This book examines wars and military occupation and the ideas underlying them. It explores the laws of war, the body of rules which sought to regulate the practices of war, and those permitted to fight in war. The central challenge posed by the principle in the modern laws of war has been the distinction between lawful and unlawful combatants; a distinction that has never been fully resolved. `Review from previous edition This is a valuable and challenging book' Military History`Nabulsi's book demonstrates creativity of a very high order. Its strength lies in its inspired attempt to identify neglected strands in the history of international thought ... original and provocative, and also illustrated from impressively eclectic reading...thought provokng.' English Historial Review`This book is as remarkable in its originality and the boldness of its intellectual approach as in the richness and variety of its erudition... Her book does not merely deploy a staggering erudition in such specialised realms as the history of war and military art, but also in the domain of political philosophy, where it is brimming with illuminating analyses and intuitions on patriotism and nationalism, on the logic of State, and on the republican spirit.' Critique Internationale`Politics, law and war are skilfully interwoven ... This is more a work of political thought than about the practice of war, but a reminder of the importance to military history of varied responses to occupation.' European History Quarterly "This is a valuable and challenging book."-- The Journal of Military History Karma Nabulsi is Fellow in Politics at St. Edmund Hall and University Lecturer in International Relations at Oxford University.