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The constantly increasing significance of logistics is reflected in the growing number of studies dealing with its history. Relatively little of importance was written before this century. World War I produced a few studies, in fields where logistics problems were most apparent. A larger number of volumes about the logistic experiences of World War II has already appeared, with more to come. In addition, many of the general war accounts pay more attention to logistics than was usual in the past.
Although Rear Admiral Stephen B. Luce seems to have introduced the word “logistics” on this side of the Atlantic some 75 years ago, the term did not become common until relatively recently. The subject, of course, is much older than that name, particularly in Army circles. Troops on the march have long had to wrestle with the problem of hauling their food, munitions, and other essentials. It was the further need of arranging shelter, or logis, at the end of a day’s march that led to the words logistics and quartermaster. By the very nature of things, navies in the days of sail had fewer logistic problems than did the armies. The ship of the line or frigate was pretty much a self-contained unit which could keep the seas for months without replenishing its stores. With the coming of steam, however, that strategic independence was radically curtailed by the need for coal. The United States Navy in the Civil War created a new “coal bureau,” and an advanced base at Port Royal to meet that need. The logistic problems of the Russian Baltic Squadron on its way around Good Hope to its destruction at Tsushima in 1905 were spectacular enough to call attention to such naval dependence; so, too, was the supplying of our “Great White Fleet” on its world cruise three years later.
Normally, however, the fighting men were likely to regard supply and service functions as something rather beneath them. The tone in which an oldtime naval line officer spat out the word paymaster was anything but complimentary, while the Quartermaster
Corps was the butt of more than one army jibe. The fighting men were apt to take it for granted that the necessary materials would be on hand when needed, but were not particularly concerned with how they got there. As one veteran naval captain expressed it, “When you are served a delicious and well-appointed dinner, you assume that your hostess has a well-run household, but you are not in the least interested in the details.” By the time of World War I, however, such events as the shocking absence of combat-loading at Gallipoli and the threatened line of supply across the subinfested Atlantic showed that at times grand strategy must take such matters into account. By World War II, the vastly increased complexity and volume of essential material, combined with the long distances to the fighting fronts, further emphasized the need of effective planning and distribution.
In its most flexible connotation, “logistics” includes not only the distribution of military material and manpower but also their procurement and the furnishing of essential services as well. The Navy, in its definition of command and administrative functions in 1945, drew the distinction between “producer” and “consumer” logistics. The former aspect, partly civilian in its nature and more often referred to as procurement or industrial mobilization, need not concern us here. Those interested in that phase will do well to consult Robert H. Connery’s The Navy and the Industrial Mobilization in World II (Princeton University Press, 1951), which includes suggestions for further reading in that phase of the subject.
The “consumer logistics” or logistics proper, is a more distinctly military subject. It falls into two major spheres, which might be termed the strategy and tactics of logistics. The former concerns itself with the top headquarters functions of determining requirements and of scheduling. The latter deals with the actual mechanics of distribution of material to the theaters of action and the furnishing of services there.
Of the three major auspices under which wartime logistics studies have been written, the British programs have been the most comprehensive, both for World War I and World War II. For the earlier conflict, their
History of the Great War, Based on Official Documents: By Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defense, published by Longmans during the 1920’s, covered a wide range of military and maritime subjects. Most pertinent from the standpoint of seagoing logistics were C. Ernest Fayle’s Seaborne Trade, 3 v., 192024, and Sir Archibald S. Hurd’s The Merchant Navy, 3 v., 1921-29. Just as in the World War II overall operational coverage by Captain S. W. Roskill for the Royal Navy and Rear Admiral Samuel Eliot Morison for the United States Navy, there was occasional suggestion of logistic aspects in the five-volume Naval Operations, started by Sir Julian Corbett and completed after his death by Sir Henry Newbold, 1920-31, with a revised edition, 1928-40. The costly consequences of improper combat-loading were discussed in C. F. Aspinall-Oglander, Military Operations, Gallipoli, 2 v. 1929-32. Supplementing that Official History was the British Series of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s economic and SOCIAL HISTORY OF THE WORLD WAR, published by the Oxford University Press; it included Salter’s Allied Shipping Control, 1921, and Fayle’s The War and the Shipping Industry, 1927.
Official British World War II Histories
For the coverage of World War II, the British official history of the second world war has been expanded to cover the scope of both of those earlier programs and still more, in some eighty volumes. This includes the UNITED KINGDOM CIVIL SERIES, edited by Sir Keith Hancock, containing a War Production Series directed by M. M. Postan; the united kingdom military histories, edited by Professor J. R. M. Butler; the united kingdom medical series, edited by Sir Arthur S. MacNalty; and nine volumes of popular military histories. These are published jointly by H. M. Stationery Office and Longmans. Canada, Australia, and New Zealand all have their own comprehensive war histories.
From the maritime logistics standpoint, perhaps the most significant of all these works so far is Merchant Shipping and the Demands of War (1955) by Miss Catherine
B. A. Behrens of Cambridge University. She pointed out that the World War I shipping studies had not been of particular utility to the planners of World War II. Fayle’s Seaborne Trade “was immensely '°ng,” and “contained a somewhat intractable mass of facts from which the general Principles were hard to deduce,” while Salter’s Allied Shipping Control “set out the general principles clearly, but in such a way that it was often difficult to see them in relation to the sequence of events, so that their significance was apt to escape the layman.” Since virtually all these wartime studies, except for the “shooting” stories, were written to pass on hard-learned lessons rather than to entertain casual readers, such considerations are important. Miss Behrens has successfully avoided those earlier pitfalls.
Her volume contains a tremendous amount of statistical and factual data, but tt is segregated in seventy-odd appendices at the ends of the various chapters, leaving the text clear for lucid explanation. Also, as she Points out, the earlier studies said virtually nothing about ports and port facilities, while she devotes a very substantial part of the hook to that aspect. There was little use, she demonstrated, in finding tonnage to carry cargo if it could not be landed and moved out of port areas, whether in the blitzed ports of Britain or in distant Archangel and Murmansk. In some strong passages on that deadly northern run, she remarked that “no government can ever have more obstinately insisted on the impossible than did the Russians.” All the way from Chapter I on “The Program of Planning for War in the Nineteen-Thirties” to the final Chapter XIX on “The End of the Crisis and the Achievements of the Anglo-American Shipping Alliance,” the story of the constant necessity to revise plans to meet emergencies makes this volume a “must” for any serious maritime library.
Next in value, perhaps, is the H. Duncan Hall volume on North American Supply (1955). Based particularly upon the archives of the British Supply Council in North America and other records in Washington, it follows the logistic history of the United States and Canadian contribution to British war production, particularly in the matter of ships and machine tools. It gives the picture from the top policy-making level. With C. C. Wrigley, Hall has also produced another Volume in the War Production Series, entitled Studies of Overseas Supply (1956).
While the Behrens volume covers most aspects of merchant shipping, the tanker situation will be covered in D. J. Peyton- Smith’s volume on Oil, and coastwise traffic in C. I. Savage’s Inland Transport. What might be termed reverse logistics, affecting the enemy’s supply problems, is being treated in W. N. Medlicott’s two volumes on Economic Blockade, the first of which, covering 1939-41, has already been published. Several other volumes of the Civil Series deal with the “producer logistics” aspect, notably M. M. Postan’s British War Production (1952).
In the MILITARY HISTORIES SERIES, the World War II counterpart of the Corbett and Newbold operational works is Captain S. W. Roskill’s The War at Sea, 1939-1945 (3 v., 1954- ), the first volume of which has been extremely well received. On the fringes of logistics, from the service standpoint, are some of the volumes in the medical series, particularly L. S. Coulter’s two volumes on The Royal Naval Medical Services, the “administration” volume of which is already published.
U. S. Official Histories
The second major official program is that of the United States Army, under the Chief of Military History. In its more restricted sphere, it shares many of the excellent qualities of the British project—comprehensive coverage of all aspects, authorship by qualified scholars, and able editorial supervision. Our Army has been slower than the British in covering World War I on the operational side, but Assistant Secretary of War Benedict Crowell, in collaboration with Robert F. Wilson, wrote a useful logistics study, The Road to France ... The Transportation of Troops and Military Supplies, 1917-1918 (2 vols., Yale University Press, 1921) as part of their six-volume series how America went to war, covering the material side of the Army’s war effort.
That, however, was extremely modest in comparison with the united states army in world war ii series now in progress, with some ninety volumes planned altogether. The timely work of two young regular colonels helped to make possible the impressive scope and quality of this program—a very generous amount, in seven figures, of unappropriated funds was somehow earmarked for the purpose; as a result the services of a large group of first-rate scholars have been secured. Constant highly effective guidance has come from the civilian Chief Historian, Dr. Kent Roberts Greenfield, former head of the History Department at Johns Hopkins University. The volumes fall into several major groups: The War Department, The Army Ground Forces, The Army Service Forces and the Technical Services, The War in Europe, The War in the Pacific, China-Burma-India, Middle East, and Special Studies. In the spring of 1955, Dr. Greenfield brought out an 81-page Master Index: Reader’s Guide, /, analyzing in detail the 25 volumes already in print. The series is published by the Government Printing Office.
Two of those volumes were valuable contributions to the field of logistics history. On the broad “logistics strategy” side is Richard M. Leighton and Robert W. Coakley, Global Logistics and Strategy, 1940-1043 (1955). Written from the standpoint of the central administration in Washington, it considers the global aspects of transportation, the division of resources among the different theaters, the allocation of material to allied nations, the coordination of logistic support of Army-Navy operations, and so on. The book has much in common with Duncan Hall’s North American Supply in the British series.
Closer to the “tactical” side of logistics in the Army history is Roland G. Ruppenthal’s logistical Support of the Armies in the European Theater of Operations series. The first volume, which appeared in 1953, carried the story through the termination of the post- Normandy pursuit in 1944. The second will continue the story to V-E Day. Ruppenthal analyzes the logistic difficulties arising from the building up of forces in England and then in supplying them in combat. There is a strong maritime element in this volume, for it has much to say about cross-Channel shipping and the development of beach and port facilities in France. It was an eyeopening experience to serve on the panel which examined the final draft of this volume. As is the custom with all of the Army History studies, several officers who had been prominent in the operations, several outside scholars, and several members of the Army History staff spent a whole day going over the book with the author. The experience helps one to understand why the series has achieved such general excellence.
Those two works have the highest logistic content in the Army studies, but several others deal with specific aspects. Particularly pertinent from the maritime angle is the first two of the three volumes of Chester Ward- low’s The Transportation Corps (1951—). Especially useful are Chapter 5, The Critical Role of Shipping; Chapter 6, Relations with other Ship-Operating Agencies; Chapter 7, Operation of the Army’s Large and Small Vessels; and Chapter 8, Other Marine Operations and Problems.
In both wars, the United States Navy’s official historical coverage has lagged far behind the British and the United States Army’s programs. In World War I, an ambitious and comprehensive series was planned at Admiral Sims’ headquarters in Europe, but the program petered out for lack of funds after a few brief monographs appeared; two bureaus, Yards & Docks and Ordnance, published full-dress accounts of their war experience, just as they would again in the second war.
The Navy’s World War II historical production resembles a sort of patchwork quilt, in contrast to the comprehensive coverage, uniform treatment, and uniform publication format of the British and United States Army series. Wide areas have not been covered at all, while there has been a striking lack of uniformity in the quality of treatment and even in auspices of publication.
Early in 1942, Professor Samuel Eliot Morison of Harvard had undertaken, with a reserve commission, a 14-volume history of UNITED STATES NAVAL OPERATIONS IN WORLD war ii, to be published by Little, Brown. While Morison and his staff of collaborators and assistants have been paid by the Navy, and have been given access to pertinent documents, the series has a semi-private status. The estimated date of completion,
originally set at 1950 has been moved to 1954 and then 1959.
In February, 1943, the Administrative History Program was set up as the Navy’s part of the Government-wide project, under the Bureau of the Budget, to record, for future use, the wartime administrative experiences of the various departments and agencies. Historical officers were appointed in each of the bureaus and in Naval Operations; later the program was extended to the shore- based headquarters of the major fleets and their type commands, sea frontiers, naval operating bases, naval districts, and shore stations. This program resulted in some 200 typescript volumes of what Director of Naval History Admiral E. C. Kalbfus termed “First Narratives,” together with collections of basic documents. One copy of each study was deposited in the Office of Naval History; the other remained with the activity which produced it. A number of them, in original or revised form, later appeared as regular printed volumes, while others came out in mimeographed form. In addition to that initial comprehensive coverage, four formal volumes were later undertaken, covering the whole history of the Naval Establishment from 1798 to 1947, with one volume each on Makers of Naval Policy, the Navy Department, the Operating Forces, and the Shore Establishment.
Perhaps the first of all the war’s logistic histories came out of the Administrative History Program—Duncan S. Ballantine’s U. S. Naval Logistics in World War II (Princeton University Press, 1947), a companion work to Connery’s study of Industrial Mobilization published under the same auspices. Ballantine, who is now President of Robert College at Istanbul, had served as a member of the Naval Operations historical section which worked under Admiral Frederick J. Horne, usn, the Vice Chief of Naval Operations. The study is oriented from that direction; it is essentially an account of the logistic “strategy” involving the determination of requirements and the overall plans for distribution.
From the Naval War College, where the study of logistics was developing in the postwar years under the direction of Rear Admiral Henry E. Eccles, usn, ret., came a request for an analysis of logistic “tactics” as well. For the moment, the “first narrative” of the Service Force, Pacific Fleet, written by Lieutenant Commander William C. Moore, usnr, was mimeographed for restricted distribution in 1949. At the Office of Naval History, moreover, two volumes on actual distribution were undertaken by Rear Admiral Worrell R. Carter, usn, ret., who had been Commander of Service Squadron Ten in the Pacific. He produced Beans, Bullets and Black Oil: The Story of Fleet Logistics Afloat in the Pacific during World War II (GPO, 1953) and Ships, Salvage and Sinews of War, a companion work for the Atlantic (1954). Rear Admiral E. E. Duvall, usn, ret., who had been his chief staff officer, collaborated in the latter volume. They contain a wealth of useful descriptive material, but relatively little of the analysis to be found in such works as those of Behrens in the British series or Ruppenthal in the Army series.
According to Admiral Eccles, they still left something to be desired. In the Naval Research Logistics Quarterly, which he had helped to establish, he wrote in 1955:
The history of U. S. naval logistics in World War II has not been completely written, and there appears to be little prospect that it ever will be written to the degree necessary to provide adequate and specific documentation for illustrating the major logistics lessons developed during that time. There are several good reasons for this.
First: The basic documentation in 1942-1945 was inadequate because the official historians and analysts in the Fleets were interested almost wholly in tactical matters.
Second: The logistic units were seldom organized and equipped to keep permanent accurate records and histories, and were not always encouraged to do so.
There has been, in addition to those three volumes devoted specifically to naval logistics, occasional peripheral material. Mori- son’s operational history suggests tactical considerations at times, as for example Admiral Fletcher’s concern over the fuel supply of his destroyers. The Bureau of Yards & Docks, through its history unit headed first by Lieutenant Commander Frank Herring, usnr, and later by Miss Helen Fairbank,
produced two detailed and well-illustrated volumes: Building the Navy’s Bases in World War II: History of the Bureau of Yards & Docks and the Civil Engineer Corps, 1940- 1946 (GPO, 1947). Unfortunately, there is still no adequate counterpart of Miss Behrens’ study of merchant shipping in the British series. The War Shipping Administration toyed with the idea of a full-dress study in 1942 but delayed the undertaking until around 1947 when the lack of funds quickly caused its suspension. Frederick C. Lane’s official and excellent Ships for Victory: A History of Shipbuilding under the U. S. Maritime Commission in World War II (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1951) naturally concentrates on the construction of vessels rather than their operation. The most comprehensive official coverage of the shipping situation is in Naval Overseas Transportation and Shipping Control (Navpers 10829, Bureau of Naval Personnel, 1949) in that bureau’s Naval Reserve Training Publications Project. Some 64 pages of the volume deal with the history of shipping during the war, though that amount was reduced in the 1954 edition. It was prepared in part by Willard C. McClellan who, as the first Forrestal Fellow at the Naval Academy, produced A History of American Military Sea Transportation which served as his Ph.D. thesis at American University in 1953 and is now awaiting publication. It covers the subject from 1898 to the formation of “M.S.T.S.” in 1949. Another unpublished thesis in the logistics field is C. H. Owens, Jr., The Logistical Support of the Army in the Central Pacific, 1941-1944 (Georgetown, 1954). And finally, among the manuscript material not yet published, a wealth of detail on specific aspects of logistics can be found among those 200 volumes of “first narratives” and records prepared in the Navy’s Administrative History Program.
PICTURE HISTORY OF THE U. S. NAVY: FROM OLD NAVY TO NEW, 1776 TO 1897. By Theodore Roscoe and Fred Freeman. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1956. 1200 illustrations; 1011 numbered paragraphs. §12.50.
Reviewed by Rear Admiral Ken- more M. McManes, usn
{Admiral McManes is Commander, Battleship- Cruiser Force, Atlantic Fleet.)
This is the story in pictures of the evolution of the U. S. Navy. It emphasizes the axiom that the nature of ones weapons determines the tactics to be employed. It unfolds in miniature the character of U. S. Navy fighting men and recreates the life of the sailor of those times. We find revealed the importance of sea power during the Revolution and recognized by George Washington in these words, “In any operations, and under all circumstances, a decisive naval superiority is to be considered as a fundamental principle and the basis upon which every hope of success must ultimately depend,” which are as true in 1956 as they were in 1780.
The picture history opens with illustrations of ships of war of the colonial period and indicates, for example, that the frigate was the cruiser of the 18th century, that a sloop-of-war and a war-brig were destroyer types. The reader’s memory will be refreshed to recall that the Turtle launched the world’s first submarine attack in 1776. The attack was unsuccessful, but it was the beginning. There are many gems of this nature throughout the book.
The many years of research that went into the collection of the pictures and accompanying text make the book a treasure of valuable information. The publishers state that the book contains the largest collection of John Paul Jones pictures (with some caricatures) ever published.
Every conflict of importance in which the U. S. Navy was engaged is reported by portraits, photographs, drawings, charts, and prints. The illustrations are accompanied by numbered paragraphs which would have aided clarity had they been tied more closely with the related picture.
The team of Freeman and Roscoe have brought their talents together as they did in U. S. Submarine Operations in World War II and the kindred volume U. S. Destroyer
Operations in World War II. Freeman’s drawings for the end papers and the Wasp and Reindeer action are superb.
Within the eight chapters, each of which mcludes several subheads, one can readily discern the growth of the U. S. Navy and the important part it has played in our history since the first six Marblehead schooners were converted to warships in 1775.
Laid before us as in a museum we see the Revolutionary leaders and their warships, °ld charts and Bowdich, sea stories and sea poetry, and a picture essay on the Texas Xavy.
It is a volume that fills one with a realization that the U. S. Navy has basically a great tradition of progress. We should hope that the authors will produce subsequent volumes to carry us from the Spanish- American War to guided missiles.
Everyone who loves the sea and ships, be he expert, amateur, or hobbyist, will enjoy many hours of reverie with this picture history before him.
Unfortunately, as is understandable in a compilation of this size and scope, there are a number of erroneous references in the captions and credit lines. These can be most irritating to the specialist but will cause the average reader no great concern, nor do they appreciably detract from the overall usefulness of this remarkable volume.
A MILITARY HISTORY OF MODERN
CHINA: 1924-1949. By F. F. Liu. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956. 512
pages. $6.00.
Reviewed by Colonel T. N. Dupuy,
U. S. Army
(Colonel Dupuy, who commanded Chinese troops in combat in Burma, and who is co-author of Military Heritage of America, is currently assigned to the Office of the Chief of Staff, U. S. Army.)
This fascinating book is not exactly what a military reader would expect from the title. The military operations of this period of incessant warfare in the Far East are only incidental to the theme of the book, which is really a review of military and politico-military affairs during the quarter-century of the ascendancy of Chiang Kai-shek in China.
While the reader may be disappointed and frustrated in his vain search for historical analysis of military operations, he will be richly rewarded by the objective survey of the rise and fall of Chiang Kai-shek, and of his Nationalist Government and army. No American writer has been able to depict so clearly the genius of one of the great men of China’s long history, and yet at the same time to record impartially the human failings which contributed so directly to Chiang’s eventual downfall.
The book has some shortcomings, which must be noted, but which can be overlooked when one considers that the author has written in a foreign tongue. There is, for instance, confusing repetition of accounts of the same events in different chapters, or different sections of the same chapter, with no indication that these matters had been treated earlier. There are some annoying proof-reading errors. There are some surprising gaps in the narrative. The diagrams and statistics are sometimes more obscuring than clarifying. The indexing could be more complete.
But these, really, are minor matters. The book’s lesson on the decay of a government, and the pernicious spread of the disease of defeat through an army and a people, should make it required reading for every informed American citizen, civilian or military. This lesson, and its profound analyses of personalities and institutions may cause some to compare the book (despite the great stylistic difference) with Sir Edward Spear’s Assignment to Catastrophe.
Throughout the book we find an amazingly candid and refreshing assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of Chiang Kai- shek: inspired patriot, brilliant soldier, indomitable leader of a great nation in adversity, stubborn and short-sighted politician, jealous meddler in petty details. Liu is equally objective in his discussion of the Chinese Communists. He is under no illusions as to the objectives of Communism in China, or of the influence of the Kremlin in the activities of the Chinese Communists, or of the extent to which their conquest of China was aided directly by the Soviet Union. Yet he notes with detached approval the organization, initiative, energy, and guile which brought the Chinese Communists victory over the disintegrating forces of the Nationalist Government.
Occasionally some pardonable national pride colors the author’s objectivity, as when he exaggerates the ability of the Chinese peasant to absorb modern military techniques. Or minimizes Japanese military capabilities with respect to Chinese forces. But these are balanced by the discussion of the problems which Chiang’s government had to surmount to keep China in World War II. And certainly there can be no quarrel with Liu’s assertions as to the numbers of Japanese forces which were thus kept tied up on the continent of Asia and unavailable in the defense of Japan’s Pacific empire, due to Chiang’s indomitable perseverance in the war.
Liu is careful not to blame the United States, or General Marshall, for the downfall of the Nationalist Government. Nevertheless, he clearly indicates his belief that the truces in the Civil War, brought about by the efforts of the Marshall Mission, were invariably used by the Communists to their own advantage. In some instances the consequences—at least locally—were disastrous. He also indirectly criticizes the inconsistency of a United States position of “neutrality” as between an allied, friendly government, and a revolutionary party attempting to overthrow that government. Some might feel that he could have laid more emphasis on the Marshall arms embargo, and on the disastrous moral and material effect which this had on the Nationalist Army and on the Chinese people.
On the other hand, it is refreshing to note that the author realizes clearly the organizational failures of the Nationalist Government, and is under no illusions as to the inner administrative confusion which led to disaster. In his description of the favoritism within the Kuomintang, which alienated so many patriotic military and civilian Chinese, Liu makes clear his understanding that the downfall of the National Government is not explicable in simple terms of black and white, or cessation or continuation of American aid to China.
Only in his unstinting approval of the military, patriotic, and political virtues of Generals Li Tsung-jen and Pai Chung-hsi can the reader detect the slightest element of partiality. If Chiang is ably presented as the classic hero of the modern tragedy of China, it is obvious that these supporting characters are the personal heroes of F. F. Liu.
Another hero of the book is General Albert C. Wedemeyer. Liu convincingly documents his apparent belief that China never had a truer, or nobler, friend than Wedemeyer.
He is less kind to General Stilwell. Nevertheless, even a soldier who fought under Stilwell in Burma, and who admired him as a magnificent combat leader, must acknowledge the brilliance and accuracy of Liu’s harsh (perhaps unnecessarily so) characterization of “Vinegar” Joe. Yet his over-all evaluation of Stilwell’s capabilities, his ability to recognize and praise the high standards of generalship which Stilwell displayed in Burma, are still further proof of Liu’s remarkable impartiality and analytic powers.
As does this reviewer, Liu believes that China’s downfall was the great disaster of the modern world. He considers the Stilwell- Chiang feud to be the greatest single contributing factor, leading directly and inevitably to the sad events of 1945-49. Painful though it is to admit it, Liu’s presentation and interpretation of the facts is most convincing.
THE AGE OF FIGHTING SAIL: The
Story of the Naval War of 1812. By C. S.
Forester. Garden City, N. Y. Doubleday.
1956. 284 pages. $5.00
Reviewed by Mark S. Watson
(Pulitzer Prize winner and military correspondent of The Baltimore Sun, Mr. Watson is author of Chief of Staff in the U. S. Army in World War II Series.)
Despite a few memorable treatments of the War of 1812 written in suitable perspective, popular American views of that conflict have been shaped chiefly by the numerous chauvinist narrations which dealt exclusively with American success. With better focus, Mr. Forester has identified the victories (which were indeed glorious) as the sea duels that they were, and not the war itself. He has done this in a narration as fascinating as his “Hornblower” tales of a valiant Briton of that period, and he deserves well of his adopted country (Mr. Forester now being a Californian).
Of the grotesque political background of ‘Mr. Madison’s war” and of the young nation’s failure to prepare itself for such a conflict as the mistress of the seas could wage once Britannia should disentangle herself from Napoleon, the author gives just enough to set the scene; likewise of America’s almost unfailingly dismal operations ashore; likewise of Britain’s enormous naval resources which were the main factor in forcing President Madison to negotiate for peace.
But the bulk of this entrancing tale deals with the brilliant feats which constitute noble pages in our naval records, with the performances of Rodgers, Decatur, Hull, Bainbridge, and their fellows on the high seas, and of Perry and Macdonough in the decisive battles on the Lakes; briefly, too, with the grand role of Joshua Humphreys who, barred by Congress from building anything larger than frigates, built the finest frigates that sailed; fleetingly of the very real skill and daring of American sailors and gunners of the privateers as well as the naval craft.
The individual exploits are reported with a deftness and authority that few writers of sea-tales have ever matched. The detail is as lucid as it is authentic, whether Forester is writing of Hull’s adroit extrication of the Constitution from an enemy trap (with kedge, and small-boat towing, and wetting of sails against the faint breeze) or of his subsequent epochal victory over the Guer- riere. Small as is this new volume, it is as welcome an addition to U. S. Naval History as has come from the press in a long time.
A MILITARY HISTORY OF THE WESTERN WORLD. Volume III: From the Seven Days Battle, 1862, to the Battle of Leyte Gulf, 1944. By Major General (Ret.) J. F. C. Fuller. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1956. Maps and index. $6.00.
Reviewed by Lynn Montross
(A civilian historian with the Marine Corps, Mr. Mon- tross is author of numerous military history books including War Through the Ages.)
With the publication of a third volume, Major General Fuller brings to a close his survey of warfare from the earliest times through World War II. This comprehensive work, as the climax to some thirty books about war, establishes the 78-year-old author as the foremost military analyst of an age which has provided only too much grist for his mill.
Vicksburg, Sedan, Port Arthur, the Marne, Amiens, Moscow, El Alamein, and Stalingrad are some of the battles described. General Fuller does not neglect the political and economic sides of strategy, nor does he confine himself to land warfare. The sea battles of Midway and Leyte Gulf are brilliantly interpreted, and it would be hard to improve upon this summary of the American naval effort in the Pacific:
“Nimitz had to move his base along with him, which meant that his fleet had to be both his base of operations and his striking force. It was, therefore, a four-fold organization—a floating base, a fleet, an air force, and an army, combined in one. That it was designed, built and assembled within eighteen months of the battle of Midway Island is without question the greatest organizational feat of naval history.”
Excellent chapters are devoted to Gallipoli and to the Normandy landings a generation later. Unfortunately, the decisive new American amphibious techniques of World War II are not given the attention they deserve. But the dazzling legend of strategic bombing does not blind Fuller to the fact that submarine sinkings did more than air raids to bring Japan to her knees.
So objective is this British soldier’s approach that an uninformed reader would not suspect his right to be known as the first great exponent of modern armored warfare. For he allots only a few paragraphs to the dawn of effective tank tactics at Cambrai in 1917—a battle planned by him as chief-of- staff of the British Tank Corps.
As might be expected, Volume III is charged with the TNT of controversy. Fuller has never shrunk from asserting his conclusions even when they were sure to explode under the seats of the mighty. Few readers will agree with all his judgments, but still fewer will deny the debt this generation owes him for his intellectual honesty and fearlessness.