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total war
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Carl von Clausewitz
Analyzing Joseph Goebbels's total war speech in Nazi Germany
Erich Ludendorff
See how the Viet Cong's successful guerrilla warfare pushed Lyndon Johnson toward the path of total war
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Louis IX of France (St. Louis), stained glass window of Louis IX during the Crusades. (Unknown location.)
World Wars
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Carl von Clausewitz
Carl von Clausewitz Military strategist Carl von Clausewitz, lithograph by Franz Michelis after an oil painting by Wilhelm Wach, 1830.

total war

military
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•History

total war, military conflict in which the contenders are willing to make any sacrifice in lives and other resources to obtain a complete victory, as distinguished from limited war. Throughout history, limitations on the scope of warfare have been more economic and social than political. Simple territorial aggrandizement has not, for the most part, brought about total commitments to war. The most deadly conflicts have been fought on ideological grounds in revolutions and civil and...

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