Book Launch: Knife Fights: A Memoir of Modern War in Theory and Practice

The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) hosted the book launch for Knife Fights: A Memoir of Modern War in Theory and Practice by Dr. John Nagl, second President of CNAS and current member of the CNAS Board of Advisors on Thursday, October 16, from 5:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Event Speakers:

Dr. John Nagl
Author, Knife Fights: A Memoir of Modern War in Theory and Practice
Member, Board of Advisors and Former President, Center for a New American Security
Ninth Headmaster, The Haverford School
 
Steve Inskeep
Host, Morning Edition
National Public Radio
 
About the Book: 
Knife Fights is a memoir about modern war – in theory, in practice and in the often-tortured relationship between the two. When Dr. Nagl was an army tank commander in the first Gulf War of 1991, fresh out of West Point and Oxford, he could already see that America’s military superiority meant that the age of conventional combat was nearing an end. Dr. Nagl was an early convert to the view that America’s greatest future threats would come from asymmetric warfare – guerrillas, terrorists and insurgents. After some hard fighting, Dr. Nagl was sent to the Pentagon to work for Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, where he was tapped by General David Petraeus to coauthor the new Army and Marine Corps counterinsurgency field manual, rewriting core army doctrine in the middle of two wars and helping the new ideas win acceptance in one of the planet’s most conservative bureaucracies. That doctrine changed the course of two wars and the thinking of an army, and has immediate relevance to the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Knife Fights: A Memoir of Modern War in Theory and Practice will be on sale before and after the event. Dr. Nagl will be available to sign copies after the discussion from 7:00 to 7:30 p.m.

Date & Time
Thursday, October 16, 2014
5:00-6:00 p.m.: Guest registration, book sales and light reception
6:00-6:30 p.m.: Moderated conversation with John Nagl
6:30-7:00 p.m.: Audience Q&A
7:00-7:30 p.m.: Book signing and cocktail reception
 
Location
The Willard InterContinental Hotel, Grand Ballroom
1401 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20004