2022 World Affairs Council of the Year
Network of Independent World Affairs Councils of America

Friday | Gen David Petraeus | “Conflict” Book Talk and Signing

REGISTRATION HAS CLOSED

 

Timely, engaging and instructive, “Conflict” is the best one-volume study of conventional warfare in the nuclear age. It sets a new benchmark in understanding modern war. – WSJ

“Conflict: The Evolution of History from 1945 to Ukraine” is here — and so is this great review in the “The Wall Street Journal,” with particularly notable final sentences. Excerpts:

‘Conflict’
Review: How Wars Are Fought and Won
By Jonathan W. Jordan

As Europe’s first big cross-border land war since World War II grinds through its second year and a mass terror raid sparks memories of the Yom Kippur War, a top-to-bottom look at how wars are fought in the era of Pax Atomica has become grimly relevant.

“Conflict” brings together one of America’s top military thinkers and Britain’s pre-eminent military historian… Retired Gen. David Petraeus, who co-authored the U.S. Army’s field manual on counterinsurgency warfare and oversaw the troop surge in Iraq in 2007, brings a professional eye to politico-military strategy. Andrew Roberts, who has been writing on military leadership since the early 1990s, offers an “arc of history” approach to the subject of mass destruction. The pair’s ambitious goals: to provide some context to the tapestry of modern conflict and a glimpse of wars to come.

Invoking the Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz, the authors argue that the first job of a strategic leader is to get the big ideas right. Those who have succeeded include Gerald Templer… whose reference to winning “the hearts and minds of the people,” we are told, “remains the most succinct explanation for how to win a counter-insurgency.” By contrast, the nationalist forces in China, the French in Algeria and the Americans in Vietnam got the big ideas wrong and paid a steep price.

The longest chapters, narrated in the first person by Mr. Petraeus, cover Iraq and Afghanistan, where political dysfunction swamped military success. On the 2021 collapse of Afghanistan’s government troops, Mr. Petraeus remarks that “the troops were brave enough—the 66,000 dead Afghan soldiers killed during the war attest to that. But they fought for an often corrupt and incompetent government that never gained the trust and confidence of local communities…

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 serves as the book’s case study on how badly Goliath can stumble against David…

The final chapter teases out the contours of future conflicts…

For all its technical erudition, “Conflict” is remarkably readable. Mr. Roberts’s engaging prose softens the edges of Mr. Petraeus’s straight-shooting analysis…

The book was written before the recent outbreak of war on Israel’s southern border… As gunmen ride to massacre scenes in pickup trucks and precision missiles take to the air in response, the authors’ introductory caveat snaps into focus: “Warfare evolves; it does not ossify. Yet it is clearly also capable of being suddenly and shockingly thrown into reverse.”..

Timely, engaging and instructive, “Conflict” is the best one-volume study of conventional warfare in the nuclear age. It sets a new benchmark in understanding modern war.

DISTINGUISHED VISITING SPEAKER PROGRAM

In Person

General David Petraeus

General, U.S. Army (Retired); former Director, Central Intelligence Agency; former Commander U.S. Central Command

Author of “Conflict: The Evolution of Warfare from 1945 to the Russian Invasion of Ukraine” with Andrew Roberts

Luncheon and Book Signing

Belmont University, Janet Ayers Conference Center, 1900 Belmont Blvd., Nashville

Friday, November 10, 2023

12:00-1:00 p.m. CT

REGISTRATION HAS CLOSED

 

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Book Signing

In connection with General Petraeus’ presentation we will have a book signing of “Conflict: The Evolution of Warfare from 1945 to the Russian Invasion of Ukraine.”

About David Petraeus

General, U.S. Army (Retired); former Director, Central Intelligence Agency; former Commander U.S. Central Command

General David H. Petraeus (US Army, Ret.) (New York) is a Partner at KKR and Chairman of the KKR Global Institute, which he established in May 2013. He is also a member of the boards of directors of Optiv and OneStream, a Strategic Advisor for Sempra and Advanced Navigation, a personal venture investor, an academic, and the co-author (with British historian Andrew Roberts) of “Conflict: The Evolution of Warfare from 1945 to Ukraine” (October, 2023).

Prior to joining KKR, General Petraeus served over 37 years in the U.S. military, culminating his career with six consecutive commands as a general officer , five of which were in combat, including command of the Surge in Iraq, command of U.S. Central Command, and command of coalition forces in Afghanistan. Following retirement from the military and after Senate confirmation by a vote of 94-0, he served as Director of the CIA during a period of significant achievements in the global war on terror, the establishment of important Agency digital initiatives, and substantial investments in the Agency’s most important asset, its human capital. General Petraeus graduated with distinction from the U.S. Military Academy and is the only person in Army history to be the top graduate of both the demanding U.S. Army Ranger School and the U.S. Army’s year-long Command and General Staff College. He also earned a Ph.D. in international relations and academics from Princeton University. General Petraeus taught both subjects at the U.S. Military Academy in the mid-1980s, he was a Visiting Professor of Public Policy at the Honors College of the City University of New York from 2013 through 2016, and he was for 6 years a Judge Widney Professor at the University of Southern California and a Senior Fellow at Harvard University’s Belfer Center. He is currently a Visiting Fellow and Lecturer at Yale University’s Jackson Institute, Co-Chairman of the Global Advisory Council of the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, Senior Vice President of the Royal United Services Institute, and a Member of the Trilateral Commission, Council on Foreign Relations, and the Aspen Strategy Group, as well as a member of the boards of the Atlantic Council, the Institute for the Study of War, and over a dozen veterans service organizations. He is also a LinkedIn Top Voice. Over the past 20 years, General Petraeus was named one of America’s 25 Best Leaders by U.S. News and World Report, a runner-up for Time magazine’s Person of the Year, the Daily Telegraph man of the year, a Time 100 selectee, Princeton University’s Madison Medalist, and one of Foreign Policy magazine’s top 100 public intellectuals in three different years. General Petraeus has earned numerous honors, awards, and decorations, including four Defense Distinguished Service Medals, the Bronze Star Medal for Valor, two NATO Meritorious Service Medals, the Combat Action Badge, the Ranger Tab, and Master Parachutist and Air Assault Badges. He has also been decorated by 14 foreign countries and he is believed to be the only person who, while in uniform, threw out the first pitch of a World Series game and did the coin toss for a Super Bowl.


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