During the Revolutionary War, many key Patriot leaders believed that militia were untrustworthy and useless in battle. After the American victory, many of the same men proclaimed their support for the militia as the foundation of the new nation's defense. The debate on the efficacy of Patriot militia continues into modern scholarship; some historians credit the militia with an important strategic role in the war, while others consider them a mere footnote in a conflict that was truly won by the Continental Army. This series of case studies examines four American expeditionary militia units to assess their level of military competence and professionalism. The results show that militia units were far from amateur, and many conducted their operations in a professional military manner. This supports a conclusion that militia both contributed to the American victory and remained a practical means of defense for the young nation.

Arkansas occupied a key position in the Confederate Trans-Mississippi Department. It offered a gateway for Confederate troops to move north and secure Missouri for the Confederacy, or for Union troops to move south towards Texas and Louisiana. During the war, Union and Confederate armies moved back and forth across the state engaging in numerous encounters. This paper is a year by year study of those encounters and engagements occurring in Arkansas between 1861 and 1865. Emphasis is necessarily placed on the significant campaigns and engagements. Actions which occurred in adjacent states but which militarily affected Arkansas are also discussed. The majority of the material was compiled from the Official Records.

After much debate during the war years over how best to respond to Nazi criminality, the United States embarked on an ambitious postwar trial program in occupied Germany, which consisted of three distinct trial sets: the International Military Trial at Nuremburg, the Nuremberg Military Tribunals, and military trials held at the former concentration camp at Dachau. Within the Dachau military tribunal programme, were the concentration camp trials in which personnel from the Dachau, Mauthausen, Buchenwald, Flossenbürg, and Dora-Mittelbau concentration camps were arraigned. These concentration camp trials at Dachau represented the principal attempt by the United States to punish Nazi crimes committed at the concentration camps liberated by the Americans. The prosecutors at Dachau tried 1,045 defendants accused of committing violations of the 'laws of war' as understood through 'customary' international and American military practice. The strain of using traditional military law to prosecute the unprecedented crimes in the Nazi concentration camps was exposed throughout the trials. To meet this challenge, the Dachau concentration camp courts included an inventive legal concept: the use of a 'criminal-conspiracy' charge-in effect arraigning defendants for participating the 'common design' of the concentration camp, 'a criminal organization'. American lawmakers had spent a good deal of time focused on the problem of how to begin the trials (What charges? What courts? Which defendants?) and very little time planning for the aftermath of the trials. Thus, by 1947 and 1948, in the face of growing tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union, the major problem with the Dachau trials was revealed -the lack of long term plans for the appellate process for those convicted. After two scandals that captured the press and the public's attention, the United States Congress held two official investigations of the entire Dachau tribunal programme. Although the resulting reviews, while critical of the Army's clemency process, were largely positive about the trials themselves, the Dachau trials faded from public memory.

Readings of contemporary accounts of the Japanese invasion of Choson Korea and Ming China's intervention, by Japanese, Korean, and Chinese writers; analysis of the writers' disparate world-views and how they each envision their country and its neighbours. This thesis uses contemporary writings from across the region to study the significance of the East Asian War of 1592-1598 for Chinese, Korean, and Japanese senses of identity, and argues that the war was a crucial moment in the development of those identities. Despite the 1592-1598 conflict affecting millions of people, and resulting in almost unprecedented cross-border flows of people and information, most previous considerations of its effect on identity have focused on court documents. In the first dedicated study of identities in the East Asian War, this thesis shifts from the hitherto emphasis on politicians and commanders to prioritize individuals at the frontiers of cross-border contact. This shift of focus from centre to periphery contributes to our understanding of two areas of history. In terms of the East Asian War as a historical event, it provides a far more nuanced picture of what this momentous conflict signified for people at the time. In terms of the history of Chinese, Korean, and Japanese identities, it demonstrates persuasively that the sense of belonging to a country held real meaning for people across society, influencing the actions even of those totally removed from the state. Tracing the legacy of frontier writings again contributes to both the history of the war and of identity, by revealing how peripheral insights and central biases combined to give birth to the orthodox narratives of the war, some of which remain influential to this day. Personal writings show how first-hand encounters in the war modified but also re-inforced already well-established identities, making national identities of immediate significance for an immeasurably wider group than in peace time. The late sixteenth-century growth in printing and literacy subsequently greatly amplified the impact of the East Asian War by allowing real-life interaction to be endlessly re-told as a dramatic clash between China, Korea, and Japan. This study restores the war to its proper place as a key moment in the longer development of national identities in East Asia. It also calls for a primary-source based, East-Asia centred reconsideration of theories on the historical development of collective identity, which remain overly influenced by later European experience.

Napoleon’s defeat in 1813 generates a number of explanations from historians regarding why he lost this epic campaign which ultimately resulted in France losing control over the German states. Scholars discussing the French marshalate of the Napoleonic era frequently assert that these generals could not win battles without the emperor present. Accustomed to assuming a subordinate role under Bonaparte’s direct supervision, these commanders faltered when deprived of the strong hand of the master. This thesis contributes to this historiographical argument by positing that the pre-professional nature of Napoleon’s marshalate precluded them from adapting to the evolving nature of warfare during the First French Empire. Emerging from non-military backgrounds and deriving their capabilities solely from practical experience, the marshals failed to succeed at endeavors outside of their capacity. An examination of the military administration of the Old Regime, the effects of the French Revolution on the French generalate, and the circumstances under which Bonaparte labored when creating the imperial marshalate demonstrates that issues systemic to the French high command contributed to French defeat in 1813. This thesis also provides evidence that Napoleon understood this problem and attempted to better prepare his marshals for independent command by instructing them in his way of war during the 1813 campaign.

In 1793, Great Britain embarked on a war against Revolutionary France to reestablish a balance of power in Europe. Traditional assessments among historians consider British war planning at the ministerial level during the First Coalition to be incompetent and haphazard. This work reassesses decision making of the leading strategists in the British Cabinet in the development of a theater in the Mediterranean by examining political, diplomatic, and military influences. William Pitt the Younger and his controlling ministers pursued a conservative strategy in the Mediterranean, reliant on Allies in the region to contain French armies and ideas inside the Alps and the Pyrenees. Dependent on British naval power, the Cabinet sought to weaken the French war effort by targeting trade in the region. Throughout the first half of 1793, the British government remained fixed on this conservative, traditional approach to France. However, with the fall of Toulon in August of 1793, decisions made by Admiral Samuel Hood in command of forces in the Mediterranean radicalized British policy towards the Revolution while undermining the construct of the Coalition. The inconsistencies in strategic thought political decisions created stagnation, wasting the opportunities gained by the Counter-revolutionary movements in southern France. As a result, reinvigorated French forces defeated Allied forces in detail in the fall of 1793.

Call number: LD2668 .T4 1985 W32 / Master of Arts

In this thesis, I discuss a group of compositionally related 'core' chapters within the Yi Zhou shu, a collection of 59 texts from ancient China that has received very limited attention in scholarship. The texts in this collection are difficult to read and interpret because of their poor preservation and the lack of concise commentaries. I develop a methodological strategy for the identification of philologically related texts within the collection, which allows me to single out a group of texts related by compositional structures, rhetorical patterns and characteristic formulaic expressions. I call such chapters 'kingly consultations', considering that most of such texts are presented as speeches involving sage rulers of the Western Zhou (mid. 11th century - 771 BC), in which they share the fundamental wisdoms of kingship. I argue that these texts are remnants of an important ritualised textual practice, which has left traces not only in the Yi Zhou shu, but also in other collections, such as the Liu tao (Six Bow Cases), which is commonly classified among 'military' texts. I reconstruct elements of the socio-political context of the kingly consultations using comparative insight. I examine the numerical lists used for systematisation of knowledge against similar lists in the Pali canon. I also explain the significance of the expressions that emphasise the secretive transmission of texts against better known esoteric textual communities in China and Japan. Such comparison allows me to preliminarily identify the communities behind the kingly consultations as based on strict knowledge-based hierarchy, but prone to segmentation. Finally, I position the kingly consultations within the broader context of the practice of treasure texts. This practice is an important development in ancient China that led to the emergence of a new type of textual authority by 'detaching' earlier epigraphic texts from their precious material carriers and introducing them into novel environment of manuscript culture.

<p>In the years 1866-1916, the U.S. Army changed from a frontier constabulary to an industrial age force capable of expeditionary operations. This conversion was made possible by organizational reforms including the creation of a system of professional education, a coordinating central staff, and doctrine integrating tactics, equipment, and organization. Yet formal structures acted in parallel with the informal culture of the officer corps, which proved far more resistant to change. This dissertation will follow the formulation of these reforms by Emory Upton following the Civil War, through their implementation by Elihu Root in the early twentieth century. It concludes in 1916, when new conditions produced an entirely different agenda for reform.</p><p>This period has generally been interpreted in one of two ways. Previous scholarship examining the internal workings of the Army has seen it as a transition from obsolete to modern organization. Despite disagreements as to the origins, impetus, and length of reform, the theme of progress has been consistent. In contrast, the historiography of the Army's external relationship with society has interpreted reform as a failed attempt to introduce militarism by mimicking foreign military institutions alien to American traditions. Although some of the foreign organizational forms were adopted, society ultimately rejected the militarist aims. This dissertation modifies both interpretations by arguing that these reforms were not as great a break with previous practices as generally asserted. The internal changes were actually a reordering of existing practices made possible by the sudden elevation of the reforming faction to organizational power. Individuals sought to emphasize only those limited aspects of the old professional culture that they valued. These individual aims often diverged, leading to a series of disjointed reforms that, while successful in altering the army, did so in unanticipated ways. These internal efforts were meant to improve the army's effectiveness; there was little effort to alter the Army's role in society. Yet the next generation of reformers sought such a change under the dubious guise of a return to tradition. In doing so, they falsely portrayed their predecessors as foreign-inspired militarists, a mischaracterization that has been largely accepted by historians.</p> / Dissertation

This dissertation explores the interaction between literati and various social forces in east China in the mid-seventeenth century by focusing on their military performance. Based on a wide range of sources, the study focuses on about twenty literati, most of whom have never been previously researched from a military history perspective. It examines the diversity and complexity of Chinese literati as they pursued power over and within local society, paying special attention to the interrelation between them (literati and society). It argues that Chinese literati in this time period had much less aptitude in changing China than has been previously thought. Both individual and group case studies show that they mainly focused on the realization of an ideal goal, but were unwilling or ill-equipped to adapt themselves to changing conditions as well as environments. This study also indicates that the local military forces as well as ordinary peasants generally played a more crucial role than the literati; the latter's superior position could only be realized in times of peace. That civil and military officials affected each other in fact is an expression of a larger relationship between the central government and its own military forces or with certain local forces. Finally, this study concludes that Chinese literati as a whole had no idea how to integrate and lead the other social forces to reach an ideal goal in that specific time period.