Understanding Modern Warfare

Understanding Modern Warfare has established itself as a leading text in professional military education and undergraduate teaching. This third edition has been revised throughout to reflect dramatic changes during the past decade. Introducing three brand new chapters, this updated volume provides in-depth analysis of the most pertinent issues of the 2020s and beyond, including cyber warfare, information activities, hybrid and grey zone warfare, multi-domain operations and recent conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and Syria. It also includes a range of features to maximise its value as a learning tool: a structure designed to guide students through key strategic principles; key questions and annotated reading guides for deeper understanding; text boxes highlighting critical thinkers and operational concepts; and a glossary explaining key terms. Providing debate driven analysis that encourages students to develop a balanced perspective, Understanding Modern Warfare remains essential reading both for officers and for students of international relations more broadly.

David Jordan is Deputy Head of the Defence Studies Department, King's College London, based at the Defence Academy of the UK, Shrivenham and a founding co-director of the Freeman Air & Space Institute. He also serves as a Director of the RAF's Centre Air & Space Power Studies and has authored numerous articles and book chapters addressing air and space power issues.

James D. Kiras is Dean and Professor at the School of Advanced Air & Space Studies (SAASS), the US Air Force's premier school of strategy. He is the author of Special Operations Success: Balancing Capabilities and Control (2025) and Special Operations Strategy: From World War II the War on Terrorism (2006), and co-editor of Into the Void: Special Operations Forces After the War on Terrorism (2024), Strategic Sabotage (2021), and Special Operations: Out of the Shadows (2020).

David J. Lonsdale is Senior Lecturer in War Studies at the University of Hull. He is the author of Alexander the Great: Lessons in Strategy (2008), The Nature of War in the Information Age: Clausewitzian Future (2003), Alexander, Killer of Men: Alexander the Great and the Macedonian Art of War (2004), and co-author of Understanding Contemporary Strategy (2019).

Ian Speller is Professor of Military History and Director of the Centre for Military History and Strategic Studies at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth. He also lectures at the Irish Military College. He is the author of numerous works on maritime strategy and naval warfare, including Understanding Naval Warfare (2024), The Role of Amphibious Warfare in British Defence Policy, 1945–1956 (2001) and, as co-editor, Small Navies: Strategy and Policy for Small Navies in War and Peace (2014) and Europe, Small Navies and Maritime Security (2021).

Christopher Tuck is Reader in Strategic Studies in the Department of Defence Studies, King's College London, based at the Joint Services Command and Staff College, Shrivenham. He is the author of Understanding Land Warfare (2022), and Confrontation, Strategy, and War Termination (2013), co-author of Amphibious Warfare: Strategy and Tactics from Gallipoli to Iraq (2014) and co-editor of British Propaganda and Wars of Empire: Influencing Friend and Foe (2014).