How a new understanding of warfare can help the military fight today's conflicts more effectively The way wars are fought has changed starkly over the past sixty years. International military campaigns used to play out between armies at central fronts. Today's conflicts find major powers facing rebel insurgencies deploying elusive methods, from improvised explosives to terrorist attacks. Presenting a transformative understanding of these contemporary confrontations, Small Wars, Big Data shows that a revolution in the study of conflict yields new insights into terrorism, civil wars, and foreign interventions. Modern warfare is not about struggles over territory but over people; civilians-and the information they might provide-can turn the tide at critical junctures. Drawing lessons from conflicts in locations around the world, Small Wars, Big Data provides groundbreaking perspectives for how small wars can be better strategized and favorably won.

How a new understanding of warfare can help the military fight today's conflicts more effectively The way wars are fought has changed starkly over the past sixty years. International military campaigns used to play out between large armies at central fronts. Today's conflicts find major powers facing rebel insurgencies that deploy elusive methods, from improvised explosives to terrorist attacks. Small Wars, Big Data presents a transformative understanding of these contemporary confrontations and how they should be fought. The authors show that a revolution in the study of conflict--enabled by vast data, rich qualitative evidence, and modern methods-yields new insights into terrorism, civil wars, and foreign interventions. Modern warfare is not about struggles over territory but over people; civilians-and the information they might choose to provide-can turn the tide at critical junctures. The authors draw practical lessons from the past two decades of conflict in locations ranging from Latin America and the Middle East to Central and Southeast Asia. Building an information-centric understanding of insurgencies, the authors examine the relationships between rebels, the government, and civilians. This approach serves as a springboard for exploring other aspects of modern conflict, including the suppression of rebel activity, the role of mobile communications networks, the links between aid and violence, and why conventional military methods might provide short-term success but undermine lasting peace. Ultimately the authors show how the stronger side can almost always win the villages, but why that does not guarantee winning the war. Small Wars, Big Data provides groundbreaking perspectives for how small wars can be better strategized and favorably won to the benefit of the local population.

A Washington Post Best Book of the year A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice

Eula, Idaho, has never seen a battle, an earthquake, or a Democrat in City Hall. Yet life here is anything but simple.

Lina's angry son Jesus has recently returned to the trailer park after living with wealthy white foster parents. Her younger son Enrique and his best friend, Gene--who lives in a neighboring trailer with his very Christian mother, Connie--are misfits who cling to their studies in the face of schoolyard cruelties. Determined to win the statewide science fair, Enrique and Gene devise an experiment involving "lake overturn," a phenomenon in which deadly gases erupt from a lake's depths. In their endeavor to discover if Eula could suffer from such an event, the boys come into contact with an odd assortment of locals--including a frail-hearted school principal with grand ambitions, a lonely lawyer who finds new love as his wife is dying, and a woman who decides to escape a life of exploitation and addiction by becoming a surrogate mother.

With sweeping perspective and a Victorian wealth of character, Lake Overturn exposes small-town America in all its beauty and treachery, sunshine and secrets.