On July 16, Scowcroft Vice President and Director Matthew Kroenig was featured in Foreign Policy’s 2023 Summer Reading List, recommending Niccolò Machiavelli’s Art of War. Despite it being published in the 16th century, Kroenig argues that it has contemporary relevance in its discussion of emerging technologies that will revolutionize security, militaries, and war. After all, the famed political thinker faced the same issues surrounding firearms and artillery that modern militaries face with artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and hypersonic missiles.
If one of the world’s greatest minds could not fully appreciate the transformative effects of gunpowder on the battlefield, then it is likely that we, too, lack sufficient imagination to fully conceptualize the disruptive wars to which we will bear witness in our futures.
