Includes bibliographical references (p. 270-273) and index.
Section 1. "Carthage must be destroyed!": wars of empire -- The Greco-Persian Wars, 500-449 BCE: "Remember the Athenians" -- The Punic Wars, 264-146 BCE: the end of Carthage -- The Hundred Years' War, 1337-1453: a perfect storm of warfare -- The Ottoman wars, 1354-1529: "The great drum of conquest" -- section 2. As God is my witness: religious wars -- The Jewish-Roman wars, 66-135 CE: "Not so much as one soul" -- The troubles, 1966-1998: by ballot and bullet -- The Arab-Israeli wars, 1948-ongoing: when war is a fact of life -- section 3. "As a fish swims in the sea": guerilla wars -- The Seminole Wars, 1817-1858: "A tribe which has long violated our rights" -- The Anglo-Afghan wars, 1839-1919: "The great game" -- The Vietnamese wars, 1945-1975: "The light at the end of the tunnel" -- section 4. "On the borders": nationalist struggles -- The Russo-Polish wars, 1558-1667: the battle for the Baltic and supremacy in Eastern Europe -- The Balkan wars, 1912-2001: the field of the blackbirds -- section 5. "Cry havoc": wars of chaos -- Guatemala civil wars, 1944-1996: the bitter fruit of oppression -- The Sudanese Civil War, 1955-2005: evil horsemen, snake venom, proxy war, and genocide.