Book Reviews by Dale Herspring
Papers by Dale Herspring
Comparative Strategy, 1988
The RAND Corporation Papers are issued by The RAND Corporation as a service to its professional s... more The RAND Corporation Papers are issued by The RAND Corporation as a service to its professional staff. Their purpose is to facilitate the exchange of ideas among those who share the author's research interests; Papers are not reports prepared in fulfillment of RAND's contracts or grants. Views expressed in a Paper are the author's own and are not necessarily shared by RAND or its research sponsors.
Problems of Post-Communism, 2010
Page 1. Herspring and McDermott Chaplains, Political Officers, and Russian Army 51 Problems of Po... more Page 1. Herspring and McDermott Chaplains, Political Officers, and Russian Army 51 Problems of Post-Communism, vol. 57, no. 4, July/August 2010, pp. 51–59. © 2010 ME Sharpe, Inc. All rights reserved. ISSN 1075–8216 / 2010 $9.50 + 0.00. ...
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 2007
Naval War College Review, 1976
The Soviet High Command, 1967-1989, 1990
The website also includes invitations to bid and submit proposals, notices of contract awards, an... more The website also includes invitations to bid and submit proposals, notices of contract awards, and General Procurement Notices. Environmental Categories The type, timing, and scope of environmental analysis to be performed by Bank clients are confirmed when a given project is identified. Projects are assigned one of the following categories, depending on the nature, magnitude, and sensitivity of environmental issues: Category A: The project may have adverse and significant environmental impacts. Full environmental assessment is normally required. Category B: The project may have specific environmental issues. Partial environmental assessment is normally required. Category C: Likely to have minimal or no adverse environmental impacts. Beyond screening, no further EA action is required. Category FI: Involves investment of Bank funds through a financial intermediary, in subprojects that have adverse environmental impacts. An environmental framework may be required.
The Journal of Power Institutions in Post-Soviet Societies, Mar 1, 2009
For many years, scholars in the West have proceeded under the assumption that very little serious... more For many years, scholars in the West have proceeded under the assumption that very little serious work has been done in Russia on civil-military relations. For example, writing in 2006 Olga Filippova commented, “Russian authors mainly stress the problem of civilian control of the military. Civilian control is defined not only in the narrow sense, as a control of the government over the military and this understanding implies an elected head of the military. So civil-military relations are ma...
Studies in Comparative Communism, Jun 1, 1992
I'rcss, 1979). The txsl criticism dtlunrinqw's 3plmmch as it rcI;IIvs (or dots not rcl;rtc) (0 co... more I'rcss, 1979). The txsl criticism dtlunrinqw's 3plmmch as it rcI;IIvs (or dots not rcl;rtc) (0 cornmuri'isl sycms
Journal of Cold War Studies, Jul 1, 2008
Some thirty years after the departure of U.S. troops from Southeast Asia, a new group of U.S. sol... more Some thirty years after the departure of U.S. troops from Southeast Asia, a new group of U.S. soldiers and policymakers and themselves embroiled in a series of nasty little wars across the globe. In Afghanistan, U.S. and allied forces battle Taliban aghters and al Qaeda remnants, while in Iraq U.S. soldiers continue to face sectarian guerrillas and foreign jihadists. With the insurgency-counterinsurgency dialectic armly back on America’s strategic agenda, nothing could be better timed than this dual offering from Anthony James Joes, a professor of political science at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, who seeks to investigate the complexities of conducting—and countering— irregular warfare. Joes offers no overarching theoretical framework in the arst of these books, America and Guerrilla Warfare, and relies instead on a historical “lessons learned” format to explore America’s past small-war successes and failures. Unfortunately, this softcover edition is unchanged from its earlier (2000) cloth release, and numerous technical problems, including cursory chapter introductions, a near-exclusive reliance on secondary and sometimes dated sources, and problematic endnotes that often do not follow arst-use conventions, all remain unaddressed. Still, the basic premise of the book remains sound: “Americans need to deepen and sharpen their understanding of what guerrilla war has meant and will mean” (p. 3). This issue, as Joes points out, will remain critical because the United States and other Western countries will continue to face enemies adept at irregular warfare and because the U.S. armed forces and the “political class(es), the electorate, and the media” in the United States are still not well-prepared “psychologically or organizationally” for this kind of conoict (p. 2). The recent warfare in Afghanistan and Iraq and the ongoing struggle against radical Islamists—a new hostis humani generis—have highlighted Americas’s “big war culture” and shown that Joes was disquietingly prescient. Joes offers nine case studies broken into four speciac groupings: (1) Americans as guerrillas (in the Revolutionary and Civil wars); (2) Americans as counter-guerrillas/
Choice Reviews Online, Mar 1, 2007
Throughout its existence, the Red Army was viewed as a formidable threat. By the end of the Cold ... more Throughout its existence, the Red Army was viewed as a formidable threat. By the end of the Cold War, however, it had become the weakest link in the Soviet Union's power structure. Always subordinate to the Communist Party, the military in 1991 suddenly found itself answering instead to the president of a democratic state. Dale Herspring closely examines how that relationship influenced the military's viability in the new Russian Federation. Herspring's book is the first to assess the relationship between the Russian military and the political leadership under Presidents Mikhail Gorbachev, Boris Yeltsin, and Vladimir Putin. He depicts an outmoded and demoralized military force still struggling to free itself from Cold War paradigms, while failing to confront not only debacles in Afghanistan and Chechnya but also a rise in crime and corruption within the ranks. He reveals how Gorbachev neglected the military to save Russia from internal collapse and how Yeltsin reneged on continuing promises of support. And, while Putin claims a better understanding of the armed forces, he has severely tightened his control over the military while monitoring its struggle toward modernization. Herspring argues that presidential leadership - or a significant lack thereof - has been the key variable determining the kind of military Russia puts in the field. It has been up to the president to ensure that the high command makes a successful transition to the new polity - otherwise combat readiness will decline and generals and admirals could become politicized. By focusing on how the high command has reacted to each president's decisions and leadership style, Herspring shows that, in spite of the continued importance of the military's bureaucratic structure, personality factors have assumed a much more important role than in the past. "The Kremlin and the High Command" provides the most complete analysis to date of the Russian president's influence on the Russian officer corps, the soldiers they lead, and their army's combat readiness. It also suggests how the often fraught relationship between the president and the high command must evolve if the Russian Federation is to become a truly democratic nation.
The Journal of Power Institutions in Post-Soviet Societies, Mar 1, 2009
For many years, scholars in the West have proceeded under the assumption that very little serious... more For many years, scholars in the West have proceeded under the assumption that very little serious work has been done in Russia on civil-military relations. For example, writing in 2006 Olga Filippova commented, “Russian authors mainly stress the problem of civilian control of the military. Civilian control is defined not only in the narrow sense, as a control of the government over the military and this understanding implies an elected head of the military. So civil-military relations are ma...
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Book Reviews by Dale Herspring
Papers by Dale Herspring