Rating: 
Summary: Superb study of Greek warfare during the classic era.
Review: Dr. Hanson, a leading classical scholar, provides an excellent examination of how warfare among the Greek city-states was conducted. He places particular emphasis on how the individual soldier fought. On the one hand, combat in the front line must have been awful; on the other hand, because the armies were made up of men who had known each other for years, unit cohesion must have been very high. While thoroughly researched, Hanson does not fall back on academic jargon, and his points are easily understood by the nonspecialist. As he demonstrates, the method of warfare, while often fatal to the soldiers, left property and noncombatants unharmed. Unfortunately, later in the wars between Athens and Sparta a more complete, and thus destructive manner of warfare developed. This is an excellent book for anyone interested either in classical Greece or the history of warfare.
Rating:
Summary: Superb study of Greek warfare during the classic era.
Review: Dr. Hanson, a leading classical scholar, provides an excellent examination of how warfare among the Greek city-states was conducted. He places particular emphasis on how the individual soldier fought. On the one hand, combat in the front line must have been awful; on the other hand, because the armies were made up of men who had known each other for years, unit cohesion must have been very high. While thoroughly researched, Hanson does not fall back on academic jargon, and his points are easily understood by the nonspecialist. As he demonstrates, the method of warfare, while often fatal to the soldiers, left property and noncombatants unharmed. Unfortunately, later in the wars between Athens and Sparta a more complete, and thus destructive manner of warfare developed. This is an excellent book for anyone interested either in classical Greece or the history of warfare.
Rating: 
Summary: what's the real point?
Review: Ever since reading this book and being obliged to teach it to undergraduates in a staff-taught course a number of years ago, I've wondered what Hanson's real point is. I think the argument is fascinating, even if I also think his leap from hoplite battle to nukes over Japan is a bit forced. But it seems to me that the sections where Hanson is most present to the reader and most engaged with his material are the assurances of first-hand knowledge we get for some of his claims about how it felt to fight in hoplite gear and formation. How does he know? He and his students made armor and weapons for themselves and then went out on the campus lawn and staged mock hoplite combat. For all of the originality of the book's argument, I can't quite shake the feeling that Hanson's real interest is in playing soldier with his students. Paintball in the ancient world, anyone?
Rating: 
Summary: Hanson's best book emerging the reader into phalanx battle
Review: Hanson historical perspectitive of the Greek City-State wars provides valueable insight into the human suffering, carnage, strategies, and life of the Spartian and Athenian Hoplite foot soldier. Hanson makes the distinction between battles and wars. The hoplite was enlisted to fight a battle, after which he returned home to continue work as either a farmer, merchant, or craftsman. Fighting was considered risky business, whereas the Spartian considered himself as a professional soldier, not bound to maintained land thus having no responsiblities to the harvest crops back home. Hanson moves "The Western Way of War" narrative into a more direct focus of the emotions, consequences, and circumstances of battle. In contrast to Hanson's book "The Ancient Greeks and their way of war" where he puts more of an emphasis on tactics, field formation, armament, and the phalanx. One thing can be sure while reading this book, the reader will get a good feel, for the conditions surrounding the infrantry man's life within the phalanx. Hanson suprebly illustrates the fear generated as massive formations squared off with radiant breast plates, bronze helment, thousands of men compressed together, the war cry, individual painted shields, and waves of trembling and teeth chatter before the order to charge. Battle formation was a matter of agreement with the phalanx arranged in eight rows with spears lowered in the front three rows. The phalanx created fear within the oppositing army as the army crossed no mans land, with each party, striving for maximum momentum and force for a crushing impact, often resulting in the the spears shatter or being cut. It is easy to understand why the spears shattered since they were only one inch in diameter. As the phalanx passed over the injuried the rear rows of soldiers smashed down a steel butt on the end of their spear into the injuried soldier. The front line pushed and stabbed with their favorite targets being the thigh, shins and foot, and groin. Pressure increased as the shield being three feet in diameter was used by the hoplite pressing shoulder against shield into the enemy force. The shield was made of wood an weight about sixteen pounds and often could be pentrated by the spear or sword. The breast plate warded off arrows and protectile missiles. Also the breast plate acted as a solar collector leaving the soldier fatiqued and dehydrated after hours of fighting. Should a soldier fall down, the additional 51 pounds made it literally impossible to get up. The phalanx soldier was recruited at eighteen years of age and could serve until sixty years of age with many phalanx formations being an average age of thirty. Simple commands were given to the phalanx because of limitations in mobility and sight. Often times the general fought along side of the soldier and in many cases died on the field of battle. The most dangerous phenemenia confronting the phalanx was panic and fear. Panic and fear could cause gaps where the enemy could enter and attack from the sides or the rear. If the battle was not going well for the front line, the rear rows could panic and abandon the battle leading to massive slaughterings as the enemy attack their backs with spears, arrows, or protectiles. The phalanx discipline against superior numbers work if they continue a slow march forward.
Rating:
Summary: Hanson's best book emerging the reader into phalanx battle
Review: Hanson historical perspectitive of the Greek City-State wars provides valueable insight into the human suffering, carnage, strategies, and life of the Spartian and Athenian Hoplite foot soldier. Hanson makes the distinction between battles and wars. The hoplite was enlisted to fight a battle, after which he returned home to continue work as either a farmer, merchant, or craftsman. Fighting was considered risky business, whereas the Spartian considered himself as a professional soldier, not bound to maintained land thus having no responsiblities to the harvest crops back home. Hanson moves "The Western Way of War" narrative into a more direct focus of the emotions, consequences, and circumstances of battle. In contrast to Hanson's book "The Ancient Greeks and their way of war" where he puts more of an emphasis on tactics, field formation, armament, and the phalanx. One thing can be sure while reading this book, the reader will get a good feel, for the conditions surrounding the infrantry man's life within the phalanx. Hanson suprebly illustrates the fear generated as massive formations squared off with radiant breast plates, bronze helment, thousands of men compressed together, the war cry, individual painted shields, and waves of trembling and teeth chatter before the order to charge. Battle formation was a matter of agreement with the phalanx arranged in eight rows with spears lowered in the front three rows. The phalanx created fear within the oppositing army as the army crossed no mans land, with each party, striving for maximum momentum and force for a crushing impact, often resulting in the the spears shatter or being cut. It is easy to understand why the spears shattered since they were only one inch in diameter. As the phalanx passed over the injuried the rear rows of soldiers smashed down a steel butt on the end of their spear into the injuried soldier. The front line pushed and stabbed with their favorite targets being the thigh, shins and foot, and groin. Pressure increased as the shield being three feet in diameter was used by the hoplite pressing shoulder against shield into the enemy force. The shield was made of wood an weight about sixteen pounds and often could be pentrated by the spear or sword. The breast plate warded off arrows and protectile missiles. Also the breast plate acted as a solar collector leaving the soldier fatiqued and dehydrated after hours of fighting. Should a soldier fall down, the additional 51 pounds made it literally impossible to get up. The phalanx soldier was recruited at eighteen years of age and could serve until sixty years of age with many phalanx formations being an average age of thirty. Simple commands were given to the phalanx because of limitations in mobility and sight. Often times the general fought along side of the soldier and in many cases died on the field of battle. The most dangerous phenemenia confronting the phalanx was panic and fear. Panic and fear could cause gaps where the enemy could enter and attack from the sides or the rear. If the battle was not going well for the front line, the rear rows could panic and abandon the battle leading to massive slaughterings as the enemy attack their backs with spears, arrows, or protectiles. The phalanx discipline against superior numbers work if they continue a slow march forward.
Rating:
Summary: The Birthplace of the Western Military Ethos
Review: Hanson writes a vivid, realistic description of the horror of hoplite combat. He gives the reader an in-depth armchairview of agrarian city-state warfare. There is much to be learned from this book about battle with edged weapons.There is also much to be learned about the birth of modern military ethos. The East's mystical model for warfare (e.g. bushido and the like) concentrated on the "inner warrior." The West concentrated on the most pragmatically efficient methods of dealing death and destruction on a large scale. When the citizen-militia of Athens met the the elite professional warriors of Persia at Marathon, it was not just a battle of the few against the many. It was a test of a pragmatic method of warmaking against a traditionalist method. The Persians, who from their youth learned three things, "to ride the horse, draw the bow, and speak the truth," were severely outclassed by a war machine that discounted the individual but turned the group into a relentless killing machine. When first I read this book, I heartily disagreed with Hansen's thesis, but a study of the wars of the last decade bear out his conclusions.
Rating:
Summary: I don't get it
Review: If I were a Greek general in charge of the defense of my city-state, why would I want to stake everything on a decisive battle which might not go my way if my opponents were say the Thebans, the Athenians or especially the ruthless Spartans? In those days, the penalty for failure was the destruction of your city-state and the enslavement of all your surviving family, friends and neighbors many of whom you'd never see again as their butts would be sold all over the Med for fun and profit. In those days, "winner-take-all" was more than just a concept and I just can't think of a good reason why anyone would want to expose his community to this kind of ruin. My take is that the Greeks developed a hardy, well led infantry that could take on enemy cavalry because their city-states simply did not have the resources to support Cecil B. De Mille size armies. The Greek city-states needed to make the few resources they had count, hence their emphasis on upping quality through training and preserving their numbers through armor that was distinctly stronger and more extensive than that of their non-Greek opponents. Whereas the Emperor of Persia could afford to lose any number of times (and any number of troops while he was at it), all he needed was winning decisively just once. The armies of the Greek city-states knew that they could not afford to lose even once, given the grimness of the outcome if they lost - so their armies had to be good, effective and maintain their discipline in the face of apalling losses if they were to preserve their respective communities. A huge emphasis was placed on quality because of the swift difference quality could make in those days of hand-to-hand combat. The Greek armies armies earned their spectacular battlefield successes because they were the first armies in the Med to systematically integrate leadership, training, discipline and armor into this difficult to quantify factor called "quality". Either I am missing something or Victor Davis Hanson is missing something - and I don't think it's me.
Rating:
Summary: Former Western Way of War
Review: In this early work Victor Hanson Davies (VHD) explains what has become his central thesis in military history: The origins and growth of Western military superiority in the art of war. According to VHD we owe much of our military greatness in the West to the legacy of the Greeks who made war their past-time. The Greek hoplite developed the close order formation of phalanx warfare, a hallmark of what has become the disciplined nature of how Wetsern society wages war. This method broke away from the earlier heroic tradition of fighting where battle was often a series of individualized combats between warrior champions. The Greeks went one step further by taking the warrior and making him into a hoplite. By doing so they created the most effective fighting techniques known to classical man. VHD always enjoys being controversial, and many of his ideas may be perceived as being biased and pro-Western, but his grasp of history and antiquity in particular can't be denied. Even the politically correct, the ones most likely to be offended by these views, will have a difficult time denying some of the facts presented. Greek hoplite warfare was both destructive and limited in scope. It seems the Greeks wished it to be so. By making war so horrific in the short term they ensured that only those directly involved would be harmed. This was how the Greek City State thought war should be resolved. By mutual agreement, at a set place and time. It was a brutal, yet logical method which over time developed a style of close-combat unmatched by other cultures. Over time the Greek Polis was gradually eroded, and with Philip and Alexander of Macedon the eventual dream of a united Greece was finally realized. With that came the means to export this lethal style of war abroad for more productive purposes. The book goes to great lengths to describe the various aspects of hoplie warfare in great detail. Constant referebce are made to the writers and philosophers of Classical Greece who fought in many of the battles themselves. VHD provides an anatomy of Greek hoplite warfare, describing each part of the panoply which the individual wore into battle. In fact this book gives you as close a feel for what those intense, sweaty, violent and bloody conflicts must have been like, without actually being there! From those small enclosed valleys in Greece has evolved our deadly tradition of Western war. The paradox that VHD points out is that the very means that created this tradition could well destroy itself today. Modern technology combined with the stand-up battle tradition is a deadly combination, one that can not be played with in the Atomic age. If nothing else we should learn from the legacy of the Classical Greeks what our own true lethality is.
Rating:
Summary: The Origins of Western Shock Combat Technique
Review: In this early work Victor Hanson Davies (VHD) explains what has become his central thesis in military history: The origins and growth of Western military superiority in the art of war. According to VHD we owe much of our military greatness in the West to the legacy of the Greeks who made war their past-time. The Greek hoplite developed the close order formation of phalanx warfare, a hallmark of what has become the disciplined nature of how Wetsern society wages war. This method broke away from the earlier heroic tradition of fighting where battle was often a series of individualized combats between warrior champions. The Greeks went one step further by taking the warrior and making him into a hoplite. By doing so they created the most effective fighting techniques known to classical man. VHD always enjoys being controversial, and many of his ideas may be perceived as being biased and pro-Western, but his grasp of history and antiquity in particular can't be denied. Even the politically correct, the ones most likely to be offended by these views, will have a difficult time denying some of the facts presented. Greek hoplite warfare was both destructive and limited in scope. It seems the Greeks wished it to be so. By making war so horrific in the short term they ensured that only those directly involved would be harmed. This was how the Greek City State thought war should be resolved. By mutual agreement, at a set place and time. It was a brutal, yet logical method which over time developed a style of close-combat unmatched by other cultures. Over time the Greek Polis was gradually eroded, and with Philip and Alexander of Macedon the eventual dream of a united Greece was finally realized. With that came the means to export this lethal style of war abroad for more productive purposes. The book goes to great lengths to describe the various aspects of hoplie warfare in great detail. Constant referebce are made to the writers and philosophers of Classical Greece who fought in many of the battles themselves. VHD provides an anatomy of Greek hoplite warfare, describing each part of the panoply which the individual wore into battle. In fact this book gives you as close a feel for what those intense, sweaty, violent and bloody conflicts must have been like, without actually being there! From those small enclosed valleys in Greece has evolved our deadly tradition of Western war. The paradox that VHD points out is that the very means that created this tradition could well destroy itself today. Modern technology combined with the stand-up battle tradition is a deadly combination, one that can not be played with in the Atomic age. If nothing else we should learn from the legacy of the Classical Greeks what our own true lethality is.
Rating:
Summary: Former Western Way of War
Review: Interesting book, but something seems amiss. While the Greek hoplite way of war may have been an impetus, I don't see it as being carried through to modern times. It seems there is another school that attempts to avoid standing toe-to-toe to fight through the ages - armored knights, fortresses, bow, firearms, and the nails in hoplite fighting coffin - long range artillery, armor, and air power. Still thought-provoking.
|
