It's not a favorite book and sometimes it's far too heavy-handed, but I wouldn't say that it's completely non-sarcastic. It's mostly pro-military, but there's s

It's not a favorite book and sometimes it's far too heavy-handed, but I wouldn't say that it's completely non-sarcastic. It's mostly pro-military, but there's some definite ambivalence about what that means in execution down to the excessively brutal miltary discipline and the jabs at the way military leaders often waste lives through over-confidence. You can tell it was written in close proximity to the oft-overestimated "Stranger in a Strange Land" if you look a bit more carefully for the cynicism. Large chunks of the first half read as if Heinlein was looking forward to "Full Metal jacket", but couldn't quite pull it together on his own.