© The Ecological Society of America www.frontiersinecology.org

For 60 years, Smokey Bear has successfully champi-oned fire suppression in the United States, but his success has come at considerable cost. Indeed, it could be likened to the British victory over American rebels at Bunker Hill in 1775, about which it was said, “A few more such victories would surely spell ruin for the vic-tors”. We examine the historical roots and consequences of US wildfire suppression policy. In addition, we criti-cally assess current efforts to ameliorate the effects of a century of wildfire suppression. Finally, we offer an alter-native approach to wildfire management that places less emphasis on suppression. Decades of aggressive wildfire suppression have caused a number of profound ecological changes in some of the nation’s forests. First, the composition of some forests is shifting toward less fire-tolerant species (Arno an