The Culture of Military Organizations - Softcover

Culture has an enormous influence on military organizations and their success or failure in war. Cultural biases often result in unstated assumptions that have a deep impact on the making of strategy, operational planning, doctrinal creation, and the organization and training of armed forces. Except in unique circumstances culture grows slowly, embedding so deeply that members often act unconsciously according to its dictates. Of all the factors that are involved in military effectiveness, culture is perhaps the most important. Yet, it also remains the most difficult to describe and understand, because it entails so many external factors that impinge, warp, and distort its formation and continuities. The sixteen case studies in this volume examine the culture of armies, navies, and air forces from the Civil War to the Iraq War and how and why culture affected their performance in the ultimate arbitration of war.

Peter R. Mansoor, Retired Colonel, US Army, is the General Raymond E. Mason, Jr Chair of Military History at The Ohio State University. He assumed this position after a twenty-six year career in the US Army that culminated in his service as the executive officer to General David Petraeus, commanding general of Multi-National Force-Iraq, during the surge of US forces in 2007 and 2008.

Williamson Murray is a Professor Emeritus of history at the Ohio State University. His work over the past fifty years focuses primarily on grand strategy, operations, and airpower. He has published numerous highly acclaimed works, including The Change in the European Balance of Power, 1938–1939: The Path to Ruin (1984), Strategy for Defeat: The Luftwaffe (1986), German Military Effectiveness (1992), The Air War in the Persian Gulf (1995) and A War to Be Won: Fighting the Second World War, 1937–1945 (2000).