A RAGE TO CONQUER: Twelve Battles That Changed the Course of Western History...not sure I agree

A RAGE TO CONQUER: Twelve Battles That Changed the Course of Western History
MICHAEL WALSH
St. Martin's Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$16.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 2.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Award-winning author Michael Walsh looks at twelve momentous battles that changed the course of Western history.

A sequel to Michael Walsh’s Last Stands, his new book A Rage to Conquer is a journey through the twelve of the most important battles in Western history. As Walsh sees it, war is an important facet of every culture—and, for better or worse, our world is unthinkable without it. War has been an essential part of the human condition throughout history, the principal agent of societal change, waged by men on behalf of, and in pursuit of, their gods, women, riches, power, and the sheer joy of combat.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: I had a hard time with this book. It's very interesting. It's not a dry history, written to inform; it is tendentious and opinionated; it's just that I do not share the author's belief that war is anything but a curse and a cause for shame and contumely, not celebration.

Examining the careers of Achilles, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Bohemond (of whom I do not recall ever hearing before now), von Clausewitz, and General George Patton, among others, the author continues the cultural valorization of men who slaughter other men in pursuit of their women, their land, or simply out of allegiance to a different "god."

Leaving aside the fact that two of the most famous of his examples...Achilles and Alexander...were famously in love with other men (Patroclus and Hephaistion), presenting these motivations as simply facts while editorializing his socks off about other things, really tips his hand as being very much in favor of this model of doing things in the world.

His opinion being at the greatest possible variance from mine, I'm not likely to offer much praise for the work. The praiseworthy things in this read are the author's evident erudition, his conscientious researching skills, and his ability to convey facts with sharp clarity.

Everything else, the jingoism, the valorization of the ugliest, most hateful parts of human nature, the reassertion (as though it's needed) that male = violent, and this is a good thing, I deplore.

Perfect in its celebration of death, gore, and unreflective immiseration of women and losers of battles, for #Deathtober. I recommend its ghoulish, violence-delighting, heteronormative nightmare of a world to anyone needing evidence for why no "devil" can ever scare me half as much as a human being.