A Civil War: A Year Inside College Football’s Purest Rivalry
John Feinstein. Boston, MA: Little, Brown and Company, 1996. 412 pp. Photos. $24.95 ($22.45).
Reviewed by Lieutenant Colonel Dick Seamon, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve (Retired)
Start a longtime coach talking about football and you may be sorry. More often than not the answer will be a litany of games won and lost in high school, college, and the pros. No score, no single play, no foul-up by an official is likely to be left out. It is a performance that can glaze the eyes and boggle the mind.
As an experienced sports reporter, John Feinstein must be all too familiar with just how deadly such detailed reminiscences can be. But he obviously believes that they need not always be dull. In A Civil War he follows the Navy and Army football teams through the entire 1995 season. The games, the scores, the players, the coaches; everything is familiar. Yet with singular skill Feinstein manages to rebuild the old excitement, the old suspense. Is that try for a field goal going to make it? Will that desperate “Hail Mary” pass be caught? Will that goal-line defense succeed? We know all the answers and they will never change. But the pleasures and disappointments of that past autumn come back with surprising freshness in Feinstein’s after-action report.
There is more here, of course, than the games themselves. The demanding regimen that must be survived both by midshipmen and cadets, the impact of scandals old and new, biographies of key players, the coaches’ odysseys that eventually land them at the two service academies—all add important muscle to the story.
As a good journalist, the author clearly did careful research. He seems to have been at every practice, every team meeting, every game. He understands the difficulty of recruiting top-rank football players for schools that will demand they actually study and attend class, to say nothing of serving in the Army and Navy after graduation. We are also reminded, though, that as a partial balance, the service academies are not bound by the same limits on athletic scholarships that apply to civilian schools. After all, all students at the service academies hold full government scholarships.
For the most part, Feinstein refrains from passing judgment. He does not avoid obvious questions; instead, he tells the story and lets the reader decide: Are football players given special treatment? Should an academy superintendent offer to help a player avoid part of his military commitment if he is anxious to play for the pros? If marriage before graduation is cause for dismissal, how can an unwed father continue on an academy team? If a first-string senior has a disease (diabetes) that will prevent him from being commissioned should he be allowed to play out the season? We are given enough information; we need not be told the answers. Nor do we need any comment on the report that during the week of hijinks preceding the 1995 Army-Navy game, the Commandant of Midshipmen stripped to his skivvies in 25° weather and turned cheerleader. Nothing needs to be added to the anecdote about a female plebe who punched out an upper-class midshipman and put her in the hospital. (So much for chauvinists who sneer at the idea of women in hand-to-hand combat.)
Inevitably, some of the author’s own conclusions come through clear enough, as well they should. He is properly scornful of athletes who moan after their final game, “How can I live with no more football?” He admires men like Navy’s Ryan Bucchianeri who stuck it out at the Academy after his missed field goals in both the 1993 and 1994 Army games made him the butt of some of the most mean-spirited attacks ever inflicted on any midshipman—by other midshipmen!
For all his excellent reporting, Feinstein makes some silly grammatical glitches that a careful editor surely would have corrected. And if he should ever follow the route he describes from Bancroft Hall to the Navy-Marine Corps Stadium, he will never get to the game. Such quibbles aside, A Civil War is far richer than a chronicle of one year’s Army- Navy football. It makes abundantly clear that television commentator Brent Musburger was not indulging in hyperbole when he described a Navy-Army game by saying; “There is no bowl game at stake here. There is no coalition poll, no number-one ranking, no Heisman Trophy is at stake either. This is bigger than all that.”
Colonel Seamon was the former assistant managing editor of Time magazine when he retired, and is a frequent contributor to Proceedings.
War With Japan
Naval Historical Branch, Ministry of Defence. London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1995.
Book I (Vol. I, II), 480 pp.
Book 2 (Vol. Ill), 320 pp.
Book 3 (Vol. IV, V), 556 pp.
Book 4 (Vol. VI), 316 pp.
Bib. Ind. Notes. Photos. Maps. £190 (approx. $285). Order directly from publisher (fax 011-44-171-873-8200).
Reviewed by Norman Polmar
After World War II, the British government sponsored a massive historical writing program. This effort was in marked contrast to the U.S. Navy, which has produced only minor operational histories of the war. While historian Samuel Eliot Morison did produce a comprehensive and highly readable History of United States Naval Operations in World War II (15 volumes, 1947-1962), this was an unofficial history, and Admiral Morison and his several collaborators did not have access to classified material.
The most popular British naval history of the war is unquestionably the three-volume The War at Sea by the brilliant S.W. Roskill. A serving naval officer, Roskill had access to classified materials while writing his book. While the Roskill history was unclassified, the Royal Navy also produced a large number of specialized histories that were classified, among them the six-volume War With Japan.
The British government now has reprinted the War With Japan for commercial sale. This is a detailed history of World War II naval operations in the Pacific theater as well as Southeast Asia, including the Indian Ocean. Herein is described the grand sweep of the Japanese Combined Fleet from 7 December 1941 until its defeat at Midway in June 1942, and then the long, bloody Allied campaigns to vanquish Japan.
American readers will be particularly interested in the coverage of Allied planning, Japanese plans and intentions, and specific British and Commonwealth naval operations. These aspects of the war with Japan are generally ignored in American naval writings.
For example, the discussion of the operations of the British carrier force in the Pacific in 1944-1945, operating a task force of the U.S. Third/Fifth Fleet, explains the political as well as logistic handicaps of that effort.
Unfortunately, the six volumes are reproduced (in four books) as they were originally printed—complete with errors that could have been corrected easily—or at least should have been noted for the modern reader. Obvious errors include (in Book 1) a photo of a Parnall Peto floatplane taking off from the British submarine M-2 labeled "Floatplane taking off from Japanese submarine,” while the same book gives credit to the U.S. submarine Nautilus (SS-168) for sinking the damaged Japanese aircraft carrier Soryu at the Battle of Midway. (The only Nautilus torpedo that struck a Japanese aircraft carrier—the Kaga—at Midway did not detonate.)
Perhaps most frustrating to the contemporary reader of War With Japan is the absence of discussions of Allied code- breaking, and its impact on the war. There are hints here and there; at Midway; "By the middle of May [1942] American naval decoders and intelligence officers were aware that Japan was concentrating her fleet movements for movements of the first importance." But nothing more.
A related frustration is the use of reports of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey (USSBS) as a primary source. Although a valuable undertaking, portions of the USSBS were written hurriedly after the war, making use of sometimes confusing Japanese statements, and without the benefit of codebreaking intelligence, as only the director and the principal deputies apparently had access to Ultra-Magic material, which could not be used in the project.
Still, the books are interesting and, to the professional historian and navalist, useful. Also on the plus side, each of the four books of War With Japan is accompanied by a separate packet of excellent maps that provide extensive details of both the areas discussed and the sea battles described. The books have extensive appendixes, which list the composition of Allied and Japanese forces and provide other useful tabulations. Finally, the historian will find the books’ numerous footnotes and lengthy bibliographies invaluable for their lists of Royal Navy reports and other documents.
A frequent contributor to the Proceedings, Norman Polmar is a naval analyst and historian. He is coauthor, with Thomas B. Allen, of the award-w inning World War II: America at War, 1941-1945.
Patton: A Genius for War
Carlo D'Este. New York, NY: HarperCollins, 1995. 809 pp. Ack. Bib. Ind. Maps. Notes. Photos. $35.00 ($31.50).
Reviewed by Lieutenant Colonel John English, Canadian Army (Retired)
Like many other army officers, I have made the pilgrimage to the grave of General George S. Patton, Jr., who even in death appears to lead his ghostly Third Army troops. I have also listened in rapt attention as Martin Blumenson concluded, during a mess dinner, that Patton was more of a poet than a soldier. Several years later, at a McCormick Tribune Foundation/Naval Institute-sponsored conference at Cantigny, I had the additional opportunity of hearing Andy Rooney present another, far less favorable view of Patton as a commander of U.S. troops. Without question, the high- strung and flamboyant Patton remains a historical enigma, which may well be why the distinguished soldier-historian Carlo D'Este chose to produce yet another biography, his first such work, on the man.
Although a wealth of literature exists on Patton’s battles and campaigns, little actually has been written about his childhood and military career prior to 1939. In 25 of 47 chapters, D’Este fills this historiographical gap by drawing upon a formidable amount of primary source material. We are told, for example, that the Pattons emigrated to Virginia from Scotland, and that 16 of their kin fought with distinction for the Confederacy. The youthful Patton, who suffered from dyslexia, also had a living hero in the infamous Confederate partisan leader John Singleton Mosby, a frequent guest of the Patton family. Always deeply conscious of his lineage, Patton unquestionably gloried in the romance of the Civil War and when he entered the Virginia Military Institute in 1903, he was the third George S. Patton to do so.
As a young officer from an affluent and relatively influential family, Patton appears to have led a charmed life more reminiscent of that enjoyed by polo-playing British upper classes than main street Americans. He was the first U.S. Army officer to represent the United States in the Olympic modem pentathlon, and went on to become the first ever master of the sword in the U.S. Army. Tellingly, he also traveled at his own expense to the French Army cavalry school at Saumur to receive instruction in the finer points of swordsmanship. Patton also served as an aide to “Black Jack” Pershing, the fiancé of his wife’s sister, during both the 1916 punitive expedition against Pancho Villa and the last year of the Great War. The first U.S. soldier to be assigned to the new American tank corps, Patton distinguished himself in the Saint-Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne offensives. Wounded in the latter operation, he finished the war as a colonel.
In relating the story of Patton’s formative and wartime experiences, D’Este explodes many of the myths that have come to be associated with the Patton legend. What emerges is not always a pretty picture, but often an unpleasant portrait of a man driven less by principle than by an obsessive thirst for greatness and crude career advancement. Virtually friendless at West Point, where he developed a reputation for being a stickler and an advocate of spit-and-polish, the ambitious Patton seemed forever to be courting those whose influence counted most. He was also a bundle of contradictions hidden behind a veneer of toughness and an affected mask of command. Blasphemous yet deeply religious, vulgar yet capable of charm, he was—as Eisenhower once said—a time bomb waiting to go off. Yet, for all his bizarre antics, Patton’s most redeeming feature was his singular focus on warfighting, the art of which he consistently attempted to glean from historical study. As a divisional commander during interwar maneuvers, Patton put his knowledge to good use by developing a fighting style that emphasized thorough reconnaissance, never using one arm alone, keeping armor off roads, and using a forward-roving command style intended mainly to provide inspired leadership. Having been the first commandant of the new Desert Training Center in California and Arizona, Patton also arrived well-prepared for action in North Africa.
At times in his 16 highly informative chapters on Patton’s role during World War II, D’Este’s continual exposure of myth borders on revisionism. Referring to the so-called race for Messina as a figment of Patton’s vivid imagination, D’Este goes on to argue that the alleged Montgomery-Patton feud makes for great copy, but not good history. Although the feud was quite real in “Patton’s obsessive, destiny-driven, tortured mind,” Montgomery was usually preoccupied with more pressing professional concerns than upstaging Patton. In fact, the two generals held a grudging respect for each other and operated alike in insisting on being their own operations officers. Neither was content to let his staff determine his design for battle, which they each (correctly) saw as a field commander’s primary responsibility. Ironically, in the battle for Normandy, Montgomery proved to be more supportive of Patton than was Omar Bradley, who had harbored deep- seated misgivings and resentments about Patton since North Africa. In marked contrast with Bradley, Patton and Montgomery also favored enveloping the German Seventh Army through a longer drive on the Seine rather than a shorter hook at Falaise. Because Patton did not live long enough to participate in the postwar controversy, notes D’Este, he “probably never knew that he and Montgomery had been in complete agreement over how the Normandy campaign ought to have concluded.”
Although Patton’s finest hour came during the Battle of the Bulge, his actions there do not escape critical scrutiny by D’Este. By generally taking such a balanced approach to what is clearly a sympathetic study of Patton, however, the author avoids the historical sin of hagiography. Patton: A Genius for War is biography as it should be written. Given its depth, incisive analysis, and accomplished literary style, it also constitutes the definitive work on Patton, warts and all. Because I have seen and heard the real Patton on video at Fort Knox, moreover, this book confirms my impression gained at the time that the living Patton was a far more appealing figure than the fictitious one portrayed in the blockbuster movie. The one scene in the book that most vividly sticks in my mind is that of Patton, before going overseas, falling on his knees before the octogenarian Pershing to ask the old soldier’s blessing.
Lieutenant Colonel John English is a retired infantry officer and at present teaches history at Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada.
Books of Interest
By Lieutenant Commander Thomas J. Cutler, U.S. Navy (Retired)
Barracuda: Final Bearing
Michael DiMercurio. New York, NY: Donald I. Fine Books, 1996. 365 pp. Ulus. Maps. $23.95 ($21.55).
In a plausible and terrifying scenario, former submarine officer Michael DiMercurio spins a tale that joins the ranks of other successful techno-thriller novels. A “Chinese democratic revolution," coupled with the collapse of the Soviet empire, results in the emergence of a new independent nation known as New Manchuria. Understandably unnerved by the presence of a new and unpredictable nuclear power so near to their homeland, the Japanese take action that eventually leads them into a confrontation with the United States that lends credence to the old saw that “history repeats itself.” DiMercurio’s previous three novels (Phoenix Sub Zero, Attack of the Seawolf and Voyage of the Devilfish) have been applauded in the likes of Publisher’s Weekly, The New York Times Book Review, and Proceedings.
Words of Honor
Dan McKinnon, Editor. Jamaica, NY: House of Hits Publishing, 1996. 310 pp. $10.00 paper.
The president of North American Airlines, a former Navy pilot, has compiled a "collection of thoughts, ideas, and principles that can be used as character building blocks.” The collected quotations are arranged by topic and include such things as “Courage Winning Business,” “Patriotism and War,” "Political Philosophies,” “Education Family,” and “Faith.” In his foreword to the book. Speaker of the House of Representatives Newt Gingrich writes that Words of Honor is a refresher course of those values that made America great.”
Project Coldfeet: Secret Mission to a Soviet Ice Station
William M. Leary and Leonard A. LeSchack. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press. 1996. 240 pp. Append. Bib. Illus. Ind. Gloss. Maps. Notes. Photos. $27.95 ($22.36).
Those who remember the exotic personnel recovery system in the James Bond movie Thunderball may be surprised to find that such a system pre-dated the movie, and was actually used as part of an unusual spy mission conducted by the Office of Naval Research and the CIA. When the Soviets abandoned one of their arctic research stations—used to collect meteorological and oceanographic data in support of military and naval operations—because of the station's impending destruction by natural forces—two U.S. intelligence officers parachuted onto the drifting ice station to gather valuable information about what the Soviets were up to and what they were capable of. The story of this real-life. Cold War spy mission is recounted in this well-researched addition to the Naval Institute’s Special Warfare Series.
Unorthodox Strategies for the Everyday Warrior: Ancient Wisdom for the Modern Competitor
Ralph D. Sawyer, Editor and Translator. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996. 315 pp. Append. Bib. Ind. $28.00 ($25.20).
Although packaged as an aid for “the modern competitor," this is actually a significant military treatise translated from the ancient Chinese. In its original form, it was entitled One Hundred Unorthodox Strategies and the actual author is unknown. Compiling the wisdom of Sun Tzu and other notable Chinese strategists, the topics discussed include “Estimates,” “Plans,” “Spies Elite Forces,” “Amphibious Strategies," “Arrogance Advancing,” “Retreating,” “Peace Negotiations,” and “Enthralled with War,"—one hundred in all. The format for each begins with a "Tactical Discussion." is enhanced by a “Historical Illustration,” and concludes with a “Commentary.”
Eagle in the Desert: Looking Back on U.S. Involvement in the Persian Gulf War
William Head and Earl H. Tilford, Jr., Editors. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1996. 360 pp. Bib. Fig. Ind. Gloss. Maps. Notes. Tables. $69.50 ($66.03) hard cover. $24.95 ($22.45) paper.
The essays in this collection, written by recognized authorities in their respective fields, examine the U.S. role in the Persian Gulf War. Several essays appear in each of the major topic areas, which include "Bringing the Eagle to the Gulf Desert: Airlift. Sealift, Supplies, and Logistics,” “The Air War: Planning and Combat,” "The Ground War: The Army and the Marines." and "The Navy’s Role in the Gulf War.”
Angels from the Sea: Relief Operations in Bangladesh, 1991: U.S. Marines in Humanitarian Operations
Charles R. Smith. Washington. DC: History and Museums Division, U.S. Marine Corps, 1995. 125 pp. Append. Ind. Maps. Notes. Photos. $11.00 ($10.45) paper.
On the night of 29 April 1991, a devastating cyclone hit Bangladesh, leaving in its wake terrible destruction, death, and suffering. The bodies of an estimated 139.000 people and more than a million livestock floated in waters that had completely covered the southeast countryside of the nation. Without any electrical power, telephones, or roads, the disaster threatened to reach monumental proportions. Operation Sea Angel brought U.S. Marines to the region to provide relief and to avert an even worse disaster. Through maps, photos, and a well-written narrative, supported by primary source documents and interviews with participants, this story, both tragic, and heroic, is recounted.
Arms Proliferation Policy: Support to the Presidential Advisory Board
Marcy Agmon et al. Santa Monica. CA: National Defense Research Institute of the Rand Corporation, 1996. 160 pp. Append. Bib. Fig. Gloss. Notes. Tables. $20.00 ($18.00) paper.
The consequences of arms proliferation versus the economic benefits of weapons exports present a difficult dilemma for policy makers. In 1995, a Presidential Executive Order established a board to advise the President on the proper implementation of a policy on conventional (non-nuclear) arms and technology transfer. This study examines that dilemma and provides relevant data and other information to make the situation clearer.
Aircraft Carriers of the Royal and Commonwealth Navies: The Complete Illustrated Encyclopedia from World War I to the Present
Commander David Hobbs, MBE, RN. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1996, 265 pp. Append. Bib. Illus. Ind. Gloss. Photos. Tables. $59.95 ($53.95).
This reference catalogues 123 ships that have served as aircraft carriers in the British, Australian, Canadian, and Indian navies. Each is presented (alphabetically by name) with photos, statistical data, and a summary of service. Besides the obvious entries, there are the plans for ten carriers that were never built, five seaplane carriers, and five balloon ships.
Battleship and Cruiser Aircraft of the United States Navy
William T. Larkins. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Military History, 1996. 275 pp. Append. Bib. lllus. Ind. Photos. $49.95 ($44.95).
Floatplanes were an important component of the capabilities of cruisers and battleships until 1949. This exhaustive study records their history using a wealth of data and more than 400 photographs. Included are the active and experimental types, aircraft markings, the techniques of launching and recovering, and a chapter on floatplanes used on small ships and submarines.
Guerrilla Conflict Before the Cold War
Anthony James Joes. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1996. 224 pp. Bib. Ind. Notes. $55.00 ($52.25).
Examining the role of guerrillas in the American Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, the American Civil War, and other conflicts, this study provides some interesting insights on unconventional warfare. Especially thought-provoking is Joes’s comparison of the French in Spain to the Soviets in Afghanistan, and the British in the Carolinas to the Americans in Vietnam.
Superior Force: The Conspiracy Behind the Escape of Goeben and Breslau
Geoffrey Miller. New York, NY: Paul &
Company, 1996. 480 pp. Append, Bib. Ind Notes. Photos. $25.00 ($23.75) paper.
In the early days of World War I, the German battlecruiser Goeben and the light cruiser Breslau escaped the Royal Navy and took refuge at Constantinople, where they would eventually exert a decisive influence upon Turkey’s attempts to remain neutral. Much has been made about this egregious error, affixing blame to many parties, but this book casts new light on the involvement of an organized conspiracy in Athens, whereby a man named Mark Keff, literally changed the course of history. Besides the new information on the conspiracy, this is a comprehensive account of the whole affair, encompassing the political, diplomatic, and naval implications and providing a great deal of insight into the world-shattering events of World War I.