Filed under: Books, Conferences, Korea, Navy, Understanding Battles, WWII | Tags: Ardant du Picq, Charles Jean Jacques Joseph, Christopher Hamner, Conrad Crane, John Hosler, John Lewis Gaddes, Jonathan Schanzer, Joseph Frechette, Julius Caesar, Keith Bird, Kelly DeVries, Raymond Ibrahim, Roy Appleman, Stephen Bourque, Trent Hone, Ulysses S. Grant, William Donnelly
While my own schedule has changed to preclude much attendance, I’m still a big supporter….
Place: Athena Pallas Greek Restaurant
556 22nd Street, South, Arlington, VA 22202
Menu: Order from the regular menu
Schedule: 5:30 Gathering
6:30 Dinner
7:30 Discussion
Cost: $35
September 17, 2019
Hone, Trent. Learning War: The Evolution of Fighting Doctrine in the U.S. Navy, 1898-1945. 2018.
Speaker: Keith W. Bird, Chancellor-Emeritus, Kentucky Community and Technical College System
October 15, 2019
Appleman, Roy E. South to the Naktong, North to the Yalu. Washington, D.C., 1962.
Speaker: William M. Donnelly, U.S. Army Center of Military History
November 19, 2019
Hosler, John D. The Siege of Acre, 1189–1191: Saladin, Richard the Lionheart, and the Battle That Decided the Third Crusade. 2018.
Speaker: Kelly DeVries, Professor of History, Loyola University Maryland
January 21, 2020
Gaddis, John Lewis. On Grand Strategy. 2018.
Speaker: Tom Keaney, senior fellow, Merrill Center for Strategic Studies, Johns Hopkins Univ, SAIS
February 18, 2020
Grant, Ulysses S. The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant. The Complete Annotated Edition. Ed. John F. Marszalek et al. 2017.
Speaker: Christopher Hamner, Associate Professor, Dept. of History and Art History, George Mason University March 17, 2020
March 17, 2020
Ibrahim, Raymond. Sword and Scimitar: Fourteen Centuries of War Between Islam and the West. 2018.
Speaker: Jonathan Schanzer, Senior Vice President, Foundation for Defense of Democracies
April 21, 2020
du Picq, Charles Jean Jacques Joseph Ardant. Battle Studies. Translated and edited by Roger J. Spiller. 2017.
Speaker: Jennie Kiesling, Professor of History and Head Novice Rowing Coach, United States Military Academy
May 19, 2020
Bourque, Stephen Alan. Beyond the Beach: The Allied War Against France. 2018.
Speaker: Conrad Crane, Chief of Historical Services, US Army Heritage and Education Center
June 16, 2020
Julius Caesar, The Landmark Julius Caesar: The Complete Works: Gallic War, Civil War, Alexandrian War, African War, and the Spanish War. Kurt A. Raaflaub and Robert B. Strassler, eds. 2017.
Speaker: Joseph Frechette, Staff historian, U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command
Filed under: Books, Conferences, Uncategorized, WWI | Tags: Alvin Coox, Bianka Adams, Brian Neumann, Bruce I. Gudmundsson, Conrad Crane, Counterinsurgency, David Crist, Edward Marolda, Geoffrey Parker, Gerhard Gross, Iran, John Kuehn, Julian Corbett, Kelly DeVries, Mark Reardon, Michael Neiberg, Military Classics Seminar, Randy Papadopoulos, Seven Years War, Shane Story, Stuart Goldman, Thirty Years War, Timothy Travers
I’d fallen off on my attendance at the Military Classics Seminar, but if you’re a historian or military history aficionado, you should be attending these. They’ve changed the location of the meetings to the Athena Pallas Greek Restaurant (located at 556 22nd Street, South, Arlington, VA 22202) but the concept remains the same.
Each month, we gather to have a few drinks, enjoy dinner and hear someone give an oral review of a military history book. Some are classics, but some are more modern. Of course, the grandest benefit of attending is meeting your peers. There are military historians from every branch, authors of all kinds, retired military officers and interested amateurs like myself. Some of the greatest benefit to the meetings is the discussion between the attendees throughout the evening. It wanders across all periods of history, including sometimes dealing with personal experiences, and across all kinds of topics.
The dinners cost $35 and there’s a book raffle (I always put in an extra $5 and come away with a book a few times a year). We gather at 5:30pm for a social hour, followed by dinner at 6:30pm and the presentation at 7:30pm. There is some parking in the restaurant’s lot and some along neighboring streets.
Make your reservation no later than the Wednesday prior to the meeting by replying Eric Joyce at this e-mail address militaryclassics@gmail.com or to Bob Goldich by phone at (703) 359-1074. Pay for the meal with check or cash ($35) at the entrance to the meeting room. Those who make a reservation and do not show are still obligated for the cost of the dinner.
September 25, 2018 (one week delay because of Yom Kippur)
Parker, Geoffrey. The Thirty Years War. 1984.
Speaker: Kelly DeVries, Loyola University
October 16, 2018
Kuehn, John T. America’s First General Staff: A Short History of the Rise and Fall of the General Board of the Navy, 1900-1950. 2017.
Speaker: Edward J. Marolda, U.S. Naval Institute
November 20, 2018
Coox, Alvin D. Nomonhan: Japan Against Russia, 1939. 1985.
Speaker: Stuart Goldman, Scholar in Residence, National Council on Eurasian and East European Research
January 15, 2019
Corbett, Julian S. England in the Seven Years War: A Study in Combined Strategy. 1907.
Speaker: Randy Papadopoulos, Secretariat Historian, Department of the Navy
February 19, 2019
Travers, Timothy. The Killing Ground: The British Army, the Western Front, and the Emergence of Modern Warfare, 1900-1918. 1987.
Speaker: Bruce I. Gudmundsson, DPhil, Quantico, Virginia
March 19, 2019
Crane, Conrad C. Cassandra in Oz: Counterinsurgency and Future War. 2016.
Speaker: Shane Story, Director, General Histories Division, U.S. Army Center of Military History
April 16, 2019
Crist, David. The Twilight War: The Secret History of America’s Thirty Year Conflict with Iran. 2012.
Speaker: Mark Reardon, Senior Historian, Histories Directorate, U.S. Army Center of Military History
May 21, 2019
Gross, Gerhard P. The Myth and Reality of German Warfare: Operational Thinking from Moltke the Elder to Heusinger. 2016.
Speaker: Bianka Adams, Historian, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
June 18, 2019
Neiberg, Michael. Dance of the Furies: Europe and the Outbreak of World War I. 2013.
Speaker: Brian F. Neumann, Historian, Contemporary History Division, U.S. Army Center of Military History
Filed under: Books, Conferences, WWI, WWII | Tags: Battle of the Somme, Bob Scales, Bud Cole, China, David Silbey, George Patton, Jeff Gibbs, John Lillard, Kelly Morningstar, Kevin Hymel, Malta, Margaret Stoltz, Military Classics Seminar, Military History Legion, Pecan Pie, University Club, Wargaming, William Philpott
The next Military Classics Seminar (18 April 2017) will feature a review of William Philpott’s Three Armies on the Somme: The First Battle of the Twentieth Century, by David Silbey, Professor and Associate Director at Cornell University in Washington. You have 8 days to read it!
If you’ve not attended the seminars before, you’re truly missing out. Each month (minus some summer months and December), either a member or a guest speaker provides and oral review of a military classic or a recent book of note. Discussions both precede and follow the commentary by the speaker. There’s dinner and a bar, so no one goes hungry or thirsty. The opportunity to discuss military history and rub elbows with a variety of historians is worth considerably more than the nominal $35 cost for the dinner. It’s held at the Fort Myer Officer’s Club and we gather at 5:30pm, with dinner served at 6:30pm and the talk starting around 7:30pm. The dinners are always good, but this month is special, as the dessert is pecan pie!
Contact Co-Secretary Eric Joyce via email: militaryclassics -at- gmail.com to make your reservation.
I also wanted to pass along the upcoming speakers and events at the University Club’s Military History Legion. I’ve not yet attended, but will likely circle July 11th, since Kevin Hymel doesn’t talk enough about Patton for me to have my fill….
Dinner is afterward, but there is an $18.00 open bar – Wine, beer, soft drinks and complimentary popcorn to hold you over during the talk.
All events are at the University Club: 1135 16th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036, Phone: 202 862-8800. You may also join us for dinner with the speaker afterward. Non-members may use credit cards or cash for dinner. Business attire (no jeans). Valet parking available: $12 for 2 hrs, $17 for 2+ hrs; some metered parking nearby but may run until 10 pm!
Questions? Contact Margaret Stoltz: mstoltz -at- universityclubdc.com. or Jeff Gibbs: tigrejj -at- aol.com
May 16, 2017 (Tues) – “China’s Quest for Great Power” by CAPT. Bud Cole USN (ret) will explain China’s naval expansion, and its linkage to the pursuit of secure energy sources and Chinese foreign policy, both globally and in an Asian context; in a presentation that we hope will be in time to anticipate pending developments in the South China Sea.
June 8, 2017 (Thurs) – “Playing War: Wargaming WW II in the Pacific” by John Lillard, will discuss the history and nature of wargaming and how the wargames conducted by the Naval War College allowed the US Navy to foresee the course of the battle for the Pacific during WW II.
June 20, 2017 (Tues) – “Scales on War: The Future of America’s Military at Risk” by MGen. Bob Scales USA(r), who will illustrate how, through the experience of recent conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, our adaptive enemies learned how to defeat American technology, and why a resurgence of neglected Army and Marine small units is now required.
July 11, 2017 (Tues) – “Patton’s Way: A Radical Theory of War” by Kelly Morningstar, who will describe Gen. George Patton’s radical doctrine of war, developed over decades, that contradicted official Army doctrine but led to brilliant successes such as his breakout from the Normandy pocket that shattered German resistance and liberated Paris.
August 24, 2017 (Thurs) – “The Great Siege – Malta 1565” by Jeff Gibbs, about one of the most celebrated but now neglected events of the period: the dramatic, desperate siege of Malta, where the Knights and the Maltese people heroically crushed the myth of Turkish invincibility.
Filed under: Books, Marines, WWI | Tags: Barbara Tuchan, Belleau Wood, Clifton Cates, Edwin Simmons, Joseph Alexander, Max Hastings, Peter Owen, Rheims, Thomas Holcomb
In preparation for Tuesday night’s Military Classics Seminar Series, which covers both Max Hastings’ Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War
At the September meeting, I won a great book in the monthly raffle, Peter Owen’s To the Limit of Endurance: A Battalion of Marines in the Great War
To slip into an aside, I really have found two compelling reasons for e-books. Now, I love real, live books. There’s nothing like reading and turning pages, smelling the book, having the tactile sensations of the book, and getting the author to sign your book. You don’t get those with an electronic book, but you do get two other things: portability and maps.
While “Through the Wheat” is no massive volume, it’s really nice to always have it with me. I have a tablet and phone, so I’ve always got a copy of whatever Kindle books I’ve read with me. So, I could be carrying 6 or 7 books on WWI, or a few dozen on Marines, and quickly cross-reference or simply read while walking to lunch or sitting down somewhere for a drink. I was reading both this one and Hastings (though I have not finished Hastings yet). As a book-addict, I could sneak 5 minutes of reading in at obscure moments. I didn’t even need to plan it.
As I’ve noted before, the greatest leap involved in having a book on a tablet is that you can just load Google maps or some other application and pull up the location being covered in the book. That is, if the book doesn’t have maps, you suddenly do. While you may not have a thematic map, with unit symbols and direction of movement drawn on it (“Through the Wheat” has some beautiful maps, by the way), you have two other abilities beyond just being able to get any map — zooming and terrain. Sometimes, it’s hard to place the action in relation to known landmarks or in context to the rest of the campaign. The zoom really allows you to do that. Looking at the terrain in Google Earth or even just contour lines and satellite imagery gives you a perspective far closer to actually walking the ground than anything else.
To return to the subject, “Through the Wheat” is a well-written book with extensive research behind it and a great ability to keep the story and the people flowing. One of the great problems in writing military history, especially in a unit study in which there are so many casualties, is to keep the story flowing, rather than jumping from place to place and from personal story through unit perspectives to some kind of overview. Alexander and Simmons were masters of the art, learned over decades, and had a mastery of the material. So, the movements of the various battalions in the Marine Brigade and of the officers transferring between those units (and occasionally both out-and-back-into them), I didn’t feel a sense of confusion and wonder who was who or how the Brigade suddenly ended up on the other side of Rheims. Of course, another aspect of this is deciding which interesting stories would detract from that by being too singular or too detailed for a study of the entire Brigade.
Getting one’s mind around the Marine experience in World War I is not easy, but I think “Through the Wheat” offers a great introduction to it. It deals with the entire range of issues, from the rapid expansion of the Corps, through training, the political maneuverings to get the Marines into the fight (both with the Army and the French) as well as the insights into each of the 5 battles the Brigade fought during the war.
I fully expect to walk the ground in Belleau Wood in 2015, with my trusty tablet in hand, reviewing Cates’ commentary on the assault through the wheatfield. If I’m lucky, I’ll have found Peter Owen’s friend and guide, Alain Romelot, and won’t be as lost as one would expect.
Filed under: Books, Colmar Pocket, German Perspective, Operation Dragoon | Tags: Anton Myrer, George Grossjohann, Once an Eagle, Sam Damon, Theodore Mataxis
BGEN Theodore Mataxis was asked to write a foreword for Georg Grossjohann’s “Five Years, Four Fronts” and nearly turned it down. He felt he’d have little in common with the Major. They hadn’t fought in the same battles and their careers hadn’t been similar.
However, because of my keen interest in and bias in favor of “eyeball accounts” by combat participants, I finally agreed to read the draft manuscript. At worst, I thought, it would confirm my doubts, and I would simply have to decline the opportunity to pen the requested foreword. The more I read, though, the more engrossed and intrigued I became. I found this was not just another war story of campaigns during WWII, but the author’s detailed account of his experience at small-unit level during peace, mobilization and war.
Mataxis truly enjoyed the book and his foreword becomes an enthusiastic endorsement of the work. Grossjohann rose from the enlisted ranks to Major while fighting in the aforementioned four fronts, including fighting in Operation Dragoon and the Colmar Pocket, finishing as a regimental commander in mid-January of 1945.
The more I read, the more I realized that I did, in fact, have much in common with Grossjohann, although not just from the war in which we shared only a common theater of operations. Later in my Army service, I served as executive officer for – and then commanded – an infantry regiment in the Korean War and served four tours in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. Altogether, I spent about five years in combat, as did Grossjohann. Although I gradually recognized that we had a lot in common in other ways, it was in these combat tours that I acquired the “mindset” which I think is what most closely links George Grossjohann and me across space and time – the critical importance of “bonding” in combat, and the soldier’s warrior ethos. That is what transcends our different nationalities, causes and theaters of war. Neither of us had much time for fripperies or superficialities. The trappings of things militaristic or the transient fads of the moment – be they the transparent nonsense of National Socialism for Grossjohann, the trumped-up bodycount game of my Vietnam tourss, the “Zero Defects” philosophy of my last years of service, or the “Consideration for Others” claptrap of today’s Army, none of them held or would have held the slightest interest for either of us. Indeed, because such things often get in the way of more important endeavors (training, learning, fighting), we despised them and ignored them when we could. The author’s unconcealed loathing of equivocation, moral cowardice, professional vanity, and selfishness among some of his fellow officers – the same kind of things scorned by Anton Myrer’s archetype of the Good Office, Sam Damon in “Once an Eagle” – struck a sympathetic chord with me. Been there, seen that – far too much of it! Take the time to perceive the author’s unabashed esteem for those – of all ranks – who exhibited anything approaching the unspoken passion the author had for soldiering, and you’ll discover the frank admiration of a kindred soul. All good soldiers can identify with the warrior ethos that is the basic cornerstone of espirit and high morale.
He finished with truly high praise.
If I ever get around to writing my memoirs, although they will be mostly about other wars and other times, I hope I can tell my story with as much honesty, class, and plain truth as this one.
Unfortunately, the final seven years of his life after penning this foreword appear not to have allowed Mataxis time and energy to write those memoirs, but I suspect reading Grossjohann’s work will give us the sense of what it would have been like.
Filed under: Books, German Perspective, Marines, Normandy, Operation Dragoon, Paratroopers, Tours, Veterans | Tags: Cody Green, Denzel Washington, Heinrich Severloh, John Carter, Mark Dolfini, Omaha Beach, Paul Woodadge, Ted Gundy, Thanksgiving
Being the end of the year, I thought I’d look at some statistics and share them.
My top-ranking posts since I started this blog is dominated by one post, but the top 5 are all good posts:
Thanksgiving 1944 1,413
This got a huge number of hits due to being linked at Ace of Spades, thanks to our friends at Bring the Heat. On Thanksgiving of 1944, Eisenhower ordered that all soldiers have a turkey dinner. For airborne engineer John Carter, that provided a very humorous story that I was able to post the video of. I have some further videos of an interview with Carter and a couple of other stories. He’s quite a comedian.
While the Marine Corps is made up of strong men, they also have strong hearts. A couple of times recently, they’ve made young men with terminal illnesses honorary Marines. The story of Cody Green and his honor guard, SGT Mark Dolfini, can’t help but move one to tears.
Denzel Washington at the Fisher House 236
Denzel Washington is among my favorite actors. He has great range and conveys the emotions of his characters very well. Some of his roles have been as military men and he’s gotten attached to the Fisher House. Fisher House Foundation is best known for a network of comfort homes where military and veterans’ families can stay at no cost while a loved one is receiving treatment. When Washington visited the Fisher House at Brooke Army Medical Center in 2004, his generosity launched an urban legend.
Heinrich Severloh was a German machine gunner at Omaha Beach and the horrors he helped inflict that day stayed in his dreams until his death in 2006.
For about a decade, Paul Woodadge built up a battlefield tour business in Normandy, expanding from a one-man operation, hiring several others to lead tours. Battlebus was the best tour company in Normandy and even had tours in Bastogne. Unfortunately, running a complex business and dealing with French tax and employment laws meant that Paul stopped being able to lead tours himself. While I lamented the end of an era, it meant that Paul could go back to doing what he loved. He also had time to publish Angels of Mercy: Two Screaming Eagle Medics in Angoville-au-Plain on D-Day (Normandy Combat Chronicles) (Volume 1)
Filed under: 36th, Books, Officers, Operation Dragoon, Understanding Battles | Tags: Fred Butler, John E. Dahlquist, Lucian Truscott, Montelimar
As I’ve said many times, there is no substitute for walking the ground. Looking at maps, reading unit/battle/campaign histories, or even using my new favorite tool, my tablet, never give you the same understanding as actually being on the ground where the fight took place.
We’re over in France and this time we’ve come to the south. This has given me an opportunity to walk the ground at Montelimar. Before we arrived, I’d contacted retired French Army Colonel Pierre Balliot to see if he could recommend a guide. He volunteered himself, driving 200+ kilometers to show us the ‘battle box’. The Colonel has written a marvelous book, of which I now possess a signed copy, entitled La Drome dans la Guerre: La bataille de Montelimar, which details the battle. So, my wife, our friend Tom and I got a half-day tour of the 20 km by 20 km ‘battle box’ in which Task Force Butler, the 36th Infantry Division and French partisans attempted to block the escape of 130,000 men of the German Army from southern France.
The battle of Montelimar had the same goal as the sealing of the Falaise Pocket in Normandy, trapping an entire Army Group. So, for me, the Battle of Montelimar is the most important action of the campaign.
Walking the ground here, you get a far better sense of why they chose the ground they did, what worked and what did not. The first thing to note is the height of the high ground. While the tablet and Google maps did point out the value of Hill 300, it gave no real sense of the true height or the slope. Somehow, I thought of 300 feet when I read about the Hill. It’s 300 meters or about 1000 feet. The slope is also extreme, making it difficult to dislodge any defenders. The Hill is so tall and long that it completely shields any troops coming up the Rhone valley through that choke point from observation or attack from the east. While there is plenty of high ground north of this, none overlooks such a tight passage as this. Thus, it comes as no surprise that there was tremendous fighting at La Coucourde, where the main road, Route Nationale 7, emerges from behind Hill 300 and where General Truscott had directed General Dahlquist to ‘put the cork in the bottle’, entrapping so many Germans.
Dahlquist and Butler faced many challenges here. The terrain that provided such an opportunity was itself a great challenge. The mountains restricted movement, inhibited communication, and provided endless opportunities for ambush. The narrow roads were difficult for armored vehicles and the slopes a great challenge as well. The vast distance from the landing beaches made resupply slow and the lack of sufficient transport compounded that.
The rivers helped, but not nearly as much as one would think when looking at the map. Walking the ground at the same time of the year, you see how low they are, how much vegetation would conceal movement and how challenging defending along those lines would be. Looking out from Dahlquist’s headquarters you see how broad a front he needed to defend.
Dahlquist himself may have been a part of the problem, never seeming to move fast enough for Truscott’s taste – Truscott flew to his headquarters twice during this campaign to hasten him along.
The few troops that reached the fight first shocked the Germans, but a few hundred men, even at strategic points, can only do so much to stop an Army Group.
Filed under: 507th, Books, Cemeteries, German Perspective, Medics, Normandy, Tours | Tags: Allan Bryson, American Sector, Angoville-au-Plain, Dale Booth, Grainges, Omaha Beach, Paul Woodadge, Pointe du Hoc
Earlier today, someone asked me about tours in Normandy and, while they are not using one of my three favorite guides, I provided some commentary on places to see. Most guides will tailor their tour at your request and there are some places I see as better spots to visit than others. There are some sites that are basically meaningless without a guide and others in which you’re not really using the guide’s knowledge.
If you have a single day to tour the battlefield with a guide, you want to maximize your time with the tour guide, sticking to sites that are close to each other and where the guide can provide the most impact. Each guide’s knowledge and enthusiasm is different, so I’m just providing my commentary.
I would say that due to the stark images and the general silence and emptiness of the German military cemetery at La Cambe, that it is a must, especially if your guide has stories to relate while you’re there. The small museum there is very well-done. Every guide should be able to relate some of the story of the cemetery and place it in context, so it is better with a guide. You might find it odd that I place this first, but I think that you don’t get as much of both the German perspective and a reminder of the horror that is war anywhere else in Normandy.
Now, since I’m looking at all this from an American perspective, I will only talk about the American sector in this post. My experience in the British and Canadian sector is far more limited, so I can’t speak as well to that.
Pointe du Hoc is absolutely required. If you’re not read The Boys of Pointe du Hoc: Ronald Reagan, D-Day, and the U.S. Army 2nd Ranger Battalion by Douglas Brinkley or watched Reagan’s historic speech in 1984 (speech written by then-unheralded Peggy Noonan), you really ought to do so before you go. Reading that will give you the structure and provide an emotive basis for your visit, but nothing really can prepare you for the level of destruction visited upon the landscape by the bombardment. Going down into one of the craters will truly give you a sense of it, but you’ll also get to see how most of the fortifications survived intact, requiring the Rangers to root the Germans out the hard way. Some guides will go with you into the bunkers and continue to explain, while others will simply let you wander. I prefer those who have more stories to tell, so it might be useful to determine in advance which kind of visit to Pointe du Hoc that the guide plans on.
Of course, as an American, you must visit the American cemetery. It is incredibly moving and feels like you’re back in the US, in a good way. You’ll note that all of our boys are facing home. The American cemetery does not allow guides to conduct tours on the grounds, so you are generally given some guidelines and advice, then explore on your own. I prefer to tour that by myself rather than using the guide’s time.
The Church at Angoville au Plainis one of the more moving stories in Normandy and if at all possible, you should try to visit there with Paul Woodadge, whose book, Angels of Mercy: Two Screaming Eagle Medics in Angoville-au-Plain on D-Day, details the experience of two American paratrooper medics caring for the wounded between enemy lines during the battle. Since this is more in the northern, airborne sector of the American battle zone, I would suggest it only be done as part of an American airborne tour rather than combined with the American cemetery or Omaha Beach. While someone who has read Paul’s book will understand what happened here, someone who has not will have no real understanding without a tour guide to explain. Similarly, having the guide present will make one who feels familiar with the story learn far more.
If you’re only doing a one-day tour, I would recommend you visit Omaha Beach, the American and German cemeteries and Pointe du Hoc. If you manage to study Angoville au Plain or Graignes, you might seek one of those, but likely need to skip something. If you’re seriously into paratroopers or gliders, or have a veteran or other link to Utah Beach, visit those with the guide rather than thinking you can visit everything.
Filed under: Books, Leadership, Marines, Officers | Tags: Douglas Southall Freeman, Duffel Blog, Iwo Jima, James Mattis
There’s no mistaking the respect of the Marines for many of their Generals and high in the pantheon must be General James N. Mattis. Back in 2004, “a colleague wrote to him asking about the ‘importance of reading and military history for officers,’ many of whom found themselves ‘too busy to read.'” Mattis responded in an email that has since gone viral. Mattis continues the grand tradition of well-read Marine officers who also excel in combat, following the example of none other than Chesty Puller, who carried a copy of Douglas Southall Freeman’s “Lee’s Lieutenants” with him in the Pacific. In his email, he dispenses with those who think there is nothing to learn for the modern warrior from books:
For all the “4th Generation of War” intellectuals running around today saying that the nature of war has fundamentally changed, the tactics are wholly new, etc, I must respectfully say … “Not really”: Alex the Great would not be in the least bit perplexed by the enemy that we face right now in Iraq, and our leaders going into this fight do their troops a disservice by not studying (studying, vice just reading) the men who have gone before us.
We're not lost, Sergeant, We're in ... France 