Virtual War

A brilliant analysis of the conflict in Kosovo and what it means for the future of warfare, by internationally renowned journalist and commentator Michael IgnatieffIn the vast tent city that sprang up in Macedonia to house Kosovar refugees, the most coveted commodity was not food or water but cell phones-a lifeline in the chaotic search for missing children, husbands, and parents. This was war at the of the twentieth century: from smart bombs to cell phones, technology ruled. For a decade, Michael Ignatieff has provided eyewitness accounts and penetrating analyses from the world's battle zones. In Virtual War, he describes the latest phase in modern combat: war fought by remote control. In "real" war, nations are mobilized, soldiers fight and die, victories are won. In virtual war, however, there is often no formal declaration of hostilities, the combatants are strike pilots and computer programmers, the nation enlists as a TV audience, and instead of defeat and victory there is only an uncertain game. Kosovo was such a virtual war, a war in which U.S. and NATO forces did the fighting but only Kosovars and Serbs did the dying. Ignatieff examines the conflict through the eyes of key players-politicians, diplomats, and generals-and through the experience of the victims, the refugees and civilians who suffered. As unrest continues in the Balkans, East Timor, and other places around the world, Ignatieff raises the troubling possibility that virtual wars, so much easier to fight, could become the way superpowers impose their will in the century ahead.