Third on Allan Millett’s list came antiquarian or hobby history, which is often not history in any real sense but consists rather of books about military uniforms and weapons, especially the latter. These are long on descriptions of, say, the M1 Garand rifle or the Kalashnikov AK-47 assault weapon and short on the political purposes these deadly instruments have served. Power might grow out of the barrel of a gun, as Mao Zedong once famously said, but readers of this genre are interested less in the power than the gun barrel.
Allan shot by the first three categories -— inspirational, nationalistic, and antiquarian —- within a few minutes. He devoted the bulk of the lecture to the remaining two, which he called “military utilitarian” and “civilian utilitarian” military history.
The former tend to be books written by and for the personnel of military institutions. Some of it focuses on the heritage of various units and is designed to instill a feeling a pride and esprit de corps among those who serve in them. Some of it is intended to influence civilian policymakers to make the “correct” choices about manpower policy or weapons appropriations. But most of it is written to support the professional education of military officers. It employs history to underscore principles of leadership, strategic and operational art, the challenges of counterinsurgencies and civil affairs, and so on: all the formidable array of issues a good officer is expected to master. The American armed forces, like those of other nations, employ dozens of career military historians, many of them quite gifted, to generate this form of military history, some of which is classified and most of which is never seen by the general public.
Last came civilian utilitarian military history, the sort that formed the principal rationale for teaching courses on the subject in a liberal arts university. Military history, Allan argued, matters for the same reason that all history matters. It affords a window into the human condition and the nature of human societies: an especially useful window because war often places extreme pressure on those societies, exposing its strengths and weaknesses.
Military history could also serve to make students better citizens. This was especially true for citizens of a superpower like the United States, whose preeminent status in world politics depended heavily upon military strength and the willingness to use it. At the height of the Vietnam War, Department of Defense consumed 70 percent of all Federal discretionary spending. In the years since, that figure has never dropped below 48 percent. Also in the years since, American policymakers have sent troops into harm’s way on numerous occasions, most notably Lebanon (1983), Grenada (1983), Panama (1989), Desert Shield/Desert Storm (1990-1991), Somalia (1993), Kosovo (1999), Afghanistan (2001- ) and Iraq (2003- ). Many of these have proven to be dubious ventures. Policymakers have invariably supported their rationales for war with historical analogies, some of them specious, most of them tendentious, and nearly all of them expressed in the most superficial terms. An informed citizenry, Allan averred, ought to have a healthy skepticism. Thus, an important reason for students to secure a firm grasp of military history was to be in a position to critically assess the wisdom of U.S. military expenditures and, especially, the resort to armed conflict and the conduct of military operations.
Part 1 – Part 2
8 Comments
Mark,
I think our recent debates show that the concept of an informed citizenry isn’t working so well at the moment, at least in terms of translating the will of the majority of the people to our political leadership. It’s quite clear that the majority of our citizens disagree stridently with the administration, and their elected representatives in Congress are listening. It’s also quite clear that the administration doesn’t care, and believes that it can’t be forced to do anything with regard to Iraq.
Please, at some point soon, put out your thoughts on this issue. I’m interested in whether you and others think that our entire concept of warmaking (ie how we decide to go to war) needs re-examination.
Charles
Charles,
This is neither the first, nor is it likely be the last, administration to take actions opposed by public opinion.
Jaron
Jaron,
I agree. Unfortunately I didn’t express myself very clearly. What I believe is needed is a comprehensive review of the process by which this nation decides to carry out military action. The concept of declaration of war appears to be a dead letter, and the administration is not abiding by the War Powers Act either. So by what formal mechanism does the government carry out its power to make war? It appears to me that we have no process that forces intelligent debate before action is taken. The runup to OIF was not intelligent debate- it was a systematic campaign of lies and spin that capitalized on the fears of every American. That was my larger point. The administration will frequently differ from public opinion, but the current situation is more than just a disagreement.
Charles
These two posts are very useful for military historians, but some of the unstated assumptions (especially in part 2) deserve consideration.
Dr. Grimsley implies that ‘civilian utilitarian military history’ serves best to dissuade people, specificaly American citizens, from supporting military interventions. Yet wouldn’t that simply make ‘civilian utilitarian military history’ the opposite of ‘national military history’, rather than a distinct type of military history?
Civilian utilitarian military history should also illuminate the many “historical analogies, some of them specious, most of them tendentious, and nearly all of them expressed in the most superficial terms” which have been used by those _opposing_ American military intervention in places such as Kosovo, Afghanistan, or Iraq.
This will occur naturally when done properly, as civilian utilitarian military history allows citizens to place current military events within a broader historical context, something the American media has failed at miserably.
It seems to me that none of the five types of military history Dr. Millett discussed should be seen as polar opposites, but rather as distinct answers to the broader sorts of historiographical questions that must be asked about all history.
Charles,
Hmmmm…FDR used a variety of hokey tricks to try to move us sideways into WW2 before Pearl Harbor (the undeclared use of naval power coming immediately to mind). He did this in defiance of public and congressional opinion at times.
Compare actual formal declarations of war (very few) to times we have used armed force abroad (quite frequent).
I guess what I am saying is that the current administration practices aren’t such a deviation from past practice.
What changes would you propose to limit the executive branch from initiating military actions abroad (beside the obvious retroactive defunding)?
Although it is a fact that military historians are on the decline in academe, this downward spiral is not, for the most part, due to any “great left-wing conspiracy” to eliminate them. The fact is that colleges and universities are hiring fewer and fewer historians because fewer and fewer students are seeking to become historians. It’s the age old economic supply and demand situation.
This situation was created by academic historians who so much prefer to dwell in the proverbial ivory tower and write papers, books and now blogs for their for their learned colleagues. Research and publishing is their mantra and teaching, if they do it at all. is a cross to be borne on the road to tenure.. And as if their disdain for teaching was not enough, PhDs only want to teach what they want to teach, particularly at the graduate level. Just take a look at some of the course offerings and you will see some pretty obscure things like “”Kyivan Princely Tradition in the Fourteenth to Sixteenth Centuries”
This sort of academic elitism is not restricted to historians but they are perhaps the worst offenders deliberately setting themselves apart from their social responsibility to pass their much needed knowledge to society and have helped to create a nation of historical illiterates. In essence, academic historians are their own worst enemies be they of the military or other persuasions because they have built walls between themselves and society.
It is interesting that people like Ken Burns, David McCullough and others that bring history and make it alive and relevant are severely criticized or sneered at by the history Dons including those of the military variety.
Unfortunately the academy does not really understand the history, including military history, is not the province of by and for professors, and those who would be professors. It affects the way the American people and their leaders respond to and impact on the world. Military history in particular has profound consequences for everyday people and yet the professorate strives to keep it hidden from them behind the veils of their academic temples. If you want “a broader vision of military history” then it has to go out to and include a broader audience.
Sure, historians write primarily for their fellow historians, but can you blame them, Miguel? Academic military history that explicitly engages in broader debates (state-building, for example) _is_ being written, but I doubt anyone in a Barnes & Noble or Borders would pick up a book like David Parrott’s Richelieu’s Army if it happened to be on the shelf (then again who knows, maybe a few would–but I doubt even one copy of the book has seen light in a commercial bookstore). So your statement that “If you want a ‘broader vision of military history’ then it has to go out to and include a broader audience” doesn’t make sense to me. The books that general readers buy seem to be narrow, not broad-visioned. B&N shelves are filled mostly with campaign histories and anecdotal biographies. At a Borders the other day I flipped open a copy of Carlo D’Este’s book on Patton to a random page, and saw mentioned Patton’s hospital room decorations and ribald jokes he directed at a nurse. On the first page of a book on Napoleon’s invasion of Russia, the author mentioned Napoleon’s young wife, who, despite the political origins of their marriage, took a liking to the man after discovering the “pleasures of the marriage bed.” Huh? How is any of this stuff relevant? Then again, you can’t really blame popular historians; I’m sure most of them would be the first to admit that making a true contribution to knowledge is not their goal at all–rather, it’s to tell an entertaining story, which is fine, as long as they don’t have any pretentions.
Note: I must give Borders credit for stocking a good number of academic history titles published by university presses. Also, they may not be large in number, but there _are_ laymen out there who read academic titles–just look at the surprisingly high number of obscure works which have received customer reviews on Amazon.
As far as supply and demand, I was under the impression that more PhDs are given each year than there are spots available? Maybe my info is old–I’ll have to check it out.
My central argument is that historians, including military historians are failing society because they are mainly concerned about impressing their peers and far less concerned about teaching history and making it relevant to the citizenry and particularly to its leaders. How is society served by books that few read? Why do academics insist on putting the proverbial bushel over the candle?
As Ajay points out, Borders does have a whole section of their stores devoted to military history, and so does Barnes & Noble but if you really look you will see hardly any few from the university presses. Most of the books are so-called “popular” military histories that are bought by the general public –David McCullough’s “1776” for instance. I submit that history books like his that cater to a broad public audience increases historical literacy and thus has a greater and more positive impact than David Parrott’s Richelieu’s Army, for instance.
Time was when the university presses practically printed any book written by a professor, but those days are coming to a close. The university presses are printing fewer books than ever before because there is a decreasing demand for their product. I am told that today the average print run at a university press is below 400 where as in the past any serious history book could expect to sell 2,000 copies. Perhaps someone from the university press community can weigh in on the general state of the business.
Again, it is my understanding that the number of history majors at both the undergraduate and graduate level is considerably down and as a result, there are fewer and fewer jobs for PhDs at the universities. This has led to the drop in enrollments. Contributing to this drop is the failure of history departments to market themselves and have left the recruitment field largely to the business and to and to some extent to the science departments The reasons the Shakers died out was they refused to have sex and even to proselytize. I am afraid that Skakerism is the religion of academic historians and that they are contributing to their own demise.
But, it is really the professorate’s disinterest in teaching and writing for a brader audience that contributes mightily to the decrease in students which in turn decreases the number of available tenured jobs. This is a great deal to the colleges who do not have to pay the higher salaries and benefits that the regular profs get and they increasingly turn to teaching adjuncts, the migratory day laborers of the history profession.