'The War That Ended Peace' / 'Poilu'

Reviews by Bill Doughty

Two recent books about World War I offer different perspectives -- one from a broad sweep of world history and the other from inside narrow muddy trenches and a "lunar landscape" battlefield.

Margaret MacMillan, Oxford University professor of history, presents a comprehensive look at events leading up to and through what writer H.G. Wells said would be "the war to end war." Macmillan's "The War that Ended Peace: The Road to 1914" shows how peculiar personalities and poor choices led to death and destruction in Europe 100 years ago.

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright endorsed this book, which has been compared with the classic "The Guns of August" by Barbara Tuchman. Albright said: "'The War That Ended Peace' tells the story of how intelligent, well-meaning leaders guided their nations into catastrophe. These epic events, brilliantly described by one of our era's most talented historians, warn of the dangers that arise when we fail to anticipate the consequences of our actions. This is one of the finest books I have ever read on the causes of World War I."

MacMillan's book has been compared with Tuchman's "The Guns of August."

MacMillan introduces us to characters like Kaiser Wilhelm II, Bernhard von Bülow, Adm. Jacky Fisher, Alfred von Tirpitz, Nicholas II, Edward Grey, Leopold von Berchtold, Raymond Poincaré, and both Helmuth von Moltkes (elder and younger). She asks rhetorically whether these men were to blame for causing the clash of nations.

"Or was no one to blame? Should we look instead at institutions or ideas?" The history of WWI must be painted on a canvas of imperialism and seen through the lens of extreme nationalism.

MacMillan goes back decades before the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand to the days of Napoleon and War of 1812 through the rise of Japan and overreach of Russia, Germany and Britain to explain how nations competed for resources and refused to respect other's territories.

"Where today the international community sees failed or failing states as a problem, in the age of imperialism the powers saw them as an opportunity. China, the Ottoman Empire, Persia, all were weak, divided, and apparently ready to be carved up."

A key influence for all major nations in an era of colonial expansion was Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan's 1890 classic, "The Influence of Sea Power Upon History." Mahan's book showed leaders the role of navies in world commerce and led to a race by Germany and Britain to build ships.

"A strong navy protected the key highways for trade and communication across the oceans, and, equally importantly, enabled the seizing and holding of colonies. Its battle fleets could serve as a deterrent, especially if they were situated in key strategic locations. 'The fleet in being,' as Mahan and others called it, did not necessarily have to fight; it could be used to put pressure on a hostile power in peacetime and make that power think twice before risking its own fleet, even if it were bigger. In war, though, it was the duty of the battle fleet or fleets to destroy the enemy in a decisive battle."

Inspection in the trenches of WWI.

Of course, when war came in 1914, much of the fighting was on landlocked battlefields in France and Germany.  Churchill called the peace before the Great War "exceptional tranquillity." The tranquillity was destroyed by what MacMillan concludes was "a failure of imagination" and "lack of courage" to prevent war.

MacMillan's perspective is global and general. For Corporal Louis Balthas, whose contemporaneous diaries (translated by Edward M. Strauss) are published in this year's "Poilu," the view is muddy and personal -- in and around the trenches -- facing the German "Boche" and "millions of tiny sharp-tongued mosquitoes," and "legions of famished ticks and lice," along with  countless rats and fleas.

I wanted to read this book because my grandfather fought for Germany in the war against the French before emigrating to the United States in the 1920s. I remember the stories he told me of the trenches and being wounded by a French poilu. I still have the old picture book we read together in 1964 about "the Great War," and I treasure the perspective he shared, learning that war and peace were more nuanced and complicated than I had imagined.

Barthas, a barrel maker drafted into the war, writes about the petty tyranny of despotic authority. He shows examples of heroic stoicism, shared humanity between warfighters, and random luck in battle, such as when a soldier's tin of coconut candy, which his girlfriend insisted he carry, ricocheted a bullet near his heart and saved his life.

He describes fear, fatigue and simple gratitude.

"As we left the village, an old lady came up to us, carrying something in her apron. They were some eggs which she handed out to us. As I passed by I managed to snatch one. It's a small thing, an egg, but we were very touched by it. This poor old lady was giving up something necessary for her, to give us this offering. How a gift is made is more important than the gift itself."

Barthas, like Vonnegut, Hemingway and Orwell, writes about the consequences and ironies of war. Like most warriors, he said he fights to preserve peace.

Back home from the war in 1919, he concludes:

"Returned to the bosom of my family after the nightmare years, I taste the joy of life, or rather of new life. I feel tender happiness about things which, before, I didn't pay attention to: sitting at home, at my table, lying in my bed, putting off sleep so I can hear the wind hitting the shutters, rustling the nearby plane trees, hearing the rain strike the windows, looking at a starry, serene, silent night or, on a dark, moonless night, thinking about similar nights spent up there ... Often I think about my many comrades fallen by my side. I heard their curses against the war and its authors, the revolt of their whole being against their tragic fate, against their murder. And I, as a survivor, believe that I am inspired by their will to struggle without cease-fire nor mercy, to my last breath, for the idea of peace and human fraternity."

Both of these books provide deep insights about the First World War and about war, in general, reinforcing the nation's Maritime Strategy, which encourages a cooperative global fraternity and stresses: "preventing wars is as important as winning wars."

Red Cloud and Heart of Everything That Is

Review by Bill Doughty

“The Heart of Everything That Is: The Untold Story of Red Cloud, an American Legend,” by Bob Drury and Tom Clavin, is a terrific new book out this week that reexamines the cruelty of expansion in the American West, the warrior ethos of the Lakota Sioux, and the strategy and tactics of Red Cloud in defeating the United States Army.

“The great warrior chief Red Cloud was the only Indian ever able to claim victory over the United States,” according to Drury and Clavin, a conclusion backed up by other writers and historians.*

Red Cloud and many other colorful protagonists in “The Heart of Everything That Is” are flawed anti-heroes in a world of intertribal raids and fights, torture, mutilation, revenge, lies and numbing grief on all sides.

Photo reportedly by Ridgway Glover, 1866

“Though the Sioux were to become its most vicious practitioners, warfare among Indians was simply a way of life.  Nearly every tribe called itself “The People” and harbored deep suspicion and hatred toward outsiders with whom it competed for game and plunders.  Death arrived swiftly and often in the violent thrust and parry of aggression and defense, abetted by a culture that revolved around a quest to avenge insults and injuries real and perceived.”

In the expansion across the North American continent, individual tribes who believed in The Great Spirit faced an enemy who justified their claims in the name of Manifest Destiny.  The crusade by people of European descent can be considered a long campaign against Native Americans, often seen as less-than-human "others" undeserving of basic human rights and freedoms:

“The military historian Peter Maslowski, attending a guest-lecture series at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, was puzzled when a general from the Chinese People’s Army casually mentioned that the United States had fought the longest war in history.  America had never fought a Thirty Years’ War, let alone a Hundred Years’ War.  What was the visiting general talking about?  The answer came with the foreigner’s next breath.  He explained that he was referring to America’s nearly 300-year war against its Indians.  Much of the world beyond North America considered it to have begun in the early seventeenth century and to have lasted until the late nineteenth.”

The authors establish characters and reveal history, introducing us to the shadowy Crazy Horse, grizzled Jim Bridger (left), genocidal Gen. Sherman, flamboyant photographer Ridgway Glover, fearless Paul Revere-like “Portugee” Phillips, frightening George Washington Grummond and "Queeg-like" Col. Carrington, among others.  The book builds interest and tension throughout, culminating in a masterful depiction of the Fetterman Massacre, showing Red Cloud as “the equal of history’s great guerilla tacticians.”

Drury and Clavin, authors of other military books including “Last Men Out,” “The Last Stand of Fox Company” and “Halsey’s Typhoon,” make the book relevant to a Navy audience:

“The historian Stephen E. Ambrose notes that Indian fighting on the High Plains was more akin to naval warfare than to any other type of battle.  The U.S. Army ‘was lumbering around with battleships and cruisers, chasing pirates in sleek, fast vessels,’ and the forts and camps were like home ports to which large ships must return often for supplies.  Meanwhile the Indians lived off the land much as the pirates lived off the ocean, and the soldiers deployed to the frontier had no more comprehension of their surroundings than the crews of Columbus or Magellan reading blank charts marked with the warning, ‘Here be monsters.’”

With graphic depictions of monstrous mutilations and violence, the writing is closer to Larry McMurtry than Louis L’Amour, all the more powerful because it is nonfiction carefully noted and sourced.  There’s a tie to McMurtry’s “Lonesome Dove” and there are references to Abraham Lincoln, Napoleon Bonaparte and von Clausewitz.

Descriptions are colorful and memorable: “Bull Bear, by all accounts a canker of a man with a face like a clenched fist...”  “Under the broiling summer sun the stench of human and animal sweat and dung hung over the post like an illness.”

Chief Red Cloud

“At six feet, Red Cloud was tall for a Sioux, if not for most men of this era.  His slender face was dominated by a beaked nose and a broad forehead, and the leathery skin around his ravaged brown eyes was prematurely creased, as if by parentheses, with age lines.  Fond of accessories, such as eagle feathers and ribbons, he carried himself with an erect, regal mien; and at such formal ceremonies his long, course black hair was almost always bear-greased and plaited around the wing bone of an eagle to signify elegance and propriety.  A good, new rifle usually rested across his saddle pommel.  On the whole he projected an aura of quiet dignity with an undercurrent of physical menace.”

The book explores the role of technology in winning the overall campaign, discussing the role of the Navy Colt, Springfield rifle and other firearms and the development of the Union Pacific Railroad.  It explores how close to the surface is the savagery in our souls.  And it considers the importance of a strong defense in keeping peace.  Red Cloud, Crazy Horse's mentor, “was a living embodiment of the maxim that war is the best teacher of war.”

Drury and Clavin write, “The four pillars of Sioux leadership -- acknowledged by the tribe to this day -- are bravery, fortitude, generosity, and wisdom.  Time and again Red Cloud exhibited each.”  In the end, Red Cloud the statesman saw the way to peace.

The authors make a brilliant proposal in the Washington Post this week (during Native American Heritage month): Rename the NFL’s Washington Redskins the Washington Red Clouds.

“Named after such a proud and powerful winner, the Washington Red Clouds would be a lock to emulate their namesake and rout 49ers, defeat Raiders, humiliate Cowboys, pluck Eagles, turn back Texans, break Broncos and generally leave quivering the remaining would-be Giants and Titans of the National Football League,” they write.

In changing the Redskins name, Red Cloud would help win another battle...

Lakota delegation at the White House, 1877. Standing - Red Bear, Young-Man-Afraid-of-his-Horses, Good Voice, Ring Thunder, Iron Crow, White Tail, Young Spotted Tail. Seated - Yellow Bear, Red Cloud, Big Road, Little Wound, Black Crow. (Library of Congress)

* Other authors and historians reach the same conclusion about Red Cloud’s War.  James Wilson noted that the government conceded defeat in “The Earth Shall Weep: A History of Native Americans.”  McMurtry refers to Red Cloud's victories along the Bozeman Trail in his beautiful and colorful "Custer" from 2012 (published, like "The Heart of Everything That Is," by Simon & Schuster).

Tom Clancy Gone?

by Bill Doughty

More than 20 years ago Martin Greenberg edited “The Tom Clancy Companion."   Like many Americans I thought about the iconic Clancy this week after his obituaries were published: Tom Clancy, author of “The Hunt for Red October,” “Red Storm Rising,” “Patriot Games,” “Clear and Present Danger” and other now-classic techno-thrillers, dead at 66.

Tom Clancy loved the Navy, and the feeling was mutual.

With an introduction by his writing partner and family friend Larry Bond, this easy read is presented in four parts: an essay by Marc A. Cerasini on “The Birth of the Techno-Thriller,” an interview with the author by Greenberg, a series of essays by Clancy, and “A Tom Clancy Concordance,” an encyclopedic compilation by Roland J. Green.  The concordance includes an entry for USS Reuben James (DDG-57), central to “Red Storm Rising.”

The interview with Clancy shows the author’s strong feeling on the mission, capabilities and power of the Navy as well as the long-lasting international impact of democracy and freedom.

 “What will happen, what must happen, very simply is that democracy is going to spread itself across the world.  And the reason democracy is going to spread itself across the world is that it works.  Over the past 200 years, representative democracy and the free-enterprise system have proven to be extraordinarily effective at giving people the things they want -- justice and prosperity.”

Read Clancy’s interview and essays and learn, among other things, his views on Reagan, Ricin, Napoleon, Apple computers, stealth technology, Bush Sr., Iran and Iraq, science and technology, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Baltimore, God and science fiction writers, including Joe Haldeman, Edgar Allen Poe and Jules Verne.

Essays

“Dinosaurs” discusses the outdated, outmoded weapons systems from previous wars and calls for extending former President Reagan’s “Zero Option” for theater nuclear forces and “an international agreement to bring intercontinental-ballistic weapons down to as close to zero as we can,” in Clancy’s words.

Clancy's essay “Before Anyone Gets Carried Away” eviscerates Oliver Stone’s movie about JFK and gives a logical and forceful view about Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories.  “But I Like to Shoot” gives the author’s views on responsible gun ownership and gun control, while “Funeral” celebrates the death of communism.  Revised in 2005, "Companion" expanded the concordance and retained the original essays.

“Getting Our Money’s Worth” showcases the British Royal Navy and prevention of war through strength, commitment and expertise.  It seems to presage CNO Adm. Greenert’s “Warfighting First” tenet:

“The military needs to restore the warrior ethic.  A warrior is someone who kills his fellow man for a living, and wants to be good at it.  Not all officers are or can be warriors, but only those who are deserve to command at any level.  The military must change its programs to identify them, to nurture them, to select only the best from their ranks, and then to give them the support and experience they need to fulfill their wartime missions at every level of command responsibility.  That will give us the force which will win in war; and recognition of it will go far toward preventing one.”

Several essays get to the heart of Clancy’s personal philosophy.  In “Investia-3. Principles,” he writes that, “A healthy society allows citizens of different beliefs to speak their mind.  In words that resonate today:

“As citizens of a free society you have a civic duty both to tolerate people whose beliefs are different from your own, and a moral duty to listen to them from time to time, because even a fool has something intelligent to say once in a while.”

“Back to the Frontier” calls for support to the nation’s space program, recalling Neil Armstrong’s and Buzz Aldrin’s walk on the moon in 1969.

Harrison, Baldwin and Affleck as Jack Ryan.

“Who can forget that night?  Who can forget the pride of nationhood?  Who can forget the excitement and the wonder? ... Exploration is part and parcel of American history ... The Space Program is the future.  It really is that simple.”

There are hundreds of other works by and especially about Tom Clancy.  Legions of critics have weighed in on the prolific writer, but he is much more complicated than his novels or protagonist Jack Ryan.  Clancy said he wrote “The Hunt for Red October” to achieve a lifelong dream to be a novelist and to achieve immortality.  

Tom Clancy, R.I.P. 

Warfighting and ‘Origins of War’

Review by Bill Doughty

“Pacifism, isolationism and other forms of wishful thinking” allow for the conditions of war, according to Donald Kagan in his insightful “On the Origins of War: And the Preservation of Peace,” a key title on the Navy Professional Reading Program’s original and newly revamped recommended list.

Peace comes from a position of strength and confidence, not from fear.

“Policies guided and dominated by fear” are the foundations for conditions of war, Kagan shows.  “Power is neutral,” he writes, but when there is a struggle for power, quoting Greek historian Thucydides, “people go to war out of ‘honor, fear and interest.’”

Kagan applies his and Thucydides’s insights from an almost entirely western perspective as he examines the Peloponnesian War, World War I, Hannibal’s War (The Second Punic War), World War II, and -- seemingly out of place, at first -- the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Sparta’s fear and resentment of Athens as a great maritime power led to war at a time when conflict was considered a normal part of life, 2,000 years before the enlightenment.

Kagan carefully unravels history’s knots, showing how nations become entangled in one war after another.

The War of 1812 led to what Europeans at the time thought was impossible -- World War I.

“The old European order, resting on a balance among the five great powers of Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia, had been established at Vienna in 1815 as a way of preventing the domination of a single state over all of Europe, such as had almost been achieved by Napoleon Bonaparte... The main threat to the new order was the powerful force of nationalism...”

Kagan shows how fear, resentment and irrational belief systems can feed what he calls “nationalism and superpatriotism” and “social imperialism.”

“Like the Hannibalic War, the Second World War emerged from flaws in the previous peace and the failure of the victors to alter or vigilantly and vigorously to defend the settlement they imposed.  The story of its origins, therefore, begins with with way in which the first World War Came to an end.”

The flames of WWI left glowing embers of resentment in Germany during a severe economic depression.  That resentment flared again under Hitler and the Nazis, who capitalized on fear, resentment and a loss of honor.  Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire after WWI led to the creation of Palestine and Iraq under British control and Syria and Lebanon under French control.

Kukryniksy, The Big Three will tie the enemy in knots (1942)

Demands for reparation, combined with false hopes for peace by other western nations, including attempts at appeasement, led to an imbalance of power and ultimately to World War II.

WWII then brought about more balkanization and creation of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Israel, as discussed in a recent review of Friedman’s “From Beirut to Jerusalem.”

Resentment and fear grew again, and WWII brought about the Cold War, Kagan contends.  The United States and Russia ended the Second World War as allies who achieved victory over the Axis powers, but we quickly became rivals for power with the Soviet Union. National honor was at stake and once again fear ruled the day.

President John F. Kennedy

War was averted, but only nearly so, thanks to what Kagan calls Kennedy’s restraint.  “Just how close that catastrophe really was we shall never know,” Kagan writes about the nearly-triggered launch/retaliation that ended with “tense bargaining” instead.

Today, the Soviet Union no longer exists.  American diplomacy is stronger, backed by a combat-ready, forward-poised and capable military.  

Our former enemies in the War of 1812, Canada and Britain, are among our best friends.  Germany and Japan, fascist imperialists in WWII, stand as models of hope and democracy and peace. World powers more economically interdependent and connected than they've ever been, giving peace a chance.

Is that more wishful thinking, or the realities of globalization tied to Maritime Strategy and the preservation of peace?

Kagan reminds us of Thomas Paine’s prediction that reason, democracy and capitalism could light the way to a peaceful world.  In “The Rights of Man,” Paine wrote, “If commerce were permitted to act to the universal extent it is capable, it would extirpate the system of war.”

Kagan also quotes Sun-Tzu: “No less vital is the art of avoiding war.”

Kagan concludes, “The secret of the success of our species has been its ability to learn from experience and to adapt its behavior accordingly.”

American troops leap forward to storm a North African beach during final amphibious maneuvers in 1944.

From Battle of Trafalgar to War of 1812

by Bill Doughty

Acts of valor were commonplace in the days of sailing ships, conquest and experimental new techniques of warfare in the early 1800s.  So were acts of terror and subversion.

A European perspective of those events and an amazing beginning for modern military techniques and weaponry can be found in the pages of Tom Pocock’s The Terror Before Trafalgar: Nelson, Napoleon, and the Secret War.

The late historian shows that for Britain, at least, the War of 1812 began in 1801 when the mighty British navy was challenged by Napoleon Bonaparte and France, assisted by the Spanish fleet.

Other countries or territories drawn into the conflict or directly affected by it included Denmark, Austria, Russia, Prussia, Italy and Egypt, according to Pocock.  Even Sweden, Peru and Jamaica were impacted.

In fact, a case can be made that the Napoleonic Wars were the first world war. 

The Battle of Trafalgar, death of Lord Nelson (told in painful detail in this book), and rise of Robert Fulton’s experiments certainly marked the beginning of the end of ancient warfare and military customs.  The savagery of the guillotine, also described in great detail, and the finery of national leaders’ costumes were on their way to becoming historic artifacts.

Read Pocock’s description of Napoleon Bonaparte on the day of his coronation as Emperor of France by Pope Pius VII.

“The Emperor was dressed in crimson velvet, embroidered with gold and silver, in lace, white silk stockings, white velvet slippers embroidered in gold; he wore a diamond-encrusted sword and carried the sceptre of Charlemagne and the Bourbons’ symbolic Hand of Justice.  He had become a glittering pantomime figure...”

Other parallels from the early 1800s to world wars more than a century later:  Napoleon/Hitler, shifting European alliances, assault landing crafts (catamarans with ramps), similar battle/invasion plans, and the spotty success of torpedoes at the beginning of the war.

Fulton's submarine.

Pocock profiles American inventor Robert Fulton as friend of Thomas Paine who first sought to develop a submarine for France before working with the British navy to deploy the first submarine and torpedoes, known as “carcasses,” “coffers” and “hogsheads.”

“The two-ton ‘coffer’ was the largest, twenty-one feet long, boat-shaped, with wedge-like bow and stern; wooden, but caulked, lead-lined and covered with tarred canvas, it was packed with forty barrels of gunpowder.  The coffer was ballasted so that its deck was flush with the surface and fitted with a buoyed grappling hook to catch the mooring cable of an enemy ship...”

Fulton and fellow inventors Sir Sidney Smith and Charles Rogier were under-appreciated for their innovative machines and experiments, called “infernals,” which often had less-than-perfect results.  The European military hierarchy, only a generation removed from those who were shocked at the guerilla tactics of the colonists, spoke out strongly against the SEALs-like attacks at night with torpedoes and mines.

Others, like Rear Adm. Home Popham, had the view that “battles in the future may be fought under water: our invincible ships of the line may give place to horrible and unknown structures, our frigates to catamarans, our pilots to divers, our hardy, dauntless tars to submarine assassins, coffers, rockets, catamarans, infernals...”

Published in 2002 by the Naval Institute Press, The Terror Before Trafalgar is understandably linked to the events of 9/11.

With a fascinating cast of characters, including wives, lovers (like Lord Nelson's married mistress Lady Emma Hamilton), soldiers and spies, Pocock shows how espionage and terror influenced -- or failed to influence events.  A cart of explosives was used in an attempt to kill Napoleon and Josephine (Fail).  Catholic insurrections in Ireland were planned as a diversion timed to allow France to invade across the Channel (Fail).  Plots of assassination were hatched in Egypt against the British sovereignty and coup attempts were launched in Paris (Fail and Fail).

Speaking of “fails”....

British impressment, capturing suspected British citizens who were sometimes Americans, became necessary in the early 1800s to fill the ranks of the British navy.  The issue led directly to the War of 1812.  At the same time, Napoleon knew he could not hold territory on the other side of the Atlantic while he tried to wage war in Europe and eastward, with his sights on India.  He sold the Louisiana Territory -- the whole Mississippi valley, from the Rio Grande to the Rocky Mountains, New Orleans to Canada -- to the United States, in what would become known as the Louisiana Purchase, for $15M -- a win for Thomas Jefferson and the United States but a huge loss for Napoleon and France.

According to Pocock:

“Ironically, Bonaparte had sought war but was not ready for it, while the British had hoped for peace and were ready to fight.”

France dominated the land war, but Britain controlled the seas, successfully defending the homeland.  The British navy proved that a commitment to maintaining peace must be tied to a readiness for war.

Grace Hopper Author Williams - Top Picks

(Prof. Kathleen Broome Williams, author of  Grace Hopper: Admiral of the Cyber Sea, on the Navy Professional Reading Program list and published by the Naval Institute Press, offers her suggestions for Navy Reads...)

by Kathleen Broome Williams

I’d like to start with an unconventional suggestion, but one that has been highly rewarding for me. There are two series of books -- both of which have been around for some time -- which anyone interested in the origins of naval theory and practice in the age of sail should read. 

HMS Tremendous engages French naval man-of-war Cannonierre, April 26, 1806.

In addition, they are rip-roaring good tales. 

Both series deal with the Royal Navy during the turbulent era of the Napoleonic wars, stretching from the end of the eighteenth century into the early nineteenth when England and France were locked in a life and death struggle covering much of the maritime world. 

First, and the quickest and easiest reading, are the books by C.S. Forester based on the naval career of Horatio Hornblower. Forester follows Hornblower from his days as a midshipman through ten books until he reaches the exalted rank of admiral. Each book is marked by Forester’s depth of knowledge of the times and of the details of naval life. 

A more recent series, and one that closely mirrors the first in subject, is Patrick O’Brian’s novels about the naval career of Jack Aubrey and of his inseparable physician friend, Stephen Maturin. Some readers may have been introduced to the two men through the movie Master and Commander, starring Russell Crowe. 

O’Brian’s twenty books, or so, are denser than Forester’s and marked by even more penetrating research and meticulous attention to nautical detail. Like the Hornblower books, too, the memorable characters and their gripping adventures make for irresistible reading.

There are a great many books about the Battle of the Atlantic that lasted from the beginning of World War II until the end of the war in Europe. For those unfamiliar with the subject a recent one worth reading is Bitter Ocean: The Battle of the Atlantic 1939-1945 by David Fairbank White. Based on secondary literature, as well as on archival sources and interviews, White presents a 300-page romp through the campaign in its entirety, on the way touching on many, perhaps most, of the most important issues. This is a useful introduction and a quick read.

Switching to the Pacific Ocean in World War II, Carl LaVO’s The Galloping Ghost: The Extraordinary Life of Submarine Legend Eugene Fluckey, tells the tale of the skipper of the submarine USS Barb, engaged in hair-raising and highly effective operations against the Japanese. Fluckey arguably sank more enemy tonnage than any other U.S. submarine commander and LaVO’s account is valuable for shedding light on the whole man, going beyond his wartime exploits to examine his personal life and postwar career. 

Nothing, however, can match Fluckey’s own memoir -- Thunder Below! -- for sheer suspense. Fluckey’s account is written with such immediacy and directness that the reader feels, sees, hears, and smells what it was like to be in action on a submarine in wartime. This is a must read for anyone interested in the Silent Service.

(Thank you to Dr. Kathleen Broome Williams, Director of General Education and Professor of History at Cogswell Polytechnical College. Dr. Williams has served and taught at the City University of New York, Sophia University in Tokyo, and at Florida State University, Republic of Panama. She has served on the editorial advisory board of The Journal of Military History and as executive director of the New York Military Affairs Symposium. She is the author of three books on naval history published by the Naval Institute Press. Read a review of her book Grace Hopper: Admiral of the Cyber Sea here.  Navy Reads will continue to have guest lists and reviews from noted authors and thinkers joining Navy Reads in the months ahead.  We will have some special reviews coming soon related to the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Midway. -- Bill Doughty)