"Gordon R. Dickson - Childe Cycle 01 - Dorsai!" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

INTRODUCTION тАв fr David Drake

I don't insist that you believe DORSAI! is the best novel of military SF ever
written: one could make a pretty good case for Heinlein's STARSHIP TROOPERS. I
will, however, insist that those two-novels (first published within weeks of
one another in 1959) are in combination the standard against which the
subgenre of military SF must be judged.

Everybody who's attempted a complex task knows that mere are more ways to go
wrong than there are to do the job right DORSAI! and STARSHIP TROOPERS are a
useful illustration of the diversity nonetheless possible between first-class
works, even within a category as narrow as military SF. Heinlein's novel
focused on the individual soldier and the social forces that molded him.
DORSAI! is an investigation of the

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problems of high command and the qualities that produce the ideal commander.

The differences in approach aren't so much apples and oranges but rather the
drive and driven plates of a clutch: both command and execution are necessary
for a military system to work. In my opinion, Dickson and Heinlein have
explored these segments of the system not only as well as anybody in the field
has done, but as well as anybody is likely ever to do.

DORSAI! is an exposition of what Basil Liddell-Hart termed the Strategy of
Indirection. (I do not imply a necessarily direct connection.) Instead of
overwhelming one's opponent by brute force, the exponent of indirection
maneuvers so that his opponent has to attack or (better yet) is checkmated
without a battle.

Liddell-Hart developed his theories as a reaction to the blood-drenched
kilting grounds of World War (tee, a conflict that was as perfect an example
of the brute force approach and its limitations as one could find. The brute
force technique as refined to its quintessential form by Field Marshal Haig
involved silencing hostile machine guns by attacking with more infantry than
the machine gunners had bullets. (I wish I were exaggerating, but read the
accounts.)

Liddell-Hart went further back in history and examined the campaigns of
Hannibal, Sherman, and particularly the Byzantine general Belisarius to find
an alternative strategy. To defeat an entrenched enemy, maneuver around him
and force him to leave his fortifications in order to protect his rear areas.
Instead of attacking an enemy, destroy his supplies so

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Introduction тАв

mat he has to retreat. Move into a position that the enemy must take (ideally