During World War I, Oxford-trained archeologist Lawrence of Arabia used his knowledge of the Middle East to help organize the Arab revolt against the Ottoman Empire. In this entertaining and insightful book, Jason Ridler profiles the intellectuals, outsiders, and eccentrics who followed in Lawrence's footsteps across the next hundred years of warfare and who relied on creativity, curiosity, and outside-the-box thinking to shape battlefields from World War II and Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan. They were Ivy Leaguers and Oxford scholars, anthropologists and archeologists, an ad executive, an international activist, a Peace Corps veteran, an emigre journalist (and former teenage member of the French Resistance), a diplomat-mavericks and oddballs, men and women-who, not always heralded or heeded and sometimes hated, challenged traditional military thought and helped win wars, secure peace, and change the face of modern war.

About the Author
Jason S. Ridler holds a PhD in war studies from the Royal Military College of Canada and is a former visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. He has published numerous articles on special forces, unconventional warfare, counterinsurgency, and military history. He is an adjunct professor at Norwich University and a teaching fellow at Johns Hopkins University. He lives in Berkeley, California.

Reviews
Jason Ridler's Mavericks of War is that rarest of books, a visceral page-turner which is also a deep examination of an overlooked human resource in war and international affairs-the expert outsider who works from inside while the ambassadors and the generals pace outside the walls. -- Richard Rhodes, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Making of the Atomic Bomb



Book Information
ISBN 9780811719865
Author Jason Ridler
Format Hardback
Page Count 344
Imprint Stackpole Books
Publisher Stackpole Books
Weight(grams) 658g
Dimensions(mm) 236mm * 160mm * 33mm