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The Dark Path

The Dark Path

The Structure of War and the Rise of the West

Williamson Murray, Yale University Press, 2024, 488 pages

Book Review published on: August 04, 2025

There are many explanations for how "the West" rose to prominence, but for Williamson "Wick" Murray, this phenomenon can be explained by the symbiotic relationship between military innovation and the rise of the state thanks to an incredible amount of competition on the European continent. Murray, who passed in August 2023, has been one of the world's preeminent historians of the changing character of war. In The Dark Path: The Structure of War and the Rise of the West, his final book and what amounts to his magnum opus, Murray shows how military changes led to the West's position of dominance in world affairs. To do so, he elaborates on his theory of five military revolutions first posited in his 2001 edited collection, The Dynamics of Military Revolution, 1300--2050.

For Murray, the European situation circa 1500 provided the ideal tinder for armed competition that allowed immense development in military superiority and the rise of the nation-state. He argues that "the explosive growth of European power was driven by fierce competition among aggressive, greedy states, which forced them to innovate and develop new approaches." This phenomenon fostered changes through frameworks in five great military-social revolutions and more minor revolutions in military affairs (RMAs). The former led to significant fundamental changes that altered the character of war and the economic, financial, and political frameworks of states in the West and the world. The latter RMAs constitute more minor, more immediate changes in how wars are fought, yet they build the foundation for more significant changes. Essentially, competition engendered innovation on a broad scale, while small-scale changes "forced a continuing evolution of the fundamental character of war."

Murray outlines five major military-social revolutions:

  1. Creating the modern state and the disciplined regular military forces to go with it. This change was accompanied by RMAs such as the gunpowder revolution, ocean-going navies, artillery fortresses, and tactical revolutions in the seventeenth century.
  2. The Industrial Revolution was accompanied by evolutions in the modes of production, the coal revolution, and the steam revolution.
  3. The French Revolution and the accompanying emphasis on mass conscript armies and nationalism, as well as the ideological mobilization of society and its resources.
  4. The Industrial and French Revolutions combined culminated in the First and Second World Wars. That one included RMAs in transportation, communications, aircraft, combined arms, non-line-of-sight artillery, and more.
  5. And finally, the scientific-computing revolution included nuclear weapons, computers, precision strike capabilities, and artificial intelligence.

But are these truly revolutions? Or, as he acknowledges, a cycle of "punctuated equilibrium." It is best to consider military innovation as the evolution of previous technologies and doctrine. The rediscovery of Greek and Roman texts was not simply limited to art, as it were, but also to warfare. The changes brought about during the early modern period portended future military revolutions that culminated in the Second World War, as an apotheosis of warfare, a culmination of Murray's first four revolutions. The jury is still out on the fifth, but as Murray ends his book in an ominous tone, the history of the past five centuries suggests that warfare is not likely to end, and even conventional weapons will prove more lethal than ever before. One need only look to Syria, Ukraine, or Gaza.

The book is incredibly readable, and its sections on each significant social-military revolution allow for quick adaptation to an undergraduate course on war. This book should be a standard for graduate study in military history for years to come, as it should become part of the rich corpus of essential works about innovation in military history. It is relevant and valuable for any student of military history, particularly for the military community, as it helps the reader understand how change and innovation, challenge and response, help shape the fate of nation-states. Further, it demonstrates the enduring interconnectedness of war and society, the ultimate political reality of warfare. Military professionals must read this book, which should be assigned at the Command and General Staff College and the Army War College.

Book Review written by: Robert F. Williams, PhD, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas

Notes

  1. Williamson Murray, The Dark Path: The Structure of War and the Rise of the West (Yale University Press, 2024), 3.
  2. Murray, The Dark Path, 18.
  3. Murray, The Dark Path, 379