For five centuries, the State has evolved according to epoch-making cycles of war and peace. But now our world has changed irrevocably. What faces us in this era of fear and uncertainty? How do we protect ourselves against war machines that can penetrate the defenses of any state? Visionary and prophetic, "The Shield of Achilles" looks back at history, at the "Long War" of 1914-1990, and at the future: the death of the nation-state and the birth of a new kind of conflict without precedent.

Foreword / by Sir Michael Howard -- Prologue -- Book I: State of war. Pt. I. The long war of the nation state. Thucydides and the epochal war ; The struggle begun: fascism, communism, parliamentarianism, 1914-1919 ; The struggle continued : 1919-1945 ; The struggle ended : 1945-1990 -- Pt. II. A brief history of the modern state and its constitutional orders. Strategy and the constitutional order ; From princes to princely states : 1494-1648 ; From kingly states to territorial states : 1648-1776 ; From state-nations to nation-states : 1776-1914 ; The study of the modern state -- Pt. III. The historic consequences of the long war. The market-state ; Strategic choices ; Strategy and the market-state ; The wars of the market-state -- Book II: States of peace. Introduction: The origin of international law in the constitutional order --Pt. I. The society of nation-states. Colonel House and a world made of law ; The Kitty Genovese incident and the war in Bosnia ; The death of the society of nation-states -- Pt. II. A brief history of the Society States and the International Order. Peace and the international order ; The Treaty of Augsburg ; The Peace of Westphalia ; The Treaty of Utrecht ; The Congress of Vienna ; The Versailles Treaty ; The Peace of Paris -- Pt. III. Challenges to the new international order ; Possible worlds ; The coming age of war and peace ; Peace in the society of market-states -- Epilogue -- Postscript: The Indian summer -- Appendix. A note on Eurocentrism ; A note on causality ; A note on periodicity.