| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 87.3

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 87.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Anticipating Total War: The German and American Experiences, 1871–1914. Ed. by Manfred F. Boemeke, Roger Chickering, and Stig Förster. (Washington and New York: German Historical Institute and Cambridge University Press, 1999. x, 496 pp. $59.95, isbn 0-521-62294-8.)

The twenty essays in this immense volume, a publication of the German Historical Institute, present a wide array of discussions about warfare in the United States and Germany between 1871 and 1914. Although some studies are political, some social, some economic, some cultural, they all share a sometimes tenuous connection to apocalyptic visions and ubiquitous expectations of long, protracted, cataclysmic wars to come. These transatlantic studies, resulting from the second of five conferences concerning "The United States and Germany in the Age of Total War," focus on "the massive impact of changes in technology and social organization on the conduct of war, as well as the impact of warfare on broader social, political, and cultural developments in the two lands." 1

The essays investigating "Germany, the United States, and Total War" examine the ideological meaning of total war, dissect the complicated definition and nature of the concept, and argue for the need to understand the emergence of total war as the product of vast and complex reciprocal changes including demographic growth, technological innovations, mass industrial production, social conflicts, redefinitions of political society, the expansion of public power, the development of bellicose nationalism, and aggressive naval expansionism. Contending that "total war requires total history," the authors convincingly conclude that historians must use this term with more caution, discrimination, sensitivity, and acuity. . . .

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