Review of The Physics of War

Book and Media Review pubs.acs.org/jchemeduc

Review of The Physics of War David P. Pursell* School of Science and Technology, Georgia Gwinnett College, Lawrenceville, Georgia 30043, United States The Physics of War by Barry Parker, Prometheus Books: New York, 2014. 320 pp. ISBN: 978-1-61614-803-4 (hardcover). $25.95.

The topic of Parker’s bookphysics and waris of particular current interest with armed conflict ongoing in many parts of the world. For readers seeking to examine the roots of the many ongoing conflicts, The Physics of War provides a nice historical overview of human conflict and the underpinnings of a few of the key scientific and technologic developments that lead to changes in both weapons and how war is waged. For many readers of the Journal of Chemical Education, the book is most useful for its historical overview up through the Cold War and serves as a jumping off point for more detailed study of the physics, chemistry, and engineering of advances in military hardware covered in other publications. Coverage of current methods of warfareasymmetric, insurgency, terrorism, and the science and technology that support these methodsis minimal. The book begins with a brief overview of topics covered and then proceeds with 17 chapters, beginning with the Battle of Kadesh (present-day Syria) in 1274 BCE and ending with the development of satellites and drones. The chapter listing is as follows; Early Wars and the Beginning of Physics; Basic Physics of Early Weapons; The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire and the Early English−French Wars; Gunpowder and Cannons: The Discoveries That Changed the Art of War and the World; Three Men Ahead of their Time: da Vinci, Tartaglia, and Galileo; From Early Guns to Total Destruction and Discovery; The Impact of the Industrial Revolution; Napoleon’s Weapons and New Breakthroughs in Physics; The American Civil War; Where does the Bullet Go? Ballistics of Rifle Bullets and Cannon Shells; Hey, Look...It Flies! Aerodynamics and the First Airplanes; The Machine Gun WarWorld War I; The Invisible Rays: The Development and Use of Radio and Radar in War; Sonar and the Submarine; The Great War: World War II; The Atomic Bomb; The Hydrogen Bomb, Intercontinental Missiles, Lasers, and the Future. The text is written in an easyreading style and includes photographs of historical figures, sketches of military hardware, and diagrams illustrating selected scientific concepts. The end of the book includes chapter notes, a bibliography, and an index that is useful in directing further study through other published work. As an example of Parker’s approach to topics, he presents a simple yet appropriate description of the scientific and technological developments that advanced the lethality of weapons in the years prior to the American Civil War. In particular, he details the advances in rifles, cannons, and the projectiles they fire and how their range and accuracy exponentially increased their lethality. Parker provides an excellent description of how the battlefield tactics, techniques, and procedures of the time failed to adapt to these lethal advances in weaponry. The result was unprecedented death and

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arry Parker’s book provides a survey of human history and its associated warfare from the time of the early Egyptian empire (ca. 1200 BCE) to the modern age and nuclear weapons. Parker covers the topic of war and how physics, or more broadly science and technology, has been intertwined with military strategy, operations, and tactics over the millennia. While this topic may be of only tangential interest to some readers of Journal of Chemical Education, there are readers in the academy, practicing scientists and engineers, as well as hobbyists, with interests in this area. The Department of History at the United States Military Academy, my alma mater, teaches many courses on the subject, including Weapons and Warfare in the Modern Era1 and likewise at the United States Air Force Academy with History of Technology and Warfare.2 The topic is not limited to the service academies as the University of Pennsylvania teaches several courses on the subject, including Strategy, Policy, and War3 and the University of North Carolina’s Department of History4 includes an area of study, in collaboration with Duke University, on military history. To gain a quick overview of the content that these programs address, one might visit The American Diplomacy5 Web page and view Technology and War by Alex Roland of Duke University. There are many in-depth books and publications on specific physics and war topics, such as The First War of Physics: The Secret History of the Atom Bomb, 1939− 19496 by Jim Baggott and reviewed by Michael Dobbs in The New York Times Sunday Book Review.7 In addition, there are peer-reviewed articles,8 such as “Military Technology: An Historical Perspective” by William J. Perry of Stanford University (former U.S. Secretary of Defense) that the Journal’s readers may find interesting.

Cover image provided by Prometheus Books and reproduced with permission.

© XXXX American Chemical Society and Division of Chemical Education, Inc.

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dx.doi.org/10.1021/ed500686f | J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX

Journal of Chemical Education

Book and Media Review

injury on both sides of the war. As another example, his presentation on the history and development of the first motorized aircraft gives a brief account of the physics of flying and clear schematic representations of aeronautical terms such as thrust, lift, drag, pitch, yaw, and roll. He briefly mentions the initial use of airplanes in World War I and the tactical aspect of aviation, but does not include much discussion of how airplanes subsequently impacted the operational and strategic levels of warfare, which continues to evolve even in current times. The Physics of War is a great introduction to the topic of technology, science, and warfare and written in an engaging, not overly technical style. I recommend it for readers new to the topic as it serves up an excellent overview and offers plenty of avenues for further study.

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AUTHOR INFORMATION

Corresponding Author

*E-mail: [email protected]. Notes

The authors declare no competing financial interest.

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REFERENCES

(1) Department of History, U.S. Military Academy. http://www. usma.edu/history/SitePages/Military%20History.aspx# (accessed Sep 2014). (2) Department of History, U.S. Air Force Academy. http://www. usafa.edu/df/dfh/mil_hist_crs.cfm (accessed Sep 2014). (3) Department of History, University of Pennsylvania. http://www. history.upenn.edu/ (accessed Sep 2014). (4) Department of History, University of North Carolina. http:// history.unc.edu/what-we-study/military-history/ (accessed Sep 2014). (5) American Diplomacy. http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/ AD_Issues/amdipl_4/roland.html (accessed Sep 2014). (6) Baggott, J. E. The First War of Physics: The Secret History of the Atom Bomb, 1939−1949; Pegasus Books: Berkeley, CA, 2011. (7) Sunday Book Review, The New York Times, May 7, 2010, “If You Build It. . .” by Michael Dobbs, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/ 09/books/review/Dobbs-t.html?_r=1& (accessed Sep 2014). (8) Perry, W. J. Military Technology: An Historical Perspective. Technol. Soc. 2004, 26, 235−243.

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dx.doi.org/10.1021/ed500686f | J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX