The Quranic Concept of Power

I've previously written on Pakistani General S.K. Malik's critically important work, The Quranic Concept of War. I've gone so far as to post this very difficult to find work online in its entirety a few months ago. This basic work is essential for understanding the Islamic way of war and its religious justification (the doctrine of jihad).

Now I'm glad to make available online Malik's expanded treatise on military strategy, The Quranic Concept of Power. This hefty volume (444p.) expands on the theme of his previous work (155p.), and is even more scarce than the Concept of War. Only 500 copies were printed by the publisher in Pakistan. Hopefully, we can soon have Malik's study of the Muslim general, Khalid bin Walid, online.

Several inquirers have asked me: why are we making these works available? Apart from the fact that we are presently engaged in a war against Islamic terrorism (you might have heard something about it), the study of the Islamic doctrine of war has long been neglected by our military. One observer recently had this to say:

As late as early 2006, the senior Service colleges of the Department of Defense had not incorporated into their curriculum a systematic study of Mohammad as a military or political leader. As a consequence, we still do not have an in-depth understanding of the war fighting doctrine laid down by Mohammad, how it might be applied today by an increasing number of Islamic groups, or how it might be countered. William Gawthrop, "The Sources and Patterns of Terrorism in Islamic Law," The Vanguard: Journal of the Military Intelligence Corps Association 11:4 (Fall 2006), p. 10 (pp. 9-14)

That is not encouraging news. But one reason why this is such a neglected area of study can be attributed to the difficulty in finding many original sources in English. Add to this the difficulty in getting ahold of a copy of either of these volumes by Malik (the Concept of War I purchased from a bookstore in India; the Concept of Power an associate had to obtain through inter-library loan from one of the few US libraries that owns a copy), and anyone looking to engage in serious study of the topic will face significant obstacles. But by making these volumes available online, we hope to provoke further study in this area.

To that end, I have also uploaded some additional resources. The first is a radio interview with my friend and colleague LTC Joe Myers, who spoke on the importance of The Quranic Concept of War on The Right Balance program. That audio file (mp3) can be downloaded here. LTC Myers' review article of that same title was in the previous issue of Parameters, the Army War College Quarterly [html] [pdf], and is essential reading. And for convenience sake, William Gawthrop's excellent article cited above, "The Sources and Patterns of Terrorism in Islamic Law", can be downloaded from our website as well.