War in the Modern World

by David R. Stone

World War II was a formidable conflict that engulfed more than 50 nations, many of them world powers. While it ended with peace, the global conflict culminated in massive human and material costs. The Soviet Union lost millions of soldiers and civilians. The United Kingdom sustained relentless bombing campaigns by Axis air forces. And Japan saw the destruction of two major cities via atomic bomb: Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Across the world, whole cities were leveled and millions of people—Axis and Allied, civilians and soldier—were displaced or killed.

Landscapes and populations weren't the only things that changed, though. A new world order emerged when the ink on the peace treaty dried in 1945, altering borders, ushering in new geopolitical realities, and leaving the West to contend with a new enemy: the Soviet Union, a communist empire intent on spreading its ideology and influence across the globe. These changes, along with the introduction of innovative but extremely destructive weapons like nuclear bombs and drones, ushered in a new kind of warfare that has characterized violent conflicts across the globe for the last three-quarters of a century.

In 24 masterfully designed and clearly presented episodes, War in the Modern World explores the new face of war. US Naval War College professor David R. Stone is your expert guide. A scholar of Russian military history, he is well-versed in the strategy, policy, and history behind modern conflicts and wars across the globe. With David in the front seat, you will examine modern war through modern conflicts, exploring decades of violent conflicts between and within nation-states. You will define insurgency and counterinsurgency warfare as well as the strategies that underlie both. You will learn about the weapons that fundamentally changed how countries and rebel groups fight. And you will understand how highly localized civil and insurgent conflicts became the new terrains on which great powers wage war.

David R. Stone is the William E. Odom Professor of Russian Studies at the US Naval War College. He received his PhD in History from Yale University. He has written or edited several books on military history, including Hammer and Rifle: The Militarization of the Soviet Union, 1926–1933, which won the ASEEES Marshall D. Shulman Book Prize and the Historical Society Best First Book Prize. He is also the author of dozens of articles on Russian military history and foreign policy, and he is the expert for the Great Course World War II: Battlefield Europe.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Audiobook, War, World History, Military History, Military Fiction

12 pages, Audible Audio

First published June 1, 2022

About the author

David Stone, director of the Institute for Military History and 20th Century Studies, is the Pickett professor of military history at Kansas State University and an award-winning author. He specializes in Russia and the Soviet Union, South Asia and military history.

Stone's first book, "Hammer and Rifle: The Militarization of the Soviet Union, 1926-1933," was a selection of the History Book Club. It also was named the winner of the 2001 inaugural Best First Book prize of the Historical Society and was co-winner of the 2001 Shulman Prize of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies. In 2006 he published "A Military History of Russia: From Ivan the Terrible to the War in Chechnya," and was named one of America's top young historians by the History News Network. He was editor of the 2010 book, "The Soviet Union at War, 1941-1945." He also is the author of more than 24 articles and book chapters on Russian/Soviet military history and foreign policy.

His current research includes Leon Trotsky and his role in the creation of the Soviet army, international finance and the collapse of the Soviet system, and the Soviet military in the run-up to World War II.

Stone earned a doctorate in history from Yale University and bachelor's degrees in history and mathematics from Wabash College.

He joined K-State in 1999. He has been recognized for his teaching with the 2001 K-State Presidential Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching.

Reviews

[Larry Bassett · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first thought, you might think that this seems to be a strange book for a pacifist to be reading. I found it to be a fairly dispassionate and seemingly factual source of information that included details about war and war like events that were new to me.

I found the presentations maintained my interest and were presented in a relatively straightforward manner.

[Joseph Kmiech III · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good overview of modern military conflicts and the implications they bring to global politics.

[Dennis Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

War in the Modern World by David Stone is a fine selection of lectures, but something is missing from this. Stone is a good lecturer, but he crams the origin, conduct, and conclusion of conflicts in just thirty minutes or so. As such, there's no time for exploration, in depth context, or much more beyond a bare outline with a few detours into the most important points. The lecture series also doesn't seem to want the lectures to talk to one another too much, as they are, for the most part, self-contained. Even major conflicts aren't broken up to be given more than a single lectures worth of material. And then there's almost no concluding thoughts towards the end of the series, nothing to bind it together out of the introduction. We're left ending on a lecture as if it were just any other, only to be greeted with silence when we expect the series to continue. While a course like this may be good for people who don't know much about the history of conflict from the cold war to the present, its nothing like other courses that go deeper into major conflicts or try to tease trends across time. I think it wouldn't be unreasonable to want a little more.

[Steven · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommended. Plenty of interesting discussion on post-1945 wars such as independence struggles in Southeast Asia, India, Israel, and so on, Falklands, Gulf War, Soviet-Afghan, etc. The writer has a global way of looking at things which is easy to miss by other writers. For instance, reading this made me realize that Indonesia has a lot to thank to the US Marshall Plan for its sovereignty in 1949 because the US used it to threaten the Dutch to stop their police actions. Similarly, many independence struggles are labelled as 'terrorism' and 'insurgency' by the incumbent occupying power. It is clear that the worldwide trend is to replace existing national boundaries with one which is based on ethnicity. Ethnic struggles are as old as time, and no amount of globalist dream can dissipate it.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting book explaining how wars which lead to current time happened

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

看的是视频。发表于2022年，但是在俄乌战争之前。但是作者在第二集当中对于几种认为世界如何维持未发生三次大战的理论进行了阐述和辨析，但是在视频当中加入了针对当今世界的主要威胁的论述，一个是俄乌另一个是台海，可谓先见之明。作者全篇较为全面客观地介绍了自二战以后发生的主要地区冲突与战争，每一个都能够举出各自特点以及发展脉络，对于初步了解引发兴趣非常有帮助。

[Hunter Ross · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating review of "modern" wars (post-WW II). I found it interesting and entertaining. Wish each one was a little longer with a little more detail but outstanding overview and insights.