The Military Legacy of Alexander the Great: Lessons for the Information Age offers readers a unique perspective on the relevance of Alexander’s aspirations, battles, campaigns, and leadership for the 21st century. The authors make use of their diverse backgrounds to great effect. Ian Worthington, currently at Macquarie University in Sydney, represents the sage academic who, over many decades, has written on ancient Greece and Macedonia. Michael Ferguson, the younger Active-duty Army officer and doctoral student in history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, leverages his combat tours and operational and strategic experiences to relate the lessons of Alexander to the contemporary operational environment. Worthington and Ferguson draw numerous parallels between Alexander’s political and military challenges and the current issues that national security professionals and joint warfighters face. They organize their work into 13 chapters within 5 major themes: the Environment; Military Organization and Structure; Choosing Battles and Winning Wars; Eastern Exposure; and the Human Domain. Most chapters link their historical content with modern issues to provide useful insights into the overreliance on technology, the fog of war, a volunteer army, mission command, toxic leadership, and strategic overreach.
The first few chapters set the stage by addressing the rise of Philip II of Macedon—Alexander’s father—and the army Alexander inherited from him. The theme of “Choosing Battles and Winning Wars” covers four chapters that explore Alexander’s campaigns against the Achaemenid Empire. The following four chapters offer lessons on the consequences of mission creep, as the campaigns into Central Asia and India exceeded the scope of Alexander’s father’s and the League of Corinth’s original pan-Hellenic project. Throughout these sections, Worthington and Ferguson provide perspective on the tactical, operational, and strategic levels of war. Particularly interesting are Alexander’s actions after the Battle of Issus. Instead of pursuing the Persian king Darius III, he seized Tyre, marched through the Levant, and occupied Egypt, which had recently revolted against the Persians and surrendered to the Greeks. These actions secured his rear area, denied Persian fleets safe harbor, and protected Alexander’s lines of communications. They also had economic and political benefits; they permitted access to resources, enabled control of the Mediterranean trade routes, and appeased his domestic opponents.
The authors emphasize that warfare is a human endeavor waged by humans against humans to create a better, or more preferred, peace. Force becomes the tool to implement political will. In that context, Alexander performed two roles: the general wielding the military instrument of national power and the authoritarian leader setting the political goals. Consistent with the subtitle Lessons for the Information Age, the authors explore how Alexander, as commander and king, made decisions and conducted actions that fall within the realm of what we now consider to be the joint function of information (J7). These information effects had both positive and negative implications for Alexander’s tactical, operational, and strategic objectives and offer lessons for the modern joint planner.
In the tactical dimension, the false retreat at the Battle of Gaugamela and the diversionary tactics at the siege of Tyre represent information operations that fed the cognitive biases of enemy commanders whose reactions Alexander exploited. Operational and strategic benefits arose through his intentional crafting of narratives for various targeted audiences: his domestic audience, his army, allies, the local population, the enemy, and the enemy’s leadership. Alexander’s self-deification at the Oracle of Zeus-Ammon legitimized his rule, inspired his troops, created a powerful image of invincibility, and intimidated his enemies. After defeating Darius, he adopted Persian customs to endear himself to the defeated elite and occupied population.
In contrast, some tactical decisions had negative information effects at the operational level. Alexander executed Greek mercenaries who fought for the Achaemenid Empire and surrendered at the Battle of the Granicus. Later, in Western Anatolia, he massacred the Greek civilian inhabitants of the city of Branchidae after he discovered their forefathers had accompanied a Persian expedition to Greece and looted a temple of Apollo. Both actions raised questions within the army, among the Greek city-states, and among occupied populations about his leadership and ability to govern. His political decision to adopt Persian customs alienated his own elites and raised doubts back in the city-states as to the merits of fusing Greek and Asian cultures.
A summary timeline to keep dates, events, locations, and personae in perspective may have benefited readers new to the history and campaigns of Alexander. The book does contain a useful map, though, of the empire and tactical figures for the Battles of the Granicus (north of Biga, Turkey, close to the Sea of Marmara), Issus (modern-day Iskenderun, Turkey), and Gaugamela (northeast of Mosul, Iraq). Additional maps that depict campaign overviews, routes, and dates would benefit the novice. However, these are minor quibbles regarding what is an expansive and exhaustive work that provides 996 endnotes and 33 pages of bibliography to satisfy further historical curiosity and the exploration of the impact and legacy of Alexander.
The Military Legacy of Alexander the Great offers readers an excellent contemporary examination of one of history’s most famous military and political leaders. Joint warfighters will benefit from this exploration of how Alexander the Commander’s campaigns relate to today’s operational environment and the joint function of information. Students and practitioners of national security will profit by reading about how Alexander the Monarch addressed threats, secured his position and power, advanced his interests, and fell into hubris, which brought about the demise of his political objectives and the Macedonian Empire. Ferguson and Worthington adeptly bridge the gap between ancient history and modern warfare and demonstrate that national security professionals and joint warfighters can still learn from Alexander, one of history’s most recognizable figures. JFQ
Robert D. Spessert, JD, is an Associate Professor in the Joint and Combined Warfighting School at the Joint Forces Staff College.