Woudhuysen



War and Peace Posts

D-Day

The truth about D-Day, 80 years on

Published 2 June 2024

Troops were fighting for democracy at home as well as abroad

Read the full article...

Xi Putin meeting 2024

What the China-Russia axis really means for the West

Published 25 May 2024

The marriage of convenience between Moscow and Beijing is a product of American decline

Read the full article...

Philippine army

Could the Philippines be the spark for the next global conflict?

Published 23 April 2024

A row over a tiny Filipino island in the South China Sea has ramped up tensions between the US and China

Read the full article...

Xi Jinping, China

China is in crisis

Published 12 March 2024

Xi is strengthening his grip over his party, the military and society

Read the full article...

Taiwan election 2024

Taiwan’s future is more uncertain than ever

Published 16 January 2024

The fall in support for Taiwan’s anti-Beijing government will embolden Xi Jinping

Read the full article...

Suez canal choke point

Are the Houthis dragging us toward a global trade crisis?

Published 8 January 2024

The attacks on Red Sea ships are having a dangerously outsized impact on the global economy

Read the full article...

Moral dilemmas on Ukraine

GB News Moral Dilemma: Should the West cripple the Russian military?

Published 17 May 2022

James talks about the moral dilemma facing western societies over the escalating war in Ukraine

Read the full article...

Abandoned Russian gun Chernobyl

Russia is far from defeated

Published 10 May 2022

A complacent West underestimates just how low the Kremlin could go

Read the full article...

The Tin-Pot Foreign General and the Old Iron Woman

Why Britain went to war over the Falklands

Published 2 April 2022

There was always more at stake than a tiny group of islands 8,000 miles away

Read the full article...

War in Ukraine

How many generals is Putin prepared to lose?

Published 30 March 2022

The loss of so many high-ranking generals is a sign of Russia’s meat-grinder militarism

Read the full article...

Ukraine and Taiwan

China has Taiwan on its mind, not Ukraine

Published 16 March 2022

Xi has little interest in getting dragged into Russia’s war

Read the full article...

Russia and China

China is playing a cynical game in Ukraine

Published 3 March 2022

Beijing has one eye on Kyiv, the other on Taiwan

Read the full article...

History of Pearl Harbor

The forgotten history of Pearl Harbor

Published 7 December 2021

Japan’s attack on the US 70 years ago was not a surprise, but rather the culmination of imperial rivalry.

Read the full article...

Aukus - Australia, UK and US

Will Aukus lead to conflict with China?

Published 17 September 2021

Tensions were already building in the Indo-Pacific

Read the full article...

Chinese soldiers

Is China about to invade Taiwan?

Published 14 September 2021

Xi Jinping is hesitant – and he has good reason to be

Read the full article...

Japanese War Crimes Trial

Taiwan

Hands off Taiwan!

Published 1 April 2021

Neither Beijing nor Washington should be meddling in Taiwanese affairs

Read the full article...

British Army, MOD

Our armed forces need a total overhaul

Published 16 March 2021

The military is far too embroiled in destructive foreign interventions to defend the country

Read the full article...

The line-up by Lewis Woudhuysen

The Nuremberg Trials: fascism as a morality play

Published 20 November 2020

They reduced the historical and political horror of Nazism to an act of evil

Read the full article...

The battle of Britain by Richard Overy

Battle of Britain: empires at war

Published 9 July 2020

On the seventieth anniversary of the Battle of Britain, Richard Overy’s account shoots down many a myth

Read the full article...

Dunkirk soldier

Dunkirk and the appeasement of China

Published 26 May 2020

An old narrative makes itself felt

Read the full article...

Normandy beachhead

D-Day: beyond the myth of the Good War

Published 6 June 2019

Seventy-five years on, let’s reckon with what really happened

Read the full article...

European Union CSDP missions, 2018

EU militarism is nothing new

Published 27 November 2018

Macron’s plan for an EU army follows longstanding traditions 

Read the full article...

India's untold story

After the war: India’s untold story

Published 10 November 2018

The Indian Army’s contribution to the Allied war effort has been downplayed for far too long

Read the full article...

Fascism in the colours of France

Published 3 July 2017

This book review, written more than 35 years ago, gives some historical clues as to why Marine Le Pen did relatively well in the French presidential elections of 2017

Read the full article...

US Secretary of Defense, Ash Carter

New wars, new technology

Published 28 October 2015

James Woudhuysen joined a panel discussion entitled New wars, new technology at the Battle of Ideas in the Barbican, October 2015

Read the full article...

First World War: Mainstream Histories, Liberal Forecasts

Published 14 June 2014

James Woudhuysen spoke on ‘World War I: Origins, and Warnings for 21st Century‘ at the Leeds Salon, June 2014

Read the full article...

East China Sea - Senkaku Islands

Big trouble in the East China Sea

Published 3 September 2012

A row between Japan, China and Taiwan over a few small islands reveals the arbitrariness of international relations.

Read the full article...

Churchill's Secret War by Madhusree Mukerjee

When Churchill starved India

Published 10 November 2010

Today, as Britain seeks diplomatic links with India and as Churchill is championed as a hero of multiculturalism, Madhusree Mukerjee’s shocking account of the exploits of the Empire is well worth reading.

Read the full article...

Carl von Clausewitz

Clausewitz after 9/11

Published 16 October 2007

The Prussian master’s brilliant analytical method in On War provides richer insights into the contemporary wars against terrorism than anything his glib critics have come up with

Read the full article...

Remembering the Moscow Trials

Published 16 April 2007

Amid today’s craze for anniversaries, there’s one episode in history that nobody – especially on the left – wants to talk about.

Read the full article...

War and deception in the Netherlands

Published 13 February 2007

Black Book, Paul Verhoeven’s thriller about the Dutch Resistance to Nazi rule, is a cracking movie – and it raises important questions, too.

Read the full article...

Life, liberty and politics after 9/11

Published 9 September 2006

Bin Laden and the arithmetic of war, by James Woudhuysen

Read the full article...

All’s quiet on the Trafalgar front

Published 21 October 2005

Why the British elite won’t utter the v-word on the bicentennial of Nelson’s battle

Read the full article...

Dresden: Don’t apologise – understand

Published 8 February 2005

The debate surrounding the sixtieth anniversary of the firestorming of Dresden shows how sober analysis of history is being distorted by angst about the world today.

Read the full article...

Things to come … Pelican planes

Published 1 September 2003

The US Army wants to be able to deploy five divisions anywhere in the world within a month, but it can’t. Boeing is trying to make this possible.

Read the full article...

Spruce Goose, 1947

The Spruce Goose and US Decline

Published 14 June 1991

If America had shown more respect for the art of product design, maybe it wouldn’t be losing out so much to competing world powers

Read the full article...

USS Carl Vinson

Naval supremacy still rules the world

Published 12 June 1986

About a year ago I found myself 100 metres beneath the waves of the North Sea.

Read the full article...

Michael Foot, 1981

What did you do in the war, Michael?

Published 9 November 1981

MICHAEL FOOT famously told the 1981 Labour Party conference that he was an ‘incurable, inveterate peace-monger’. However Foot’s record in the Second World War gives the lie to this

Read the full article...