Brian McAllister Linn's "Real Soldiering"

Brian McAllister Linn is professor of history at Texas A&M and the author of The Philippine War, 1899–1902, The Echo of Battle: The Army’s Way of War, and other books.

He applied the “Page 99 Test” to his new book, Real Soldiering: The US Army in the Aftermath of War, 1815-1980, and reported the following:

Page 99 provides examples of the ’skeletonized’ US Army officer corps in the decade after the end of World War 1. It briefly discusses the careers of officers who would later become famous such as Dwight D. Eisenhower and Matthew B. Ridgway and the inadequate pay and wretched living conditions that most junior officers endured.

Real Soldiering is a comparative historical analysis of the US Army’s experience in the decade after every major war. The book’s central argument is that in many ways this experience follows a common pattern of a brief period of reform followed by a long period of stagnation, insufficient resources, and the ‘hollowing out’ of the field forces. The book looks at similarities in the how the lessons of the recent war were assimilated, the adaptation to new missions, continental and overseas deployments, the officer corps (and especially the experience of junior officers), the acquisition, training, and retention of (or inability to retain) enlisted personnel, and how the army prepared for the next war. Page 99 would provide the reader with a basic understanding of a primary argument in Real Soldiering—that armies transitioning from war to peace have to engage in a prolonged and traumatic period of recovery.

Real Soldiering grew out of my belief that neither soldiers nor civilians had much understanding of what happens when a professional army after a war is over. In most histories, postwar armies are of interest as prewar armies—and historians focus on the individuals, doctrines, technologies, etc. that proved decisive in the next conflict. My book argues that postwar armies need to be studied as distinct military entities. By examine the US Army from the decade after the War of 1812 to a decade after the Vietnam War, I am able to make comparisons, highlight similarities, and challenge much of the existing literature.

Learn more about Real Soldiering at the University Press of Kansas website.

--Marshal Zeringue