Citizen Soldiers In A Time Of Transition

Currently, U.S. armed forces are facing a rapidly shifting environment. Even as the major combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq that defined the last decade are coming to an end, a wide variety of new and evolving challenges, both abroad and at home, are confronting the nation’s military. The U.S. Army National Guard faces a unique set of dynamics, given its role in domestic as well as overseas operations. As the Army National Guard considers its future, it asked the CSIS Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Program to provide an independent analysis of the strategic-level issues facing the Guard, as well as its evolving roles and missions. This report provides policymakers and practitioners with objective insights and recommendations to assist in outlining potential future responsibilities for the Army National Guard.

The image of farmers and workers called to the colours endures in Canada’s social memory of the First World War. But is the ideal of being a citizen first and a soldier only by necessity as recent as our histories and memories suggest? Militia Myths brings to light a military culture that consistently employed the citizen soldier as its foremost symbol, but was otherwise in a state of profound transition. At the time of Confederation, the defence of Canada itself represented the country’s only real obligation to the British Empire, but by the early twentieth century Canadians were already fighting an imperial war in South Africa. In 1914, they began raising an army to fight on the Western Front. By the end of the First World War, the ideological transition was complete: for better or for worse, the untrained civilian who had answered the call-to-arms in 1914 replaced the long-serving volunteer militiaman of the past as the archetypical Canadian citizen soldier. Militia Myths traces the evolution of a uniquely Canadian amateur military tradition -- one that has had an enormous impact on the country’s experience of the First and Second World Wars. Published in association with the Canadian War Museum.

Historians depict nineteenth-century militiamen as drunken buffoons who poked each other with cornstalk weapons, and inevitably shot their commander in the backside. This book demonstrates that, to the contrary, militia remained an active civil institution in early nineteenth century, affecting era's social, political, and economic transitions.

Nations and their Histories highlights the importance of the past and its uses in the formation of modern nations and national identities. The book looks at the construction of different national historiographies as well as present representations of the past in the political and cultural life of nations, covering the five continents.

One of the most significant post-Cold War issues is the future of the U.S. Army's reserve components. Although National Guard and Army Reserve units fought well in the first Persian Gulf war, Jeffrey Jacobs warns that Americans should not be sanguine about their ability to perform effectively in future conflicts. Having served in the active Army as well as both the Guard and the Reserve, Jacobs offers a unique perspective on the current missions, structure, and policies of the Army and the impact of the reserve system on its readiness for combat. From both active and reserve points of view, Jacobs describes the current limitations and deficiencies inherent in the separate structures of the Army's three disparate components. He finds the roots of many of the reserves' problems in their strong ties to traditions and politics. The solutions he proposes focus on integrating the three components into a true Total Army -- in fact as well as in rhetoric. Such reforms will affect several sacred cows, including state control of the National Guard, the weekend drill system, and the geography-based reserve system. Much has been written about the reserves, but few recent writers have proposed such far-reaching reforms. Jacobs's controversial proposals will interest those who make, influence, and study military policy. Here is a stimulating and thought-provoking consideration of a vital aspect of America's defense posture.