can see live coverage on c-span2. >> now on booktv historian margaret macmillan, author of the book "war: how conflict shaped us." this conversation was hosted by the new york historical society. >> good evening, everyone. i am louise mirrer, new york a. >> societies president and ceo and i am thrilled to welcome you to the knights virtual program, "war: how conflict shaped us." to knights presentation is presented as a part of our menard's and irene schwartz distinguished speaker series which is the heart of our public programs. just before i introduce our speakers i want to recognize and thank several new york historical trustees were joining us this evening. the chair of the board, visioneer chairman emeritus of new york historical roger her

dog, the chair of our executive committee richard reese, and trustees brian kane, suzanne, david. i would also like to thank members of our chairman skelton who were joining us this evening. we are so very grateful to each and every one of you for your encouragement and support especially at this challenging time. now then, we are very pleased indeed to welcome martha mcmillian, a professor of international history at the university of oxford. doctor mcmillian prettily was on the faculty before going on to serve as provost at trinity college at the university of toronto. she's the author of "war: how conflict shaped us" which was

published this past fall and her previous books include paris 1919, nixon and mao, and women. joining us this moderator the cd is philip bobbitt, professor at columbia law school. professor bobbitt is a leading constitutional theorist who has an extensive history of government service. he served in all three brancheso of government during six administrations both republican and democratic, including most recently as a director of the intelligence program, senior director for critical infrastructure, and senior director for strategic planning at the national security council. to knights presentation last an hour and including 15 minutes for questions and answers. your questions can be submitted via the q&a function on your

zoom screen. in the interest of simplicity we have disabled the chat function so please do remember to use the q&a. our speakers will get to have many questions as time allows. and now it is my great pleasure to turn our virtual stage over two tonight's speakers. thank you. >> you say war is the most organized of human activities. as a constitutional lawyer like me it is said that governments are the most organized that relationship between more and the emergence of state one of the great strengths of this wonderful and gripping book the need to make war is the driver for organization and we should expand on that.

>> a pleasure to be here have very happy memories of the historical society i think we may argue because war and government are so closely intertwined but what i mean is that when you think of what is needed to make war the mobilization but the resources the control of those people and the discipline of those people. to take tremendous organization and as you pointed out this has drove ahead the organization of state that it became necessary for state to acquire greater power than the more powerful

they became. it's difficult to say which came first the level of the high organization of states because they are intertwined. >> you also say government organization persisted in peacetime then need to monetize sources create those structures that these do not disappear with the end of war has there been a mission creep for the state and we shared rollback those powers that are gained in wartime quick. >> in society without considerable authority to the government to give up freedoms during war but the covid pandemic that people use the language of orbit there is something similar. with the freedom to come and go as we wish we understand

there is a greater good at state. and it's the same with large-scale wars for the government to do things they would not approve of in peacetime to make people not to move freely around to use censorship. often some of these are rollback but i'm not saying there is anything malignant but once government has achieved a level of control it's for peaceful purposes the amount of money they take in society that was inconceivable it became something they could do and then of course mission creep isn't bad word with those resources getting out of society in peacetime so often governments go back so with

that authority and the powers to persist after the war is over. >> you say war is one organized group fighting another using violence over the other organize group. this includes gaining warfare or perhaps crime syndicates. this suggests that there has to be a state to have war but with that legal relationship between two or more states to be intolerable of the idea to have a war and not have the state. in like michael howard maintained at one point.

>> i am very sympathetic with that point of view but if you try to get the essence we all have different definitions but i'm trying to distinguish between random violence or a canadian hockey game. this is an organized violence. what i'm trying to get at that organize groups who make war have some sort of thing that keeps them together or a goal and there is a blurred line between large-scale gains to make money as a crime that may have more political preferences. we saw the same in northern ireland with a hard man on both sides slipped over into criminal activities that had a larger goal in mind. so the notion that you try to

do something with whatever force you have not just to have more illicit goods. >> did you acknowledge there is some historical factors demography or geography or technology in those epidemics that are not altered or transformed in decision-making? but you write so powerfully about the historic and cultural consequences of war if they defeated the greeks supposed charles had been defeated if the ottomans had successfully said the spanish conquest had failed.

and these pivot that have change. with those deep moving currents on the surface but there are times you can see the outcome of four does make a difference. we do have to be careful that you just raise them. america would have been different if there were different outcomes to the war. north america could have been different if the british on the independence rather than losing it. including canada or mexico. so we have to recognize the outcome can determine for generations religion, political organization so to say it's on

the surface and doesn't change things very much i more in the side you can see with certain wars if they ended differently the war would be different. >> it is incredible intensity. what is more bring out the best is it simply a matter of risk? >> there is a debate if we are prone to violence. we could equally argue we are prone to altruism and we see both. you see this in the memoir of

which i have not done but they have not felt saying i never felt such comradeship is a felt in the war. i knew they would die for me and usually don't get that feeling. may be firefighters have that sense. it's one of the things we puzzle about. also those signs of human nature. but because it is a complicated but we are attracted to war. and down to the century asian men or women have said could i do it? they want to measure themselves up against it and in certain cultures that produce to the iliad or test men and why do people do it? we keep thinking about it but

that intensity of experience. and they get at that but suddenly to stand out in the sun is very bright you feel life as you are about to lose it. >> robert e. lee said war is terrible but then we fall in love with it. this is a rare book that addresses gender in the history of warfare. are they in the warriors of cultures? bigger or stronger or more endurance is this evolution? but then i have other questions who do you think is the source? >> the debate over evolution

is a long one. it's not mere physical strength. there is a spectrum those i can be as strong as men. and women who are weaker than most men. a lot of it has to do with culture. if you grew up in a world you are brought up to thank you must not show pain or fear and be prepared to follow orders and i have necessary. it's always been men pretty much at the receiving end of the admonition and the expectations where women expect to be the nurturers to stay home. but we knew - - we do know

women fight they behave differently and react differently but they do fight with as much courage as men. so that wonderful book about soviet women in the second world war but they didn't just stay behind the lines they were grillers and slippers and fighter pilots with manned artillery brigade so it is possible to argue women haven't fathers much because of the culture of society of which they have come. i suspect that is changing. and they are in combat roles not just doing things like logistics are necessary things behind the scenes. >> technology will facilitate this transition. it hasn't been recorded as motivators of war.

or objects of tactics serbian rape of bosnian women. i certainly had not realized there is more evidence can you say more about that quick. >> one of the fascinating things is that archaeologist in evolutionary biologist cannot tell much more about ancient skeletons and actually get at ancient dna which was impossible 20 years ago. tools have been found around one - - tombs were found around the black see that looks like they were killed in a violent struggle. with their armor with the leather or other natural

substances and they are women. and identified as women and have been given their burials. and in the water grieves is not of possible to identify the skeletons so it does look as if women had had a role in combat. and an expectation isn't to fight. >> keeping this away from my six-year-old daughter. she already has amazonian tendencies. [laughter] as we got better at killing we got less tolerant. there is little question that nuclear posture of the cold war but i would like you to discuss this is more a thing of the past for those northern tier countries quick. >> you don't think it is.

i don't want to predict because historians are hopeless at predicting the future but it seems to me most of us didn't experience it and i grabbed one of the last days of the second world war in peaceful country canada and i never saw a war in few canadians did unless they went overseas to fight working from countries. 's we got used to the idea were happens elsewhere but not to us. before the first world war europeans thought we would never do that again. that something that others do. 's you never know until you feel threatened or something happens. at a know how many people were isolationist in the united states before 1940 but a

majority. but americans who said they would never fight were also lighting up to volunteer after pearl harbor. >> if it's true and less tolerance but in those extortion by violence quick. >> yes that is a very good question that is a possibility. the enemies of countries like the united states and isis make statements that americans cannot take the pain of losing soldiers so they will give it up. 's have to make it painful for them and that is a lesson guerrilla groups can fight there much weaker than the united states. and we are very reluctant now

and doing a comparison the other day how many british show soldiers died in afghanistan it's around 1400. 20000 people died on the first day of the battle. i don't think we accept that anymore and it's a very good thing. >> on average world war ii 16000 people die every day. >> it would be unacceptable today for us. >> unimaginable. >> but those generations have grown up now those of my students and yours. the draft ended in the seventies. as a giant step toward the different sorts of order if

this is inevitable with the experience of services in a democracy. >> what we don't want to see is a military curse so certainly in canada there has not been a public outcry but not doing enough from those veterans coming back from afghanistan because so few of us knew any. those that have military experience most have not had direct military experience and if you haven't for the firsthand you cream or casual about going to war. those political leaders were very cautious about going to war you may think oh great.

it may be bad for society. >> the annual dinner in washington to give a talk and at the beginning of the dinner the band plays the various anthem of the service and they stand up and it's very rare to see someone stand up. those are composed the very badly treated common soldiers and also for those that elevated of the ottoman

empire. why should be wary of that class? >> it's a good question like to say i don't know that the danger of having a military curse they can see themselves at odds with the rest of society that the rest of society is soft that's the case in germany where the military had the elevated status but felt they were above politics and deserving of the germination it didn't feel any need with political leadership wanted and often from what it was they are planning and this can be dangerous democratic societies locale control of the military is and it is part of society

not to be seen as separate. >> i used to give the opening lecture to colonels and brigadier is and ask them is war the defeat of the enemy? and that is victory in and football that is the achievement of the war aim. do you agree with this? and if you do is the reason we fail to achieve victory in vietnam or afghanistan because our aims were unrealistic or the tactics and methods? >> it could be both you try to win the war with methods that don't suit a particular type of terrain or struggle. the nations go to war thinking

once a defeat the enemy forces, that's it they don't really think about what happens next are how to achieve a lasting peace. saint augustine said it should be peace i think he's right but the danger isn't focusing on military victory there is a book called the allure of battle winning the decisive battle that it doesn't actually settle things and having a plan for what you do when the enemy is ready to talk and too often groups go into wars without thinking what it is they hope to achieve and what they want also the more costly it becomes the more it expands. and to make up for those. >> it is to say in warfare it

is silent. do you agree with this size sense a certain skepticism about the laws of war. >> we keep trying and i think we ought to keep trying but it seems to me an extra everything we control something to become uncontrollable and it's about going all out to win but it is a credit to keep limit the effects of war to say you must not use certain kinds of weapons we attempt through the ages to try to protect the innocent and women and children and those who are not having any harm but that temptation is to respect the law out the window. >> you mentioned francis lieber during the civil war

for the code of world of war. but also seeing the first appearance of total war in the modern era so do you see a relationship between the effort as they attempted with the creation that they initiated? >> the 19th century with the attempt to make laws in a number of areas to regulate society. that may be driven in part that society was becoming too complex and that distraction was becoming too great.

to happen in other times and places that the distinction between those who are fighting or supporting those lines got more blurred general sherman said we must feel what it means to go on fighting so women and children making it impossible for them to survive. so on the one side this attempt that we see in other areas of society the age of great lawmaking with the industrial society but we also see the blurring of the line because it often last longer we are just blurring the lines. >> discussed for the audience which i think is interested in your answer away from the

teaching of diplomatic and military history. >> i am concerned about it. and the own country canada and the history department and the singular most popular undergraduate course is called strategy and statecraft but the department is a bit leery because history has been moving and as it should and taking in new subjects and histories and new groups that have not been written into history, for example. because war can have such profound effect on the lives of people in different societies, i think that we need to be aware of it. the study of or has come to be

people talking about tanks and regimens. michael howard who mentioned earlier, studying more and so society. studying the system of war and society. it does concern me. those that will lead us in the next generation need to know something about war. need to know something about international relations. they will have to deal with issues involving those. >> to return to our team of the relationship between war and relationship, the history had ended. it meant that the guy elected, d with the triumph that was a naturalistic state. we would agree with this.

you give a riveting description of the battle. you quote the need for our audience. from this place and this day forward, the history of the world, present at its birth. would you just described what he was writing about? >> it was actually one of those historical events that does not deserve the attention and symbolism. it was a clash of arms between the french revolutionary troops in 1972 and invading forces from who wanted to strangle the french revolution as soon as i possibly could. forces coming into germany, they were pressuring. turning back or did not come any further as a result of the

resistance. the offices of the more traditional forces were horrified. they just did not seem to know how to behave. they saying revolutionary songs. the order was terrible. they did not stop. it is a new spirit. it was a new narrative force among soldiers. not for all peoples, but a very powerful source in the world today. it is like in ideology. it is like a religion i wanted to build a utopia on earth. you will fight and die and kill others for the nation. i do not think that history came to an and. the way we fight changes, technology changes, we live today in a very different world than the world at the beginning of the 19th century.

>> in large part, you write a very interesting thing about the relationship between herbert spencer and imperialism and racism on the other. how did war play into this? >> how we think about ourselves and others sets the way in which we behave. in retrospect, a misapplication about evolution and adaptation to human societies. something called the french race or the british race which we know is nonsense anyway. impossible to distinguish an enemy meaningful way. the french were like bulldogs in the british were like poodles or the other way around. distinct species.

this whole idea of adaptation answer viable. it is a very dangerous concept that only those that adapted and were prepared to adapt would survive. this became a moral imperative. you should be swept away. and in some, not all, and some, there were some races so defined in this way. deserving to be swept aside by the more vigorous races. they did not have the moral right to survive. the imperialism of the 19th century. they went out around the world as they had not done so much in the eight century. they were a superior race and they had every right to do it. the country who came from the

less specific, the more important it was to have an empire. he acquired what became the belgium condo. it was a way of showing you counted. >> culture in the northern tier countries are moving towards more devolution or multicultural identities. certainly greater individual autonomy. who will be willing to fight for such a state when there is not national identity. driving by a tennis camp. if war broke out, if war broke out, would you go to england?

i said, well, i might very well send you and your mother there. but, no, i don't stay here. i told them about people that were sent to america as babies. he said why would you come back? i said, well, this is my country it seemed like a natural imply. his contemporary would have such a settlement if they don't, with a be willing to risk their lives >> i would make a distinction, which i think visiting patriotism and nationalism, it is often on reflecting and sometimes they tend to be themselves as sometimes bound by these mystical ties and sometimes others. i cannot remember all of the

words. my country is a decent place. i would like to defend it. yes, i will fight for it. i think the ingredients of that needed to depend on the shared ethnicity or shared cultural values. you have to see what happens in canada. we have moved way beyond being an offshoot of britain and france. we have moved into much more will try cultural society. it has become an ingredient and anwhat it is to become canadian. just as our public health system >> i will pressure you on this. people will be willing to fight for a country whose history they have been taught to despise.

let me go on to something else. >> we talk a long time about that. >> stephen p has advanced fees,i am skeptical about this myself. as i say, i live with small children. what are the implications for d war? might we turn to drones and artificial intelligence as a way of hiding violence? or will we actually become pacifist? >> i don't know. it is very hard to predict. h a distinction to be made. how society, the desire to, willing to tell tolerate things like public executions or

spectacles that they are facing. i was young and it was not unusual to see people fighting in the streets. in ways that you would not perhaps as much now. whether that means less likely to go to war. what the individual will commit is not warmaking. i think one of the things that the military does his spending an awful lot of time turning ordinary people into those that fight. that is why there is so much training in preparation. i think this could make a huge difference in the willingness of people to say this. >> one of the things about this book iss your discussion on how organized violence begins in the community when hunter gatherers were replaced by cultural roots. would you just expand on that for a moment.

>> it is highly speculative. it happened so far back that we probably will never get definitive evidence. there was a third degree of violence. this view that people lived in the garden of eden is not realistic at all. once people settle down, i think a number of things happened. they will or able to produce a surplus. not everyone had to work on the land. not everyone had to take part in gathering and preparing and killing theam food that they wod need. it became possible to support an upper class and military. once people settle down, it was more difficult to pick up and go away. t you could not as you could have done said there is trouble over the horizon, let's get out. you could not pick up and go

away as easily. you had to build walls. of course, the more organized and well subdued particular groups come up the more they were targets, the more they were capable of attacking others. i think, going back to your earlier point about the coexistence, what is the word i want, the codevelopment organization and fighting, i think it goes back a very long way. >> that is fascinating. i wonder about the future. with this question, perhaps we can go to orange which i know is anxious to ask their own questions. the prospect of deploying roadblocks and drones and

battlefield, do you think we would build robots that have conscience driven algorithms that will allow them to do the right thing despite the risk of their destruction or do you think we will build road blocks out will act decisively as human beings? >> i think it depends on how you program them. there is a considerable debate at the moment. autonomous weapon systems which can include the next generation of robots should have ethical standards tilting in. having any sort of areas built in. would it make them less effective? we know that as artificial intelligence develops that these may begin to program themselves.

we also know the problems with programming that can go wrong. we haveou seen enough of that. you program a robot and say don't do any harm to women and children so the robot will go off and kill everyone else. it is not a good example. i am worried about the way that war is going, particularly at the high tech interfered. >> and exercise of maximum self restraint. adhering to 45 minute deadline so we can go to the audience. i am suspicious of modern technology. i think i have mastered at least this part. here are some questions. how has compulsory military service in the u.s. and abroad affect did nationalism and

public opinion? >> well, one of the side effects is and can often make people more patriotic. when the german army first started training largehe numbers of men, the working class, poor classes and general society, they were very concerned. we are putting a gun in their hands and they will turn it towards us. quite left wing workers, members of trade unions who did the military service became s quite different, as a result. often military service was a nationbuilding activity depending again on the country. whatif also seems to happen, i think it is a good thing. if you do military services, you can't be and often are stronger with people that aren't the least bit like you. i thinknk that that is good for the country. people from different classes in different types of people to have to get on with each other.

there are numbers that say often they say i never talk to a working-class person before. they read poetry. they have ids. in fact, others who they did not take seriously at citizens did have their own wants and desires personalities. i think it can be a good thing. >> a questioner asked, from the vadark side, based on your observations, have you found there to be a link between compulsory service in the frequency? >> i think that it depends very much on the nation. i do not think that i would draw a direct link. a number had service after the second world war. no major one since 1945. the germans continue to have at least service. this was dead. i do not think it leads in

itself to war. it often simply leads to a greater appreciation to do the military service of the country. >> one person asked, there is a general consensus at least in the united states that veterans should be cared for and supported by their government. not has the experience of veterans changed throughout history. >> it usedd. to be and many arms that they were simply discarded. they had no pensions, no one worried about them. tommy atkins, they need us and at the end they don't get to sense for us. i think, gradually, as the idea began to spread, governments began to see they ought to do something. chelsea pension hospital was established to look after old

and often sick soldiers, ordinary soldiers. perhaps, shall i say in paris, established for the same thing. by the 19th century and a number of countries, there was a sense thatfo you must do something for those at at fault for you and suffered for you. >> what links do you see between war and class? for example, who fights, of course, whoat dies and more or other considerations from your research? >> it depends on the nature of the society. where those at the top actually, and some cases depend on the military strength toth maintain their power, they don't want anyone else fighting. in the middle ages, the knights and armor were very relaxed to use foot soldiers to have access on the ground.

they. for their own dominance. it gave them tremendous power and tremendous authority. as i said, i think that it depends on the society. you will get societies in which only a few people fight. in democratic societies, those who fight will often be ordinary people because they are fighting for, as i see it, their own society. by and large i don't think fighting for abstract contracts. what they were fighting for was their homes and their wives in their children. >> and image, described as the original lithia winnings confronting on horseback. seven, 8 feet high. he compares it to seeing a take. >> it would've been absolutely

terrifying. once they learned how to deal with a it, you can do rather we. >> how would you characterize meddling in u.s. elections? should we be calling this an act of war, cyber espionage or something else entirely? >> it is such a new area. such an interesting question. i can have this rather narrow definition. i think that war is moving into this new area of cyber war and cyberspace. it does not involve direct combat, but it can often involve the damage and destruction and loss of life as more direct conflict. i think the ways in which states are substate actors use cyber attacks for destruction, i think it could be seen, in many cases, as an act of war. we know that it is possible, at

least, for hostile forces to do things like turn off power grids and the damage from that work, you know, destroying dams or making it possible to have water verification plants. that can be enormous. i would regard it as an extremely important part of war. >> another question is, with the exception of genocide, conflicts throughout history, typically designated portions of the population, what are the origins of this? how did it evolve over time? >> i think, we don't know for sure, part of it may have been a game to be in bedded into the values of a particular society. women and children were viewed as the future of this society. meant for killing them, their own detail, killing others was a

very graphic thing to do. also certain functions should be protected. priest, for example. they have been exempt from being attacked or, in theory, exempt from being attacked. i think it was also a utilitarian motion. you did notou kill people that y be useful to you. you tended not to kill those that were farming because you knew they would produce the food that you needed even if they belong to someone else or on someone else's land. >> another question is, how has the advent of social media nddetermines how conflicts are solved in fought and how ifighters are recruited? in your opinion, does it get too much credit? or not enough? >> well, i think we are just coming to terms with the power of social media. i we know that people recruit themselves and they now have the

means to do it. it is not a new phenomenon. they basically recruited themselves by reading the works of anarchists and other successful assassins. it was much more difficult in those days. they were not as instantaneous and as widespread as they are today. i think we do face a real problem with people that will recruit themselves. also find conspiracy theories. i i do think that this is a problem. wars are fought under tremendous spotlight. a tremendous amount of publicity. it is s to make sure your story gets out in the other side story does not get out. causing trouble for the united states and vietnam. it reached people at home and

made it come to it not being a war that they could win. >> your leadership has expanded far beyond this wonderful new book. could there have been another outcome to the treaty? it has been written differently. this amazing book. >> i would maybe change my mind now. i looked at what they were actually dealing with. how much freedom did they actually have? they were dealing they thought with the germany on the battlefield. whatever the german high command says.

what could the allies have done, being much more generous to germany. if you are living and you know the country is devastated which contains the villages, mines, railways all destroyed leaving in the summer of 1918. will you say let's be generous. i will have to face the classes. facing the neck asked collection germany was treated much, much worse. it was divided.

it was devastated. we do not here today how very unfairly germany was treated. partly what went wrong to give a very short answer after 1919 is the failure of politics and a number of countries and the failure of the systems. it may have been all right if it would not have been for the great depression. >> almost to the end of the time >> what parts of the world should we be watching? >> i thinknk we may still be considered state to state. they fought once.

recently along the frontier and the himalayas. of course the united states and china. these are several possibilities that people are beginning to contemplate they may be wrong and i certainly hope they may be wrong. government for various reasons, states that were wobbly to begin with, a strong political infrastructure which were often destabilized. i think we will see more of those. we will see more and that worries me. >> to return to the point that we beganf with, the large body f opinion in america, they drive themselves towards war. when you get the state more power, you take the power away from the individual.

it may not always be true. do not count on a week state. they are the most vulnerable states. it is a sort of prejudice privilege. maybe the next-to-last question. do you think increasing budgets increase the likelihood of war? >> not necessarily. i think it depends on what you are facing. how these budgets take this on in the military just keep spending. they don't really sit down and say do we need all of this. there is always a danger. when you have an arm in the race

that society feels like it is falling behind may be attempted to do something silly. >> this has been a wonderful evening. so grateful to you for coming. it is wonderful to see you. i hopeer that we are all reunitd somewhere sometime soon. >> thank you. i apologize for my cough. bthank you all. >> we wish you were here. >> thank you for all of the questions. >> good evening to all of our friends in new york. thank you to all of you. thanks for coming. thanks for these wonderful questions. thanks to our tremendous author. >> tonight on book tv on c-span2. a look at some of this year's best-selling books. starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern,

chronicle inc. the secret service from the kennedy assassination to the insurrection at the capital on january 6. then an interview with alex marla, author of breaking the news which argues that the mainstream media reports fake news. later, michael lewis on his book the premonition which tells a story of the early days of the coronavirus pandemic and listen to us that worked to convince the u.s. government to take the virus seriously. >> watch tv now on sundays on c-span2. find it online anytime apple tv.org. it is television for serious readers. >> the u.s. senate is not in session today to allow senators to attend the funeral of a warmer senator in wyoming the senate is back in session at 11:00 a.m. eastern on saturday.

senators will continue work on the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill. it funds roads, bridges, public transit, railways, water projects, airports, broadband internet and electric vehicle charging stations. when the senate is back in station at 11:00 a.m. eastern on saturday, you can see coverage on c-span2. next, military historian and author patrick o'donnell on his book the indispensable spirit it chronicles the marvel regimen of the continental army during the american revolution which he says played a crucial role in both battle and as protectors of george washington. >> good evening. i am kevin butterfield. the executive director at washington mount vernon. i am coming to you from that library for exciting book talk with patrick o'donnell. i want to thank the