When I was an undergraduate in the 1960s, as the Vietnam
conflict was escalating, I took Stanley Hoffmann's mesmeriz-
ing course, "Causes of War." I thought back to this class as I
read Cynthia Enloe's book, which deserves all the superla-
tives it has accrued. The experience of reading now and
remembering back left me wondering: Without Enloe to
consult (her first book on militarism and gender came out in
the early 1980s), what were we missing in Hoffmann's class?
The answer, I think, is this: We could understand well enough
the contending theories about why nations go to war; but in
the absence of Enloe, we were less able to ask how militaries
could manage such massive mobilizations that required the
often calamitous sacrifice of precious lives even for wars
whose purposes seemed remote or unconvincing.
