As Mara Karlin memorably wrote last year, total war is back. Indeed, there are signs everywhere that countries are preparing for all-out conflicts. Just this week, the Trump administration asked Congress to approve the largest-ever U.S. arms package for Taiwan, and the head of the British military said the United Kingdom needs more people “ready to fight,” given threats from Russia. “The circumscribed struggles of the post-9/11 era are gone, and today’s wars are increasingly whole-of-society phenomena,” Karlin explained. Her advice for Washington is persuasive, if counterintuitive—that the best way to avoid a total war is gearing up to fight one.