Afghanistan and the future of war

Abstract

Discussion about the nature of warfare in Afghanistan is related to several larger inter-related debates in the field of military history. First, is the world witnessing a military revolution, or a military technical revolution/revolution in military affairs at the dawn of the new millennium? Second, is conventional warfare dead? Third, are we witnessing a new form of insurgency, and is the new form of insurgency part of the so-called Eastern way of warfare? Fourth, does this mean that counter-insurgency in Afghanistan is part of the West’s ongoing Global War on Terror (also dubbed the Long War)? We will try to generalize the future of warfare by making a case study of the recent conflict in Afghanistan.