Military SF

Military SF is SF that focuses particularly on armed conflict (war), typically from the perspective of military personnel, and often with detailed attention to military strategy, materiel, battles, relationships across the ranks, and so on. The defining feature is the focus on the military aspects; thus, "Star Wars", although it has "war" in the title, is not "military SF" as very little of it focuses on war. (Although the last scenes of the "Star Wars" movie are notable for their connection to Leni Riefenstahl and certain military stories.) Numerous recastings of traditional historical / military genres have been exported to space or alternative historical eras.

In SF, military stories frequently focus on inter-stellar warfare, often drawing from nautical and naval stories in particular.

In fantasy, military stories are typically planet-bound, often in an alternative fantastic earth with pre-Industrial Revolution technology.

In computer/video games, military settings frequently provide a background for first person shooter games and space combat games. ("World of Warcraft" is not, actually, a military SF title, although fighting monsters is a major part of the game.)

Perhaps one of the earliest famous works of military SF are Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers (1959) (made into the execrable 1997 film) and H. Beam Piper's Uller Uprising (1952) and Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen (1965). A significant early anthologoy includes Gordon Dickson, editor, Combat SF (1975). Following Heinlein's lead, much of this work leans from Libertarian to conservative to fascist. A significant contemporary publisher is Baen Books, which publishes Lois McMaster Bujold's works among others.

Feminist SF writers have long been a feature of the genre, crafting stories in which an exceptional woman is a soldier or leader (like Jeanne d'Arc), and alternative or future realities in which women and men both serve in the military. (See Elizabeth Moon's Paksenarrion stories for an alternative fantasy take in which women serve in the military; Elizabeth Moon's The Serrano Legacy and Vatta's War series; "Battlestar Galactica (2004)" for a SFnal take in which women and men both serve in the military; Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan series which features a patriarchal society). See also C. J. Cherryh's Downbelow Station; David Weber's Honor Harrington series (SF). More recently see Naomi Novik's Temeraire series (nautical dragon alternative historical fantasy stories).

A number of anthologies have been published that have explored women and "war", as opposed to the "woman warrior"; these typically include military SF, but may also include works focusing on the military from other perspectives.

• Women at War (1995), ed. by Lois McMaster Bujold and Roland J. Green (anthology of military SF by women authors)
• Women of War (2005), ed. by Tanya Huff and Alexander Potter (women involved in war issues; typically individual warriors, but some other war-related SF)

Related & countertrends

Feminist SF writers have also engaged the military, war, and violence, in a number of other genres, some of which occasionally touch on military SF in their focus on battle tactics, warriors, etc.

• Women warriors: Works involving women warriors often incorporate a de facto feminism, either including women soldiers and warriors without comment, or using the presence of women in the military to periodically raise feminist issues or social critiques of war and the military. For instance, Xena: Warrior Princess repeatedly engaged the question of peace versus warfare and the way of the warrior, and had numerous episodes featuring battle tactics, sometimes recreating historical battles (in Xenaverse faux-historical style).
• Anti-war feminists, and anti-war writers more generally, have explored the effects of war on civilian populations; the uses of war and militarization to maintain power and control in society. See, e.g., George Orwell's 1984; story in which women are maintained for breeding in a perpetual war --?; Marge Piercy's Woman on the Edge of Time in the dystopian possible future. Ecofeminists such as Starhawk in The Fifth Sacred Thing have explicitly contrasted militarism and violence with pacifism and nonviolence. See also Ursula K. Le Guin's Always Coming Home, for another story that juxtaposes a violent society with a peaceful one.