Since 2014, Western militaries renewed their focus from peacekeeping to combat operations against advanced opponents. Russian tactics, as demonstrated in the conflict in Ukraine, relied on massed indirect fires. Facing a (near-) peer adversary keen on using artillery on a massive scale raises the …

National political leadership faces complex dynamics in order to plausibly exit a military mission. Putnam's two-level game helps to understand the essence of these dynamics. National political leadership will aim to keep the domestic audience on its hand in order to remain in office, while simultaneously …

In literature on public support for military missions, political discord has been criticised, because it is claimed that having a single strategic narrative as a basis for consensus helps foster such support. In this chapter the author starts from the perspective of the primacy of politics. The chapter …

Overview of recent issues central to political, military, and academic debates about political and military exit strategies from conflicts and wars. One important concept is the supposed political military divide, time and again expressed in the dichotomy end states versus end dates.

The introduction to NL ARMS 2015 "The dilemma of leaving" povides an overview of recent issues central to political, military, and academic debates about political and military exit strategies from conflicts and wars.

The moral dimension of exit is closely related to the moral dimension of entry. Notably, when the entry is highly questioned from a moral perspective, by many different actors, there are bound to be moral problems with regard to exit as well. This point will be illustrated by a discussion of the situation …

When studying exit strategies and their (military) implications, historical parallels come to mind. Because they are full of analogies with present-day expeditionary missions, for the purpose of this book probably the most thought-provoking and informative exits are those related to the process of decolonisation. …