The 2024 War on the Rocks Holiday Reading List
Books Worth Reading for the Holidays
Non-Fiction
MBS: The Rise to Power of Mohammed bin Salman by Ben Hubbard
The Iran Wars: Spy Games, Bank Battles, and the Secret Deals that Reshaped the Middle East by Jay Solomon
To Fix a National Character: The United States in the First Barbary War, 1800–1805 by Abigail Mullen
Too Far on a Whim: The Limits of High-Steam Propulsion in the US Navy by Tyler Pitrof
Orbital by Samantha Harvey
All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me by Patrick Bringley
Napoleon: A Life by Andrew Roberts
Biographical series on Lyndon Johnson (4 thus far) by Robert Caro
AI Snake Oil by Arvind Narayanan and Sayash Kapoor
On Settler Colonialism by Adam Kirsch
This Earthly Globe: A Venetian Geographer’s Quest to Map the World by Andrea Di Robilant
Planning for Protraction: A Historically Informed Approach to Great-Power War and Sino-US Competition by Iskander Rehman
The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone by Olivia Laing
Sparks: China’s Underground Historians and Their Battle for the Future by Ian Johnson
The Demon in the Freezer: A True Story by Richard Preston
The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the CIA, and the Origins of America’s Invasion of Iraq by Steve Coll
Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality by Frank Wilczek
Routledge Handbook of Proxy Wars edited by Assaf Moghadam, Vladimir Rauta, and Michel Wyss
Advanced Land Warfare: Tactics and Operations edited by Mikael Weissman and Niklas Nilsson
The Wizard of the Kremlin by Giuliano da Empoli
Freedom. Memoirs 1954 -2021 by Angela Merkel
Superpower Interrupted: The Chinese History of the World by Michael Shuman
The Dark Path: The Structure of War and the Rise of the West by Williamson Murray
Invisible China by Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right by Arlie Russell Hochschild
Beyond Ukraine: Debating the Future of War edited by Tim Sweijs and Jeffrey Michaels
Melting Point. High Command and War in the 21st Century by Kenneth. F. McKenzie, Jr.
Oceans Rise Empires Fall: Why Geopolitics Hastens Climate Catastrophe by Gerard Toal
On Wars by Michael Mann
Unit X: How the Pentagon and Silicon Valley Are Transforming the Future of War by Raj M. Shah and Christopher Kirchhoff
Oceans Rise Empires Fall: Why Geopolitics Hastens Climate Catastrophe by Gerard Toal
Economic War: Ukraine and the Global Conflict between Russia and the West by Maximillian Hess
On Obedience by Pauline Shanks Kaurin
Just and Unjust Wars by Michael Walzer
The Black Box: Demystifying the Study of Korean Unification and North Korea by Victor Cha
Training for Victory: U.S. Special Forces Advisory Operations from El Salvador to Afghanistan by Frank Sobchak
The Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson
The Glorious Cause: the American Revolution 1763-1789 by Robert Middlekauff
Land Between the Rivers: a 5,000 Year History of Iraq by Bartle Bull
The City and its Uncertain Walls by Haruki Murakami
Faustian Bargain: The Soviet-German Partnership and the Origins of the Second World War by Ian Ona Johnson
Anticipating Total War: The German and American Experiences, 1871-1914 edited by Manfred M. Bomeke
Putin’s Wars: From Chechnya to Ukraine by Mark Galeotti
Fluke: Chance, Chaos, and Why Everything We Do Matters by Brian Klaas
You Dreamed of Empires by Alvaro Enrigue
The Cutting Off Way: Indigenous Warfare in Eastern North America, 1500-1800 by Wayne E. Lee
The Embrace of Unreason: France, 1914-1940 by Frederick Brown
Polostan by Neal Stephenson
A Woman I Know: Female Spies, Double Identities, and a New Story of the Kennedy Assassination by Mary Haverstick
Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick
On All Fronts: The Education of a Journalist by Clarissa Ward
Exercise of Power: American Failures, Successes, and a New Path Forward in the Post-Cold War World by Robert M. Gates
Fair Play: The Moral Dilemmas of Spying by James M. Olson
Putin’s World: Russia Against the West and With the Rest by Angela Stent
Image: Adam Bernaert via Wikimedia Commons.