Return of the Barbarians
Confronting Non-State Actors from Ancient Rome to the Present

Reveals the threat of violent non-state actors throughout history and the lessons that are applicable to current security challenges.

Jakub J. Grygiel (Author)

9781316611241, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 7 June 2018

230 pages
22.8 x 15.2 x 1.4 cm, 0.34 kg

'Policymakers and scholars of international relations will undoubtedly find Return of the Barbarians by Jakub Grygiel, to be a rich resource of information on the premodern global order. Throughout the text, Grygiel cogently and forcefully argues for researchers and practitioners to return to premodern history to understand contemporary threats and strategic challenges that the United States currently and increasingly faces.' Megan A. Stewart, H-Diplo

Barbarians are back. These small, highly mobile, and stateless groups are no longer confined to the pages of history; they are a contemporary reality in groups such as the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, and ISIL. Return of the Barbarians re-examines the threat of violent non-state actors throughout history, revealing key lessons that are applicable today. From the Roman Empire and its barbarian challenge on the Danube and Rhine, Russia and the steppes to the nineteenth-century Comanches, Jakub J. Grygiel shows how these groups have presented peculiar, long-term problems that could rarely be solved with a finite war or clearly demarcated diplomacy. To succeed and survive, states were often forced to alter their own internal structure, giving greater power and responsibility to the communities most directly affected by the barbarian menace. Understanding the barbarian challenge, and strategies employed to confront it, offers new insights into the contemporary security threats facing the Western world.

Introduction
1. The nature of the pre-modern strategic environment
2. Barbarians and the character of the competition
3. The return of pre-modern history?
4. Altering the state: decentralization
5. Three saints and the barbarian threat
6. Settlements, local forces, fortifications, and altering the environment
7. Conclusion: sidewalks and two fronts.

Subject Areas: Military history [HBW]