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| Historian John M. Barry |
On Feb. 6, 2020 Navy Reads posted a review of "The Great Influenza." I'm following up that post with this email interview with the prescient, farsighted author. He offers his views about truth-telling during a national crisis, the CAPT Crozier controversy, Navy's role in 1918 and now, and of course what's on his reading list.
BD: Your dedication of "The Great Influenza" was "To my Darling Anne and to the spirit that was Paul Lewis." Would you please remind us, why Paul Lewis? How should we all remember him?
JB: Lewis was an outstanding leading civilian scientist who became a Navy officer when the war started. He was a tragic figure. A scientist, brilliant, with an incredibly promising early career, he judged himself a failure partly because he could not develop a vaccine for influenza. Later, while seeking a vaccine for yellow fever he ended up infecting himself in a laboratory accident and dying of the disease. In fact I think there is a good chance it was a suicide. I just found his story moving and I wanted to honor him in some way. The book opens and closes with him.
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| HM1 Matthew Oberg advises people to get their pneumococcal vaccine at NH Bremerton, June 2015 |
JB: Virtually every top scientist in the country became a military officer. The deans of medical school became colonels. The entire Rockefeller University (then called the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research) was incorporated into the army. Most of the science done in the pandemic was done by these people while in the military. All of them were trying to find an answer to the disease. They tried things we are trying now, such as using convalescent serum, and they did develop vaccines against secondary bacterial pneumonias. If you get an anti-pneumococcus vaccine today, it's a descendant of what was developed back then.
BD: What is your take on the way commanding officer Navy Capt. Brett Crozier dealt with the COVID-19 outbreak aboard USS Theodore Roosevelt?
JB: He did what leaders are supposed to do. Take care of people they are responsible for, as opposed to those above them.
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| CAPT Crozier, CO, USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71). (Photo by Seaman Alexander Williams) |
JB: We are (getting the truth) from public health leaders and from many politicians, Republican and Democrat –– governors in Ohio, New York, Louisiana, off the top of my head. Unfortunately we are getting less than that from politicians in other places, including the White House.
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| United States Marine Corps COVID-19 poster. (LCPL Leslie Alcarez) |
JB: Absolutely. Testing is everything. Think of a guerrilla war. You can't fight an enemy effectively unless you can identify that enemy.
BD: (During the 1918 pandemic, once people confronted the truth and adapted to realities, some places like San Francisco came together as a community.) What are some good things that are coming out of the COVID-19 crisis?
JB: I think there has been a sense of community, that we are all in this together. I think people are largely helping each other. I live in New Orleans and know some homeless people. A guy told me yesterday he almost cries because people have been so generous to him. My neighbor is a dentist and gave all his masks and gloves to a hospital, and he continues to treat emergency cases without an N95 mask. I'm over 70 and younger friends have volunteered to get groceries for me. A lot of little things like that add up.
BD: During this extended self-quarantine period of isolation, many people have more time to read. Who are some of your lifelong-favorite authors and books (of any genre)?
JB: Classic fiction mostly. Faulkner. Russian novels. I expected to do a lot of reading when I stopped going to my office, but right now I'm busier than any other time in my life. Communicating with scientists around the world, the media, trying to get people to comply with public health guidelines.
BD: What about books specifically for Navy readers; anything you'd recommend with a nautical, maritime or leadership theme?JB: No nautical themes. Well, a river is in there. Always meant to read a Russian novel by a Nobel laureate, Mikhail Sholokhov, "And Quiet Flows the Don." That's the only book I've read lately and it's a great book. About Russia in World War I and the Russian Revolution.
BD: Finally, are you considering a book perhaps on the COVID-19 pandemic? What are your book plans for the future?
JB: A week ago I'd have said no, but now I'm considering it.
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Barry advised panels and groups under both the Bush and Obama administrations and helped develop stockpiles, plans and preparations for a pandemic. In every meeting he said he "pushed" the importance of starting out by telling the truth.
In addition to promoting truth-telling, Barry says that a federally guided and states-aligned response should prioritize providing protective equipment for frontline health care providers; testing, isolation and contact tracing; and sustained quarantine and stay-at-home measures while a vaccine is developed.
Barry is a Distinguished Scholar and adjunct faculty at Tulane University.
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Throughout 2020, Navy Reads intends to post other author interviews. Recently Navy Reads featured an interview with Michael Junge, author of "Crimes of Command." A review of Junge's book included a report about the firing of CAPT Brett Crozier, CO of USS Theodore Roosevelt. Since then, Acting SECNAV Modly was asked to resign after remarks he made aboard T.R.
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| Lt.Gen. Honore directs paratroopers in September 2005 during relief efforts along the Gulf Coast. |
In a televised interview yesterday, retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel L. Honoré said, "It should be a simple decision for the Secretary of Defense." Honore was commander of Joint Task Force Katrina, coordinating military relief efforts for Hurricane Katrina in 2005 across the Gulf Coast. Like John Barry, he calls Louisiana Home. Honoré suggested DOD listen to its admirals. "This is the legacy of our great Navy. It should be an easy decision for Secretary Esper."
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