Is Britain a force for good? Investigating British citizens’ narrative understanding of war

It is commonly assumed in the foreign policy literature that narratives are uniquely persuasive and thus integral to obtaining public support for war. Yet, empirical research on “strategic narrative” is often vague on both the concept of narrative and how it persuades. Moreover, the stories publics use to interpret war are rarely examined. This paper offers a novel approach to studying “from the ground up” the war stories of individual British citizens. It examines public interpretations of war through emplotment: the way people select and link events to create a coherent story. Examining the wars people include and those they silence, it illustrates how a diverse range of citizens morally evaluates Britain’s military role, be it as a Force for Good, a Force for Ill or a country Learning from its Mistakes. In doing so, the paper offers an alternative methodological approach to studying how individual citizens understand war.     

Majority rule,minority issues: The Macedonian question in the Dekemvriana

This article examines the role of the Macedonian Question in the 1944 December Uprising (Dekemvriana) in Greece. While the Dekemvriana is commonly portrayed in right–left terminology in the historiography, this article argues that part of the reason for the left’s failure was their inability to manage the Macedonian ethnic component of the struggle, either within their armed forces or in their relationship with Yugoslavia. As such, this article integrates the early phases of the Greek Civil War into the broader literature on minorities in civil conflict, while simultaneously exposing some of the myths about Macedonian involvement that result from its contemporary political ramifications.     

GPS在导航战中的作用及其干扰对抗研究

论述导航战的作用和军用范围,进攻导航战的目标和防御导航战的措施以及GPS系统中C/A码的扩展和加密应用,新码的发展和抗干扰能力。并通过应用实例进一步论述对GPS接收机的干扰原理和干扰效果分析以及美、俄两国发展GPS干扰机的技术现状。     

基于网络的指挥控制协同性能评估模型

网络中心作战是通过部队网络化而实现的军事行动,网络化作战行动的评估需要新的模型和测量方法,以便获取基于信息优势对改进后的指挥和控制的效果.在借鉴美军经验的基础上,从信息的角度区分了网络中心作战信息栅格运作的方式,运用图论、复杂性理论和性能评估理论等方法,建立了作为信息处理系统的指挥控制网络的结构、预期延迟时间、协同影响、复杂性和有效期望等待时间模型,以及作为指挥控制系统的指挥控制网络的节点决策和网络决策效能模型,是对网络中心作战方法的探索.     

精确制导武器发展趋向

通过“科索沃战争”中精确制导武器使用情况的跟踪研究 ,结合近年来国外公开报道的有关资料 ,分析未来高技术条件下局部战争对精确制导武器的发展需求 ,提出在军事技术高速发展新形势下精确制导武器发展趋向。     

How Is a Man to Decide? Unjust Combatants,Duress and McMahan’s Killing in War

Jeff McMahan’s much-discussed work Killing in War is an important part of the revisionist school of just war studies. This paper avoids discussion of McMahan’s use of human rights and examines the practical consequences of his argument about duress on soldiers to fight an unjust war. These arguments are found to be wanting and to be impractical ones that do not fit battlefield realities. The importance of the Law of Armed Conflict and the legal equality of combatants that is part of it is emphasised and accepted as the most practical way of regulating battlefield behaviour and saving lives. It is concluded that attempts to tell soldiers what to do when they may be fighting an unjust war add to their burdens and are misplaced.     

【邀请论文】美军未来司令部探析——成立背景、主要职能与未来前景

新一轮科技革命的快速发展正推动战争形态从信息化向智能化演进。美军作为二战后始终位列世界第一的军事力量,正在积极设计未来战争以应对当前的“大国竞争”,2018年刚刚成立的陆军未来司令部正是在这一背景下产生的。未来司令部隶属于美国陆军,主要负责美陆军新型武器装备的研发、未来作战概念创新以及新兴军事科技的测试和应用。成立两年以来,未来司令部已经拥有了一套完善、严密的组织架构,创造了包括C5ISR作战概念在内的一系列理论成果,在空基导弹、远程精确火力系统等新型作战装备上也取得了众多进展。本文基于大量前沿文献研究,廓清了未来司令部的组织架构,总结了其主要职能,并对这一新设司令部的发展前景进行了展望和预测,期望能够为推进军队现代化和未来化建设提供有益启示。     

“三无”战争发展

随着高科技的不断发展,当前战争呈现出有别于以往机械化战争的特点,表现为"三无",即无人、无形、无声。文章介绍了"三无"战争的基本内涵和主要特征,分析了"三无"战争的实战运用,并提出了对未来"三无"战争的几点思考。     

Competing for Control over the State: The Case of Yemen

Abstract

This article argues that the current conflict in Yemen is better understood as a competition over who controls the state, rather than as a conflict between the state and a non-state actor. It traces the development of the Houthis and shows how the movement managed to seize key government institutions. However, the Houthis lack internal legitimacy and have not been able to position themselves as a nationally relevant political elite. The fragmentation of the Yemeni state has resulted in a shift to more localized struggles over access to resources and power that involve both internal and external actors.     

From Westphalian Failure to Heterarchic Governance in MENA: The Case of Syria

Abstract

The problematic export of the Westphalian system to MENA is examined, taking Syria as exemplar. The export model is juxtaposed to actual non-lineal trajectories, semi-sovereignty and hybrid or failing states. This is manifested in post-uprising Syria in failing statehood, fragmented and overlapping governance, permeable and collapsing borders, the loss of sovereignty to trans-state movements, “competitive regime-building” between the Asad regime and jihadist warlords, and “competitive interventionism” by external powers filling the governance vacuum with their own proxies. The result is heterarchic zones of limited statehood in which state sovereignty is contested by both international (supra-state) penetration and sub-state fragmentation.