Preface
Economics
Economics
Principle I: Opportunity cost
Principle II: Expected marginal costs and benefits
Principle III: Substitution
Principle IV: Diminishing marginal returns
Principle V: asymmetric information and hidden characteristics
Principle VI: Hidden actions and incentive alignments
Conclusion: economics
and military history
The high Middle Ages, 1000-1300: The case of the medieval castle and the opportunity cost of warfare
Opportunity cost and warfare
The ubiquity of castles
The cost of castling
The advantages of castles
The cost of armies
Castle building and the other principles of economics
Conclusion
The Renaissance, 1300-1600: the case of the condottieri and the military labor market
The principal-agent problem
Demand, supply, and recruitment
Contracts and pay
Control and contract evolution
The development of permanent armies
Condottieri and the other principles of economics
Conclusion
The age of battle, 1618-1815: the case of costs, benefits, and the decision to offer battle
Expected marginal costs and benefits of battle
The 1600s: Gustavus Adolphus and Raimondo de Montecuccoli
The 1700s: Marlborough, de Saxe, and Frederick the Great
Napoleonic warfare
The age of battle and the other principles of economics
Conclusion
The age of revolution, 1789-1914: the case of the American Civil War and the economics of information asymmetry
Information and warfare
North, South, and the search for information
Major Eastern campaigns through Gettysburg
Grant in Virginia
The American Civil War and the other principles of economics
Conclusion
The age of the world wars, 1914-1945: the case of diminishing marginal returns to the strategic bombing of Germany in World War II
A strategic bombing production function
Bombing German war production
Bombing the supply chain and the civilian economy
Bombing German morale
Assessing the effect of strategic bombing
Strategic bombing and the other principles of economics
Conclusion
The age of the Cold War, 1945-1991: the case of capital-labor substitution and France's Force de Frappe
History of the Force de Frappe
The force post-De Gaulle
Justifying the force
The force's effect on France's conventional arms
Substituting nuclear for conventional forces
The Force de Frappe and the other principles of economics
Conclusion
Economics and military history in the twenty-first century
Economics of terrorism
Economics of military manpower
Economics of private military companies
Economics, historiography, and military history
Conclusion
Notes
References
Index.