OxBlog

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

# Posted 10:04 PM by Ariel David Adesnik  

WHAT THE ARMY WANTS YOU TO READ: Since army officers have lots of free time, the Chief of Staff (currently Gen. Peter Schoomaker) maintains a Professional Reading List on the Army's homepage. The list is divided into four sections, according to rank, from cadet all the way up to general.

The list for cadets includes classics such as John Keegan's Face of Battle, which I must admit to having not read, although it is very high on my 'to read list'. Yet the list for generals starts of with some trendy bits of pundit-puff such as The Clash of Civilizations and The Lexus and the Olive Tree.

(Sorry, Tom, you're a great columnist and a friendly guy, but that book just got on my nerves. Not that you care. You're rich and famous, so you can wear floral-print Hawaiian shirts in public or even have a kooky haircut.)

On the bright side, the generals' reading list does gets much better as it goes along. The highlight, of course, is Donald Kagan's account of the Peloponnesian War. If only our generals had time to read the original four-volume edition...
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