What to Do About Clausewitz: Saving Strategic Studies From Itself
For strategic studies to be worth a damn in the 21st century, it must 1) treat force as a problem not just a solution, 2) relate the political context, and 3) aspire toward self-abnegation.
“A specter is haunting strategic studies—the specter of peace.” These bizarre words are from Richard Betts, who provocatively presented peace itself as a problem in a largely forgotten article from 1997 asking, “Should Strategic Studies Survive?”
Betts answered his title question in the affirmative. As one of the most p…