Out of the Mountains: The Coming Age of the Urban Guerrilla Author: Visit Amazon's David Kilcullen Page | Language: English | ISBN:
0199737509 | Format: PDF
Out of the Mountains: The Coming Age of the Urban Guerrilla Description
Amazon.com Review
A Look Inside: Out of the Mountains: The Coming Age of the Urban Guerrilla [Click Images to Enlarge]
A mine-resistant ambush protected vehicle (MRAP), a few minutes before the ambush in Dara-i Nur District, Afghanistan, September 10, 2009. Photo by David Kilcullen.
Feral City-- African Union peacekeepers drive past shops and power lines on the streets of Mogadishu, June 2012. Photo by David Kilcullen.
Competitive control-- Somali clan militia at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Mogadishu, June 2012. Photo by David Kilcullen.
Competitive control-- a Somali building destroyed by militants as punishment for its owners’ failure to pay insurgent taxes. Photo taken by David Kilcullen.
Hindu Kush, Afghanistan-- the remote landlocked mountain environment has become the default for many western militaries, diplomats, and development agencies since 2001. Photo taken by David Kilcullen.
Competitive control-- African Union troops with weapons, radios, and ammunition captured from al-Shabaab during the battle of Afgoye, June 2012. Photo taken by David Kilcullen.
Review
"An iconoclastic new book on future urban conflicts." --David Ignatius, Washington Post
"Out of the Mountains isn't brimming with tactical solutions to such problems. Just as present-day counterinsurgency doctrine didn't materialize overnight, the answers to the questions Mr. Kilcullen poses will evolve over time. But his insistence that it is 'time to drag ourselves -- body and mind -- out of the mountains' serves as a reminder that complacency remains one of the most serious threats to U.S. national security." --Wall Street Journal
"Kilcullen has a rare ability to combine serious theory with the insight of an experienced practitioner." --Foreign Affairs
"Out of the Mountains will appeal to a broad range of readers -- social scientists, security experts and military officers, urban planners and technologists, and a general readership interested in how today's global trends will shape tomorrow's world. Readers who enjoy the work of Robert Kaplan or even Paul Theroux -- the engaging mix of adventure writing with sophisticated social and political analysis -- will find Kilcullen quite appealing." --Washington Monthly
"Although an enemy of the state, I must concede that this is a brilliant book by the most unfettered and analytically acute mind in the military intelligentsia. Kilcullen unflinchingly confronts the nightmare of endless warfare in the slums of the world." --Mike Davis, author of Planet of Slums
"David Kilcullen brilliantly illuminates a coming dystopian urban world, part Blade Runner and part Minority Report. He cogently argues that we must rapidly find a way to build our own security networks to prepare for the coming age of urban guerrillas. Out of the Mountains crystallizes this sadly probable future in vivid and practical terms." --Admiral James Stavridis, USN (Ret), Former Supreme Allied Commander at NATO and Dean, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University
"Kilcullen delivers a lucid, important study that American leaders should read." --Kirkus Reviews
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- Hardcover: 352 pages
- Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (October 1, 2013)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0199737509
- ISBN-13: 978-0199737505
- Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.1 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Unlike the majority of other reviewers, I did not fall in love with this book. It's good and worth a read, but nothing spectacular. I'm not sure it is even an important book (interesting, yes; important, not so sure).
For starters, I don't think there's anything truly new in the book (something the author pretty much admits to in the first few pages). Mr. Kilcullen's spends (in my uncorrected, advance copy) 265 pages (not including an appendix and notes) telling the reader that future conflict will - more often than not - take place in urban areas (by 2050, more than 3/4 of the world's population will reside in an urban setting), that most urban areas are situated within 12 miles of a coastline (hence, littoral), and that these urban/littoral setting will be ultra-connected. In short, future conflict will take place in a "Blade Runner" environment and thus is something that works to the (dis)advantage of both sides. Mr. Kilcullen also reminds us that the world is not binary (i.e., us vs them), but multi-agenda'd. Finally, Mr. Kilcullen states that in future conflicts the line between lawful conflict and criminal activity will be blurred and our comfortable Westphalian view of the "nation-state in conflict" will be displaced by a reality where the enemy is a non-state entity. I'm not finding anything new here (except for the 20th century, seems this is how the world has always been [again, something the authors admits to in the first few pages]). Not to be cheeky, but :yawn:.
While the book is informative, accessible, and well-written it is not what one should expect from an academic publishing house (in this case, Oxford University Press).
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