John Keegan | |
|---|---|
 Keegan in 1993 | |
| Born | John Desmond Patrick Keegan (1934-05-15)15 May 1934 Clapham, London, England |
| Died | 2 August 2012(2012-08-02) (aged 78) Kilmington, Wiltshire, England |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Balliol College, Oxford |
| Academic work | |
| Main interests | Military history,history of warfare,First World War |
| Notable works | The Face of Battle,Soldiers: A History of Men in Battle,The Mask of Command and other major works |
Sir John Desmond Patrick KeeganOBE FRSL (15 May 1934 – 2 August 2012) was an Englishmilitary historian, lecturer, author and journalist. He wrote many published works on the nature of combat between prehistory and the 21st century, covering land, air, maritime,intelligence warfare and thepsychology of battle.
Keegan was born inClapham to an IrishWorld War I veteran and was evacuated toSomerset whenWorld War II broke out.[1] At the age of 13, Keegan contracted orthopaedictuberculosis, which subsequently affected his gait. The long-term effects of this rendered him unfit for military service, and the timing of his birth made him too young for service in theSecond World War, facts he mentioned in his works as an ironic observation on his profession and interests.[2] The illness also interrupted his education in his teenage years, although it included a period atKing's College, Taunton and two years atWimbledon College, which led to entry toBalliol College, Oxford in 1953, where he readhistory with an emphasis on war theory. After graduation he worked at theAmerican Embassy in London for three years.[3]
In 1960 Keegan took up a lectureship in military history at theRoyal Military Academy Sandhurst, which trains officers for theBritish Army. He remained there for 26 years, becoming a senior lecturer in military history during his tenure, during which he also held a visiting professorship atPrinceton University and was Delmas Distinguished Professor of History atVassar College.[4]
Leaving the academy in 1986,[2] Keegan joinedThe Daily Telegraph as a defence correspondent and stayed with the paper as defence editor until his death. He also wrote for the conservative American publicationNational Review Online. In 1998, he wrote and presented theBBC'sReith Lectures, entitling them "War in Our World".
Keegan died on 2 August 2012 of natural causes at his home inKilmington, Wiltshire. He was survived by his wife, their two daughters and two sons.[5]
InA History of Warfare, Keegan outlined the development and limitations of warfare from prehistory to the modern era. It looked at various topics, including the use of horses, logistics, and "fire". A key concept put forward was that war is inherently cultural.[6] In the introduction, he vigorously denounced the notion that war is a reasonable tool of statecraft, "simply a continuation of [interstate] politics by other means", rejecting "Clausewitzian" ideas. However, Keegan's discussion of Clausewitz was criticised as uninformed and inaccurate by writers likePeter Paret,Christopher Bassford, and Richard M. Swain.[7]
Other books written by Keegan are:The Iraq War,Intelligence in War,The First World War,The Second World War,The Battle for History,The Face of Battle,War and Our World,The Mask of Command, andFields of Battle.
He also contributed to work onhistoriography in modern conflict. WithRichard Holmes he wrote the BBC documentarySoldiers: A History of Men in Battle. Frank C. Mahncke wrote that Keegan is seen as "among the most prominent and widely read military historians of the late twentieth century".[8] In a book-cover blurb extracted from a more complex article,Sir Michael Howard wrote, "at once the most readable and the most original of living historians".[9]
Keegan was also criticised by peers, includingSir Michael Howard[13] andChristopher Bassford[14] for his critical position onCarl von Clausewitz, a Prussian officer and author ofVom Kriege (On War), one of the basic texts onwarfare andmilitary strategy. Describing Keegan as "profoundly mistaken", Bassford stated, "Nothing anywhere in Keegan's work – despite his many diatribes about Clausewitz and 'the Clausewitzians' – reflects any reading whatsoever of Clausewitz's own writings." The political scientistRichard Betts criticised Keegan's understanding of the political dimensions of war, calling Keegan "a naïf about politics."[15]
In his 1997 bookRevolutionary Armies in the Modern Era: A Revisionist Approach (described as "too flawed to be recommended as an undergraduate text"[16]), historianS.P. MacKenzie reports Keegan as saying that the best panzer units of theWaffen SS altered the course of the war and were "faithful unto death and fiercer in combat than any soldiers who fought them on western battlefields".[17]
Detlef Siebert, a television documentarian, disagreed with Keegan's view that the deliberate targeting of civilian populations by aerial bombing 'descended to the enemy's level', although he did call it a 'moral blemish'.[18]
On 29 June 1991, as awar correspondent forThe Daily Telegraph, Keegan was appointedOfficer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) "in recognition of service within theoperations in the Gulf".[19] In the2000 New Year Honours, he wasknighted "for services to Military History".[20]
He was elected aFellow of theRoyal Society of Literature (FRSL) in 1986.[21] In 1993 he won theDuff Cooper Prize.[22]
In 1996, he was awarded theSamuel Eliot Morison Prize for lifetime achievement by theSociety for Military History.[23]
TheUniversity of Bath awarded him anHonoraryDoctor of Letters (DLitt) in 2002.[24]
I didn't want to change my beliefs, but there was too much evidence accumulating to stick to the article of faith. It now does look as if air power has prevailed in the Balkans, and that the time has come to redefine how victory in war may be won.
