Born to Run: Julius Caesar, Fast and Fortunate
Caesar the General
In this module we consider Julius Caesar primarily as a commander in battle and secondarily as a leader in Roman politics -- a distinction that Romans drew much less firmly than do virtually all modern states. We approach Caesar's generalship through two influential and roughly antithetical European takes on the art of war (Clausewitz and Jomini) and corresponding styles of military history (Keegan and Kagan).
Along the way we analyze how modern mass media, social media, popular press, and scholarly war narratives construct and depict organized killing and the men (in these narratives, if not quite as much in reality, almost always males) who orchestrate it.