I offer a books´list on military theory, which reading will be very useful to you. And that I consider to be fundamental to know better the military topics and not simply to read a more or less repeated history.
I am including one of my books, fruit of my years of dedication to this topic, which content you can examine in www.amazon.com.
«Maneuver Warfare Handbook» by William Lind.
The classical on modern maneuver warfare. Setting out from German experience.
«The Art of War» by Sun Tzu. Samuel Griffith’s translation is the best.
The permanent and global chinese military theory from a classical author. Its style and content characteristics support the idea of one unique author. With each useful reading, more shades and perspectives are caught. That come to fruition in major richness, agility and depth of thought.
Other “Chinese” books give you a number of strategies (the 33, the 36, the 100, etc.). Its utilization is based on its constant memorization or on iits permanent application. I consider them to be slight practical, for the profuse, diffuse and still confused character of many ancient authors of the Han etnia. What does happen if a different case arises? It seems as if they wanted to conceal their supposed wisdom from the not initiated ones.
«The Soviet Conduct of Tactical Maneuver» by David Glantz.
The Soviet military doctrine that won the War, fully explained. With them they won the II World War. And imposed their economic social system in half Europe, supposed “liberated” from the Germans.
“On War” by Clausewitz.
It is an extensive work, since it fits with the epoch, in which writing little was a sign of inconsistency, little importance and scanty reflection. The books or parts that compose it were finished in variable degree by the author, whose premature death did not allow its conclusion. We are interested in the first chapters on the theory and the philosophy of the war. Other books treat on the tactics of a period in which the enemy deployment was staying at the sights of the enemy command and his HHQQ and auxiliary, placed in a nearby height. He praises Liddell Hart’s opposite: a decisive battle using the maximum own concentration and power on the enemy army. In an age of masses armies, inaugurated by Napoleon, soon was clear that it was not possible to win a war between full armed nations, in an alone great battle. It was necessary a campaign with successive victorious operations, looking for the achievement of the military goals of the campaign (theatre of operations, Europe, Pacific Ocean, Africa) or the strategy. In addition, already there did not exist a genius advanced to his epoch as Napoleon.
«Forward into Battle» by Paddy Griffith.
Excelent book about last two centuries’ military tactics. It has detractors for its sometimes breaking vision.
«Maneuver Warfare: An Anthology», compiled by Richard D. Hooker.
Short articles from some of the best modern military writers. It has works from Rommel, Leonhard, John Antal, etc.
«The Art of Maneuver» by Robert Leonhard.
One of the first full theory about maneuver warfare. And he stands out strongly, expanding the ideas torrent of this theory in development those moments.
«Race to the Swift» by Richard Simpkin.
On maneuver warfare. The best book of the British military thinker. Its reading is some difficult, for its language erudition.
«Manual de Táctica», dos tomos, by Eike Middeldorf.
It is the most complete and current manual on modern tactics that I have found. It has chapters about land warfare using atomic tactical bombs and on the particular conditions of fight: by night, in forests, with extreme cold, etc.
«Estrategia» by Basil Liddell Hart.
Best military theory by B. L. Hart. Easy to read.
«The Foundations of the Science of War» by John Frederick Charles Fuller.
The best book about military principles. Hard to read sometimes. Almost 65 years after its first edition, it was reprinted by the Marines Corps. I got a first edition copy from an American university library. It had many critiques and later the author went back on the underlying ideas in the book. The critiques, in turn, had as bottom that he had an eccentric personality, in a group (the military men) tremendously conservative and established by protocol. He had mystical streakes (Hindu philosophy, yoga) and flirted with the Nazi, being got by Hitler.
«On the Nature of War» by Enrique Alonso.
The «how to do» in war. Recent, full and unusual military theory. It is based in ten «operational systems».
«Understanding War» by Trevor N. Dupuy.
It is a combat theory, based on History, military factors and its figures. I find that his “friction” concept development, took from Clausewitz, is deviant. And he exposes another concept different from Clausewitz.