The Oxford Handbook of Warfare in Asia

Within the global history framework, books written on warfare frequently focus on West Europe and the United States of America. Asian militaries are too often understood or measured in terms of the 'West', with scholars contending that bureaucratic polities, standing armies, and decisive sieges were mostly absent in Asian history. Warfare in Asia is generally portrayed as a 'flower war,' involving skirmishing, pillaging, and plundering backed by "magic", cultural conservatism, and political intrigues. However, the history of warfare in Asia is far more complex than that. States with sophisticated bureaucratic fabric and standing armies first evolved in Mesopotamia. Disciplined heavy infantry, which constituted the core of so-called Western warfare, emerged in the Middle East. Decisive battles were waged by armies in China, South Asia and West Asia long before the emergence of Classical Greece. Hence, a study of the Asian militaries in their own right is necessary, and The Oxford Handbook on Warfare in Asia endeavours to do this. Warfare in Asia highlights the important features of warfare as it developed in Asia during the last 2500 years. "Warfare" in this volume is defined broadly and includes both conventional and unconventional campaigns: at one level it involves the way various societies conceptualised it; at another, it means how organised violence has been influenced by geography, politics, culture, and economics and its societal impact. This handbook is geared towards understanding the instrumental nature of war, the variety of warfare that has existed in history, and the evolving character of warfare in Asia.