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Anatomy of Failure: Why America Loses Every War It Starts, by Harlan Ullman. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2017. 272 pages. $29.95.
When former Secretaries of State General Colin Powell and John Kerry and former Supreme Allied Commander Europe Marine general Jim Jones (for whom I worked when I commanded the International Security Assistance Force [ISAF] in Afghanistan when it expanded across the whole country) call Harlan Ullman's Anatomy of Failure a must-read, people should pay attention. And for those who worry about policy books being boring, House of Cards creator Michael, Lord Dobbs deems Anatomy, in another blurb, a combination of the works of best-selling thriller novelist Tom Clancy and Carl von Clausewitz. All are correct.
In the interests of full disclosure, the writer and I have been friends and colleagues since my time at ISAF. As Britain's Chief of the General Staff and then Chief of the Defence Staff, I worked with Ullman on many issues. Irrespective of this, Anatomy is essential reading for practitioners and students of foreign, defense, and national security policy.
The book's center of gravity is the asking and answering of the vital question of why, since World War II, America arguably has lost all the wars it started and has failed in military interventions in which it did not have just cause to participate. This question alone directly challenges the accepted view in Washington that America has the best and most formidable military in the world. If that is the case, despite some stunning...