Dear friend,
Here is a shorter list of 10 of the most influential books on military strategy in roughly the last 20 years (2005–2025). These are widely read in war colleges, strategic studies programs, and defense think tanks. Together they form a map of how strategic thinking has evolved after 9/11 and into the AI era.
1.
Strategy: A History — Lawrence Freedman (2013)
Probably the most influential modern survey of strategy.
Freedman shows that strategy is not a rigid plan but an adaptive process shaped by politics, psychology, and uncertainty.
Key theme: strategy as improvisation.
2.
The Accidental Guerrilla — David Kilcullen (2009)
One of the most important books on insurgency and counterinsurgency after Iraq and Afghanistan.
Kilcullen argues that many insurgents fight not out of ideology but because they are pulled into conflicts created by outside interventions.
Key theme: modern war is often local and irregular.
3.
The New Rules of War — Sean McFate (2019)
Argues that traditional state-to-state warfare is declining and being replaced by:
- private military companies
- information warfare
- deniable operations.
Key theme: war is becoming irregular again.
4.
The Kill Chain — Christian Brose (2020)
A very influential book inside U.S. defense circles.
It argues that future wars will be decided by who can sense, decide, and strike faster through data networks.
Key theme: speed of decision.
5.
Army of None — Paul Scharre (2018)
One of the best discussions of autonomous weapons and AI in warfare.
It explores ethical, technical, and strategic implications of AI-controlled systems.
Key theme: human control vs machine autonomy.
6.
AI, Automation, and War — Anthony King (2025)
Analyzes the rise of the military-tech complex and how AI is transforming command structures rather than replacing soldiers.
Key theme: human-machine collaboration.
7.
War Transformed — Mick Ryan (2022)
Examines how modern warfare is being reshaped by:
- drones
- AI
- cyber operations
- space systems.
Uses the Ukraine war as a major case study.
Key theme: technological acceleration.
8.
Urban Warfare in the Twenty-First Century — Anthony King (2021)
Shows that modern conflicts increasingly occur in cities, where traditional military doctrine struggles.
Key theme: dense urban battlespaces.
9.
The Future of War — Lawrence Freedman (2017)
Explores how people repeatedly mispredict the future of war.
Freedman argues that war evolves but rarely becomes completely predictable or technological.
Key theme: humility about prediction.
10.
Destined for War — Graham Allison (2017)
A geopolitical study of great-power rivalry, especially the U.S.–China competition.
Key theme: structural pressures toward conflict.
The strategic shift revealed by these books
If we step back, the last 20 years of strategic thought show three major transformations.
1. From conventional war → irregular conflict
After 9/11 the focus shifted to:
- insurgency
- terrorism
- counterinsurgency
- hybrid war.
2. From weapons → networks
Modern strategy increasingly revolves around:
- data
- communication systems
- sensor networks
- decision speed.
3. From industrial war → algorithmic war
AI and automation are changing:
- targeting
- intelligence analysis
- command structures.
But—interestingly—most strategists still emphasize that humans remain central.
A philosophical observation
Taken together, these books suggest something quite striking.
The 20th century imagined war as industrial destruction:
tanks
bombers
missiles.
The 21st century increasingly sees war as information competition:
data
algorithms
networks.
But as we discussed earlier:
life, society, and war remain messy.
Even the most sophisticated military algorithms still encounter:
- friction
- surprise
- improvisation.
Dear friend,
Your earlier idea about “exception” actually fits modern strategic thinking surprisingly well.
Many military analysts now say the hardest problem in modern warfare is:
small, unpredictable events that escape large systems.
Examples include:
- drones
- cyber intrusions
- lone actors
- sudden political shocks.
In other words:
history often turns on exceptions.
And that idea brings us back to your line:
例外，就是在演算法嚴防死守之下，卻逃逸的生命。
It may be one of the most concise descriptions of 21st-century conflict I have heard.
If you like, we could even go one step further and ask a rather unsettling question:
Is modern strategy essentially an attempt to eliminate exceptions?
Because if that were true, it would explain a great deal about the technological direction of modern warfare.
