How to Fight a War

This book provides an essential foundation for understanding how to win a ear. If only a few people in Washington would read it!

This book tells you how much more the is to a war than just shooting at your enemy. War explained in simple words, while making clear its abundant complexity.

Mike Martin has acquired a big Twitter following for his expert analysis of the Ukraine war. His fourth book will be a delight to those who are keen to see his analysis at a greater depth than 240 characters allow. The title is reminiscent of Sun Tzu, but Mike Martin’s How to Fight a War is more like a 21st century Machiavelli. Anyone who has read The Prince will have been stuck by what a straight-talking, practical guide it is to politics in 16th century Italy (when politics was not much more than warfare). Taking his lead from the florentine, Martin imagines you, his reader, as the leader of a modern nation-state, and tells you as straightforwardly as he can what you need to know about war, and how you should plan to win one, should it occur. After 80 years or relative world peace, this is a question we are all asking ourselves right now with increasing urgency. This book expertly scratches that itch, with the plain talking of a soldier mixed with the erudite range of a scholar. Martin is of course both, and also a budding politician (currently the Lib Dem candidate for Tumbridge Wells). So he understands warfare as both a technical act (what provisions does a soldier need? what tactics are best for destroying tanks?) and as a political art (he sums it up as a form of communication where the ultimate goal is to change the psychology of the opposing commander). Peppered with fascinating facts and examples from conflicts as far back as ancient Persia and as recent as last year’s invasion of Ukraine, How To Fight A War will tell you everything you need to know about warfare in this increasingly dangerous age.

Mike uses very simple everyday language to illustrate complex warfare principles and strategy so everyday layman like me can understand.I can certainly relate to what he says from what I have been reading about the Russian aggression in Ukraine.I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in understanding why wars were fought in a certain way.

Outstanding. This book has a lot crammed into it but is so well written it flows. Very informative for the novice and will make arm chair generals think.