This panel will examine crisis response and strategic revision in a historical context. The four papers range across history from Classical Greece to the Cold War and afterwards, assessing how strategic and diplomatic actors respond to and learn from sudden, unexpected events. The first two papers address this in the context of naval history, evaluating how Athenians responded to the oligarchic coup of 411BC challenging seapower strategy, and how the Royal Navy learnt from the 1916 Battle of Jutland. The other papers consider more recent challenges, including the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the contested participation of Hezbollah in the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association bombing in Buenos Aires in 1994, exploring national and international responses to these events.

Panellists:

• Chair: by Bill Philpott
• The Athenian Oligarchic Coup of 411BC; Re-evaluation of seapower politics, strategy, and identity - Kunika Kakuta, PhD Researcher, Department of War Studies
• Sir Julian Corbett,Jutland and the Concept of ‘Decisive’ Battle, and the educational value of experience, Professor Andrew Lambert, Laughton Professor of Naval History, Department of War Studies
• A New 'Great Game': The Thatcher government and the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan in December 1979 - Dr Geraint Hughes, Reader in Diplomatic and Military History, Defence Studies Department
• Hezbollah’s internationalism. The case of the AMIA bombing in historical context - Ignacio Morales Barckhahn, PhD Researcher, Defence Studies Department

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