This is an excellent book on the history of Western dominance, exploring the connections between cultural values and military success. Instead of evaluating the West through its cultural and literary achievements, Hanson focuses on the much harsher reality of Western battlefields. Rather than the Great Books, it studies the Great Battles, providing graphic representations of nine representative conflicts between the West and the non-West.

Hanson writes superbly about combat and has a unique ability to capture the chaos and horror of war, crystallizing his arguments in accounts of several hours of intense fighting. Furthermore, he argues that the West has won not only because of technology and military strength but also due to its focus on individualism, democratic political structures, and scientific rationalism.

However, this is not a simple Eurocentric narrative of the steady millennia-long rise of Western power. On the contrary, it is an explanation of why the West is now militarily dominant, with its values spreading across the world — sometimes with disastrous consequences for local cultures that have, over time, adopted some of the worst aspects of what European traditions offered or imposed.

Pages: 512, Dimensions: 13.5x13.5cm