Riemann, Malte Der Krieg im 20. und 21. Jahrhundert. Entwicklungen und Strategien

War is a chameleon, remarked the famous 19th century Prussian general Carl von Clausewitz. Indeed, war can take different forms. Especially in the last 120 years, the ways and strategies of war have changed several times, from the people's war and total war, to the Cold War, to "humanitarian" and asymmetric war. All these forms of war provide information about the social, political and economic conditions of the states by which they are waged.

The study of war is therefore not a specialised military-historical science, but an integral part of a critical view of history. Malte Riemann offers a concise introduction to the different manifestations of war and their developments since the beginning of the 20th century. He deals vividly with the types of war, war technologies and military strategies. Beyond the narrow military sphere, however, the effects of war on the societies and politics of the warring countries are also described. In the introduction, the author describes the intellectual-historical discourse on the nature of war in modern times. This is followed by seven chronologically arranged chapters, first describing the First World War (people's war, war of position and colonial war). This is followed by an account of the Second World War as a "total" war. The following chapters are devoted, among other things, to the Cold War and the wars in the wake of the dissolution of the Soviet Union. As an outlook, the author sketches possible scenarios about the "future of war" at the end, starting from current developments (war on terror, asymmetric war, drone war, "private war" by mercenaries and automated war). The fact that the topic of war has never disappeared from the political agenda since 1990, and that we are by no means living in an age of absolute peace in Germany either, becomes particularly clear when the Bundestag once again has to decide on a foreign deployment of the Bundeswehr. It is precisely this topicality of the subject that has led to the rise of New Military History and is meeting with broad interest in society and academia.