Anyone read any Victor Davis Hanson?

[King_of_Spain]

I am a big fan of Dan Carlin's Hardcore History podcast, and every now and then he cites Victor Davis Hanson (and occasionally refers to him as "controversial"). I understand his political views and am not hugely interested in them as a whole, but would love to know if anyone has read any of his more purely historical/military books, such as Carnage and Culture/Why the West Has Won (as it's called in Europe, I think?) and if so, whether they enjoyed it?

Alternatively, anyone read any of his other classical history books? Keen to hear thoughts.

 

[Abdul Goatherd]

Came across him a few times on Ancient Greece a while back. Can't remember the titles. But his scholarly work was quite insightful and sensible, even if the underlying ideology is a bit smelly.

When he strays off his specialty, it is a different story. His political views, of course, are a whole other thing.

 

[Arilou]

My understanding is that within his speciality (some specific aspects of greek military history) he is considered good, even great. But outside of it he has spent the last 20-30 years basically recycling the same shitty arguments that have been debunked a dozen times.

So like many other historians he is good within his speciality and worse than useless outside it. (and even then most of his good work was done a couple of decades ago, so some of it might have been revised since)

I did read Carnage & Culture and it was pretty much worthless, amateurish argumentation, cherry picked examples, etc. (but then again, I tend to be sceptical of these kinds of macro-theories in general)

EDIT: This r/askhistorians thread seems to pretty much echo most sentiments I've heard from historains: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistori...s_victor_davis_hansons_work_on_greek_warfare/

 

[Sarmatia1871]

My understanding is that within his speciality (some specific aspects of greek military history) he is considered good, even great. But outside of it he has spent the last 20-30 years basically recycling the same shitty arguments that have been debunked a dozen times.

So like many other historians he is good within his speciality and worse than useless outside it. (and even then most of his good work was done a couple of decades ago, so some of it might have been revised since)

I did read Carnage & Culture and it was pretty much worthless, amateurish argumentation, cherry picked examples, etc. (but then again, I tend to be sceptical of these kinds of macro-theories in general)

EDIT: This r/askhistorians thread seems to pretty much echo most sentiments I've heard from historains: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistori...s_victor_davis_hansons_work_on_greek_warfare/

Yeah, I remember ages ago when I did a university course on ancient Greek history, the lecturer just mentioned his arguments for one sentence, went "RAFF RAFF RAFF ALL NONSENSE," and then carried on for the remaining ten weeks without mentioning him again.

 

[MarcoRossolini]

I got papers back mentioning how I should've looked further afield than Hanson because of how controversial he is. His book on the Peloponnesian War is solid popular history, but I can't make a comment beyond that.

 

[Gurkhal]

I've read about half of "The Other Greeks" by said VDH. The book was very interesting and the reason as to why I haven't finished it yet was that I've got a short attention span and its a fairly big book. I'm looking forward to get hold of his "Warfare and Agriculture in Classical Greece" as well as "A War Like No Other". And in all honestly I think that a perspective from a person of his background can be valuable to get a fuller perspective about Ancient Greece than only from born and raised urbanites.

But you'll need, from my understanding of what he's written, to be a fairly dark blue shade of conservative to agree with his political views. Which I personally do not. But I know that I hold some controversial views on other topics so I feel that I'm fairly tolerant of controversial viewpoints that I don't agree with.

My understanding is that within his speciality (some specific aspects of greek military history) he is considered good, even great. But outside of it he has spent the last 20-30 years basically recycling the same shitty arguments that have been debunked a dozen times.

So like many other historians he is good within his speciality and worse than useless outside it. (and even then most of his good work was done a couple of decades ago, so some of it might have been revised since)

I did read Carnage & Culture and it was pretty much worthless, amateurish argumentation, cherry picked examples, etc. (but then again, I tend to be sceptical of these kinds of macro-theories in general)

EDIT: This r/askhistorians thread seems to pretty much echo most sentiments I've heard from historains: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistori...s_victor_davis_hansons_work_on_greek_warfare/

Thank you very much for the link. It was very interesting to see someone critical of Hanson put out the criticism. Although just like I kind of skipped over the political commentary in Hansons work and don't buy everything he writes, I give this historian the same treatment.

But very interesting to read nevertheless.

EDITED: Clarified a meaning.

 

[King_of_Spain]

Thanks all, this is proving useful. I always expected to disagree with his politics but interesting to hear it from people who have read him firsthand.

 

[MCMartel]

I am not a historian in this area, but I've read summaries of his work from people who are who've read his work, in summary:
He wrote one very good article about the battle of Leuktra, early in his career, which is possibly the definitive work on the subject
He's basically strayed far from his knowledge base since then and made up elaborate theoretical frameworks backed up by relatively little evidence since then that have become increasingly ridiculous.
Basically most of his general arguments about Hoplites, agriculture, Greek society, and similarly wide-ranging things have either since been overturned by more recent, better-evidenced scholarship or were never taken seriously in the first place.
Here are two excellent in-depth explanations with sources by a historian of Greek Warfare on the subject if you want to know more:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistori...s_victor_davis_hansons_work_on_greek_warfare/
and
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/61tpf6/victor_davis_hanson_and_the_question_of_the/

 

[Abdul Goatherd]

Basically most of his general arguments about Hoplites, agriculture, Greek society, and similarly wide-ranging things have either since been overturned by more recent, better-evidenced scholarship or were never taken seriously in the first place.

Well, this is not quite right either. I'd say his central arguments on hoplites, agriculture & Greek society (to an extent) have generally held up. Of course, it is a matter of degree and interpretation, but IMO his critics on these points have generally been wronger than he was, or right in only some very small or qualified way. That budding scholars feel compelled to try to "overturn" it repeatedly only testifies how hard it actually is to dislodge. It is a target because it still there.

 

[MCMartel]

It hasn't held up because it wasn't really based on much evidence besides his contention that it's possible to burn a grain field. The idea that greeks therefore resorted to short decisive battles is completely baseless and counter to the evidence.

 

[Abdul Goatherd]

It hasn't held up because it wasn't really based on much evidence besides his contention that it's possible to burn a grain field. The idea that greeks therefore resorted to short decisive battles is completely baseless and counter to the evidence.

Huh? It's not "baseless" or "counter to the evidence". Where'd you get that idea?

 

[MCMartel]

Huh? It's not "baseless" or "counter to the evidence". Where'd you get that idea?

What do you mean where did I get that idea? The sources contradict him at every turn. The historian I linked to summarizes it with sources much better than I can, as he's more eloquent than I am.

 

[Abdul Goatherd]

What do you mean where did I get that idea? The sources contradict him at every turn. The historian I linked to summarizes it with sources much better than I can, as he's more eloquent than I am.

The "historian" you linked to is producing a rather weak argument and no evidence. Every one of his points is more easily disputed than Hanson's, frankly. Not that he is necessarily wrong (although I could easily pick at them). But he is not right either.

 

[Abdul Goatherd]

McMartel if you're going to click "disagree" to my response to you, at least have the decency to explain what you disagree with.

 

[icedt729]

I read and enjoyed a lot of his work when I first started taking history seriously, but since then I've come to disregard just about everything I took from his work as, basically, prejudice. It's been several years since I read any of his work so I may be hazy, but I'm going over a synopsis of Carnage and Culture and for any of these battles that I have any expertise on whatsoever I disagree strongly with his conclusions on them. His assertions about the Second Punic War in particular seem especially baseless and wrong-headed.

 

[MCMartel]

McMartel if you're going to click "disagree" to my response to you, at least have the decency to explain what you disagree with.

I already explained it, and linked to a sourced explanation that explains those disagreements in depth, you simply dismissed them all out of hand, so I disagree because you haven't adressed any points I've made.

 

[Geriander]

Regarding Greek Warfare Hanson may have a point regarding the unusualy common decision to fight ”decisive battles”. Considering that the terrain of Greece is quite mountainous, both sides of the war have to go out of their way to find flat terrain suitable for phalanx tactics. This may, as Hanson argues, have been motivated by the interests of the landowners.

The further claim of the superiority of western warfare due to free citizen farmer soldiers seems to ignore that both peak Hellenic, peakRoman and late middle ages warfare through to the advent of mass mobilization, was dominated by professional or mercenary armies.

 

[Sabotage13]

Isn't he the guy who claims that white yeoman farmers make superior soldiers which is why the Spartans, the British Empire, and the US of A were inherently superior to any other military?

EDIT: Yes he is.

He really seems to appeal to people with only a very basic understanding of history, which is probably why Carlin thinks so highly of him.

 

[Henry IX]

The major problem with Hanson, as I see it, is that he takes a fairly weak evidence base (that ancient Greece was dominated by an agrarian 'middle class') and uses it to build a history spanning theory. In general I tend to be very cautious of any historian who tries to build a general theory to explain phenomena as geographically and temporally disparate as Classical Greek victories over Persia and American military dominance in the second half of the 20th century. Grand theories are incredibly appealing but local explanations are better.

Hanson compounds this by having a fairly explicitly political grand theory. His assumptions and findings are all distorted by his politics. That is not to say that his specific historical findings are wrong, or even that his whole theory is wrong simply because I disagree with his politics but rather that you need to be very cautious about what evidence he presents and how it presents it. Treat him with the same caution you should extend to overtly Marxist histories. Not everything can be best understood in terms of the superiority of the yeoman farmer or class struggle.

 

[Dinglehoff]

I noticed he will use an example to illustrate a point that doesn't make sense about an out of date problem. Like he thought the Japanese launching a new carrier named the Kaga was a big deal; IIRC indicating a resurgence of obstinate militarism.