventional force appears to always be to either disperse its forces to control territory and population and to hunt down the enemy’s irregulars or to stay concentrated to be able to give battle to the enemy’s conventional forces. While technical and tactical developments change the efficiency and details of these tactics the basic dilemma stays the same over the centuries.

The authors make a valid point in ascertaining that hybrid warfare was neither a new threat nor failsafe. In their description of conflicts they do stay very much in the area of military history and write mainly for an audience interested in history. Somewhat neglecting details of military tactics, political action and economic factors they do not address some of the issues the modern use of hybrid warfare have focused on, as the hybrid threat tries to circumvent not only the conventional military abilities of a nation but its security forces altogether, utilizing political, economic, cyber and psychological capabilities. In this regard the edition does not properly address its topic, but this would have been admittedly hard to do with historical examples.

Overall this edition of texts is a good set of historical examples to everybody interested in the historical applications of hybrid warfare, as it provides a basic understanding of the strategic dilemma conventional forces face in such conflicts. Nevertheless the reader is obliged to draw conclusions for himself as this is a set of historical examples and neither a textbook nor an analysis of this kind of warfare per se.

[Kenton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent at explaining the Hybrid nature of all warfare with some examples of successful and unsuccessful campaigns.

[Farhad Zaker · Rating 4 out of 5]

I started this book with the expectation of an overview of the role of guerillas/insurgents in different wars, and the approach armies took in different situations to counter them. This book way surpassed my expectations in every regard. This is a book written by organized minds and never loses its focus over the hundreds of pages. It covers the span between the Teutoburg forest and the Vietnam war, but mainly focuses on the modern era. The main idea of the book is that war in the enemy's home base cannot be conducted without a good grasp of the culture (and history etc) of the people, working and promoting collaborators, and most of all, the willingness to go all in to achieve victory. Overall, I would suggest this book to a person moderately knowledgeable of important historical events, who can put the arguments in the right context.

[Eskild Walnum · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short summary: hybrid warfare, or what I like to call "the use of unconventional and unorthodox methods along with the conventional", has existed for centuries. It no new way of warfare the Russians have invented.
Nevertheless, the book is worth the time, it gives a historical view of what might have been looked upon as hybrid warfare throughout different periods of time.

[Hj Reichen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book. Demonstrates that hybrid warfare has been around for a long time, through excellent short descriptions of wars and their analysis. Comprehensive bibliography that allows to dig in the individual conflicts.