Keegan puts an emphasis on how warfare can be an expression of culture. This explains a lot about how militaries can stubbornly stick with obsolete tactics and weapons long after they're proven useless. Keegan also believes that there is an element of cultural consensus in the war cultures fight. For instance, the heavy cavalry of European mediaeval knights had a kind of consensus that warfare is about heavy cavalry charges and standing up to them: that was seen as the manly thing to do. When they encountered the Mongols, light cavalry using composite bows, they were confused and frustrated that the Mongols saw nothing unmanly about scattering well out the way and picking them off from a distance.

He also regards the pitched infantry battles of Western warfare in and after the Greeks in a similar light: as a kind of culturally agreed ritual.

He says that there is a kind of "primitive warfare", which occurs most often throughout the world. (This seems to me a lot like the way football hooligans clash). The different sides face each other and shout abuse and insults, sometimes hurling missiles. Occasionally, the challenges will result in almost-duels between individuals, one from each side. Occasionally, one side will make a sally. If you start to lose, you retreat. The Aztec "flower wars" are examples of this. While dangerous, a battles doesn't tend to result in masses of deaths.

Keegan seems to partly follow the "Western Way of War" theory. In this view, the ancient Greeks broke from primitive warfare by inventing the phalanx. Managing to defy the deep instinct to flee, they created a new and much more lethal form of warfare, where many of the opposing side would be slaughtered in a single battle. In his view, in the wars between the Greeks and the Persians, the Persians were still using "primitive warfare", and couldn't cope with this strange and savage innovation.

He seems to differ from the traditional "Western Way of War" theory by crediting the "horse peoples" of the steppe (Huns, Mongols, Magyars etc) with creating their own way of warfare independently, based on herding and hunting in the plains. In his view infantry-humans could be outflanked, isolated and butchered in much the same way as prey animals, without much need to develop new tactics. This kind of warfare is as brutal as the "Western Way", but like primitive warfare involves sallying and retreating, rather than direct confrontation to the death.

Keegan also hypothesizes that the Crusades were crucial because it brought European soldiers, versed in the Western Way, into contact directly with Mongols, and with Turkish warriors using horse-people tactics. This allowed them to synthesize the two deadliest ways of warfare. In his theory, this was taken back to Spain and used in the Reconquest, then even on into the New World by the Conquistadors. Stuck with their primitive warfare traditions like the "flower wars", the poor Amerindians didn't stand a chance.

The last bit seems a bit of a stretch: there wasn't that much contact between Crusaders and Mongols, and as we've seen soldiers can be quite resistant to new ideas.

Also I think Keegan might be underestimating the practical difficulties in getting armies with innovative weapons and tactics. Rather than cultural resistance, armies might just get trapped in local optima, where they can't adopt new ways of fighting without losing too much fighting-power while they're adapting.

Overall though, an interesting, thought-provoking book, well worth a look for the big picture. With the whole of history to cover though (well, except the peaceful bits), it's pretty shallow on most specifics.

Interesting tidbit: the reason ancient cultures used chariots for fighting was they hadn't managed to breed large horses yet. They were only the size of small ponies and couldn't carry a man's weight. In the early stages they could only carry people sitting on their hindquarter with limited control.

What I'm Watching
Saw Waltz with Bashir at the cinema. Animated documentary about an Israeli guy gradually recovering his memories of his part in the Lebanon war, by interviewing other men in his unit.

Pretty good. Animation style is a bit disconcerting. Seems to have a 3D backdrop using blurred photos. The the foreground characters look hand-drawn: but complicated shadows move across them: not sure if they're 3D modelled or just solid drawing. The movement is very unrealistic though, with robotically smooth shifts between static postures: looks as if it's crudely interpolated by computer, without any physics model.

Movie itself is pretty effective, with plenty of striking images. Heavily influenced by the Vietnam war movies like Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket: lots of juxtapositions between the soldiers partying and fighting.

The ending seem a bit sudden and a bit of a cop-out. The animated pictures showing the aftermath of the Sabra and Shatila massacre are dissolved into real newsreel footage, as if they don't have confidence of the power of the animation itself.

Still, a pretty powerful and haunting movie, well worth a look.

Peter Bradshaw, Times, Derek Nalco, reviews.

What I'm Watching 2
Got somewhat conned movie-wise. Picked up Flight 93 on DVD in the library, thinking it was United 93. They're both docudramas following the event of United Flight 93, the plane that crashed on September 11th when the passengers tried to retake it from the hijackers.

However, the one I watched was a Fox TV movie, the one I wanted was the Paul Greengrass (Bourne director) cinema movie.

It wasn't too bad: the subject matter is too compelling, but got a bit cheesy with sentimental music and overblown irony (practically everyone on board seems to have swapped shifts or raced through customs to make it).

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