A small step in the right direction

When you call a book the Greatest Battle, you would expect that the book would tell the story of, well, a battle. I suppose if you want to get metaphorical this book is about a sort of struggle, but not a military one. Rather it is about the Russian's people struggle to get a war won while Stalin was leading the country. The lopsided emphasis of the narrative makes the subtitle Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow That Changed the Course of World War II, all the more inappropriate.

The conflict between Stalin and Hitler is less known in the West than the much smaller war fought in North Africa, Italy and Normandy. This is too bad, as the Red Army was essential to breaking the break of Germany (Lend Lease and the bombing campaign were also vital, but also lack the heroic luster of democratic soldiers fighting totalitarian soldiers.) This book is not the one to learn how the Russians succeeded, but to learn about how, thanks to Stalin's policies, they nearly failed.

Author Andrew Nagorski is principally about how a series of bad decisions nearly gave the victory to Germany. Stalin ignored intelligence indicating an attack was coming. He purged senior and mid-level military leadership, making it difficult for large units to function. He put in place political commissar units that killed soldiers that tried to retreat. There is very little about the actual fighting in his story. General Zhukov makes a few appearances, but Nagorski is mostly concerned with Stalin.

You won't get much information about the actual fighting and you don't get much information about the Nazis or Hitler either. The latter is excusable in that anyone reading a history book is going to be well versed in Nazi atrocities. They may not know about the einsatzgruppen, which Nagorski does detail. It does, though, make the titles misleading.

The number of popular books written about the Eastern front is pitifully small compared to that of the Western front. For that fact alone, this one has value. It just isn't what it could be.

Thanks for the propaganda!

True fans were probably well aware, but I had no idea that we have the British effort to pull America fully into World War 2 to thank for Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. After being grounded as an RAF pilot thanks to injuries, he was sent to the embassy in DC where he eventually joined a group that sought to clamp down isolationist and anti-British sentiment in the USA. In her book the Irregulars, Jennet Conat details his adventures.

He came into writing due to boredom and a lucky encounter. CS Forester approached him to jot down some notes so that Forester could write an article about his RAF life. Not thrilled with his party circuit lifestyle, he wrote an entire article instead. Forester loved it and helped it get published. Soon, Dahl was working with Disney on stories about gremlins and his writing career was launched.

It wasn't all writing though. He worked with other spies (they preferred the term agent) like Ian Fleming and the legendary William Stephenson (known as the Man Called Intrepid). He formed a relationship with the Roosevelts and an intimate one with the married Clare Booth Luce, who used her position in Congress and her husbands Life magazine to push for a Pacific rather than a European focus. The dashing Dahl was ordered to sleep with Luce, the better to influence her.

I haven't finished the book, but I like how it both delights with little tales and that it educates with important reminders. For example, Britain and the United States were intensely close at this period, but even still they had crucial policy differences, because they had different interests. There is a sense today that we are not allowed to disagree with an ally like Israel, even when our interests are increasingly divergent.

I also like how the book shows how dis-united American public opinion was on how to conduct the war. If there was any war that you would think people would get behind it was this one, but even then there was intense disagreement.

USS Franklin

I was out searching for aircraft carrier videos to entertain my aircraft obsessed son, when I stumbled upon a documentary about the USS Franklin (CV-13). The Franklin was an Essex-class carrier that was severely damaged by Japanese aircraft, but heroic efforts by her crew got her back to the States. The ship was rebuilt and then left in mothballs waiting for a conversion that never came. The shame is that when she was broken up in the 1960s, she was one of the last US Navy carriers that looked as she did in World War 2. The other Essex class carriers that have been made into museums, the Intrepid, the Yorktown, the Lexington and the Hornet were all updated and are really Cold War carriers in their preserved state.

There is at least one book about the ordeal of the Franklin, called Lucky Lady. The documentary below consists mostly of veterans recalling the fight to save the ship. They tell the story of the ship well. There is also great archival footage in the documentary. The opening and closing shots show the ship being taken apart just a few miles downriver from where I grew up. The video below is part 1, the other parts can be found here.

Write about destruction

Oh my, Adam Tooze's Wages of Destruction is quite a book. It an economic history of Nazi Germany and it provides economic reasons for Nazi policy making. This alone should raise interest (or potentially hackles). The discussion of lebensraum is illuminating. Most texts write this off as sheer propaganda or delusion, but Tooze shows that the German economy of the early 20th century was actually quite behind a number of competitors and that the very large agricultural work force was difficult to employ, hence the interest in stealing others land.

Tooze argues that there were other economic choices available to the Germans including taking a classically liberal export oriented approach, but that ideologically and politically this was a non-starter thanks in part to the inward turn of the United States in the early 30s. The Germans saw their future as that of an economic satellite of the United States or as the leader of a united Europe. They chose the later course, to the world's great dismay.

Too often analysis of political choices, at least in American writing, ignores economic influences. If they are identified, it is usually on the basis of nefarious special interests hoping to get their narrow agendas satisfied. It is much more rare to see an analysis of the economic situation facing leaders and how this constrains their behavior. Tooze explores how the balance of payments in Germany greatly influenced its foreign policy throughout the 30s. Today, you can't examine the US-China relationship without looking at the economic aspect. We need more books like Tooze's that examine these things.

The horrors of the Holocaust and the other other German atrocities also have economic underpinings. Most importantly, there was not enough food for everyone in Europe, at least with all the resources going to war making. Couple this with the extreme racism of the regime and the wholesale slaughter of Eastern Europeans and Jews by starvation and then mass murder becomes a policy choice rather than a fit of insanity.

This is a very large book that takes close reading. The subject range is massive, including an assessment of Albert Speer's economic wizardry, technology investments by the German military, relative economic strengths of the various powers and average farm size in 1930s Germany. For many readers it will be too much. For those of whom that is too much, consider picking it up and reading the introduction and the conclusion, which is easy enough. If you think you have read all you need about World War 2, think again.

Armageddon

There are so many books about the Second World War, it is difficult to know where to start. Max Hasting's Armageddon is a great choice for those wanting a serious, thoughtful book that isn't too dense for non-specialists, but is also takes strong stands that can inform those who are well-read in the subject. What will attract many is the analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the American, British, German and Soviet armies in 1944 and 1945. Also of great interest is the exploration of incidents that are not well known to Western readers.

Hastings constantly reinforces the scale and the intensity of suffering in World War 2. While we recall the Holocaust, we tend to ignore the full range of the horror of life in early 40s Europe. Hastings spends some time on one of the more controversial subjects, the sufferings of German civilians. The bombing of German cities does not generate the same level of controversy as the atomic bombing of Japan, and the wholesale rape of German (and Polish) women by the Red Army is practically unknown. The issue of collective guilt overlays this and makes it more difficult to discuss.

One incident that is well known in Germany and less known elsewhere was the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff. As the vengeful Red Army approached East Prussia, Gauleiter Erich Koch refused to evacuate civilians. Once the atrocities began piling up, the civilians began to be evacuated, but in much more dangerous conditions. The Wilhelm Gustloff was a liner loaded with up to 10,000 refugees when it was sunk by a Soviet submarine. There were survivors, but somewhere between five and seven thousand people drowned, making it the worst maritime disaster in history.

These deaths are but a small piece of the total loss of civilian German life. Hastings gives a figure of one million missing German civilians and a hundreds of thousands confirmed dead. Of course, the Germans had much more Russian civilian blood on their hands, a fact also little known in the West, but again, there is much more to this war than is commonly known in the West.

Human Smoke

Because it is one of favorite topics, I suppose I have to read Human Smoke. From the adulatory LA Times review and the condemnatory NY Times review, it appears this myth-busting book suffers from engaging in its own myths. As I mentioned before, focusing on Churchill and Roosevelt without giving equal time to Stalin makes no sense.

Like World War One before it, World War Two was about Germany reacting to its strategic position through aggressive invasion with a focus on a fear of Russia. The strategy in World War One was to knock out France and then turn the energy to Russia. As it happened, Germany got bogged down in France but defeated Russia. In World War Two, they tried it again, this time defeating France but being defeated by Russia. The war was primarily fought by two collectivist horrors, one right wing and one left wing, but both disastrous for their subject peoples. The Allied role, except in the Pacific, was primarily a side-show.

Are people, who read history books, really unaware that the war was, in fact, bad? Studs Terkel wrote the ironically titled The Good War back in the 80s and it sold rather well. Cultural critic and veteran Paul Fussell's Boy's Crusade is a searing account of the hellish experience of American soldier in Europe and labels it a waste. With the Old Breed presents the view of the foot soldier in the Pacific in all its terror. Antony Beevor's Fall of Berlin revealed the terrors visited upon the German populace by the Red Army and Allied bombers. Anyone who has done any reading in the field should be well aware that this war is the worst thing that has ever happened.

Perpetuating a myth

I am predisposed to dislike a revisionist history of World War 2 written by novelist using a non-analytical framework, but there is one element of Nicholson Baker's upcoming Human Smoke that I find particularly grating.

Like the celebrators of the Good War, Baker, from all I can tell, makes the Anglo-American-centric error. The Western Allies did not win the war, they contributed to the victory of the Red Army. Removing the Western Allies from the war would have just allowed the Germans to attack the Russians more quickly.

The vast majority of killing and dying happened in the East. Combined, the total deaths for the UK and the USA totaled less than a million while Poland lost five million, Germany over seven and Russia over twenty. Had the US and the UK sat out, it still would have been the worst war ever. This puts aside the problem that the UK most likely faced the choice of conquest or vassalization regardless of whether Churchill led the government.

In this, admittedly brief, interview, Baker connects the Holocaust to the events of 1941. His apparent thesis is that Roosevelt and Churchill were war-mongers and if we just sat out the war, things would have been better.

The Holocaust is connected to 1941, but certainly not due to Pearl Harbor. World War 2, even more than World War 1, is centered on the German-Russian conflict. Once the German Army was able to commence its race war in Russia, the real killing began. While the death camps didn't kick into gear until after the 1942 Wannsee Conference, the Einsatzgruppen began their reign of murder well before the United States entered the war.

If you want a provocative argument for pacifism by Britain, take a look at Niall Ferguson's Pity of War, which argues that the world would have been better off if Germany quickly won World War One, without Britain joining.

Brute Force

In his classic Why the Allies Won, Richard Overy argues that that Allies beat the Germans because they did a better job of mobilizing their resources and the superior use of air power. In his decidedly bleaker Brute Force, John Ellis argues that the material superiority of the Allies allowed them to adopt an attrition strategy that was wasteful, overly violent and likely lengthened the war.

Ellis is disdainful of the operational and tactical skills of the Allies, noting that in North Africa, the British consistently failed to apply combined arms tactics and lost against the materially inferior Afrika Korps. Only the constant reinforcement of the British, and the long supply lines of the Germans, prevented defeat. Finally at El Alamein, Montgomery, one of the great villains of the book, pummeled the Germans with artillery. Having done so, he failed to destroy the beaten Germans. Patton by the way doesn't come out wonderfully either. His backhand compliment is that Patton was probably the greatest military traffic coordinator, but not very good at fighting.

It is this failure to complete the job that infuriates Ellis. German forces escaped destruction in Egypt, in Tunisia, in Sicily, in Italy and in Northern France. Unlike the Russians in cataclysmic battles like Operation Bagration (also known as the Destruction of Army Group Center,) the Allies focused on hammering the Germans and then gaining ground, which allowed a relatively small group of German divisions to slow Allied progress in West.

Ellis is equally disdainful of the air wars against Germany and Japan. He argues that the Allies became enamored of the destructive power of bombers but eventually just focused on burning down cities and killing civilians.

Ellis is not saying that these tactics weren't successful, they were. He does argue that focusing on destroying the German Army would have saved more lives in the long run and perhaps avoided many civilian deaths. More importantly, one can see a starting point for the disastrous tactics employed in Vietnam, where the US used free fire zones and airpower in an attempt to defeat an insurgency.

Day of Battle

If you read books about the Second World War, put Rick Atkinson's The Day of Battle at the top of your pile. If you don't, this is a great place to start. The focus of the book is on the American Army experience in Sicily and Italy from 1943-44. The British, Polish, Canadian, Free French, and New Zealand forces are also covered, but the emphasis here is on the American forces.

The book is admirably balanced between the problems of command and the daily lives and deaths of the foot soldier. Like in other wars, early thoughts of being home by Christmas were broken on the realities of the Italian terrain. The many hills and valleys, poor roads and the in depth German fortifications made the war primarily a slow moving and grinding infantry war. Allied commanders often seem like World War One generals, perplexed by the tactical problems facing them and limited resources at hand. The increasingly desperate situation of the soldier on both sides is a major theme as well.

The book covers the near-disaster at Anzio, where a large army held onto to a postage stamp sized beachhead and failed to break-out for months. A Nazi radio propagandist called it the largest self-run POW camp in the world. Atkinson goes into great depth about the Cassino struggle. The casualty heavy attempts by Allied Armies to break the German lines and the pointless destruction of Monte Cassino are heartbreaking.

The book ends with a brief discussion as to whether the Italy campaign made sense at all. Atkinson briefly argues that it did, but the grand strategic context is not the heart of this book. It is instead a warning and a memorial about the costs of war.

If at first you don't succeed

Reading the Day of Battle with its stories of mishaps at Anzio, Salerno and other Italian locales, I recalled a book that has long sat on my wish list, America's First Battles. The book looks at the first land battles of the US Army in conflicts from 1776 to 1965. In each case the first battle, such as Kasserine Pass, Manassas and Long Island, the US Army fared poorly and eventually developed into an effective force for that particular conflict. The book examines why this is the case. Iraq would make for an interesting inclusion in a future addition. In that case, a spectacular initial battle was followed by years of falling behind.

On the topic of Manassas, it is a little strange that the US Navy has a USS Chancellorsville, named after one of the greatest victories of the CSA over the USA. It's hard to think of other circumstances where the losing side is so honored. This site mentions that Churchill wanted an HMS Cromwell, but the Crown wasn't keen. Cromwell had to make do with a tank.

Atkinson

I haven't finished the book yet, but I can say that if you have any World War 2 readers on your holiday list, then Rick Atkinson's the Day of Battle is a great choice. The author's clear, prose and focus on people as well as a avoidance of jargon and technical minutiae will help those with limited knowledge of the war enjoy the story. Those who've read more deeply will appreciate his exploration of the inter-service and international rivalries, the challenges of command and the story of an Army learning how to operate.

The development of the Army starting in North Africa, moving to southern Europe and then on to Northern Europe is the major story line of Atkinson's book. He pays a lot of attention to the senior and mid-level generals of the Army, emphasizing their leadership or lack thereof. This emphasis is nicely balanced by frequent discussion of the foot soldier and civilian view.

The book is a follow up to Army of Dawn and describes the American war in Sicily and Italy in 1943 to mid-1944. The other Allied forces in Italy are not ignored, but the emphasis here is on the American effort. I'll have more to say later, but this is a can't miss book for anyone interested in World War 2.

Very Large World War 2 Histories

I have Max Hasting's Armageddon on my bookshelf and I plan to read it soon. On the World War 2 front, Rick Atkinson's Day of Battle is first in line, so Mr. Hastings will have to wait. I can see my Very Large History pile growing as Hastings has yet another one coming called Nemesis, the Battle for Japan 1944-45. It's UK only and the Antony Beever (Stalingrad, Fall of Berlin) review is one of those that talks about the subject matter instead of the book itself.

Book marketing

Rick Atkinson's Army at Dawn is one of best written and accessible accounts of the Americans at war. That book covers the War in North Africa in 1942-42. So I am thrilled about the good press for the follow-on volume, the Day of Battle, is getting. The book has quite the promotional website, with a trailer, and interactive maps of North Africa and Italy.

The maps are particularly helpful for military history. For non-specialists, the descriptions of multiple units moving across wide swaths of land is hard to comprehend without maps to detail the action. It must be expensive as far too few books in this category come with adequate maps.

Lost at sea

In the Hunt for Red October, Russian captain Marko Ramius is portrayed as imperturbable and wise. One way in which this is demonstrated is the Captain's critique of Jack Ryan's book on Admiral Halsey. Ramius delivers his negative verdict on the book and Halsey, while his submarine is being stalked by a hostile Russian submarine. Halsey's Typhoon makes the case that Halsey should at the very least be re-evaluated.

In late 1944 while sailing to the Philippines, Halsey's task force sailed right into a typhoon. Three ships were lost and more Americans died than did at Midway. In addition to the lost ships, many ships were badly damaged. The failure to spot the typhoon is laid on mid-level operational failure to communicate, but Halsey is justly reprimanded for continuing to drive the fleet through the storm when it was clear many ships could not make it. One captain is particularly condemned for failing to react at all to his sinking ship's situation.

This book is told from the perspective of the ships that sank and of one ship that rescued most of the survivors. The story is gripping although it is also very narrow. The author's only touch upon the ships that did not sink, including some light carriers. Another new book called Sea Cobra, paints a broader picture. Still, the story of the ship that disobeyed orders to stay behind and rescue sailors is an inspiring one.

World War 2 books

If you are an Atlantic subscriber (or have access to Academic Search Premeir) , be sure to read Stalin's Gift in the May 2007 issue. In it Benjamin Schwarz's review of a few World War 2 books, in particular Norman Davies' Europe At War 1939-1945 and Stalin's Wars by Geoffrey Roberts. Both books point out that World War 2 was won by the Red Army and both argue that Stalin did not hold back his generals, but truly became a master strategist over the years. The great irony that the authors and Schwarz point out is that Stalin's gift was making the world safe for democracy.

In the same review he calls out Thunder in the East as the new standard history for the Eastern front. Looks like I need that one. He also tips his hat to the insanely prolific David Glantz.

On the World War 2 side, I am reading the wonderful Fire in the Sky by Eric Bergerud. It is a history of the air war in the South Pacific from 1942 to 1944. Unlike other military histories, which tend to narrate progress and focus on individual battles, Bergerud is interesting in analyzing why the war turned out like he did. So he starts by talking about the geography and how both sides chose and developed bases. He then talks about how they operated and how they designed their planes. Then he goes into the analysis of the planes themselves. It's so dense, but in a very good way.

This sort of thing is not for those who want a diverting narrative, but for those looking to understand the underlying causes for the direction of the war, this is flat out excellent.

The end

While it is certainly not enjoyable, Downfall is well worth seeing. The movie takes place in the last 30 days of Hitler's reign. Most of the action is in the bunker, with occasional flashes to the chaos in Berlin. At first, Hitler appears level-headed (if evil) but as the approaching doom becomes more apparent he becomes more and more unhinged. He berates his generals for being unable to stop the Red Army with their scattered and outnumbered armies. He notes that all the destruction in Berlin is a good thing, as it will make rebuilding the city so much easier after the Germans win. Eventually he turns on German civilians, arguing they didn't win so they don't deserve to win.

The horrid fate of ordinary Germans is made clear without excess pathos. Hitler won't allow the Army to evacuate civilians, right wing death squads knock off remaining enemies while there is still time, and children are conscripted to fight the Russians. The movie rarely shows the Russians and few of the Germans shown killed are killed by Soviets. Instead they are executed by other Germans or kill themselves. There is a frightening amount of suicide due to not wanting to live in a world "without National Socialism." Ian Kershaw, a historian of the Third Reich, wrote an interesting review about what this German movie means for Germany today and its relationship with its past. As Kershaw notes, this is the first German movie in which Hitler is portrayed by an actor.

Those familiar with the Nazi leadership will not be surprised at the oily, vile Goebbels, who along with his spouse, takes some of the most reprehensible actions in the film. What is slightly surprising is that the more conscientious (if not necessarily good) people tend to be SS as opposed to general Army. This may just be random and based on a few people, but I definitely took note.

On the subject of Nazis, have a look at this Disney produced propaganda short (Education for Death) from the war years. It is immensely effective and terribly sad, as it shows a sweet young boy turned into a cruel robot sent to a terrible fate. It serves as an excellent critique of Nazism, but also of us. vs. them ideology.

I'm a shock trooper in a stupor, yes I am

Yesterday, while gathering my library selections, my eyes fell upon a book that seemed out of place. It looked quite like the pulpy volumes you used to find at five and dimes. Take a gander at the cover. Not only does the cover feature garish colors and explosive action, but the two esses in the author's last name are styled like that of the Schutzstaffel, Waffen no doubt. Now, Nazi imagery is often used in book marketing, but it is often used as a threating icon. In this case, the Nazis are associated with the author's name.

What makes that all the more peculiar is the the author, a Dane who claims Eastern front experience, may have been a member of the Gestapo! According to reviews, his books take a anti-Nazi, anti-war line (to a point, of course, people read them for the battle action) so I wonder if they are meant to atone for prior sins.

I remain amazed that there are people who take a murky approach to the Nazis. Here we have re-enactors of the first SS Panzer division, a unit of which perpetrated the Malmedy massacre. The we have books like Watch on the Rhine. In this book, aliens invade Germany, so the leadership decides to reanimate the Waffen SS, to fight the aliens. Personally I think reanimating Blucher or Moltkes the Elder's armies, since they actually won wars, without perpetrating mass atrocities across an entire continent. But that's just me.

Another big fat World War 2 book

Jan Morris reviews the new one volume history of World War 2 in Europe by Norman Davies. It is a mixed review. She says: His twin hobby-horses are tremendous, but almost knackered: the iniquity of Stalin's Soviet Union, just as evil as Hitler's Germany, and the predominant part played by the Red Army in the Allied victory. There may be people still unaware of these fundamental truths about the Second World War, but I doubt many of them will be readers of this book.

She also says that, as in prior Davies' works, you will learn things you didn't know before, such as the fact 54 non-aggression treaties were signed during the war. I once saw Davies speak and I he was overly fond of trying to re-educate people on what really happened in the war. My favorite single volume treatment is a War to Be Won. It includes both Europe and Asia and the authors editorialize throughout. The danger is taking this much history in a single book is that the text becomes a list of facts. In this book (and to be fair I am sure Davies' shares this trait) the authors frame the factual narrative with analysis of what and who worked and what and who didn't. It makes for a much more interesting read.