Ep 101: Iskander Rehman on Wars of Protraction

Iskander Rehman, Ax:son Johnson Fellow at SAIS’s Kissinger Center and author of Planning for Protraction: A Historically Informed Approach to Great-power War and Sino-US Competition, joins the show to talk about how future wars might be more a test of national endurance than expected.

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Times 

    •    01:56 Introduction 

    •    04:01 Sharp and short wars

    •    09:07 After the first salvo

    •    12:33 Geography as a predictor

    •    15:21 Will nuclear deterrence work?

    •    21:16 “An informationized local war”

    •    25:13 What matters in protracted wars

    •    28:59 Innovation and adaptation

    •    33:51 The role of national leadership in protracted conflict

    •    38:49 Sino-U.S. competition 

    •    44:50 Absorbing massive casualties

    •    48:06 Polybius

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Find a transcript of today’s episode on our School of War Substack