| | |  | Identity & Access Management | Home » » Fighting Identity: Sacred War and World Change (The Changing Face of War) | | | | | | | Product Promotions: | | | | | Description: | | This work highlights a national ethos infused by a sacred narrative of divine mission. This deep association leads to a narrow approach to conflict relationships, built around an Us vs. Them distance from the enemy, in which their submission is achieved through kinetic effects and their subsequent redemption through our good works (reconstruction). Vlahos contends that America's difficult engagement in the Muslim world demonstrates urgently that different operational approaches and tactics (like counterinsurgency) are not enough. Alternative paradigms of strategic engagement are needed, but their very consideration requires deeper cultural rethinking about how we assess world change and other cultures, and how our national ethos makes war. Why are terrorists and insurgents we fight so formidable? Their strength - and our vulnerability - is in identity. Clausewitz knew that geist (spirit) was always stronger than the material: identity is power in war. But how can non-state actors face up to nation states? The answer is in globalization. This is the West's 3rd globalization. Two centuries of intense mixing has torn down old ways of life and created a growing demand for new belonging. There is also a decline in US universalism. America's vision as history's anointed prophet and manager is now competing head-to-head with renewed universal visions. Like Late Antiquity and the High Middle Ages our globalization begins to subside. We may be in the later days of American modernity. We can see this worldwide, as emerging local communities within states and meta-movements find their voice - through conflict and war. Identities struggling for realization are always the most powerful. Add the diffusion of new technology and new practice, and even the poorest and seemingly most primitive group can now make war against those on high. They are successful because of a symbiotic fit between old states and new identities. Increasingly, old societies no longer find identity-celebration in war - while non-state identities embrace the struggle for realization. Hence non-state wars with America become a mythic narrative for them. Our engagement actually helps them realize identity - and we become the midwife. This book offers another path to deal with non-state challenges, one that does not further weaken us. | | | Product Details: | | | Author:
| Michael Vlahos | | Hardcover:
| 260 pages | | Publisher:
| Praeger | | Publication Date:
| December 30, 2008 | | Language:
| English | | ISBN:
| 0313348456 | | Product Length:
| 9.4 inches | | Product Width:
| 6.1 inches | | Product Height:
| 0.9 inches | | Product Weight:
| 1.15 pounds | | Package Length:
| 9.3 inches | | Package Width:
| 6.3 inches | | Package Height:
| 1.0 inches | | Package Weight:
| 1.1 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 7 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 7 customer reviews )
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 9 found the following review helpful:
Heed Sun TzuApr 30, 2009
By C. V. Pena
Sun Tzu wrote "Not knowing the other and not knowing oneself, In every battle certain defeat." Michael Vlahos has written an important book if we are going to be able to avoid that defeat. Most importantly, he recognizes that we have to take a hard and honest look at ourselves to understand our enemy. The conventional wisdom is that our enemy, the "other," is separate from us. Vlahos, however, understands that just because the other is different (culturally, economically, or otherwise) does not mean that it is separated from us. Indeed, we need to understand how we shape them and that there is a symbiotic relationship that we ignore at our own peril. Ultimately, "Fighting Identity" is not about how to fight the identity of the other, but about coming to grips with our own identity of what it means to be American beyond the shallow jingoism of politics and punditry. Even if one doesn't completely agree with Vlahos's prescription of national service (and I don't, but I understand and agree with the underlying reasons that lead him to call for it), his diagnosis of the problem is absolutely correct. What Vlahos so clearly and eloquently grasps is that the real defeat we have to worry about is not one inflicted by the enemy but one we would bring upon ourselves.
5 of 7 found the following review helpful:
The Most Brilliant WriterMay 26, 2009
By James G. Stavridis
"Admiral, U.S. Navy"
No one is smarter or more incisive than Michael Vlahos -- his intellectual credentials are absolutely brilliant. Every book he has writter has opened my eyes to a more nuanced view of the world around me, especially as it connects to history, culture, language, anthropology, geography, and strategy.
If we are to *win* the ongoing ideological struggles that have thus far dominated the unfolding 21st century, we must understand why the ideas we espouse -- freedom, liberty, justice, progressive economics -- are indeed the *right* ideas. To do that, we must understand the competing ideas. Michael Vlahos is the best guide through those very troubled waters, and this new volume is his best work to date.
We live in a world in which war is deconstructing before our ideas. This book begins our intellectual process of reconstructing it in our understanding.
6 of 9 found the following review helpful:
Our Bunker Hill-a STAKE in the Heart of "The Borg"Jun 27, 2009
By Robert D. Steele
I consider this book one of the most important books of our time, for it takes on "the Borg" at an intellectual level in a cultural context, and in so doing, speaks truth to power: our Emperors ("the Borg") are naked and ignorant.
Early on he points out that ours is not the first globalization, and that previous globalizations have demonstrated that new identities rise within globalization and *cannot be put down* (his emphasis). New ideas, counter-establishment ideas, cannot be suppressed, and ultimately triumph in new consciousness at multiple levels. States struggle vainly, equating everything "new" with being a "threat," and ultimately collapse under the weight of their own ignorance and inability to adapt.
The first few chapters suggest that our reaction to 9-11 opened a Pandora's box, that AF-IQ are our Waterloo, and that "non-state actors" is a generic term for all that is outside the state.
He specifies six "identity" migration paths: networks of conversion and subversion (e.g. the Muslim Brotherhood and the Pentecostals); autonomous urban subcultures (e.g. gangs); emerging nations; fighter fraternities; militarized Bucellani (vandal elites, e.g. the Taliban, a state within a state); and our own cross to bear, intercessor security sub-cultures (e.g. our military-industrial complex to which I would add, a Congress lacking in integrity).
TWO MAJOR POINTS:
1. The US Military is no longer Of, By, and For We the People, no longer a collective citizenry that is armed--in brief, the militarization of national policy has made us arrogant, ignorant, and repugnant.
2. By resisting change we are promoting change. I cannot help myself, I think of the anti-Borg from outer space that grows when we nuke it, shrinks when we show love.
The author points out that every US military intervention into a Muslim society has failed; that our failures lead to new formulas (reformations) rather than new directions (transformations); and that in being drawn in and maintaining the chaos space, we are feeding the metamorphosis of non-state cocoons into butterflies very hard to hit with an artillery shell or even an aimed bullet.
The middle of the book expands on the theme of war as "creative destruction" (a mantra in the commercial intelligence world), while pointing out that in ignoring morality, the Napoleonic and Clauswitzian essential ("the moral is to the physical as three is to one"--today I would make it 10:1) the US is giving up the very power that matters, and failing to understand that identity is stronger than materiel. He points out that the "others" have commitment, sacrifice, collective effectiveness, breeding in battle, are fighting on their home ground, and achieve transcendence in resisting the US. Meanwhile, in the US, 1% do the fighting and the other 99% are asked to go shopping.
P26: "America's problem comes with the discovery that it is merely the midwife rather than the godfather. We fight so as to get nothing from those we legitimize."
I have a note culture is identity is being is sacred and together form consciousness.
The author is critical of Al Qaeda and its many mistakes, but credits them with drawing the US out into creating the chaos space within which other indigenous forces are rising.
His section on method discusses the utility of history and anthropology, both foreign "denied areas" to the USG IMHO.
The author points out the obvious that is not so obvious to those sacrificing America's blood, treasure, and spirit in our name, i.e. two thirds of humanity is "the other" living the Hobbsian life that is "poor, nasty, brutish, and short.," For these people, war is an entry point to negotiations, and the new players acquire legitimacy by out-lasting (not necessarily out-fighting) US forces.
As we move toward the conclusion the author speculates that we may be headed for a new Middle Ages with a global pandemic, climate change, and an energy crunch (to which I would add water crunch).
AF-IQ went wrong in five ways:
1. Liberation fizzled (I add, because neither Rumsfeld nor Gates are serious about waging peace)
2. Al Qaeda showed up in Iraq (the author neglects Iran's glee and strategic leverage)
3. No miraculous reconstruction (according to Paul Wolfowitz , "at their expense")
4. No democratic transformation (to have expected one was idiocy or mendacity)
5. World did not, will not, accept the "Long War"
Chapter 8 on "fit" credits Martin van Creveld with the term, and elegantly discusses how our leaders went to war, ordered others to war, without the slightest understanding of "the other." The "American way of battle" that Tony Echeverria has pointed out is not a way of war at all, has been, in the author's words, "the helpmate to enemy realization."
On page 176 the author itemizes our "transformation" rules set and concludes it is flat out wrong.
1. Situational awareness (based on remote technologies)
2. Precision killing (ineffective for individuals)
3. Rapid dominance (not so fast)
4. Kill enough of the enemy and their leaders, and resistance will fold (simply not so).
PP191-192 are a stake in the heart of COIN--it is not wrong, it is simply ignorant and oblivious of the strategic Whole of Government and Whole Earth ramifications of spending all of our money on a lemon. COIN is (my words) "Borg triumphant." COIN is "bento-box consciousness" and RAND--normally a supplicant cheer-leader-- has outlined its demise in detail.
P202: "The events of 9/11 drove us back to Great War, but this time without *the people.* This Great War was *and remains* a war of the leadership and its tribal confederacy. It is a state-military enterprise, but far more significantly, *it is also now a state-military liturgy.* (Emphasis in original.]
The author notes that the "other" has a faster learning curve than we do, and on page 182: "Today's non-state actors know us better than we wish to know them." This is an indictment of the USG.
See the images loaded under the book cover, and below books consistent with author's intent:
The Lessons of History
The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past
The Health of Nations: Society and Law beyond the State
The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence and the Will of the People
A Power Governments Cannot Suppress
Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World's Last Dictators by 2025
Uncomfortable Wars Revisited (International and Security Affairs Series)
Who the Hell Are We Fighting?: The Story of Sam Adams and the Vietnam Intelligence Wars
The Tunnels of Cu Chi: A Harrowing Account of America's "Tunnel Rats" in the Underground Battlefields of Vietnam
Radical Man
4 of 6 found the following review helpful:
Gets right to the heart of the matterMay 01, 2009
By R. J. Eggers
Our very basic questions raised by the 9/11 attacks, "Who is doing this and why?", went largely unanswered by our government. The U.S. and the West embarked on a course of retaliation and protection of our way of life. Is our response to the Islamic insurgency effective because it is atuned to the underlying causation or is it adding more fuel to the fire?
Michael Vlahos brings to bear his exceptional understanding of history and anthropology to touch upon the root causes of the insurgency and its urge to strike at America. He reawakens us to periods in our own history where we as a people acted and thought similarly to these "madmen". When you read "Fighting Identity", you will grasp as never before the driving forces of "terrorism".
Mr. Vlahos takes on a very complex issue, and weaves the lessons of history as well as an understanding of tribal and antique cultures to give us a clean lens through which to view Islamic insurgency. Gratefully, he does so in plain English, in a way that ought to add a great deal to our national dialogue.
7 of 11 found the following review helpful:
"Through a Glass, Darkly"Jun 17, 2009
By Mark B. Lyles
"JAWBREAKER"
Reading `Fighting Identity, Sacred War and World Change' by Professor Michael Vlahos stirred several emotions within me. The book is written with not only a profound personal and scholarly knowledge of the U.S. military as it exists today but with a well honed appreciation for history ancient and modern. As I sit here trying to write this review, I am having some difficulty coming to terms with the many jolts of emotional turmoil and honest self analysis, and I am laid bare. For you see, I was one of the few who sat in the audience with Prof. Vlahos together with my fellow Naval War College classmates during the showing of the movie `300'. I completely identified with the 300 Spartans defending their homes, their families, and most importantly, their belief in the sacred oath that is America.
As Prof. Vlahos writes, the symbolism of the movie `300', accurately depicts in the simplest of terms, the motivations and religious fervor that accompany a devotion to country, to service before self, that appears so foreign to much of America. The movie was in a very real sense a religious experience. The emotional and passionate symbolism is so profound that it expands consciousness and washes over you warming the soul as the sun breaking out from a cloud. To not only believe but to really know that there ARE ideas and causes that ARE worth sacrificing and dying for. For those who have worshiped and suffered at the Alter of Liberty, God and Country are synonymous. As John Stuart Mills writes, "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things." With a depth of historical and anthropological context seldom seen, this book accurately identifies the decayed and degraded state of our `Sacred Identity'. The enemy is us and we have met the enemy.
As a recalled reservist for the War on Terror serving most recently in OIF as a member of a Marine Corps detachment, I have breathed the intensity of `God, Country, Corps'. I identify with Vlahos' Tribal Confederacy of Defense'. The men and women that I serve with epitomize Vlahos' described 2nd America, those of us who have committed to a solemn vow to `defend the Constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic'. "We few, we happy few, we band of brothers".
But in a larger sense, I fear that the `gathering hunting bands' that make up the Tribal Confederacy of Defense are becoming disillusioned and with disillusionment comes anger and defiance. As a member of the Warrior class and a proud member of the Tribal Confederacy of Defense, I understand what history has shown, that a house divided against itself cannot stand for long. Prophetically, this book is a must read for all citizens who truly believe that "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth".
See all 7 customer reviews on Amazon.com
| | |
|
