Atlas Trail
Six Doctrines Across 2,300 Years of War
From the Macedonian hammer-and-anvil to Cold War deterrence, six named ideas about how to fight, in the order they first appeared.
Stop 1 of 6.
Strategy and Doctrine
359 BC: Philip II builds the hammer-and-anvil system Alexander would use to conquer Persia.
Stop 2 of 6.
Strategy and Doctrine
216 BC: Hannibal closes the double envelopment on a larger Roman army at Cannae, the tactic Sun Tzu had cautioned against three centuries earlier.
Stop 3 of 6.
Strategy and Doctrine
1206-1207: Genghis Khan organizes composite-bow horse archery and the feigned retreat into empire-conquering scale.
Stop 4 of 6.
Strategy and Doctrine
1806 onward: Prussian reformers build Auftragstaktik, trusting subordinate officers with intent rather than fixed orders.
Stop 5 of 6.
Strategy and Doctrine
1939: journalists coin blitzkrieg for Germany's armor-and-air breakthroughs; historians still argue whether it was ever a codified doctrine.
Stop 6 of 6.
Sources
1946: Bernard Brodie argues the atomic bomb makes deterrence, not victory, the purpose of a modern military.
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