The U.S. Army in Peacetime, 1812-2001

FAIN: FEL-256972-18

Brian M. Linn
Texas A & M Research Foundation (College Station, TX 77843-0001)

A book-length history of America's armies in peacetime.

The NEH initiative Standing Together: The Humanities and the Experience of War provides a unique opportunity to study a long-ignored question: what happens to America’s armies after the war ends, the citizen-soldiers become civilians, and the colors are folded? There is much literature on the veterans’ return to civilian life, but what of those who remain in uniform? Real Soldiering will be the first interpretive history of the U.S. Army’s experience in the aftermath of war. Its central thesis is that for over two centuries, the end of hostilities ushered in a remarkably consistent process of “military recovery.” And although each conflict creates a unique postwar force, collectively these forces have similar missions including institutional reforms, professionalizing the officer corps, stabilizing the enlisted ranks, assimilating the last war’s veterans, using military forces for social experiments, and redefining the army’s role to its members and the public.

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