Ask us anything
Plus what’s coming up and my book is coming out
First, welcome to new subscribers who’ve signed up over the past few months. There are now over 44,000 of you in 170 countries (a special hello to our first subscribers in Burundi, Kyrgyzstan and Timor-Leste). As ever a particular thanks to those of you who are paying - without you we would not be able to do this.
For those of you wondering who we are, you can find out more on our about page. But the quick version is that this is a father and son substack. Lawrence (Dad) is Emeritus Professor of War Studies at King’s College, London, and author of many books on strategy and military history. He focuses on conflicts around the world and broader international relations.
I am a senior fellow at the Institute for Government, and former government adviser and write about UK policy and politics. We tend to write alternate posts, though when a big story breaks in either field one of us may write more than the other for a bit.
Paying subscribers get at least five paywalled posts a month, usually including a guest post from people like former UK ambassador to Russia Roderic Lyne.
Over the coming weeks I will be suggesting a few quick wins for a new Labour government, looking at some of the most difficult policy issues they’ll inherit including university finances and special educational needs, and running predictions and analysis on the local elections. Dad will be continuing his coverage of conflicts around the globe, and writing several posts on how this thinking about strategy has evolved since he published his bestselling “Strategy: A History”. We also have some great guest posts coming up.
Ask us anything
Every quarter or so we ask subscribers to send us your burning questions. They can be to either or both of us and on any topic, whether we’ve covered it or not. Put them in the comments below or email us via the site if you don’t want it to be public. We’re happy to publish anonymous questions (as long as we know who the author is). We’ll do a post with answers next week.
My book is coming out!
Over the past 18 months I’ve been working on a book: “Failed State: Why Nothing Works and How We Fix It”. When I first came up with the title I was worried it sounded a bit hyperbolic. Less so now.
I’ll write more about it closer to the release date but the core argument is that the mess we’re in today is a long time in the making, and that decades-long structural changes to the way the British state and British politics work have made governing well exceptionally hard. It’s easy to bash Boris and Brexit and to have a laugh at Truss (and I do some of that) but they are merely symptoms of bigger problems. The next government will have to tackle some of these deep structural issues if they want to resolve our crises rather than just briefly alleviate them.
You can pre-order at whatever bookseller you prefer. The Amazon link is here: https://buff.ly/3Pw9d2v
And please do pre-order if you think you’re going to want to read it as that will get my publisher more excited about sales prospects. The book builds on a lot of themes and ideas I’ve explored in the substack, and the many thoughtful comments those posts have received, so you will all feature collectively in the acknowledgements!
Question for Sam:
Very much looking forward to the book despite knowing that it will depress and enrage me.
One of the things that makes me optimistic about a possible Starmer/Reeves government is that both seem like strong institutionalists, the former having run and reformed a large public service and the latter's time at the Bank of England. This makes me hope that they, more than any other recent PM/Chancellor pairing *get* structures and institutions and how important it is that they properly function.
Am I deluded in thinking they are like that? And even if so, do you think the cross-pressures of British politics and the headwinds they would face would just be too overwhelming?
I'd be interested on LF's take on what the shape of a hypothetical US-China war might be (sorry if I've asked this before ...), as a corrective to people who glibly talk about such a war without considering what that might actually involve for the two countries and the rest of the world.
The discussion I've seen tends to focus on how war might start: an assault by China on Taiwan and a US response. I've seen less which recognises the obvious point that these are superpowers with enormous resources, with an ocean between them, so neither can expect to easily defeat the other. A war between them might be very long, or there might be a series of wars with periods of uneasy truce, until domestic strain eventually forces one or both to stop fighting. I realise this is a very long piece of string but I'd be interested in your thoughts.