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Book Cover
Book
Author Merom, Gil, 1956- author

Title How democracies lose small wars : state, society, and the failures of France in Algeria, Israel in Lebanon, and the United States in Vietnam / Gil Merom
Published Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, [2003]
Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2003
©2003
©2003

Copies

Location Call no. Vol. Availability
 MELB  355.02 Mer/Hdl  AVAILABLE
Description xiii, 295 pages : illustrations (black and white) ; 24 cm
Contents Part I -- 1. Introduction -- The biased study of war and the neglect of small wars -- International relations theory and small wars -- How do democracies fail in small wars -- The role of realist, motivational, and other factors reconsidered -- Research design and methodological considerations -- Plan of the book -- 2. Military superiority and victory in small wars : historical observations -- Fighting small wars : insurgents and oppressors -- Violence and counterinsurgency : brutality as a means of cost management -- Conclusion -- 3. The structural origins of defiance : the middle-class, the marketplace of ideas, and the normative gap -- Power out of feebleness : the rise of the middle-class and the state -- Foundations of a normative gap -- Colonial wars : the domestic dimension of brutalization -- Conclusion -- 4. The structural origins of tenacity : national alignment and compartmentalization -- Institutional incongruity and strategic preferences -- The modern foundation of the state's autonomy : popular alignment -- Institutional responses to threats against the normative alignment -- A question of timing -- Conclusion -- Part II -- 5. The French war in Algeria : a strategic, political, and economic overview -- The strategic dimensions of the war in Algeria -- The French political system, the state, the army, and the war -- The French economy and the Algerian war -- Conclusion -- 6. French instrumental dependence and its consequences -- 7. The development of a normative difference in France, and its consequences -- The utilitarian debate about the necessity of the war -- The debate about the morality of the conduct of the military in Algeria -- The debate about the identity of the state -- 8. The French struggle to contain the growth of the normative gap and the rise of the "democratic agenda" -- The domestic reaction of the government and the state -- The secondary expansion of the normative gap -- 9. Political relevance and Its Consequences in France -- The intellectuals and the press -- The consequences of political relevance -- Part III -- 10. The Israeli war in Lebanon : a strategic, political, and economic overview -- The strategic dimensions of the war in Lebanon -- The Israeli political system, the state, the army, and the war -- The Israeli economy and the Lebanon war -- Conclusion -- 11. Israeli instrumental dependence and its consequences -- 12. The development of a normative difference in Israel, and its consequences -- The utilitarian debate about the human cost of war -- The debate about the morality of the military conduct in Lebanon -- The debate about the identity of the state -- 13. The Israeli struggle to contain the growth of the normative gap and the rise of the "democratic agenda" -- The domestic reaction of the government and the state -- The secondary expansion of the normative gap -- 14. Political relevance and its consequences in Israel -- The conformist soft-left and the press -- The consequences of political relevance -- Part IV -- 15. Conclusion -- Domestic and international causality reconsidered -- The role of instrumental dependence in a comparative perspective -- Democracy and the use of force -- Concluding remarks -- Postscript
Summary In this 2003 book, Gil Merom argues that modern democracies fail in insurgency wars because they are unable to find a winning balance between expedient and moral tolerance to the costs of war. Small wars, he argues, are lost at home when a critical minority mass shifts the center of gravity from the battlefield to the market place of ideas. Merom analyzes the role of brutality in counterinsurgency, the historical foundations of moral and expedient opposition to war, and the actions states traditionally took in order to preserve foreign policy autonomy. He then discusses the elements of the process that led to the failure of France in Algeria and Israel in Lebanon. In the conclusion, Merom considers the Vietnam War and the influence failed small wars had on Western war-making and military intervention
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 261-276) and index
Subject Low-intensity conflicts (Military science) -- United States.
Low-intensity conflicts (Military science) -- Israel.
Low-intensity conflicts (Military science) -- France.
Military doctrine -- France.
Military doctrine -- Israel.
Counterinsurgency.
Military doctrine -- United States.
LC no. 2002041490
ISBN 9780521804035 (hardback)
0521804035 :
0521008778 (paperback)