Books

The New Maneuver Warfare Handbook

By William S. Lind

Since the original maneuver warfare handbook was published in 1985, understanding of maneuver warfare has broadened and deepened. Here, the author of the original book, William S. Lind, shares that new knowledge with readers. The New Maneuver Warfare Handbook offers novel insights in military theory while remaining focused on the people who do the fighting, Marines and soldiers from Battalion level on down through staff NCOs and NCOs. It includes updates of Marine Colonel Mike Wiley’s examples which illustrate the application of critical maneuver warfare concepts. It goes beyond the original book in discussing how to train for maneuver warfare. In short, the New Maneuver Warfare Handbook augments the original book rather than replacing it, in ways useful to commanders at every tactical level. Like the earlier book, it is destined to become a classic in its field.

The book covers a number of topics including...

  • Maneuver warfare theory

  • Operations, tactics, techniques and organization

  • Combined arms, surfaces & gaps, recon-pull and mission command

  • Amphibious operations

  • Maneuver warfare culture

  • Tactical Decision Exercises (TDEs) developed by the Special Tactics staff

  • Outcomes Based Learning (OBL)

Retroculture

By William S. Lind

If you have ever felt out of place living in the modern world, Retroculture gives you the option to dwell in a different era.

Addressing the various aesthetics, architectural styles, values and manners of days gone by, William Lind identifies the concepts of Retroculture and provides the reader with the tool-set to begin situating their lives in the “new-old.”

However, this shift in lifestyle addresses not only the hobbyist, but also American society at large, urging a return to an era in which truth, politeness and beauty were considered paramount, and pointing a way forward to a brighter future for the nation as a whole.

Victoria: A Novel of 4th Generation War

By Thomas Hobbes

When Captain John Rumford, USMC, stands up for the dead Marines of Iwo Jima against the forces of political correctness that have invaded his beloved Corps, he is promptly cashiered for his trouble. But upon his return to his native Maine, he discovers that even in the countryside, there is no escaping the political correctness that has spread throughout the United States of America. And when what begins as a small effort by some former Marines to help fellow Christians in Boston free themselves from the plague of crime in their neighborhoods turns into a larger resistance movement, Captain Rumford unexpectedly finds himself leading his fellow revolutionaries into combat against an ideological enemy that takes many different forms. Victoria: A Novel of 4th Generation War is a vision of an American restoration. For some it will be seen as a poignant dream, for others, a horrific nightmare. But Victoria is more than a conventional novel and involves considerably more than mere entertainment. In much the same way Atlas Shrugged was the dramatization of a particular philosophical perspective, Victoria is the dramatization of a new form of modern war that is taking shape as the state gradually loses its four-century monopoly on violence. It is a book that informs, even teaches, through example. And sometimes, the lessons are very harsh indeed

Reforging Excalibur

By William S. Lind

Reforging Excalibur is an exciting and unique proposal for restructuring America’s armed forces in order to better prepare us for Fourth-Generation warfare. After a withering critique of the bloat and waste of the Department of Defense and Pentagon’s “business as usual” attitude towards military spending, the authors disclose why this approach is unsustainable in terms of budget and combat readiness. In short, while our military is prepared to fight wars with other state militaries, it is woefully unprepared — psychologically and structurally — to succeed in Fourth-Generation warfare.

The authors address social experiments and challenges hoisted upon military servicemen that wind up confusing and emasculating them as effective warriors: the deleterious effects of women and gay men in units, insufficient command time for commanding officers, et al. These issues have been discussed behind closed doors among combat veterans for years, although they are never openly addressed by general officers before Congress. This book aims to change that conversation.

Ultimately, the vision that Lind and Ewald share is one of a military scaled down to precision, while the National Guard takes on a new and bold outsized role in protecting the United States.

The Next Conservatism

By William S. Lind & Paul M. Weyrich

Since November's election, conservative columnists have filled the op-ed pages with calls for a new conservative agenda. In The Next Conservatism, two of the conservative movement's best-known thinkers, Paul M. Weyrich and William S. Lind, offer exactly that. More, they offer a new kind of conservative agenda, one that reaches far beyond politics to grapple with the sources of our nation's cultural decay.
The Next Conservatism recognizes that culture is more powerful than politics. Nevertheless, it offers an engaging menu of political reforms, all under the rubric of "Restore the Republic!" No enthusiasts of Imperial America at home or abroad, Weyrich and Lind seek limited government, jealous guardianship of civil liberties, and a Washington liberated from the power of the New Class, the interests that feed off our nation's decay. To these frequent conservative themes, Weyrich and Lind offer something new: a warning of a general crisis of legitimacy of the state itself, which can lead to a Hobbesian state of anarchy. How might we save the state while avoiding the jaws of Leviathan? The Next Conservatism offers innovative ways to thread that needle.

4th Generation Warfare Handbook

By William S. Lind & LtCol Gregory A. Thiele, USMC

Written by the author of the Maneuver Warfare Handbook and an active-duty USMC officer with experience in Iraq, 4th Generation Warfare Handbook is the doctrine for a new generation of war. Over the last 40 years, the world has gradually entered into a post-Clausewitzian state where the wars are undeclared, the battlefields can be anywhere, the uniforms are optional, and the combatants as well as the targets are often "civilian". Conventional militaries have repeatedly attempted to utilize technology to meet the new challenges posed, but even the most advanced technology has provided little more than meaningless short-term victories rendered futile in months, if not weeks. This inability of Western governments and militaries to come to terms with the changing nature of modern warfare has led to failed interventions, failed occupations, and now even failed states everywhere from Eastern Europe to Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. And with the recent mass movement of peoples around the world, 4th Generation Warfare can be safely expected to appear in Western Europe and the United States before long. Drawing on their decades of experience with military history and military action, the authors have distilled 4GW theory into a short, concise, easily accessible handbook that provides the soldier, the military analyst, and the civilian observer with a guide to understanding and responding to the changing realities of this challenging new form of war.

The Four Generations of Modern War (Audiobook)

By William S. Lind

The Four Generations of Modern War is William S. Lind’s landmark lecture given at Quantico in 2000 that launched a continuing debate in many military circles. In this edited transcript of a later repetition of the original 50-minute lecture, Lind explains the conceptual framework of the Four Generations and goes briefly into detail describing the foundations and features of each of the Generations. He describes the gradual military transformation from Europe’s post-Westphalian culture of state order to the global culture of non-state disorder as well as the resulting effects of these transformations on the battlefield and beyond.

Lind provides informative historical examples of the Four Generation framework in action and explains its consequences for modern war. And in closing, he warns of how the development of Fourth Generation warfare may not favor the West in its ongoing, centuries-old clash with rival civilizations and cultures.

On War

By William S. Lind

On War is a seven-year collection of columns written by the father of 4th Generation War theory while observing the U.S. invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. It is an intriguing account of a war in progress, as seen through the eyes of a military theorist able to anticipate events with an almost prophetic degree of accuracy. Throughout the book, 4GW theory is defined, described, and refined as events in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other places demonstrate the theory’s utility in making sense of current events and predicting future ones.

William S. Lind is one of the most significant and influential military theorists on the planet. The author of the Maneuver Warfare Handbook and a founder of 4th Generation War theory, Mr. Lind is known and respected by military personnel around the world.