"The Threatening Space Between Napoleon and Nukes:..." Topic

… Clausewitz vs. Schelling.

"Great theories stand the test of time—shedding light on their subject's essence despite varying contexts, technological upheavals or mutable human relations. One such work is Carl von Clausewitz's On War. That said, with the detonation of the atomic bomb and the proliferation of nuclear weapons, many find Clausewitz wanting. How can there be a decisive battle without nuclear annihilation? Nuclear weapons seem to breach our understanding of force, suggesting the need for radically different conceptions of war. Enter Thomas C. Schelling and his work on The Strategy of Conflict—an attempt to comprehend and harness force within the context of nuclear weapons. Surprisingly, both Schelling's and Clausewitz's projects are far more similar than their diverging contexts would suggest. Lest we forget, the transformations in war that they bore witness to—Napoleon and nukes—were similarly jarring; despite the difference in potency, the rupture in the traditional form of war corresponds. After the introduction of these methodological and technological terrors, Clausewitz and Schelling spent their time trying to comprehend what these changes meant for war and conflict—in theory and in reality—converging on the problem of delimiting war. While Clausewitz's problem is limited war and Schelling's problem is limiting warfare, both turn to the concept of the threat to compensate for the failure of war in reality to realize its theoretical potential. Ultimately the difference between Clausewitz and Schelling lies in the utility of threat…"
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