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LOGISTICAL SUPPORT OF THE ARMIES: EUROPEAN THEATER OF OPERATIONS. By R. G. Ruppenthal of the Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army. U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D. C. 616 pages. 1953. $4.50.
Reviewed by Rear Admiral Henry E.
Eccles, U. S. Navy (Retired)
{Admiral Eccles is a student of logistics. He was the first Head of the Department of Logistics at the Naval War College {1947) and has had extensive practical experience in logistics assignments.)
This excellent story of the build up of the U. S. Army in England and the preparations for and first three months of the continental invasion was written by Dr. R. G. Ruppenthal, a Reserve Lieutenant Colonel with campaign experience in VII Corps and Third Army. A second volume will continue the story to the end in May, 1945.
The work is objective, factual, and well organized. However, it would be easier to analyze if it contained a chronology and a fold out map of the whole area with planned and actual phase lines of tactical advance.
The sheer mass of the available data on the Army’s logistical operations in World War II tends to overwhelm the non-technical student. Complete analysis will not be possible until the completion of this comprehensive series. However, certain basic lessons and patterns of cause and effect are clearly evident.
The scheme of operations set the pattern for the Command Organizations which, with task assignments, set the nature and pattern of the staffs. The scale and timing of the operations determined the size of the staffs and the rate at which they should be built up. The readiness of the staffs to function determined the rate at which combat forces and supplies could be usefully expanded. Staff and Material Logistic build up had to precede Combat Force build up.
The failure to build up staffs and supply levels before they were needed resulted in critical shortages. The resultant emphatic demands not only produced direct waste in their hasty fulfillment but caused further harmful effects by eventually producing an oversupply of the materials desired. This in turn clogged the normal distribution channels, thus impeding the distribution of other needed and available items.
Thus the Logistics Snowball was set into operation. Combat Forces were diminished in effectiveness and the unnecessary, avoidable waste became huge.
There was continual argument as to the proper ratio of combat to service troops. Many commanders and planning officers failed to understand the principle stated on page 332, “ . . . the faster an army intended to advance and the more violent the blows it desired to strike, the larger must be its administrative tail.”
The continued basic conflict between “functional” and “regional” command is illustrated by the statement on page 209: “It was characteristic of the theater that directives on command and organization always seemed to fall short of clear cut definitions of responsibility and authority, leaving much room for contention.”
The book abounds in illustrations of the interrelationship of logistics and tactics. Such is the discussion of air transported supply on page 576:
“Scarcities bred scarcities. Airfields for both tactical and administrative use were urgently needed. To restore captured air fields and to build new ones, engineer materials had to be shipped in transport that was already desperately inadequate.”
The volume ends on an appropriate somber note as to the situation at the end of September, 1944:
“For the next two months supply limitations were to dominate operational plans, and the Allies were now to learn the real meaning of the tyranny of logistics.”
In summation, only when the major lessons of this history are understood by officers in command and operations billets as well as by those in logistics billets will it be possible fully to develop our future combat effectiveness.
MARINE INDOCHINE. By Jacques Mor-
dal. Amiot-Dumont, Paris, 1953. 231
pages with 15 photographs. 720 francs
($2.10 est.)
Reviewed by Russell Brooks
(A veteran of over twenty-five years of foreign service with the Department of State, Mr. Brooks was the American Consul at Casablanca in 1941 and served in France and her dependencies at various strategic centers until his retirement in 1948.)
Jacques Mordal (the nom de plume of a French naval medical officer), who with less literary appeal but much greater historical accuracy has replaced the late Paul Chack as the Morison of the French Navy, has published his latest book Marine Indochine, covering the period from the Armistice of 1940 to the middle of 1953.
History has no record, says Mordal, of naval operations comparable with those in Indochina, for because of few land communications the navy’s principal efforts were on inland waters. During the Japanese occupation the navy undertook the essential exchange of coal and rice between Tonkin and Cochin China, furnished two policy making Governors General, Admirals Decoux, a Petain choice, and later Thierry d’Argenlieu, his Gaulist successor, and after Japan’s defeat carried into the otherwise inaccessible bayous, rice fields, and tidal swamps of the Viet Nam troops and navy commandos to stamp out the insurrection, transported reoccupying forces by sea, and patrolled a coastline over 1,600 miles in length. For over fourteen years French naval forces have fought against a treacherous enemy, whenever a landing craft or motor boat could float.
Occupied France meant Indochina deprived of all aid from the metropole and left on its own to meet the triple threat of China, Japan, and Thailand. Admiral Darlan observed that to refuse a Japanese offer of “common defence,” equalled invasion; to protest, assured elimination; to accept, provoked Anglo-American enmity, and counselled bending before the storm, by agreeing to help in the defence of the territory, but declining offensive operations. Mordal makes a strong case for the policy of tergiversation, made inevitable by the inability of French authorities to take independent action and which found partial justification in the nominal re-establishment of French sovereignty in 1946.
With the defeat of France, Thailand claims to Cambodian territory resulted in an undeclared frontier war and the little known battle of Koh Chang, the only engagement fought—and won—by a French naval division, after French prepared plans, and with wholly French material, during the course of two World Wars. The combat, off the island of Koh Chang in the Gulf of Thailand, was between the light cruiser La Molte Piquet and four colonial avisos under Captain Berenger (now Vice Admiral, retired) and Thai forces of two modern armored coastguard ships with 203 mm. guns and three torpedo boats, and ended in the total destruction of the latter. But France derived no benefits from the victory, for Japan fearing Anglo-American intervention in favor of Thailand “arbitrated” the controversy by accepting the Thai thesis, a concession unwarranted by the military situation of the belligerents.
The American declaration of war pyramided Indochina’s difficulties, and it is understandable that the French navy has not yet entirely condoned American mine laying, the torpedoing of French coastwise shipping, and the bombing and destruction of French merchant and naval vessels, among the latter the La Molle Piquet moored in the Donnai.
Mordal treats the Allied agreement of November 8, 1943, dividing Indochina into two military zones—below the 16th Parallel to Mountbatten—above to Chiang Kai- shek, and the “unfortunate delay” of 28 days between the Japanese capitulation and the arrival of the first Allied troops—objectively, but makes it clear that he regards them as important causes of the prolongation of the war.
French passive resistance to the occupation ended March 9, 1945, when Japan menaced by MacArthur’s return to the Philippines, made prisoner the Governor General, his staff, and all military and naval personnel and seized stores and equipment. Native soldiers deserted en masse and French fugitives were betrayed by the inhabitants. French influence practically disappeared.
After Japan’s defeat, re-establishment of an unsubstantial French authority was possible only by close co-operation of army and navy in the heavy fighting against both Viet Nam (nationalist) and Chinese forces, the latter in Tonkin. A curious incident of the campaign was the use, probably for the first time in naval warfare, of a bazooka to capture a rebel junk.
A treaty of March 24, 1946, with Ho Chi Minh recognized the independence of the Viet Nam Republic (Annam, Cochin China, and Tonkin) within the French Union and marked the official end of hostilities. But there was no peace, for guerrilla warfare by both the nationalist and pro-communist elements of the Viet Nam against the French, was followed by the grave incidents of Haiphong and Hanoi near the end of the year. Ho Chi Minh had deliberately broken with France and in so doing split the Viet Nam into two camps—the nationalistic Viet Nam Republic which accepts French aid and the communistic Vietminh, or party for the Independence of the Viet Nam! During the following three years Ho Chi Minh became a tracked fugitive, his only hope Chinese intervention. Bao Dai who had collaborated with Japan was given French support and returned to his throne in 1949, and French and Viet Nam forces controlled most of Indochina, except the mountainous regions of Tonkin and Northern Annam.
But French indecision and Chinese assistance to the Vietminh reversed the situation, and in 1953 France was in a war far beyond its military and financial potentialities—incidentally one disliked by all.
General Gieps, Vietminh commander-inchief, is now fighting his seventh French adversary: Nazarre, who was preceded by Leclerc, Valluy, Blaizot, Charpentier, de Lattre, and Salan; since the recall of Admiral d’Argenlieu, several Governor’s General or High Commissioners of various political beliefs have come and gone, and France has had fifteen premiers since 1946!
Reading Mordal one is humble before the continuity and fidelity of the French Navy.
OIL IN THE SOVIET UNION: HISTORY,
GEOGRAPHY, PROBLEMS. By Heinrich Hassmann; translated by Alfred M.
Leeston. Princeton University Press,
Princeton, N.J. 173 pages. 1953. $3.75.
Reviewed by Rear Admiral Burton B. Briggs, U. S. Navy
(A U. S. Naval Academy graduate in the Class of 1921, Admiral Briggs is currently serving as Commander Service Force, U. S. Pacfiic Fleet.)
Oil in the Soviet Union, in common with other studies of the Soviet oil industry, contains many estimates of production and refining which, although they cannot be disproved, are almost equally difficult to authenticate. The coverage of details of the various oil regions is truly Teutonic. The great unanswered question remains—“what oil development has been attained in the plains of Siberia?” There is an implication that these northern regions are under extensive study resulting in an unknown amount of exploration and development.
On page 61, appear five interesting points of difference between the Czarist and Soviet oil industry. One clause under point 2 should be of interest to our legislators at the present time, “ . . . the government prevented a sound development of its oil industry by shortsighted legislation; . . . .” This indicates that the pressure groups and special pleaders had their way without too much regard to the general welfare or future national needs.
The author’s discussion of “Problems of the Industry” is by far the most thought- provoking portion of the book. The estimation of Soviet oil demand has occupied economists, oil industry executives (some of whom are economists in the best sense of the term), and military planners for the past eight or ten years. “ . . . the conclusion that the Russian oil supply is the Achilles’ heel of the Soviet economy” is, as the author points out, not necessarily true. He might have cited the length of time Germany supported a war on two fronts with a mere 400,000 barrels per day of petroleum products. The U. S. consumed within her own borders 4,000,000 barrels per day during the same war period.
Technological progress and status of a country does have a marked effect upon the demand for petroleum products. This effect can be over-emphasized as well as any other. The comparison of a highly industrialized Germany and an equally highly industrialized United States cited above is a case in point. In the Soviet Union, the author implies that as the years pass technological advances will make petroleum supply the greatest problem. He cites the sharp increase in the use of tractors in agriculture in the Soviet Union as one example. In this connection he states, “The almost complete mechanization of Russian farming would force a crisis and probably cause a disastrous food shortage in the event of an insufficient allotment of oil.” Considering the manpower supply of the Soviet Union, it would appear that a number of things could be done to prevent “a disastrous food shortage” regardless of either the degree of mechanization or rationing of petroleum products.
Although a number of similar controversial statements contained in this book could be pointed out and in a few cases refuted, it remains a challenging discussion. All military officers could profit from reading Oil in the Soviet Union. Part IV and the Epilogue warrant particular attention, if for no other reason than to lacerate some of the author’s conclusions.
SOVIET EMPIRE, THE TURKS OF CENTRAL ASIA AND STALINISM. By Sir Olaf Caroe. St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1953. 300 pages with Bibliography and Index. $5.00.
Reviewed by Vice Admiral L. C.
Stevens, U. S. Navy
(Admiral Stevens is the author of Russian Assignment •which records his first hand observations of the Communist state while U. S. Naval Attache in Moscow, 1947-49.)
In his long and distinguished career as a top administrator of the Northwest Provinces of India, Sir Olaf Caroe came to realize fully the necessity of understanding what lay immediately beyond the borders in the Soviet Union. The vast area of desert, steppe, and mountains south of the Transsiberian railroad between the Caspian Sea and China, more than half the size of the United States, is made up of the five so- called Republics of Uzbekistan, Turkmenia, Kirghizia, Kazakis- tan, and Tajikistan. It is inhabited by some 17,000,000 people, two-thirds of whom, although of complex origins, are basically Turanians. For the most part, these Moslem lands have been taken over by the Russians only within the memory of men who are still alive.
This is the legendary land of'Prester John, traversed by the caravans of the Silk Road, so isolated both by its remoteness and by the policies of its rulers that in the four hundred years from the time of Timurlane to the middle of the nineteenth century, Samarkand, a chief city, was visited only twice by Europeans. It has been effectively isolated for the last generation by the Soviet regime, and even under the Tsars, it was a secret land. “There seemed always something to conceal, a rebellion, a massacre, an advance not to be at once avowed.” Chinese Turkestan, its extension into Sinkiang, has long been much more accessible to Westerners. There is far more in Sir Olaf’s book than its limited title implies. He gives us an excellent interpretative summary of what is known of Russian Turkestan; its geography, history, peoples, economics, politics, and temper. This is the most important book on Turkestan to have appeared in English since Lord Curzon’s work in 1889. It is the only one that has ever covered such a wide range. He relies greatly on the writings of Zeki Velidi Togan, which have never been translated from the Turkish, but this reliance is well-founded, for Togan is the great historian and spokesman of those peoples in the Western world today.
Turkestan, the land of the Oxus of Alexander the Great, has always been a borderland where conflicting cultures have met; those of the oasis and the nomad, the European Russian and the Asiatic tribesman, industrialization and the tending of herds and flocks, Communism and Islam. It is at one and the same time a point of major weakness in the Soviet empire and a bridge to the rest of Moslem Asia.
This book is modest and reliable, scholarly without being pedantic. When confronted with a maze of confused evidence, as in the vexed problem of the origins of various peoples, Sir Olaf admits the confusion and clings to some broader guide, such as the natural division between the nomads and the tillers of the soil, the city and the desert. This book contains explanations only in so far as explanations make sense. But it is full of color, from the account of Timurlane as seen through Eastern eyes and the torture pits of Bukhara to the dramatic death of Enver Pasha and the Basmachi Rebellion, which lasted much longer than the Soviets ever admitted and still lives in the hearts of the Eastern Turks.
Here the reader will encounter such intriguing characters as Colonel Bailey, who helped the Bolsheviks to chase himself, or Ossipov, the Tsarist officer who cast his lot with the Bolsheviks only to turn treacherously on his own leaders, shoot them all, and, “after one crowded hour of glorious life in command of the situation, gave away his advantage by getting superbly drunk and decamping with the money in the direction of Ashkabad.” There are important details of Togan’s direct conversations with Lenin and
Stalin which show clearly the cynicism of the Soviet leaders. Or, if one’s taste runs to politico-economics, there are excellent analyses of the effects of suppressing the nomads, or of the practicability of the canal and hydroelectric systems planned by the regime.
Although Russian Turkestan is not in the news of today, it is safe to predict that when the Bolshevik regime finally disintegrates, it will be of great importance. Sir Olaf Caroe’s book gives one the best background available for understanding why that is true.
UNCONDITIONAL HATRED. GERMAN WAR GUILT AND THE FUTURE OF EUROPE. By Captain Russell Grenfell, R.N. New York: The Devin-Adair Company, 1953. 273 pages. $3.75.
Reviewed by Lieutenant Minot Simons II, U. S. Navy
(Lieutenant Simons is an instructor in the Department of Seamanship and Navigation at the Naval Academy. He has served in the Sixth Fleet as a Naval Aviator and as a Flag Lieutenant.)
Those who enjoyed Main Fleet to Singapore will welcome Captain Russell Grenfell’s new book, Unconditional Hatred. His readers know Captain Grenfell as a writer with a flair for the facts and a gift for tying them together into very interesting reading. The new book, similar in style and construction to Main Fleet, is a criticism of Britain’s policy toward France and Germany since 1815. The title, Unconditional Hatred, refers to the meaningless, harmful hatred that has been fanned into the hearts of Englishmen by the British government in order to blame Germany and absolve Britain and France of war guilt. Captain Grenfell analyzes the relationships of the three countries since 1815 and finds that Britain and France have records of aggression that are undeniable and quite extensive. Furthermore, they are each just as responsible as Germany, if not more so, for World War I. They are definitely responsible for the Treaty of Versailles and for the circumstances in Germany that made Hitler’s accession to power inevitable.
If it was unjust to consider Germany solely responsible for the last two wars, it was a much more serious mistake, Captain Grenfell explains, to believe that her unconditional surrender would prevent any further recurrence of war. On the contrary, since unconditional surrender is a purely military objective, it makes no provision for a political objective to be achieved after the military phase has been won. Therefore, by demanding it during World War II, the Allies exhausted themselves far more than if they had settled for a conditional peace; ironically they had subsequently to exhaust themselves still further to prevent their former enemy from falling into the hands of the communists.
Left with the situation as it is, Captain Grenfell would prefer to depend less upon the United Nations than upon a third great power—namely, a political-military union of Britain, France, and Germany—to prevent a third world war. Such a union would be more dependable and more effective, he believes, than the present system of defensive alliances. The community of interests thus achieved would keep this union intact when, in spite of agreements, other countries might decide that their own interests were not directly involved.
The ideas in Unconditional Hatred are bold; they may not win general approval, at least, not immediately. As a source of a new outlook on modern European history, however, and as a new approach to the problem of keeping the peace, it is highly recommended.
SOPRANINO. By Partick Ellam and Colin
Mudie. New York: W. W. Norton Co.,
Inc., 1953. 288 pages. 1953. $3.75.
Reviewed by Boris Lauer-Leonardi
(Mr. Leonardi, himself a yachtsman, is the editor of The Rudder Magazine.)
This is a remarkable tale of a ten thousand- mile passage from Falmouth, England, to New York over the fabled southern track, the route that is God’s highway to the new world on which everything streams westward, air, water, birds, and even butterflies. In fact, the westward surge of the elements is so strong there that it is difficult to understand why the Europeans were so dilatory in discovering the western hemisphere.
The ship the authors selected was minute. Figures only will give a true comprehension of how small she was. Four inches short of twenty feet, she had a beam of only five feet four inches. Ellam graphically states, “When I stood on the keel, the cabin roof came up to my waist, while from there I could stretch out my arms and lay my hands over both sides of our little boat at once.”
The idea back of the transatlantic passage was the desire on the part of these two young gentlemen to prove to the world that a small boat could survive at sea. Since men have been messing around in boats for some time, this information was available. In fact, it is admitted that a stout beer keg will survive a hurricane, although the passengers would be somewhat discouraged. However, Ellam and Mudie performed a feat that leaves the average sailor aghast at their ability to withstand discomfort and apparently enjoy it and thrive on it.
The idea, and the book, are primarily Patrick Ellam’s. To make life easier for the reader, however, Mudie’s thoughts are printed in italics. This is a true forward step in publishing practices.
Now back to the story. Ellam had the boat especially developed by Laurent Giles, a leading British yacht designer, and she was carefully built and arranged. After several short passages and voyages across the channel the real test begins with Mudie aboard as shipmate. The first run across the Bay of Biscay to Corunna leaves the reader astounded that they are still willing to go on. This is a rough body of water, and that they took a beating is obvious although unmentioned. Ellam writes with typical British restraint, his ability of understatement often appearing coy. Refreshing also is the occasional flash of humor which softens what often threatens to become a tragedy.
From Spain via Portugal to Las Palmas in the Canaries nothing seems to bother them except a mysterious malady which besets Mudie, but he recovers handsomely.
Here begins the transatlantic run, the 2,700 miles to Barbados. They sail south for the trades and settle down for real passage making. This is the sailor’s heaven—fresh winds, clear skies, settled weather. Some of the finest writing in the book is found here. Since time immemorial the sailor is at his best at sea, away from the land, and, too, he is safest.
They make Barbados in twenty-seven days, with the best day’s run 134 miles. Exceptionally good going and a top notch performance.
From Barbados the pace of the narrative becomes hasty. The reader feels as if the publisher had set a word limit. A splendid cruise through the West Indies, up the Florida coast, and through the Inland Waterway to New York is told in telegraphic style. Incidentally the splendid Mudie, a stout Scotsman, left the ship in Cuba to fly to Bermuda to participate in a small-boat race to Plymouth. Patrick carries on singlehanded. A fine narrative of an exceptional achievement in small boat voyaging.
THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS. By Ewen Montagu. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1954. 160 pages, illustrations. $2.75.
THE MEN IN THE TROJAN HORSE. By Kurt Singer. Boston: The Beacon Press, 1953. 258 pages, index. $3.50.
Reviewed by Richard Gordon McCloskey
(Mr. McCloskey is Ike author of many military lexls and a contributor to military journals. Formerly editor of the Combat Forces Press, he specializes in intelligence and naval affairs.)
Operation Mincemeat was one of the most brilliant intelligence ruses of all time. Its purpose was to convince the Germans that Sicily, the most obvious point of attack for the Allies in North Africa, was not the most obvious point. Lieutenant Commander Montagu produced a plan for this purpose which a reputable author of thrillers would not dare use: Take an anonymous corpse, give him an identity as a supposed Major of the Royal Marines bearing top secret messages, cast him from a submarine into the sea where he will float to the Spanish shore at a point where a German agent is known to be operating. Then sit back and hope that not only will the body be discovered by the Spanish and the documents turned over to the Germans, but that the enemy right up to the High Command will be deceived into spread-eagling their defensive effort across Europe, even to the extent of ordering troops away from Sicily.
Those in brief are the details of the highly successful Operation Mincemeat. How it was carried out and how the many problems were solved (one of the greatest problems was convincing the British High Command to approve the plan) makes an enthralling narrative. The many details provided make the book of great intelligence interest.
* * *
Kurt Singer, a successful popularizer of spies and spying techniques, has made a useful summary of the more successful twentieth century spies and intelligence operations. He devotes considerable space to Lavrenti Beria, whose intelligence net failed him at the most crucial moment; and to Admiral Canaris, whose ability as an intelligence chief is still undetermined; and deals briefly with Sillitoe of England and Dulles of the United States.
Mr. Singer follows these individual analyses with examples of typical intelligence nets. Three of them are Communist: the Red Orchestra net in Germany; the Orlov- Andersson net in Sweden; and the Sorge net in Japan. The fourth is the despicable Quisling operation in Norway. Some individual agents are then singled out: Otto Katz, the “Grey Eminence”; Gerhart Eisler, the “Whip”; the Grand Mufti; Noel, Field, whose disappearance is still a mystery; Malenkov’s hatchet-man, Wilhelm Zaisser; Tomas Santiago, the “Manilla Boy”; and Godse of the Hindu Mahassabha (Grand Society), who murdered Ghandi.
At the beginning and end of the book Mr. Singer offers some perfunctory observations on the meaning of intelligence, the psychology of espionage, and the danger of canonizing ex-Communists. He makes the pointed comment that the ex-Communists are the favored children of amateur investigating committees, but not of the professional intelligence agencies.
The book is dramatically written, and makes easy reading about an unpleasant but very essential subject.