Victor Davis Hanson

The New York Times bestselling author of The Case for Trump explains the decline and fall of the once cherished idea of American citizenship.Human history is full of the stories of peasants, subjects, and tribes. Yet the concept of the citizen is historically rareand was among Americas most valued ideals for over two centuries. But without shock treatment, warns historian Victor Davis Hanson, American citizenship as we have known it may soon vanish.In The Dying Citizen, Hanson outlines the historical forces that led to this crisis. The evisceration of the middle class over the last fifty years has made many Americans dependent on the federal government. Open borders have undermined the idea of allegiance to a particular place. Identity politics have eradicated our collective civic sense of self. And a top-heavy administrative state has endangered personal liberty, along with formal efforts to weaken the Constitution.As in the revolutionary years of 1848, 1917, and 1968, 2020 ripped away our complacency about the future. But in the aftermath, we as Americans can rebuild and recover what we have lost. The choice is ours.

A "breathtakingly magisterial" account of World War II by Americas preeminent military historian (Wall Street Journal)World War II was the most lethal conflict in human history. Never before had a war been fought on so many diverse landscapes and in so many different ways, from rocket attacks in London to jungle fighting in Burma to armor strikes in Libya.The Second World Wars examines how combat unfolded in the air, at sea, and on land to show how distinct conflicts among disparate combatants coalesced into one interconnected global war. Drawing on 3,000 years of military history, bestselling author Victor Davis Hanson argues that despite its novel industrial barbarity, neither the wars origins nor its geography were unusual. Nor was its ultimate outcome surprising. The Axis powers were well prepared to win limited border conflicts, but once they blundered into global war, they had no hope of victory.An authoritative new history of astonishing breadth, The Second World Wars offers a stunning reinterpretation of historys deadliest conflict.

In 336 b.c. Philip of Macedonia was assassinated and his twenty-year-old son, Alexander, inherited his kingdom. Immediately quelling rebellion, Alexander extended his fathers empire through-out the Middle East and into parts of Asia, fullling the soothsayer Aristanders prediction that the new king should perform acts so important and glorious as would make the poets and musicians of future ages labour and sweat to describe and celebrate him. The Life of Alexander the Great is one of the rst surviving attempts to memorialize the achievements of this legendary king, remembered today as the greatest military genius of all time. This exclusive Modern Library edition, excerpted from Plutarchs Lives, is a riveting tale of honor, power, scandal, and bravery written by the most eminent biographer of the ancient world.

In his acclaimed collection An Autumn of War, the scholar and military historian Victor Davis Hanson expressed powerful and provocative views of September 11 and the ensuing war in Afghanistan. Now, in these challenging new essays, he examines the worlds ongoing war on terrorism, from America to Iraq, from Europe to Israel, and beyond. In direct language, Hanson portrays an America making progress against Islamic fundamentalism but hampered by the self-hatred of elite academics at home and the cynical self-interest of allies abroad. He sees a new and urgent struggle of evil against good, one that can fail only if we convince ourselves that our enemies fight because of something we, rather than they, did. Whether its a clear-cut defense of Israel as a secular democracy, a denunciation of how the U.N. undermines the U.S., a plea to drastically alter our alliance with Saudi Arabia, or a perception that postwar Iraq is reaching a dangerous tipping point, Hansons arguments have the shock of candor and the fire of conviction.

Everyone has been taught that the Greek city-state is the ultimate source of the Western tradition in literature, philosophy, and politics. For generations, scholars have focused on the rise of the city-state and its brilliant cosmopolitan culture. Now Victor Hanson, the author of several studies of ancient warfare and agriculture, has written a book that will completely change our view of Greek society. For Hanson shows that the real "Greek revolution" was not the rise of a free and democratic urban culture, remarkable as this was, but the historic innovation of the independent family farm. The heroes of his book, therefore, are what he calls "the other Greeks" - the neglected freehold farmers, vinegrowers and herdsmen of ancient Greece who formed the backbone of Hellenic civilization. It was these tough-minded, pracitcal, and fiercely independent agrarians, Hanson contends, who gave Greek culture its distinctive emphasis on private property, constitutional government, contractual agreements, infantry warfare, and individual rights. Hansons reconstruction of ancient Greek farm life, informed by the hands-on knowledge of the subject (he is a fifth-generation California vine and fruit-grower), is fresh, comprehensive, and totally absorbing. But his detailed chronicle of the rise and tragic fall of the Greek city-state also helps us to grasp the implications of what may be the single most significant trend in American life today - namely, the imminent extinction of the family farm. Since Thomas Jefferson Hanson points out, American democracy has been though to depend on the virtues that have traditionally been bred on the farm: self-reliance, honesty, skepticism, a healthy suspicion of urban sophistication, and a stern ethic of accountability, which, as the Greeks teach us, have always been the core values of democratic citizenship. Hanson rightly fears the consequences for American democracy when the family farm disappears, taking with it our last links to the agrarian roots of Western civilization.

A New York Times bestseller and a brilliant and bracing analysis (Mark R. Levin) of Donald Trump, his presidency, and his vision of Americas futurenow updated for 2024 In The Case for Trump, award-winning historian and political commentator Victor Davis Hanson explains how a celebrity businessman with no political or military experience triumphed over sixteen well-qualified Republican rivals, a Democrat with a quarter-billion-dollar war chest, and a hostile media and Washington establishment to become an extremely successful president. Trump alone saw a political opportunity in defending the working people of Americas interior whom the coastal elite of both parties had come to scorn, Hanson argues. And Trump alone had the instincts and energy to pursue this opening to victory, dismantle a corrupt old order, and bring long-overdue policy changes at home and abroad. After decades of drift, America needed the outsider Trump to do what normal politicians would not and could not do. Now updated for the 2024 election with a comprehensive new introduction, this is the essential book on what Donald Trump means for America.

The Greeks of the classical age invented not only the central idea of Western politics--that the power of state should be guided by a majority of its citizens--but also the central act of Western warfare, the decisive infantry battle. Instead of ambush, skirmish, maneuver, or combat between individual heroes, the Greeks of the fifth century b.c. devised a ferocious, brief, and destructive head-on clash between armed men of all ages. In this bold, original study, Victor Davis Hanson shows how this brutal enterprise was dedicated to the same outcome as consensual government--an unequivocal, instant resolution to dispute.The Western Way of War draws from an extraordinary range of sources--Greek poetry, drama, and vase painting, as well as historical records--to describe what actually took place on the battlefield. It is the first study to explore the actual mechanics of classical Greek battle from the vantage point of the infantryman--the brutal spear-thrusting, the difficulty of fighting in heavy bronze armor which made it hard to see, hear and move, and the fear. Hanson also discusses the physical condition and age of the men, weaponry, wounds, and morale.This compelling account of what happened on the killing fields of the ancient Greeks ultimately shows that their style of armament and battle was contrived to minimize time and life lost by making the battle experience as decisive and appalling as possible. Linking this new style of fighting to the rise of constitutional government, Hanson raises new issues and questions old assumptions about the history of war.

The effects of war refuse to remain local: they persist through the centuries, sometimes in unlikely ways far removed from the military arena. In Ripples of Battle,the acclaimed historian Victor Davis Hanson weaves wide-ranging military and cultural history with his unparalleled gift for battle narrative as he illuminates the centrality of war in the human experience.The Athenian defeat at Delium in 424 BC brought tactical innovations to infantry fighting; it also assured the influence of the philosophy of Socrates, who fought well in the battle. Nearly twenty-three hundred years later, the carnage at Shiloh and the death of the brilliant Southern strategist Albert Sidney Johnson inspired a sense of fateful tragedy that would endure and stymie Southern culture for decades. The Northern victory would also bolster the reputation of William Tecumseh Sherman, and inspire Lew Wallace to pen the classicBen Hur. And, perhaps most resonant for our time, the agony of Okinawa spurred the Japanese toward state-sanctioned suicide missions, a tactic so uncompromising and subversive, it haunts our view of non-Western combatants to this day.

One of our most provocative military historians, Victor Davis Hanson has given us painstakingly researched and pathbreaking accounts of wars ranging from classical antiquity to the twenty-first century. Now he juxtaposes an ancient conflict with our most urgent modern concerns to create his most engrossing work to date, A War Like No Other.Over the course of a generation, the Hellenic city-states of Athens and Sparta fought a bloody conflict that resulted in the collapse of Athens and the end of its golden age. Thucydides wrote the standard history of the Peloponnesian War, which has given readers throughout the ages a vivid and authoritative narrative. But Hanson offers readers something new: a complete chronological account that reflects the political background of the time, the strategic thinking of the combatants, the misery of battle in multifaceted theaters, and important insight into how these events echo in the present.Hanson compellingly portrays the ways Athens and Sparta fought on land and sea, in city and countryside, and details their employment of the full scope of conventional and nonconventional tactics, from sieges to targeted assassinations, torture, and terrorism. He also assesses the crucial roles played by warriors such as Pericles and Lysander, artists, among them Aristophanes, and thinkers including Sophocles and Plato.Hansons perceptive analysis of events and personalities raises many thought-provoking questions: Were Athens and Sparta like America and Russia, two superpowers battling to the death? Is the Peloponnesian War echoed in the endless, frustrating conflicts of Vietnam, Northern Ireland, and the current Middle East? Or was it more like Americas own Civil War, a brutal rift that rent the fabric of a glorious society, or even this centurys red stateblue state schism between liberals and conservatives, a cultural war that manifestly controls military policies? Hanson daringly brings the facts to life and unearths the often surprising ways in which the past informs the present.Brilliantly researched, dynamically written, A War Like No Other is like no other history of this important war.

Examining nine landmark battles from ancient to modern times--from Salamis, where outnumbered Greeks devastated the slave army of Xerxes, to Cortess conquest of Mexico to the Tet offensive--Victor Davis Hanson explains why the armies of the West have been the most lethal and effective of any fighting forces in the world.Looking beyond popular explanations such as geography or superior technology, Hanson argues that it is in fact Western culture and valuesthe tradition of dissent, the value placed on inventiveness and adaptation, the concept of citizenshipwhich have consistently produced superior arms and soldiers. Offering riveting battle narratives and a balanced perspective that avoids simple triumphalism, Carnage and Culture demonstrates how armies cannot be separated from the cultures that produce them and explains why an army produced by a free culture will always have the advantage.

On September 11, 2001, hours after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, the eminent military historian Victor Davis Hanson wrote an article in which he asserted that the United States, like it or not, was now at war and had the moral right to respond with force. An Autumn of War, which opens with that first essay, will stimulate readers across the political spectrum to think more deeply about the attacks, the war, and their lessons for all of us.

Una historia de la guerra como devoradora de civilizaciones Las guerras pueden poner fin a disputas, derrocar tiranos y cambiar el curso de una civilización? o destruirla por completo. Desde Troya hasta Hiroshima, hay momentos en que la guerra ha llevado al fin de sistemas politicos, culturas e incluso eras. Aunque la humanidad ha evolucionado, es un error creer que las sociedades modernas estan a salvo del horror de una guerra de exterminio. En El fin de todo, Victor Davis Hanson, celebre historiador militar, nos acompaña en un viaje epico a traves de la historia para analizar la caida de cuatro grandes civilizaciones: la Tebas clasica, la poderosa Cartago, la majestuosa Constantinopla y el imponente Imperio azteca. Este es un relato de asedios y conquistas, y de las decisiones de los lideres que llevaron a sus sociedades a una guerra de exterminio. La obra acompaña a Alejandro Magno, Escipion Emiliano, Mehmed II y Hernan Cortes en sus campañas, y observa como sus ambiciones y su vision unica del mundo cambiaron el curso de la historia para siempre. El fin de todo es una obra clave para comprender el drama, la violencia y la insensatez de la guerra. Al revivir la historia de los vencidos y los vencedores, Hanson lanza una poderosa advertencia a los lectores contemporaneos sobre el peligro de las las guerras de aniquilacion y la importancia de evitar una catastrofe similar en nuestros dias.

Hanson, maestro de historiadores, explora • la relación entre civilización y guerra, desde la Antigüedad hasta nuestros días. Una mirada filosófica, histórica y literaria a la guerra como “empresa co

El profesor Hanson, uno de los mayores expertos en historia militar, ha reunido en este volumen a investigadores de la talla de Donald Kagan, Barry Strauss o Peter J. Heather, entre otros, para ofrecernos una vision del papel de la guerra en el mundo antiguo, desde el enfrentamiento de los griegos contra el Imperio persa hasta la caida del Imperio romano, mil años mas tarde.Este es un libro con protagonistas como Epaminondas, Pericles, Alejandro, Espartaco o Cesar, que nos habla de las grandes batallas del pasado y nos ayuda a entender mayor los triunfos y la gloria de Atenas o de Roma. Pero es tambien una reflexion acerca de todo lo que hay de leccion permanente en esta historia: de cuestiones como el choque de civilizaciones, las guerras preventivas, las luchas urbanas y el terrorismo o el agotamiento y colapso de los imperios.

An instant New York Times bestseller, this profound book (Wall Street Journal) charts how and why some societies chose to utterly destroy their foes, and warns that similar wars of obliteration are possible in our time War can settle disputes, topple tyrants, and bend the trajectory of civilizationsometimes to the breaking point. From Troy to Hiroshima, moments when war has ended in utter annihilation have reverberated through the centuries, signaling the end of political systems, cultures, and epochs. Though much has changed over the millennia, human nature remains the same. Modern societies are not immune from the horror of a war of extinction. In The End of Everything, military historian Victor Davis Hanson narrates a series of sieges and sackings that span the age of antiquity to the conquest of the New World to show how societies descend into barbarism and obliteration. In the stories of Thebes, Carthage, Constantinople, and Tenochtitlan, he depicts wars drama, violence, and folly. Highlighting the naivete that plagued the vanquished and the wrath that justified mass slaughter, Hanson delivers a sobering call to contemporary readers to heed the lessons of obliteration lest we blunder into catastrophe once again.

Desde Salamina, Lepanto o Midway hasta las batallas clave de la ofensiva del Tet, Matanza y cultura analiza y valora la capacidad de destrucción del hombre occidental y la relaciona con caraterísticas culturales y psicologicas. Al afirmar que los europeos son los soldados mas letales, y por tanto mas eficaces, de la historia de la civilizacion no alude a una superioridad teorica real, sino al sentido de individualidad, al criterio y a la capacidad de disciplina generados por la idea de pertenencia a un Estado, cualidades que determinan una manera de actuar frente al enemigo. Completan este absorbente volumen un imprescindible glosario, mapas detallados, un indice onomastico y tematico y una bibliografia de lecturas recomendadas, conformando asi un autentico manual para el aficionado a la historia.