What is the citizen-soldier? The question demands something beyond the obvious answer, any soldier who is also a citizen. Judged by that criterion, the citizen-soldier is alive and well in the United States and, for that matter, most other countries. Soldiers, more than ever before, vote: in the United States, base commanders are evaluated on the basis of their success in generating large turnouts for national elections. Free speech is most certainly alive and well. Service men and women write, call, or email their representatives in Congress, who duly probe into accusations of mistreatment, malfeasance, or abuse. There are newspapers for each of the services, and overseas (Stars and Stripes) that delight in ripping into the high command, and local papers are filled with letters from uniformed members of the armed forces, openly identifying themselves as such. A military legal system operates that gives the accused rights which are comparable to, and in some cases superior to, those of the civilian legal syst em. And yet, I think, most of us would agree that the American military is not, in fact, a citizen-soldier force. It is somehow qualitatively different from the armies that fought the Civil War and the World Wars (Korea and Vietnam are already, I suspect, transitional wars). The term seems archaic, even quaint-- except, perhaps, as applied to reservists. Why? How is a military composed of soldiers who are certainly citizens somehow not composed of citizen-soldiers? Viewed legally, we have an army of citizen-soldiers; viewed historically and philosophically, we do not. The true citizen-soldier is distinguished from his professional or semi-professional counterpart in three ways, all of which suggest that military service follows from true citizenship. The first is his motivation for military service. In the case of the true citizen-soldier, military service is either an obligation imposed by the state or the result of mobilization for some pressing cause. Democratic states generally impose only two kinds of forced labor upon their citizens--jury duty and military service. The former serves the administration of justice; the latter serves the purpose of defense. These two high and essential objects of government ennoble coerced service--and this is the reason why obligatory schemes of nonmilitary service, which have much weaker justification, will find it hard ever to succeed in countries like the United States. In the absence of conscription, mobilization for a particula r struggle is the other way in which citizenship elicits military service. The state is embarked upon some great crusade or adventure, and in the spirit of ancient Athens, citizens make the highest contribution to it by offering their service as soldiers. For the normal volunteer of today, neither motivation applies. Patriotism, a desire for personal challenge, monetary or career incentives--all mold the young man or woman who joins today. But in all cases (except perhaps that of patriotism), the link between citizenship and service is thin. The true army of citizen-soldiers represents the state. Rich and poor, black and white, Christian and Jew serve alongside one another in similarly Spartan surroundings--at least in theory. The idea of military service as the great leveler is part of its charm in a democratic age, one of whose bedrock principles is surely the formal equality of all citizens. The voluntary military, by way of contrast, is very rarely representative. To be sure, in the contemporary United States recruiters attempt to maintain some rough balance among ethnic groups, although even here it is clear that minority groups are overrepresented. Recruiters pay no heed, however, to socioeconomic, religious, or other kinds of ethnic diversity in the ranks. That the children of millionaires almost never serve or that a bare handful of Ivy League graduates don a uniform is not even a matter for comment. Third, and perhaps most important, the true citizen-soldier's identity is fundamentally civilian. …