Over the past several years, I have mulled over the possibility of compiling a collection of articles I have written. These pieces have conveyed my broader sense of history to those interested in the role that historical studies might play in molding our understanding of the uses of force in the past as well as in thinking about its use in the future. I have also used such articles and essays as a means of correcting the myths and historical inconsistencies that seem to proliferate in the current policy milieu, like toadstools in a damp and corrupt climate. My editor at Cambridge, Frank Smith, expressed surprising enthusiasm for such a collection when I raised the possibility. The result was that I had to rummage over a considerable period through disparate journals and unpublished essays locked away in my files and in the various disks and thumbdrives that form the chaos that is my working environment. In the process of assembling this collection, the reviewers of the initial manuscript helped me enormously in molding the final manuscript. Their apposite comments have guided me not only in the writing of this introduction but also in the formatting and ordering of the chapters in this book.

Some of these essays reflect my recent work, and some appeared almost 20 years ago. In the case of the latter, instead of attempting to rework the footnotes, I have appended a small bibliographical paragraph of more recent books and articles that have since appeared. These short references should provide sufficient guidance for interested readers as they follow the path of historical research and arguments over the course of the intervening years.