Through an analysis of the use of drones, Rebecca Mignot-Mahdavi explores the ways in which, in the context of counterterrorism, war, technology and the law interact and reshape one another. She demonstrates that drone programs are techno-legal machineries that facilitate and accelerate the emergence of a new kind of warfare. This new model of warfare is individualized and de-materialized in the sense that it focuses on threat anticipation and thus consists in identifying dangerous figures (individualized warfare) rather than responding to acts of hostilities (material warfare). Revolving around threat anticipation, drone wars endure over an extensive timeframe and geographical area, to the extent that the use of drones may even be seen, as appears to be the case for the United States, as part of the normal functioning of the state, with profound consequences for the international legal order.

The story of arms in Western Europe from the Renaissance to the Industrial Revolution. A treasury of information based on solid scholarship, anyone seeking a factual and vivid account of the story of arms from the Renaissance period to the Industrial Revolution will welcome this book. The author chooses as his starting-point the invasion of Italy by France in 1494, which sowed the dragon's teeth of all the successive European wars; the French invasion was to accelerate the trend towards new armaments and new methods of warfare. The authordescribes the development of the handgun and the pike, the use and style of staff-weapons, mace and axe and war-hammer, dagger and dirk and bayonet. He shows how armour attained its full Renaissance splendour and then suffered itssorry and inevitable decline, culminating in the Industrial Revolution, with its far-reaching effects on military armaments. Above all, he follows the long history of the sword, queen of weapons, to the late eighteenth century, when it finally ceased to form a part of a gentleman's every-day wear. Lavishly illustrated. EWART OAKESHOTT was one of the world's leading authorities on the arms and armour of medieval Europe. His other works on the subject include Records of the Medieval Sword and The Sword in the Age of Chivalry.

A history of arms and armour in Europe from pre-history to the 15th century. In The Archaeology of Weapons, Ewart Oakeshott traces the development of European arms in logical sequence, showing how changes were wrought by the use of new materials and the ever-shifting demands of war and fashion. This history begins nearly two hundred years before the Christian era, covering among other subjects the charioteers of the Near East, the Roman attitude to arms and the Bronze Age weapons of Europe. The core of the book, however, is the middle ages: a general survey of the institution of chivalry, an understanding of which is vital to the appreciation of all the arms of the high middle ages, is followed by a classification covering all sword types from about 1050to 1500. Oakeshott draws on a variety of sources, from the archaeological evidence provided by existing weapons to the clues to be found in literature as diverse as the Old Testament, the works of Homer, Norse sagas and medieval romances. The symbolic importance of the sword is treated as an essential part of this lucid study and adds much to its archaeological interest. The late EWART OAKESHOTT was one of the world's leading authorities on the arms and armour of medieval Europe. His other works on the subject include Records of the Medieval Sword and The Sword in the Age of Chivalry.

During the American Civil War, the mounted soldiers fighting on both sides of the conflict carried a wide array of weapons, from sabers and lances to carbines, revolvers, and other firearms. Though some sections of the cavalry placed their trust in the sabre, the advent of viable breechloading carbines -- especially repeaters such as the Spencer -- was to transform warfare within little more than a decade of General Lee's final surrender at Appomattox. However, output struggled to keep up with unprecedented demands on manufacturing technology and distribution in areas where communication was difficult and in states whose primary aim was to equip their own men rather than contribute to the arming of Federal or Confederate regiments. In addition, the almost unparalleled losses of men and equipment ensured that almost any firearm, effectual or not, was pressed into service. Consequently, the sheer variety of weaponry carried reflected the mounted soldiers' various roles in different theatres of operation, but also the availability -- or otherwise -- of weapons, notably on the Confederate side. Fully illustrated, this study assesses the effectiveness of the many different weapons arming the Civil War cavalryman and analyses the strengths and weaknesses of the decisions made after 1865 concerning the armament of the US cavalry.

In this stunning account of the human impact of a single machine, John Ellis argues that the history of technology and military history are "part and parcel of social history in general." The Social History of the Machine Gun, now with a new foreword by Edward C. Ezell, provides an original and fascinating interpretation of weaponry, warfare, and society in nineteenth-and twentieth-century Europe and America. From its beginning, the machine gun threatened established assumptions about the nature of war. In spite of its highly effective use in the European colonization of Africa, the machine gun was resisted by military elites, who clung to "the old certanties of the battlefield-the glorious change and opportunities for individual heroism." These values were carried into the trenches of World War I and swept away along with a generation of soldiers. After the war, machine guns became commercially availble in America and in many ways became a symbol of the times. Advertisements touted the Thompson submachine gun as the ideal weapon for protecting factory and farm, while "tommy guns" entered the culture's imagination with Machine Gun Kelly and Boonie and Clyde. More significantly, Ellis suggests, the machine gun was the catalyst for the modern arms race. It necessitated a technological response: first the armored tank, then the jet fighter, and, perhaps ultimately, the hydrogen bomb.

A History of Artillery traces the development of artillery through the ages, providing a thorough study of these weapons. From its earliest recorded use in battle over a millennium ago, up to the recent Gulf War, Balkan, and Afghanistan conflicts, artillery has often been the deciding factor in battle. Black shows that artillery sits within the general history of a war as a means that varied greatly between armies and navies, and also across time.

What happens when competing assertions of validity collide? This question stands at the center of 22 projects being undertaken in various fields as part of the interdisciplinary research project Transcendence and Shared Meaning. Drawing on empirical examples, the contributions show how transcendence is founded or, alternatively, challenged."

Originally published in 1937, this book provides an authentic sketch of the history of English gun production, from their first use in the fourteenth century down to the time of Marlborough's campaigns during the early part of the eighteenth century. At the time of publication there had been relatively few historical analyses of gun foundering, the preference being to examine their use in battle. This book was useful in terms of giving readers a collection of facts relating to the subject and outlining a little-known branch of military history. It remains a fascinating document, containing numerous illustrations, that will be of value anyone with an interest in English history and the development of guns.

Adopted from the Celts in the 1st century BC, the spatha, a lethal and formidable chopping blade, became the primary sword of the Roman soldier in the Later Empire. Over the following centuries, the blade, its scabbard, and its system of carriage underwent a series of developments, until by the 3rd century AD it was the universal sidearm of both infantry and cavalry. Thanks to its long reach, the spatha was the ideal cavalry weapon, replacing the long gladius hispaniensis in the later Republican period. As the manner in which Roman infantrymen fought evolved, styles of hand-to-hand combat changed so much that the gladius was superseded by the longer spatha during the 2nd century AD. Like the gladius, the spatha was technologically advanced, with a carefully controlled use of steel. Easy maintenance was key to its success and the spatha was designed to be easily repaired in the field where access to a forge may have been limited. It remained the main Roman sword into the Late Roman period and its influence survived into the Dark Ages with Byzantine, Carolingian and Viking blades. Drawing together historical accounts, excavated artefacts and the results of the latest scientific analyses of the blades, renowned authority M.C. Bishop reveals the full history of the development, technology, training and use of the spatha: the sword that defended an empire.

Created by a long-forgotten Austrian nobleman, Adolf Odkolek von Augezd, the air-cooled Hotchkiss machine gun was the first to function effectively by tapping propellant gas from the bore as the gun fired. Although the Hotchkiss would be overshadowed by the water-cooled Maxim and Vickers Guns, it proved its effectiveness during the Russo-Japanese War. The gun, quirky though it was, was successful enough to persuade Laurence Benet and Henri Mercie to develop the Modele Portative: a man-portable version which, it was hoped, could move with infantrymen as they advanced. Later mounted on tanks and aircraft, it became the first automatic weapon to obtain a 'kill' in aerial combat. Though it served the French and US armies during World War I (and also the British in areas where French and British units fought alongside each other), the Odkolek-Hotchkiss system was to have its longest-term effect in Japan. Here, a succession of derivatives found favour in theatres of operations in which water-cooling could be more of a liability than an asset. When US forces landed on Saipan, Guam and Iwo Jima, battling their way from island to island across the Pacific, it was the 'Woodpecker' - the Type 92 Hotchkiss, with its characteristically slow rate of fire - which cut swathes through their ranks. Supported by contemporary photographs and full-colour illustrations, this title explores the exciting and eventful history of the first successful gas-operated machine gun.

"Engineering the Revolution "documents the forging of a new relationship between technology and politics in Revolutionary France, and the inauguration of a distinctively modern form of the "technological life." Here, Ken Alder rewrites the history of the eighteenth century as the total history of one particular artifact--the gun--by offering a novel and historical account of how material artifacts emerge as the outcome of political struggle. By expanding the "political" to include conflict over material objects, this volume rethinks the nature of engineering rationality, the origins of mass production, the rise of meritocracy, and our interpretation of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution.

"The Hand Grenade" is the dramatic story, covering its origins, development, use - in the World Wars and into the present day - and lasting influence on close-quarter combat and infantry tactics.
Allowing the user to inflict damage on his opponent within throwing range without leaving cover, the portable, lethally efficient hand grenade is a ubiquitous weapon of modern warfare, and has now found its way into law-enforcement arsenals too. In this engaging study the origins, development, combat use and lasting legacy of the military hand grenade are explored and assessed, accompanied by specially commissioned full-color artwork and an array of revealing photographs of grenades in use and in close-up.

This 1993 volume is a lucid and accurate history of the technical research that led to the first atomic bombs. The authors explore how the 'critical assembly' of scientists, engineers and military personnel at Los Alamos, responding to wartime deadlines, collaborated to create a new approach to large-scale research. The book opens with an introduction laying out major themes. After a synopsis of the prehistory of the bomb project, from the discovery of nuclear fission to the start of the Manhattan Engineer District, and an overview of the early materials programme, the book examines the establishment of the Los Alamos Laboratory, the implosion and gun assembly programmes, nuclear physics research, chemistry and metallurgy, explosives, uranium and plutonium development, confirmation of spontaneous fission in pile-produced plutonium, the thermonuclear bomb, critical assemblies, the Trinity test, and delivery of the combat weapons. Readers interested in history of science will find this volume a crucial resource for understanding the underpinnings of contemporary science and technology.

Banning Chemical Weapons is a readable account of the science and technology involved in attempting to achieve an enforceable international ban on chemical weapons. If such a ban is negotiated, it will be the first effective treaty of its kind, surpassing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Biological Weapons Convention. The layman should have a grasp of the basic science of chemical warfare and defense to understand the intricacies of the negotiation and drafting of such a treaty. A successful and socially desirable treaty will have contributions from many quarters--from politicians, diplomats, jurists, and scientists.

The units and formations of the US Special Operations Command (SOCOM) have privileged access to the finest weaponry in the world's arsenal. Whether Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marines, the SOCOM troops select weapons that match their mission requirements, but which also sit at the cutting edge of combat technology.

This means that, while SOCOM troops frequently use standard-issue weaponry, they also adopt many specialist pieces of kit that are not so accessible to the broader armed services, including sniper rifles, battle rifles, and machine guns, as well as high-tech tactical accessories used to transform standard weaponry into something exceptional.

Assessing the technology and capabilities of these combat weapons, as well as how they have been used in modern combat, this fully illustrated study lifts the veil on some of the most distinctive hand-held weapon systems of US special operations forces since 1987.

Former secretary of defense Leon Panetta once described cyber warfare as "the most serious threat in the twenty-first century," capable of destroying our entire infrastructure and crippling the nation. Already, major cyber attacks have affected countries around the world: Estonia in 2007, Georgia in 2008, Iran in 2010, and most recently the United States. As with other methods of war, cyber technology can be used not only against military forces and facilities but also against civilian targets. Information technology has enabled a new method of warfare that is proving extremely difficult to combat, let alone defeat. And yet cyber warfare is still in its infancy, with innumerable possibilities and contingencies for how such conflicts may play out in the coming decades. Brian M. Mazanec examines the worldwide development of constraining norms for cyber war and predicts how those norms will unfold in the future. Employing case studies of other emerging-technology weapons-chemical and biological, strategic bombing, and nuclear weaponry-Mazanec expands previous understandings of norm-evolution theory, offering recommendations for U.S. policymakers and citizens alike as they grapple with the reality of cyber terrorism in our own backyard.

The immense impact of technology on both warfare and security has been clearly demonstrated and has heightened concerns relating to the proliferation of military technology and misuse by irresponsible actors. Technology control regimes are a vital component of national security strategies. This report presents evidence of the increasing relevance of technology in the 21st century and a brief review of the control regimes, as well as the perspectives of progressive developing nations. It highlights the need for a new approach to the management of technology and security issues. Meeting future challenges to arms control and non-proliferation will require wider cooperation among nations in a rapidly changing and interdependent world in which some of the new technologies will further accentuate security sensitivities. The report advocates the abandonment of cold war mindsets and makes a case for a broader cooperative approach to the management of technology controls. International cooperation will be vital for achieving the objectives of non-proliferation, disarmament and global socio-economic progress and will facilitate steps towards the elimination of weapons of mass destruction and the dangers posed by terrorism, thereby fostering enhanced international peace and stability.

The book is a balanced analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of Taylorism, including the naivete that led its proponents to ignore the emotional side of the complex roles and patterns that govern the world of work. Originally published in 1985. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Trinity, the debut graphic book by Jonathan Fetter-Vorm, depicts the dramatic history of the race to build and the decision to drop the first atomic bomb in World War Two―with a focus on the brilliant, enigmatic scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer.

This sweeping historical narrative traces the spark of invention from the laboratories of nineteenth-century Europe to the massive industrial and scientific efforts of the Manhattan Project, and even transports the reader into a nuclear reaction―into the splitting atoms themselves.

The power of the atom was harnessed in a top-secret government compound in Los Alamos, New Mexico, by a group of brilliant scientists led by the enigmatic wunderkind J. Robert Oppenheimer. Focused from the start on the monumentally difficult task of building an atomic weapon, these men and women soon began to wrestle with the moral implications of actually succeeding. When they detonated the first bomb at a test site code-named Trinity, they recognized that they had irreversibly thrust the world into a new and terrifying age.

With powerful renderings of WWII's catastrophic events at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Fetter-Vorm unflinchingly chronicles the far-reaching political, environmental, and psychological effects of this new invention. Informative and thought-provoking, Trinity is the ideal introduction to one of the most significant events in history.

Historian Alfred W. Crosby looks at hard, accurate throwing and the manipulation of fire as unique human capabilities. Humans began throwing rocks in prehistory and then progressed to javelins, atlatls, bows and arrows. We learned to make fire by friction and used it to cook, drive game, burn out rivals, and alter landscapes. In historic times we invented catapults, trebuchets, and such flammable liquids as Greek Fire. About 1,000 years ago we invented gunpowder, which accelerated the rise of empires and the advance of European imperialism. In the 20th century, gunpowder weaponry enabled us to wage the most destructive wars of all time, peaking at the end of World War II with the V-2 and atomic bomb. Today, we have turned our projectile talents to space travel which may make it possible for our species to migrate to other bodies of our solar system and even other star systems.

The book is a balanced analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of Taylorism, including the naivet_ that led its proponents to ignore the emotional side of the complex roles and patterns that govern the world of work.

Originally published in 1985.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

In Throwing Fire, historian Alfred W. Crosby looks at hard, accurate throwing and the manipulation of fire as unique human capabilities. Humans began throwing rocks in prehistory and then progressed to javelins, atlatls, bows and arrows. We learned to make fire by friction and used it to cook, drive game, burn out rivals, and alter landscapes to our liking. Our exploitation of these two capabilities figured in the extinction of many species, and may have played a role in the demise of Neanderthals. In historic times we invented catapults, trebuchets, and such flammable liquids as Greek Fire, a napalm-like substance that stuck to whatever it hit and could not be extinguished with water. About 1,000 years ago we invented gunpowder, which led to guns and rockets, enabling us to literally throw fire. Gunpowder weaponry accelerated the rise of empires and the advance of European imperialism. In the 20th century, gunpowder weaponry enabled us to achieve unprecedented mayhem--the most destructive wars of all time. This trend peaked at the end of World War II with the V-2 and atomic bomb, at which point species suicide became possible. Faced with possible extinction should we experience World War III, we have turned our projectile talents to space travel which may make it possible for our species to migrate to other bodies of our solar system and even other star systems. Alfred W. Crosby is the author of the widely popular and ground-breaking books The Measure of Reality (Cambridge, 1996), America's Forgotten Pandemic (Cambridge, 1990) and Ecological Imperialism (Cambridge, 1986). He taught at the University of Texas, Austin for over 20 years. His books have received the Ralph Waldo Emerson Prize, the Medical Writers Association Prize and been named by the Los Angeles Times as among the best books of the year.

This volume is the first comprehensive analysis of a number of on-site test inspections which have been conducted in the chemical industry. These inspections were conducted in order to design and test the verification mechanisms for a future international Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). Conclusions are drawn from these experiences about the manner in which such inspection could be conducted in future, problems encountered in the inspection process are described, and suggestions are made how the verification system of the CWC might be finalized so as to function most efficiently. Information is also presented which will broaden understanding of how such inspections will be conducted, what their limits will be and how the concerns of the chemical industry can be addressed. This book is intended for professionals, teachers, and students concerned with strategic studies, peace studies, and international relations consultants, policy-makers, and journalists specializing in these areas.

Technē’s Paradox—a frequent theme in science fiction—is the commonplace belief that technology has both the potential to annihilate humanity and to preserve it. Advocating Weapons, War, and Terrorism looks at how this paradox applies to some of the most dangerous of technologies: population bombs, dynamite bombs, chemical weapons, nuclear weapons, and improvised explosive devices. Hill’s study analyzes the rhetoric used to promote such weapons in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. By examining Thomas R. Malthus’s Essay on the Principle of Population, the courtroom address of accused Haymarket bomber August Spies, the army textbook Chemical Warfare by Major General Amos A. Fries and Clarence J. West, the life and letters of Manhattan Project physicist Leo Szilard, and the writings of Ted “Unabomber” Kaczynski, Hill shows how contemporary societies are equipped with abundant rhetorical means to describe and debate the extreme capacities of weapons to both destroy and protect. The book takes a middle-way approach between language and materialism that combines traditional rhetorical criticism of texts with analyses of the persuasive force of weapons themselves, as objects, irrespective of human intervention. Advocating Weapons, War, and Terrorism is the first study of its kind, revealing how the combination of weapons and rhetoric facilitated the magnitude of killing in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and illuminating how humanity understands and acts upon its propensity for violence. This book will be invaluable for scholars of rhetoric, scholars of science and technology, and the study of warfare.