Recommended: Engineers of Victory

Paul Kennedy's 2013 book Engineers of Victory: The Problem Solvers Who Turned the Tide in the Second World War is a fascinating book to read for those interesting in the history of World War II. But in fact it is much more than that; it is an exploration of issues of military organization and strategic thinking that ought to concern us today as well. Kennedy has organized this book around five strategic problems to be solved, such as how to get convoys safely across the Atlantic, or how to defeat the "tyranny of distance". He certainly talks about the innovators who helped solve these problems, but he does so in the larger context of the entire chessboard of the war, and in doing so he educates us on basic principles of grand strategy that are as applicable today as they were in World War II. For example, both Germany and Japan overreached themselves, trying to do too much in too many places rather than focusing on the few key objectives that really mattered, a mistake America may well be repeating today.

Kennedy, a British historian, co-teaches a class in "grand strategy" at Yale, where he is Director of International Security Studies. His previous book, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers is also worth reading.