Book Review: A War Like No Other
With the name A War Like No Other, one is immediately drawn to the battles of the Twentieth Century – the stalemate of the First World War, the unparalleled devastation of World War Two, or the terrible conflagration that was the Vietnam War. Yet the title of this book speaks not of these wars, but of another that raged some 2,000 years previous.
A War Like No Other is, simply put, a thematically based history of the Peloponnesian War fought between the Greek city states of Sparta and Athens. For nigh on thirty years, these two military giants of their time fought an on-again, off-again war of invasion, rampage, devastation and destruction over Greece and Sicily. The outcome? Ultimately, Sparta won the war, but in doing so sealed its own doom.
Rather than provide a simple chronological history of the conflict, Victor Davis Hanson (the author) approaches the conflict based upon various aspects of the conduct of war between the two parties. This is not a book so much of what happened when the Athenians and Spartans fought the Peloponnesian War, but how. It looks at the various phases of the war, and the dominant aspects of warfare in each – for instance, discussing fear in why the war began, discussing the role of armour in the main period of hoplite pitched battles, and describing the roles of horses and ships in the climatic phases of the war. As such, while the chapters are thematic and refer to material out of chronological order, the very means of the way the war was conducted (or perhaps, the way the author interprets it) lends towards a concurrent chronological telling of the war as the book progresses. As such, one essentially gets the combination of two methods of historical writing – the classical narrative mixed in with a thematic assessment of the conflict. Surprisingly, the author pulls the mix off well (it could easily lead to disaster).
This book is a good overview of the conduct of the war. At 300 pages (plus appendices, bibliography, and footnotes) it is long enough to go in to some depth without getting too bogged down in the detail. Hanson has a refreshingly light style to his writing that allows for an easy read, and the insertion of maps at various points along the way help in placing the descriptions of major campaigns and battles into some spatial context. A well recommended read. 8.5/10.
Incidentally, Hanson makes a passing suggestion that the conflict between Athens and Sparta bears a greater resemblance to the battles between the USA and other oligarchic powers (such as Nazi Germany or the USSR), than the usual simplistic bleating describing the USA as some kind of Imperial Rome. I think that the suggestion deserves more discussion and reflection, and one day I hope to sit down and write out my thoughts on it.
