Packed with gripping first-hand accounts from the battlefield to high-level strategic forums, Statecraft gives you the tools to understand how states collaborate, compete and fight.

Why did Russia struggle in the early months of their full-scale invasion of Ukraine?
Why does Israel repeatedly ignore international pressure on Gaza?
Why does the UK spend billions on aircraft carriers it struggles to support at sea?
How do smaller states shape world events when dwarfed by superpowers?

The world today is gripped by conflict at a scale not seen since the Cold War. Whether in Ukraine, the Middle East or Taiwan, we are in a period of intense power competition. In Statecraft, Dr Jack Watling takes you into wood-panelled offices to meet the world’s powerbrokers, or the bunkers from which battles are coordinated, and explains the mechanics behind these struggles for supremacy.

Informed by a career on the ground in conflict zones, and advising generals and political leaders, Watling examines the crucial dilemmas that states face to get ahead, no matter their size. From economic alliances and global trade to sea power and military technology, Statecraft provides a powerful new framework to understand an increasingly divided world.

About the Author

Jack Watling is Senior Research Fellow for Land Warfare at the Royal United Services Institute in London. He works closely with the British, Ukrainian and American military, and advises governments on security and strategy.

He was formally a Global Fellow at the Wilson Center in Washington DC and is the author of Arms of the Future: Technology and Close Combat in the Twenty-First Century. Originally a journalist he has contributed to Reuters, The Atlantic, Foreign Policy and the Guardian, among others.