American Military History: A Survey From Colonial Times to the Present

by William Thomas Allison, Jeffrey G. Grey, Janet G. Valentine

This book is for undergraduate courses in American Military History. It covers from the colonial period through the War on Terror, using a narrative and thematic approach. Includes the development of civilian control of the military; the American military at war; the professionalization of the American military; the use of American military power to achieve national strategic objectives; and the non-military uses of the American military throughout American history.

Genres: History, Military History, Textbooks, American History, Nonfiction

400 pages, Paperback

First published November 3, 2006

About the author

William Thomas "Bill" Allison is Professor of Military History at Georgia Southern University, joining the faculty there in 2008 and serving as Chair of the Department of History from 2008 to 2010. He earned his Ph.D. in history at Bowling Green State University in 1995, then taught at the University of Saint Francis before joining the History Department at Weber State University from 1999-2008. During the 2002-2003 academic year, he was Visiting Professor in the Department Strategy and International Security at the USAF Air War College and he was Visiting Professor of Military History at the USAF School for Advanced Air and Space Studies from 2010-2011. He is currently the General Harold K. Johnson Visiting Chair in Military History at the US Army War College.

He is author of The Gulf War (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), My Lai: An American Atrocity in the Vietnam War (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012), Military Justice in Vietnam: The Rule of Law in an American War (University Press of Kansas, 2007), The Tet Offensive (Routledge, 2008), among other works. He has presented papers and lectured at numerous conferences and universities, including Oxford, Cambridge, and the Australian Defence Force Academy. He is active in the Society for Military History and has served on the editorial board of the Journal of Military History. He has also served as a member of the Department of the Army Historical Advisory Committee.

A native of Texas, he lives in Spartanburg, South Carolina, with his wife Jennifer and black lab Moose.

Reviews

[Tony Martinez · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very Dry.

[Ellen Tillman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall it is very good for what it does.

[Jewels · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had to get this volume as a text book for a college course. It's not something that I would initially pick up, so I naturally am not too thrilled by it. Basically, it's an overview of the United States military, from Revolution to present day. It doesn't delve too much into the political aspects, but focuses more on building and dismantling, deployment, large engagements and wars, and numbers. Lots of statistics. If that's your thing, then by all means, you need this book. Me? Not so much.