Ch. 1. The origins of war and of the state to 2500 BCE. Is war innate? -- War among animals: chimpanzees -- The evidence for early human warfare -- Biology and selection -- Sedentism, agriculture, and war -- A lord among lords and the rise of the state -- Warring complex societies outside the state -- Ch. 2. Carts, chariots, catastrophe, and cavalry 3500-700 BCE. Kings and carts -- Inventing the chariot: tribes, horses, and bronze on the steppe, 6000-1600 BCE -- Chariots and the urban politics of the Near East and Egypt, 1500-1200 BCE -- Chariots under Heaven: China, 1200-400 BCE -- Gods and heroes: the chariot in India and Europe -- Catastrophe, cavalry, and the decline of the chariot in the Near East -- Ch. 3. Men in lines with spears 900-300 BCE. Masses of men in the background -- Assyria reborn -- Communal solidarity and the Greek Hoplite Phalanx -- The Macedonian Sarissa Phalanx -- Ch. 4. Discipline and frontiers in the agricultural empires Rome and China 300 BCE-400 CE. Rome: disciplina and limes -- Infantrymen and walls in Han China -- Ch. 5. The horsemen of Europe and the Steppe 400-1450 CE. European heavy horsemen -- The Steppe warrior system -- The Mongols -- Ch. 6. War under oars 700 BCE-1600 CE. The earliest shipping -- The trireme and the Mediterranean -- Variations on a theme: hellenistic invention and gigantism, Rome, Greek fire, and the gunpowder galley -- Ch. 7. Gunpowder in Europe and in the Ottoman Empire 1300-1650 CE. Europe and the Ottoman Empire 1300-1683 -- The technology of gunpowder and gunpowder weapons -- Siege cannon to 1650 -- The artillery fortress, 1450 to 1650 -- Infantry and firearms, 1450-1650 -- Conclusion: a military revolution! -- Ch. 8. Adapting to gunpowder (or not) on the open seas, Africa, North America, and Asia. Maritime power -- The gun-slave cycle in Africa? -- Amerindians and gunpowder -- Gunpowder and the Steppe: China from Ming to Manchu -- Conclusion: the military revolution problem -- Ch. 9. Institutionalization, bureaucratization, and professionalization China, Japan, and Europe, 1650-1815. Qing (Manchu) China -- Private enterprise war in Europe to 1650 -- Institutionalization, bureaucratization, and professionalization in Europe, 1650-1789 -- Japan's variant path, 1500-1868 -- The Levée en Masse and mass conscript armies -- Ch. 10. The age of steam and the industrial empires 1815-1905. Invention and production -- Coal and steam navies -- Scrambling for empire -- The rise of Japan -- Ch. 11. Men against fire 1861-1917. The American Civil War: a false dawn of "modern war"? -- Prussian reforms, a general staff, and German unification -- Firepower -- Firepower and scramble for empire: Dahomey and Ethiopia -- World War I -- Ch. 12. Wars of maneuver 1918-2003. Doctrine -- Avoiding deadlock:methodical battle, blitzkrieg, and deep battle -- The German model? -- The Arab-Israeli wars -- AirLand and battle -- Ch. 13. The lure of strategic air power, the nuclear paradox, and the revolution in military affairs? 1915-2003. Strategic bombing, 1915 to July 1945 -- Nuclear weapons as air power -- The nuclear shadow and limited war in Korea and Vietnam -- The return of strategic air power and the revolution in military affairs? -- Ch. 14. Bringing down the state guerrillas, insurgents, terrorism, and counterinsurgency, 1930-2014. The revolutionary response to the industrial state: Mao, Giap, and Guevara -- Terrorism and insurgency by terrorism -- Counterinsurgency and counter terror.