‘Havoc the laws of regular warfare do not sanction:’ the resort to punitive violence by British forces in Victorian small wars

Why did British military commanders in the Victorian age resort to punitive violence in so-called small wars? This study argues that the lack of military manuals or literature on conducting small wars resulted in the implementation of Jominian strategies in a non-European context. This, combined with Victorian assumptions that the enemy was ‘inferior’ and unable to adhere to reciprocal codes of military conduct, along with the constraints of operating in remote theatres of war, all coalesced to suggest that punitive violence was the simplest, safest and most efficient means of projecting British power.