projections of U.S. leadership are justified by gendered ideologies -critics are dismissed as women who don’t ‘understand real world politics’

The U.S.–led “war on terror” exemplifies how identity investments, ideological commitments, and militarized practices interact. Some argue that George W. Bush’s forceful response to the 9/11 bombings involved not only his outrage and claim to military leadership but also his desire to establish a hypermasculine image of himself and the United States. It is well-known that Bush had personal reasons for enhancing his militarist (manly) identity. He had avoided serving in Vietnam, was invested in the image of being a “guy’s guy,” and arguably hoped to redeem his father’s failure to oust Saddam in the First Gulf War. For many Americans, the identity and power of the United States had been feminized by its defeat in Vietnam, made more humiliating by losing to a people stereotyped as ethnically/racially inferior. Feminization anxiety was also fueled by the increasing visibility of women in politics and the workplace and the growing strength of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) political movements. A yearning to remasculinize the nation (Jeffords 1989) was already present and readily tapped by Bush and his advisers as the nation responded to 9/11 and its spectacular demonstration of U.S. vulnerability to penetration by foreign men. The war story the Bush administration immediately cultivated featured fanatical terrorists inexplicably committed to destroying freedom, democracy, and (implicitly Western) civilization by any means. Enemies this irrational and unpredictable could only be defeated by drawing an absolute line between good and evil and adopting the strongest possible measures to eliminate those deemed evil. Feminization operates here to construct enemies as so absolutely different from “us” that the only viable strategy is their annihilation. Those who were fearful, were skeptical, or actively opposed Bush’s strategies were rendered unequivocally suspect—unpatriotic, anti-American, naively (irrationally) out of touch, or quite simply unmanly (lacking the guts to do what must be done). In this instance, feminization operates to deny absolutely the rationality of dissenters or any cogent reasons for critique. Dissenters are simply and irredeemably discredited: unwilling to stand up for their country, ungratefully abandoning the United States and freeloading on its military power, and/or failing to grasp real-world politics. Those seeking debate and diplomacy are feminized—cast as behaving like cowardly women and undermining U.S. interests by wimping out of military action. In effect, dissidents become a less stark but ultimately an equally threatening enemy: “If you’re not with us, you’re against us.” And as enemies, those who are against us lose any claim to inclusion, respect, or (apparently) rights. Investments in gendered identities and commitments to masculinist ideologies mattered for initiating the “war on terror,” and they also matter within processes of militarization. Militaries, of course, are quintessential sites of hypermasculinity. Success in war is presumed to demand a constellation of qualities long considered the exclusive province of men: superior physical strength, incomparable male bonding, heroic risk taking, extremes of violence, and readiness to sacrifice one’s life for the cause. Historically, military service afforded decisive proof of manhood and constituted a claim to citizenship. The identities and ideals of military service continue to inform recruitment and enlistment, with the increasingly crucial addition of economic incentives. Masculinist qualities remain key to military life but are complicated in today’s services by a variety of differences among men (by ethnicity, race, religion, class, skills) and by the inclusion of women. Within militaries, multiple masculinities are differently mobilized in pursuit of warring objectives.5 More physically powerful and hyper- masculine men are valued but subordinated to orders from above; commanding officers, with their presumed leadership competence, enjoy higher prestige and less ambivalent valorization. Increasing reliance on advanced technologies prompts new masculinities. While desk jobs that distance soldiers from the battle front were previously feminized, computer specialists and high-tech operators today are increasingly valorized (Blanchard 2003). If we consider the education and training required for these positions, classed and raced dimensions of masculinities come into view. Indeed, the techno-war paradigm of the U.S. military presents a new version of Western superiority: high-tech sophistication, efficiency, and awesome power.