Walter Millis, of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, is perhaps the only writer sufficiently knowledgeable about all the social, political, and economic implications of military policy to have been able to overcome the difficulties involved in this project. From Benjamin Franklin's call for a volunteer militia (1747) to Secretary of Defense McNamara's remarks before the Economic Club of New York (1963) there stretches ""a continuous, unbroken thread of American military thinking,"" but it is a looped and tangled one. And, as Mr. Millis points out, there are no American Clausewitzes and very few military theorists of any stature; add to this the fact that our thoughts on the subject have ""usually proceeded in controversy,"" and it is easy to see why he has so often been forced to rely on the statements of civilian leaders, terminating rather than delineating debate. Likewise, in view of the unprecedented circumstances, we can understand even if we regret the strict curtailment of material on the post-WW II era; that period in itself would require at least another volume the size of this one. Hopefully, soon, Walter Millis will produce it.