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Kansas State University Department of History and the Fort Riley Museums announce a conference on War and Technology to be held October 18-19, 2024. It will take place in the beautiful Flint Hills at the Fort Riley Museum Complex and the Kansas State University campus. In addition to the usual conference agenda, there will also be recreational activities.
 
Topics include but are not limited to War and Technology and The Year of Victory. Technological innovations have greatly influenced both warfare and civilian life throughout history. From M&Ms and duct tape to helicopters and GPS, this innovation corridor has changed both worlds. The strategic environment now facing the world spurs a new round of innovation and inquiry into past adaptations. The term “Year of Victory” refers to the focus of celebration for the First Infantry Division during this calendar year. There is not a specific year denoted. Division leadership chose this theme to commemorate the accomplishments of the Big Red One during its 117 years of service to the United States. As such, proposals do not need to directly relate to the First Infantry Division or its history.
 
Papers dealing with all wars in all historical periods around the world are welcome as is subject matter on all branches of the military. A special interest, however, is placed on twentieth and twenty-first century wars.
 
Please submit abstracts or panel proposals by July 15, 2024 via email to Damon Penner at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Full paper submissions will be due by October 4, 2024. For any questions contact Damon Penner at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
 
No registration fee required. List of available lodging will be provided, along with other information, to those selected.

Greg Nedved from the Center for Cryptologic History at Ft. Meade, MD, would like to call researchers' attention to ISCOT. This was a British project during World War II to monitor the activity of Soviet agents by intercepting via radio their encrypted messages. It was quite successful, resulting in several volumes of decrypts. ISCOT includes a fair amount of information about the CCP-KMT relationship, e.g., discussion of Li Lisan. It also includes letters to Mao from his two boys, Anying and Anqing, then in the Soviet Union. The complete ISCOT set can be found at the National Cryptologic Museum's library, where it is available to researchers. If you have questions, you are welcome to contact Greg directly (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.). He can tell you which item numbers pertain specifically to CCP-KMT relations, but please don't ask him to do any other research for you.

journal cover smallIssue 12.2 of the Journal of Chinese Military History was published in November 2023. It includes four book reviews and the following articles:

Yiming Ha, "Was There a Military Collapse in Late Yuan? A Reconsideration of the Yuan Garrisons and Military Response to the Red Turban Rebellion in the 1350s," pp. 107-141.

J. Travis Shutz, "Old Hundred Names and Barbarians Fight the Pirates: Recruiting Auxiliaries for Late Ming Naval Operations," pp. 142-187.

Amanda Zhang, "Reconsidering Wartime Female Tewu (Special Agent) Activities and Narratives of 'Honey Traps' in the Early People's Republic of China, 1949-1959," pp. 188-216.

journal cover smallIssue 12.1 of the Journal of Chinese Military History was published in May 2023. A special issue on riverine warfare edited by Ken Swope and Jim Bonk, it includes four book reviews and the following articles:
 
James Bonk, "Introduction: Riverine Warfare," pp. 1-5.
 
Wicky W.K. Tse, "The Tactical Role of Rivers in Early Chinese Warfare," pp. 7-23.
 
Xiaobing Li, "River Defense and Fleet Building: The Song Navy in the Wars against the Jin and Mongol Forces," pp. 24-39.
 
Yan Hon Michael Chung, "River Transport and the Effectiveness of the Qing Artillery Corps during the Ming-Qing Transition," pp. 40-62.
 
Kenneth M. Swope, "Boats, Barbarians, and Bandits: Riverine Warfare and the Taiping Rebellion," pp. 63-91

Member Notes

  • Harold Tanner’s published in the inaugural edition of the journal War Studies in April 2024

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    Harold Tanner’s article “American Understandings of Chinese Strategy: A First-Draft Genealogy of the Search for a Chinese Way of War” will be published in the inaugural edition of the journal War Studies in April 2024.

  • Kenneth Swope delivered new lecture

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    Kenneth Swope delivered a lecture entitled "Trickle-down Confucianism: War, Reconstruction, and Cultural Assimilation in the Late Qing,” at the Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (November 2023). He was also discussant for a panel entitled “The Cutting Edge: Weapons Technology in Postwar East Asia,” as part of the workshop “Mastery of Materialities: Resources and Technology in Post-Imjin East Asia (1598-1650),” held at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain (September 2023).

  • Kevin McCauley just published new monograph

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    Kevin McCauley reports that the Foreign Military Studies Office, US Army TRADOC just published his monograph The People's Liberation Army's Evolving Close Air Support Capability. The study examines PLA close air firepower support since its employment in the Yijiangshan amphibious operation, command and control, coordination, support to ground combat, Army Aviation support, employment of UAV/UCAVs, and future developments including intelligent technologies. A pdf can be found at https://community.apan.org/wg/tradoc-g2/fmso/m/fmso-monographs/452483

  • Xiaobing Li published two books

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    Xiaobing Li published two books: China’s New Navy: The Evolution of PLAN from the People’s Revolution to a 21st Century Cold War (Naval Institute Press, 2023) and Sino-American Relations: A New Cold War, co-edited with Qiang Fang (Amsterdam University Press, 2023).

     Li also published “China’s Support to the Vietnamese Communists,” in The Brown Water War at 50: A Retrospective on the Coastal and Riverine Conflict in Vietnam, eds. Thomas Culter and Edward Marolda (Naval Institute Press, 2023) and “Chinese Military History Research in the Past Forty Years,” War & Society 42 (Issue 2, 2023).

    Li was invited to lecture at Ji’nan University, Guangzhou, June 6-19; to present “Japan’s Occupation of China: Impact, Memory, and Geopolitics” at the annual National Museum of the Pacific War Symposium on September 15-16; to talk about his new book at the Naval Institute on September 20; and to lecture on the Korean War at Air War College on October 11, 2023.

  • The pictorial biography of Soong Mayling (1899-2003)

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    The pictorial biography of Soong Mayling (1899-2003), 佳美的腳蹤： 宋美齡與她的時代 A Legacy of Grace and Resilience: Soong Mayling and her Era, edited by Nancy Chen with English translation by Esther Hu (Taipei: Minguo lishi wenhua xue she, 2023) has just been released in Taiwan. It contains a treasure trove of rare archival materials and images.

  • Parks Coble did an interview for the New Books Network about his new book The Collapse of Nationalist China:

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    Parks Coble did an interview for the New Books Network about his new book The Collapse of Nationalist China: How Chiang Kai-shek Lost China’s Civil War (Cambridge University Press, 2023).The podcast is approximately 50 minutes in length, and the interviewer is WANG Dong, a scholar of Republican China. Here is the link: https://newbooksnetwork.com/the-collapse-of-nationalist-china

  • Geoff Babb published two articles in the Military Review in 2023

    Fri, 15 December 2023

    Geoff Babb published two articles in the Military Review in 2023: "China's Military History and Way of War: A Backgrounder" (March), and "2035: Sino-American Détente, From Near-Peer Foe to Near Ally Again" (November).