What was written as current affairs is now popular history and military sociology.

In March 1995, at what we now know to be the midpoint between the Cold War and the so-called Global War on Terror, military journalist Tom Ricks embedded himself in a platoon of recruits going through Marine Corps boot camp at the famed Parris Island. Making the Corps, Ricks' account of that experience, was published in the late summer of 1997, just as I enrolled – as a Foreign Service Officer – in the Marine Corps' Command and Staff College in Quantico. Like Ricks, in my ten years in the State Department (to that point), I had had frequent contact with Marines – the detachments that secured our embassies, and my Ambassador in Jamaica, who had been the first African-American to lead a Marine infantry unit in combat (in Vietnam), and was at that time a Reserve USMC Major General (two-star).

The bulk of the book is, properly enough, taken up with the literal trials and tribulations of the 63 men who seek to gain the title and dignity of being called “U.S. Marine,” which will only come after they complete the eleven week course. Ricks, much like the drill sergeants, focuses his attention on the stand-outs and wash-outs among the recruits. For the D.I.s, those in the middle will do ok without their attention. For Ricks, the ends of the bell curve provide better stories: “reformed” white supremacists and nominally criminal gang members from SE Washington DC are more interesting than fast food employees or even a washed up accountant. And it is interesting – but is it an authentic picture of the Marine recruit in the mid-1990s? Probably not.

Where the book really disappoints though is the penultimate chapter, Ricks' attempt to predict the coming role of the Marines and the US military. Having belabored the idea that there exists a deep and widening gap between the military generally and the Marines specifically and civilian culture at large, Ricks doubles down. Earlier, he noted that the skinhead and the gangbanger agreed that a “race war” was coming to America (and that Jews were at fault). In this latter chapter, he turns to experts with better credentials but the same bigotry to argue that as the military experiences the then-expected downsizing, and American culture is ravaged by the supposed acolytes of cultural Marxism, the Marines will be called on to maintain peace and order at home. Ricks is blind to oncoming rush of terrorism, even though al Qaeda had already bombed the World Trade Center in 1993 and the USAF barracks in Khobar, Saudi Arabia in 1996 (initially atributed to Hezbollah and its backer Iran), neither of which he mentions, and the Marines suffered 220 deaths in the 1983 Beirut terror bombing (which Ricks does mention).

In that chapter, Ricks worries about the increasing politicization of individual Marine and military officers, taking as his benchmark a mythical past in which US military officers were strictly apolitical, not even voting. The benchmark, the myth, studiously ignores the real history, which saw the former Commanding General of the U.S. Army George McClellan candidacy against his former Commander-in-Chief Lincoln in 1864, General Douglas MacArthur flirt with a run for President in 1952; the cigar-chomping, fire-bombing, warmongering General Curtis Lemay's run for Vice-President in 1968; and the similar role of Admiral James Stockdale in 1992.

Making the Corps is well-written, and Ricks had almost astonishing access to the boot camp experience. A very good effort for his first book-length essay. But in the end, this is descriptive, not analytical or incisive, and it remains a curio for the curious, easily laid aside and forgotten.

Book Review: The Longest Winter: The Battle of the Bulge and the Epic Story of World War II's Most Decorated Platoon (Hardcover) by Alex Kershaw

When Kershaw is relating the stories of the members of the I&R platoon (Intelligence and Recon (scout) 394th Infantry regiment, 99th Division, US Army) , drawing on his personal interviews with the veterans, the book is pretty good. At that point, it is a compelling story of men under fire and duress. When he is setting the larger context, drawing on secondary sources, the story is trite and filled with niggling errors.

I also disliked the amount of attention given to Skorzeny and SS Col. Peiper. In particular, Kershaw imples that Peiper was unfairly targeted by "Communists" after the war. Here's the thing: a commanding officer is responsible for the behavior of ALL the troops under his command. It does not matter if Peiper was not personally present at the Malmedy Massacre, or that he did not order the killings of POWs. When atrocities occured, it was Peiper's responsibility to punish those of his subordinates who transgressed. Op. cit. Jadranko Prlić, Rasim Delić, Atif Dudaković, Sakib Mahmuljin - all convicted of war crimes during the Bosnian War (1992-5) for their failure to adequately supervise troops under their command. And Prlić was a politician, not an army commander in the field. (I also met all four after the war.) [N.b.: Dudaković has been charged; he has not been tried as of this writing.]

 

Book Review: Behold, America: The Entangled History of “America First” and “The American Dream” by Sarah Churchwell

An Etymological Essay at Book Length

Churchwell's 2018 book looks at these two tropes, from their origins around 1900, the peak of “America First” in the speeches of isolationist Charles Lindbergh in 1941, to the proclaimed “death” of the American Dream and renewed promotion of “America First” in 2015 by the loser of the 2020 Presidential election. Churchwell examines these two terms through their use in public discourse throughout the 20^th century, focusing on their definition over time. She argues that “The American Dream” is the social contract, a moral economy, that balances liberty and freedom, equality and justice, but that its meaning has been diverted and perverted, especially since the Second World War, to mean the possibility of becoming exceedingly, excessively rich. That America and Americans have redefined Calvinism as “If you are rich, it is God rewarding you for your virtues” and making “The American Dream” synonymous with that redefined doctrine. On the other hand, “America First” and its close relative “100% American” = “100% white” – and Nordic or “Aryan”* white at that. (Lindbergh's public leadership of the “America First” campaign collapsed a few months before the attack on Pearl Harbor after he delivered an anti-Semitic speech in Des Moines.)

I rather liked the opening of Chapter 6, “America First 1920-1923: The Simplicity of Government” which opens with the tale of President Harding, who in “his 1920 'America first' campaign,[] notoriously announced that 'government is a very simple thing,'” further “promising to run the American government like a business.” Now, where have we heard that lately?

Churchwell reminds us of the lasting value of the works of Sinclair Lewis, Walter Lippman, and Dorothy Thompson. All were pronounced anti-Fascists, and their observations hold true today as applied to the heirs of the reactionary “100% American” & “America First” legacies.


* “Aryan” was a term applied to themselves by ancient Indo-Iranian peoples. Somehow I am not surprised that its misapplication as a synonym for “Nordic” was popularized by a graduate of the University of Geneva (who was born in England, raised in France, and settled in Germany), whose B.Sc. thesis was shown to be mystical nonsense.

Book Review:  Imperialism: A Study ... is the iconoclastic 1902 work from British economist J.A. Hobson. Today it is more generally known for having inspired Vladimir Lenin to write his 1916 treatise, Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism. Secondarily, Hobson advanced his theory that the British investor class had "oversaved," with domestic production outstripping domestic consumption, in consequence thereof leading the investors to seek investment opportunities overseas: first in Europe and from 1870 onward in Africa and Asia - the "tropics". A Socialist, Hobson argued that the funds should have been directed homeward by increasing the income placed at the disposition and advantage of the working classes, thereby increasing domestic consumption to match production.

An exhaustive (and exhausting) reading of the text reveals a persistent shadowed motivation: British investment overseas will empower the "black" and "yellow" races, literally imperilling "white civilization." While Hobson is rightfully criticized for anti-Semitism in his earlier book on the Boer War (UK vs ethnic Dutch settlers in South Africa, 1899-1901), blaming the war on "Jewish financiers," such blatant anti-Semitism is missing from "Imperialism." It is beyond curious that modern reviewers of Imperialism so blithely skate past the racism that persists throughout the text.

Hobson supports "colonisation" as opposed to imperialism, which he sees as white families settling in temperate climes - without regard for extant aborginal society and culture.

Hobson's analysis of British imperialism - that is to say, abusive exploitation - of Africa is extensive, cogent and well-supported by citations. (Part II, Chapter IV - "Imperialism and the Lower Races.") Not so the following Chapter on "Imperialism in Asia," which is painted on a phantasmagorical background of an innately corrupt India and a peaceful, wise and complacent China robbed of its innocence and riches by European buccaneers.

Hobson has both an eye and a pen for a good turn of phrase.

Pithy metaphor:

"A coma accompanied by fits." Miss Mary Kingsley on British policy in the West African colonies. p. 128

Insouciant nationalism:

"Probably every one would agree that an Englishman would be right in considering his way of looking at the world and at life better than that of the Maori or Hottentot, and no one will object in the abstract to England doing her best to impose her better and higher view on those savages." (Goes on to accord Belgians, Germans, Nordics the same lack of disrespect, if at a higher step.) Earl Grey on Hubert Harvey of the British South African Chartered Company, p. 167

Outrageous sanctimony:

"Our only programme is that of the moral and material regeneration of the country." King Leopold II of Belgium, referencing the Congo. p. 209

{I cannot praise too highly King Leopold's Ghost by Adam Hochschild in refutation of this hypocrisy.}

Damnation of Populism:

They are no longer seriously frightened by the power of the people as implied by a popular franchise, nor are they prepared to conciliate it by further taxes on property; .... 'Panem et circenses' interpreted into English means cheap booze and Mafficking (Mafeking, Siege of: ed.). Popular education, instead of serving as a defence, is an incitement towards Imperialism; it has opened up a panorama of vulgar pride and crude sensationalism to a great inert mass who see current history and the tangled maze of world movements with dim, bewildered eyes, and are the inevitable dupes of the able organised interests who can lure, or scare, or drive them into any convenient course. p. 107

Fake News:

Imperialism is based upon a persistent misrepresentation of facts and forces chiefly through a most refined process of selection, exaggeration, and attenuation, directed by interested cliques and persons so as to distort the face of history. The gravest peril of Imperialism lies in the state of mind of a nation which has become habituated to this deception and which has rendered itself incapable of self-criticism. p. 223

Prophesy:

"[China] may turn upon her civiliser [.] .... [T]here is no consideration, theoretic or practical, to prevent British capital from transferring itself to China, provided it can find there a cheaper or more efficient supply of labour, or even to prevent Chinese capital with Chinese labour from ousting Britsh produce [.] ....

China might so turn the tables upon the Western industrial nations, and, either by adopting their capital and organisers or, as is more probable, by substituting her own, might flood their markets with her cheaper manufacturers, and refusing their imports in exchange might take her payments in liens upon their capital, reversing the earlier process of investment until she gradually obtained financial control over her quondam patrons and civilisers. This is no idle speculation." pp 329-330

And Condemnation of the "Upper" Class:

" ... vulgar ostentation, domineering demeanour and corrupting largesse to dazzle and degrade the life of our people." p. 158

 Book Review All Against All: The Long Winter of 1933 and the Origins of the Second World War by Paul Jankowski

I'll agree that this is "A narrative [ ], cinematic in scope, of a process." But a history it is not. A proper history is analytical - why and not just what happened. "Delusions of nationalism" is an assertion, not analysis. Overall, the text is merely descriptive, no more so than when he devotes a paragraph to actress Jeanette MacDonald's impression of the appearance of German delegate (and rabid nationalist) Alfred Hugenberg at the 1933 London World Economic Conference.

The narrative itself is crippled by the author's style, which employs a muddled grammar (notably far too many indefinite referents) and odd metaphors that leaves a turgid account, one that had me reading the same sentence or paragraph over and over again until I finally fished out his meaning - or, too often, gave up and moved on.

His discussions of diplomacy are ill-founded. He asserts that the 1922 Washington Naval Treaty, a backdrop to the disarmament discussions a decade later in Geneva, resulted from an aspirational verging on delusional attachment to disarmament, and necessitated the concurrent agreement guaranteeing security in China. At no point does the author note that no naval power of the time could afford the fleets they had in being and far less the extravagant armadas being built, that naval disarmament was an economic imperative.

As with understanding of diplomatic motivations, his discussion of diplomatic process is lacking. On the World Economic Conference of 1933, Jankowski states that FDR “never sought authority” from Congress to discuss war debts and tariffs. That's not how it works: the US Executive does not need “Congressional Authority” to discuss an issue, or even enter into negotiations. Congress is involved if the resulting agreement requires legislation to implement, or takes the form of a treaty require Senate consent. Even here, the author later restates the obstacle as instructions to the US delegation to not “sign” agreements without "congressional scrutiny.” And indeed, the author turns to discussions led by the UK and US central banks, in which participated seven other countries, which did reach an agreement including from the US delegation for referral to capitals.

Not worthless, but not worth the time it took to read. It's certainly not The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914 by Christopher Clark.

Book Review: Moral Combat: Good and Evil in World War II, by Michael Burleigh.

Synopsis: The Nazis were bad people who did bad things for bad reasons. The Soviets under Stalin were bad people who did bad things for one good reason. The Japanese did a lot of bad things, but since the legal definition of conspiracy is unfathomable, those things just happened – and some of them were good people who loved their families, so there's that. The Americans were good people who did good things but were too naive and unsophisticated to know why they did what they did. The British are good people who did good things for good reasons, except when they did bad things for good reasons, so those were good things too, really. The Italians changed sides so that 99% of the Fascists could escape punishment for the not so terribly bad things they did. The Croatian Ustashe are beneath notice, and while Polish and French resistance is remarkable, the Yugoslav Partisans turned out to be Commies, so there is no reason to acknowledge them.

Reinhold Neibuhr and Martin Niemöller can't hold a candle to CoE (Church of England) clergy when it comes to the theological implications of morality in wartime, so are justly ignored. Also, lawyers, and moral philosophers, the political “left,” the New York Times, and all other historians are ignorant. And you can tell whether someone is morally virtuous by their appearance and personal habits. Lastly, apparently there is no problem with using terms like “Apache-like” and Gypsy.

TL, DR: Hitler bad, Churchill good.

Overrated Classic: Fritz Fischer's Germany's Aims in the First World War

Fritz Fischer's Germany's Aims in the First World War is an acclaimed classic, usually cited for breaking with forty years of German accepted wisdom that, unlike in 1939, in 1914 Germany “slid” blamelessly into war (to quote UK PM Lloyd-George). That is to say, Fischer asserted iconoclastically that the German Reich bore "a substantial share of the historical responsibility for the outbreak of the general war." And this assertion, commonly accepted outside of Germany long before Fischer's 1961 pronouncement, is what gained Germany's Aims in the First World War such fame and notoriety – even though Fischer himself states in his book “It is not the purpose of this work (to debate) the question of war guilt.” p 87 And truly, what Fischer spends over 500 pages on is not war guilt, but an effort to show that the Second Reich sought to use the war to establish itself as a “world power,” through the political annexation of its nearest neighbors and the economic subordination of much of Europe into a Mitteleuropa.

Unfortunately for readability, Fischer pursues this goal by repetitive chronological rendering of state papers and the opinions of Germany's government officials and occasionally politicians and leading businessmen. Make no mistake, getting through this tome is a slog, one that is rarely rewarding.

Fischer's genuine thesis is buried halfway through the book: “Leading circles in Germany were convinced that only a victorious war ending in substantial gains would enable them to maintain their political and social order;” p. 329 Such a stance certainly explains the stubbornness with which the Emperor, Army (and Navy), and Reich and Prussian governments held to to arrogant war aims – domination of Belgium and Poland, exploitation of Romania, seizure of the Baltic, Ukraine, even Caucasus, and commandeering the mine fields of northeast France.

But Fischer's emptying of the German archives into his expose leads him astray, by overvaluing any and all documents that support his thesis of an unchecked German will to power. For example, he cites the views of the head of the German Colonial Association and the head of the Reich Colonial Office as proof of German war aims in Africa. p. 587 Bureaucratically, an organization will always advocate for its own narrow goals, irrespective of whether those goals serve the greater good. Without clear evidence that the goal was accepted by the state, such views are interesting, but not dispositive. One might as well say a child's wish for a pony proves the existence of the stable.

And again, Fischer proffers arguments such as that on page 603: “a long report (in June 1918) by the [Prussian] Ministry of State (was) one more testimony to Prussia's obstinate determination to expand....” It is more likely that the report is testimony to the inertia of bureaucracy, offering reports to the captain on how to arrange the deckchairs long after hitting the iceberg.

The past few years have seen numerous new books on the question of why the Great War broke out. Any of them, even the least of them, is a better contribution to the field than Fischer at this date.

From Bad to Simply Awful and Tendentious: No Simple Victory - World War II in Europe, 1939-1945, by Norman Davies

Lately, I've taken to reading the end of novels first, to see how the author reaches her conclusions. If only I had done that with Davies' 500 page No Simple Victory. I could have then tossed it aside as the tendentious work it is hours earlier, without wasting my time.

Nominally, Davies sets out to give a synthetic view of WW2 in Europe, and not focus simply on the efforts of the US and UK militaries. But the small and large factual errors pile up (see below), all under an assertion that the Soviet effort was so "overwhelming" as to completely overshadow the Western effort. Frankly, any book on WW2 Europe that dismissively asserts that "D-Day does not figure among the top ten battles of the war" is seriously in error.

How does Davies figure the significance of battles? By counting up the number of military deaths, primarily, secondarily by counting the number of divisions, and lastly by assigning a duration to the battle. All of which, perhaps accidently but more likely by surreptitious intention, assigns more weight to the inefficient way of battle practiced by the Soviet Army, which created and destroyed (understrength) divisions by the hundreds, as compared to the West, which created a few score divisions, each quite powerful on its own and generally overstrength, not just compared to a Soviet division (which it would overawe, one on one), but even compared to its "authorized" strength, if measured just prior to a campaign.

To Davies' way of thought, a battle between 300,000 men on both sides that kills half of each force over two months is far more significant than a battle between the same forces, where the victor loses only 5,000 men in a week of fighting to vanquish its foe, which loses 20,000 dead and 200,000 captured. In fact, it would be either 150,000 divided by 25,000 = six times more significant; or it is eight times more significant (300,000 men each force x two forces x two months = 1,200,000 "man-months) cf. 300,000 men each force x two forces x 1/4 month = 150,000 man-months). Yet in the real world the first is a bloody stalemate, the second a brilliant victory.

Or look at Davies' list of battles and campaigns (p. 25): of the top four battles, two (Barbarossa and Kiev 1941) were won by the strategic loser (Germany), and a third (Leningrad) was a stalemate - and in Davies' own assessment, a fight that Soviets should have declined by withdrawing from the city.

Another notable error is Davies' assertion (page 109) that the Axis "cut its losses" in Tunisia in 1943. German military dead in North Africa in 1943 were slight (c. 8,500), so Davies' method would have this as insignificant. Never mind the surrender of over 200,000 Axis troops ( 12/ German) - more than surrendered at Stalingrad. Never mind the loss of 40% of the Luftwaffe (11/42 - 5/43, in N. Africa and the Med).  The small errors are too numerous to recapitulate (one sticks too hard not to mention: B-24s were built by Consolidated, not North American).

I'm not sure what Davies' goal was in writing NSV. But given his reputation as a fervent advocate for Poland (he was made a Polish citizen on the basis of his prior work), I believe he wants to fault his homeland, the UK, for failing in its September goal of restoring Poland's freedom within its 1939 borders.

Book Review: The Darkest Days: The Truth Behind Britain's Rush to War 1914, by Douglas Newton

Newton delivers a solid piece of historical research, exploding the myths of why, how, and importantly when Britain decided on war in 1914. The classic myth is that Britain only decided on war AFTER Germany invaded “plucky little” Belgium on August 4th, declaring war late that evening. Newton shows that the very senior members of Britain's government, acting without Parliament or even the larger Cabinet, decided on war August 2^nd, in support of the “Ententes” with Russia and France, themselves designed not to constrain Germany, but to de-conflict the British Empire's colonial holdings in Africa and Asia.

In this account, PM Asquith, Foreign Minister Grey, and First Sea Lord Churchill controlled the descent into war. Only Asquith's motivation is explored in depth, stressing his desire to keep his Liberal government in power. (Ironically, a coalition with the Conservatives was unavoidable in May 1915, resulting from poor management of the war.)

Newton also all too briefly sketches the nascent opposition to war, nipped in the bud by the heavy-handed rush to war.

Newton's writing style is solid but academic, and the book is not a”page-turner.” It is however a useful counter to the “fairy tale” of Britain being forced into war by “dire necessity.” At the least, any reader interested in the origins of World War One should read Newton's last two paragraphs, Radical Recriminations, and Conclusion,where he gives an excellent summary of his arguments.

Book Review: An Unsatisfying Account of the Naval Battles off Guadalcanal in 1942

Neptune's Inferno: The U.S. Navy at Guadalcanal. James D. Hornfischer.

I really wanted to like this book. I enjoyed immensely Hornfischer's The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors, a gripping account of the succesful defiance shown by the smallest warships of the US Navy when faced with a devasting surface attack led by the warship in the world, the Japanese battleship Yamato, off Leyte Gulf in October 1944. But Hornfischer's technique of showing the reactions of sailors and officers to the confusion and terror of battle in one encounter doesn't work that well when applied to an entire months-long campaign, with seven major battles and near-continous skirmishes. In reading Neptune's Inferno, I repeatedly lost track of individuals and even entire ships - and I have read numerous accounts of these events before. A novice to naval warfare would be even more lost, as Hornfischer ignores technology in favor of personalities - except when he doesn't, with unexplicated references to "turret 1" and such.

There are disconcerting editing mistakes as well: Two examples, page 283: "at murderously close range, sixty-two thousand yards,..." No, that's 35 miles; should be “hundred yards.” Page 284: "Bruce McCandless at the flagship's (San Francisco) conn called to Captain Jenkins, "The Atlanta's turning left. Should I follow her?" Really? Because Jenkins is captain of the Atlanta - how and why would McCandless on the San Francisco's bridge call out to him?

I know I am outlier here, but Neptune's Inferno's narrative left me confused, its exposition of events was superficial, and its analysis was simply missing in all the action. For example, Hornficher properly notes that the anti-aircraft cruiser USS Atlanta was sent to join a surface action group, while the US battleships were retained on carrier and escort convoy duty - a perfect mismatch of roles and capabilities - but does little to explicate this command error.

I will go back to Samuel E. Morison's official history The Struggle for Guadalcanal: August 1942-February 1943 (History of United States Naval Operations in World War II) , Eric Hammels' Decision at Sea and Carrier Strike, and Osprey Publishing's The Naval Battles for Guadalcanal 1942: Clash for Supremacy in the Pacific (Campaign).

Book Review: The Dead Hand - The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and its Dangerous Legacy

David E. Hoffman's Dead Hand  is both well-researched and well-written - but in its focus on Gorbachev and Reagan, it lacks analysis. When faced with the question, why did  Gorbachev continue funding the hidden, and quite illegal, Soviet biological weapons program while seeking the complete elimination of nuclear and chemical weapons, Hoffman shrugs. Hoffman never raises the question of why the Soviets hated Reagan's SDI ("Star Wars" - ballistic missile defense). Nor does it occur to Hoffman to examine what Reagan did, and could have done, to push his Administration to support his goal of the total elimination of nuclear weapons. I don't have a good answer for the last - but Hoffman, as a political reporter, could have presumably done more on the question.

The penultimate chapter of Dead Hand hints at why the Soviets, if not Gorbachev himself, kept the biological weapons program. Namely, it becomes a war-winning weapon in the absence of opposing WMD systems, particularly if the weapons are deployed on the scale envisioned by the Soviets. Compliance with the Biological and Toxic Weapons Convention (BWTC) is still, in 2015, nearly impossible to verify, given the BWTC's lack of any verification protocol. As shown by Aum Shinrikyo's 1994 and 1995 (Tokyo subway) attacks, biological weapons are comparatively easy to acquire and deliver, with research and production of the weapons easily concealed.

Conversely, Hoffman never considers why the Soviets feared a viable ballistic missile defense (BMD). Hoffman takes Reagan at his word, that BMD would be a passive shield. Hoffman never considers that shields and armor exist not to preserve the combatant against repeated, unreturned blows, but to enable the armored fighter to deliver a decisive attack while surviving the exchange.

Let's consider two countries, perfect reciprocals. Both have 1000 missiles with 3 nuclear warheads each. Each has 100 cities with 1 million population each; each city takes 5 warheads to destroy. Likewise, each missile is in a silo, which takes two warheads to destroy. Each missile has 95% accuracy against a city, but only 
60% against a silo. (You have to hit much closer to a hardened silo to destroy it, compared to a city.)

Without BMD, a first strike against silos leaves 100 to 200 missiles to retaliate. The retaliation essentially destroys 90% of the attacker's cities.  If the first striker has BMD to destroy that retaliation, it can strike without injury to itself. And if the BMD has to handle 100 to 200 missiles, rather than 1000, the task is simplified and the efficacy of the shield improved.

The world is safer with fewer nuclear weapons, and will be safer with even fewer still. But the last phase, from several hundred to zero, will be tricky - and much trickier than the Dead Hand would lead one to believe.

Book review: Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs

Compelling. Evocative. Persuasive. Whether you are opposed to the war on drugs, fully support it, are undecided or just uninformed, it is worth your time to read this investigation in to how the war started, who its victims are, and whether it is just making things worse. Even before I read Johann Hari's recent book (published this year (2015)), I believed that drug prohibition had many of the ill effects as alcohol prohibition in the 1920s, with no better chance for success. (Crime, smuggling, corruption, police brutality, poison deaths - all with little effect on usage.)  Hari comes to the same conclusion, looking at the U.S. experience from 1914 to 2014, and at the experience of other countries, notably Switzerland, Portugal, and Uruguay, which have to varying degrees, ended the war on drugs - and seen drug abuse decline as a result.

Hari's subject is controversial, as is Hari himself (he lost his position as popular columnist over plagiarism charges, no doubt one of the reasons he is so careful to document sources in this book).

Hari humanizes his subject, and in particular its victims. Even the drug dealers, mob bosses, and cartel hitmen appear as humans, to the dismay perhaps of those seeking still to divide the world into black and white, good and evil. (Indeed, from the book it appears the only person for whom Hari has no sympathy is the late Dr. Timothy Leary.)

You need not accept Hari's thesis that addiction stems primarily from isolation to perceive that his examples of decriminalization and legalization as successfully reducing the harmful effects of drug use are, at least in their settings, valid. Or vice-versa. The War on Drugs -- Nancy Reagan's facile "Just Say No," "This your brain on drugs," DA.R.E., and harsh raids and punishments you wouldn't inflict on a rabid dog -- has failed. What was that definition of insanity?

Book Review: Dance of the Furies: Europe and the Outbreak of World War I, by Michael S. Neiberg

Did you know:

a) most Europeans did not want a general war in 1914?
b) most Europeans did not expect the war to last more than a few weeks or at most months after it did start?
c) war causes privation, and seeing the dead and wounded from war is emotionally painful?

If your answer to all three is "yes" - skip Dance of the Furies: Europe and the Outbreak of World War I, by Michael S. Neiberg.

Book Review: Dark Invasion - 1915: Germany's Secret War and the Hunt for the First Terrorist Cell in America

Well, the sub-title tells you all you need to know about the subject of the book. The title plays off that of the memoirs of one of the German saboteurs, Dark Invader. Howard Blum's tale is compelling, and reads like an action-adventure novel, only it all happened. Murder, disguise, espionage, sabotage, suicide, attempted assassination of a powerful NY banker, rebellion, war in Mexico, WMD, detective stake-outs and chases, high-level briefings of the US President - it's all here. And it's history, not fiction.

As a story, Dark Invasion is gripping. As history, this well-researched account is even more compelling. In setting out the extensive, notorious and scandalous efforts of German diplomats, agents, and disgracefully not a few dual-nationals to violently block shipments from the "neutral" US to Britain and France in their war with Germany, Blum underscores an often overlooked motivation for America's entry into the Great War - German provocations, which even President Wilson ultimately found too much to withstand.

Blum's focus on Tom Tierney, the NYPD detective trying to halt Germany's attacks on allied shipping in his home town and harbor, is an effective device.  Tierney reminded me of Jack Ryan, but I'd rather have Tierney on my side than Ryan any day.

Book Review: White Eagles over Serbia, by Lawrence Durrell

Durrell was posted at the British Embassy in Belgrade from 1948 to 1952. It is from that experience that he gathered his background for White Eagles over Serbia, an entrancing realistic spy thriller from 1957 set in the time of Durrell's service in Yugoslavia. As a fellow ex-pat who served in the (former) Yugoslavia for six years, if at a later time, Durrell's narrative rings true. I wish to avoid spoilers, as this short (by current standards) tale moves briskly, alternating adventure and narrative, and should be read by any fan of Fleming, Forsyth, Le Carre, Ludlum and the like.

Book Review: A Mad Catastrophe - The Outbreak of World War I and the Collapse of the Hapsburg Empire

Geoffrey Wawro's book is a useful addition to the literature on the outbreak of World War One. The first quarter of the book examines how Austria entered the war with such a weak force; man for man, perhaps the weakest of any combatant. Wawro argues that it was Hungarian obstinacy, facilitated by the 1867 Compromise, itself supported by Bismarck who was keen to guard against Austrian schemes of revenge for their 1866 humiliation at the hands of Prussia. Penny-pinching led to shortages of rifles, machine guns, artillery and shells, and low pay for officers, leading to mediocre leadership.

It's a convincing argument, reading the remainder of the book, as general after general, most notably the army's leader, the inept and maudlin Chief of Staff Conrad, "lead" their troops from comfortable chateaus far, far to the rear. Three (!) invasions of Serbia in 1914, which had armed the assassins of the Austrian emperor's heir, were thrown back with heavy losses on both sides. There, as against Russia, only German intervention stabilized the front.

I found the successive accounts of military debacle after debacle exhausting and repetitive. But think of those who fought in them!

I do wish that Wawro had spent more time on the "why" of Austrian decision-making, both in politics before the war and militarily after July 1914. Wawro explicates the July crisis as quickly as he can, and falls into the trap of calling the ultimatum "degrading," mischaracterizing the key point as calling for Austrian officials to "lead an inquiry (on Serbian soil)" into the assassination - the ultimatum in fact calls for the cooperation and participation of Austria in Serbian led actions. But for Wawro's book, this is a sidelight, and thus a more excusable error than in some other accounts.

The maps included are useful, and the photographs add welcome interest.

Book Review: The Famine Plot, by Tim Pat Coogan

"The Almighty, indeed, sent the potato blight, but the English created the Famine." 

John Mitchel, 1861. 

Mitchel was "transported" (exiled) to Bermuda for 14 years for speaking the truth. Tim Pat Coogan will suffer no such fate for writing: "The Famine Plot; England's Role in Ireland's Greatest Tragedy." In America, he will suffer worse: the vast majority will never hear of, let alone read, his book. Of those of who do, almost all will view it as either a tale of "Olde Tyme Irelande" or as a political critique of, and only pertaining to, early Victorian England.

Coogan makes a well-researched, well-argued case for Mitchel's aphorism. Moreover, the faults of London's politicians and bureaucrats persist today, whenever government exploits tragedy to advance narrow, ideological, and partisan goals at the expense of ordinary citizens and in favor of the wealthy elite. It is a case history that Coogan's book can best assist our understanding of present day political culture.

The English Government, particularly after Russell succeeded Peel as Prime Minister in June 1847, put forward a number of reasons why it would not relieve Ireland's distress - even though Ireland, de jure, was an integral part of the so-called United Kingdom. I will summarize Coogan's arguments, which he includes as part of his chronological assessment, instead by topics.

Capitalism

Most Irish farmers were tenants, farming plots rented from often absentee landlords. Those landlords believed (often rightly) that they could receive more money if the small farms were extinguished, and the land use for "big farming" - cattle and export crops. The famine, though death and emigration, accomplished their goals.

Laissez faire economics

Prime Russel's Whigs were great proponents of laissez faire economics and the philosophies of Adam Smith and Thomas Malthus. So much so, they opposed food assistance as it would lower the price received by merchants. Nor was thought given to retaining food in Ireland - food exports continued in accordance with "sacrosanct" contracts. When at last public work programs were put in place, the roads were built in wildernesses -- "Boithre an ocrais (roads of hunger)" (p. 109), to not give private road builders competition.

Opposition to Government Welfare

Only with great reluctance did Russell's government provide welfare, and usually only under limited and demeaning circumstances, namely the infamous Dickensian workhouses.  Coogan cites England's senior bureaucrat (Trevelyan) as asserting that any wages paid for public works should be lower the prevailing wage, and only enough to keep away starvation. (p. 108) Recipients of welfare were to be destitute, devoid of even the smallest plot of land on which subsistence could be made. The governing philosophy was that poor relief (welfare) must be "penal and repulsive" - Treveleyan again. (p. 117), ignoring the overcrowded and diseased conditions of the workhouse that prevailed in reality. Instead, the Whigs and their favorite newspaper, The Times (of London) imagined as late as 1848, after a million Irish had died or emigrated in "coffin ships" that the Irish "are sitting idle at home, basking in the sun, telling stories, going to fairs, plotting, rebelling, wishing death to the Saxon," all born "on the shoulders of the hard working" Englishman (p. 213).

Racism

Coogan does not spare his readers the racist epithets of the English leadership, wherein such lights of the Victorian age as Disraeli, Punch magazine, and many others lesser known to an American audience compared the Irish to apes and rats. In a passage reminiscent of W's "they hate our freedoms," Disraeli proclaimed, "The Irish hate our order, our civilization, our enterprising industry, our pure religion." (p. 57)

Austerity

Coogan underscores as well the objection of HMG to relief on the grounds of government expense. It is somewhat difficult to parse from Coogan what would have been the expense of a responsive plan, one that would have spared the Irish from the famine. It appears, however, to be on the scale of 15 million pounds - roughly the UK's annual defense budget, or 1/4th the total financial cost to the UK of its wholly unnecessary and thoroughly unproductive prosecution of the Crimean war ten years after the Famine.

Conclusion

There is much, much more in Coogan's magnificent book, and I whole-heartedly recommend to anyone interested in Irish history, English politics, or political behavior and philosophy in general.

Book Review: The Lost History of 1914

Jack Beatty has taken a hard look at the "inevitability" of World War One, and deftly refuted the argument. The core of his book is the first six chapters, each looking at one of the major combatant countries and how close each came to NOT entering onto military action in Europe in 1914 (or 1917). The six are Germany, Russia, England, United States, Austria-Hungary, and France.  

The most interesting arguments are those on England, the US, and France. As any serious scholar of England knows, until the very last days of July 1914, it looked far more likely that the British Expeditionary Force would go to Ireland, as civil war broke out between Protestants and Catholics over Home Rule, than to France in the wake of Germany's attack through Belgium. 

If not for a nationalist editor publishing scandalous but true accounts of the skirt-chasing Minister of Finance, Joseph Callaux, Mme Callaux would have no cause to shoot and kill the newspaperman - derailing her husband's otherwise easy electoral victory and appointment as Prime Minister. With the renowned Jean Jaures as his foreign minister, and Callaux's track record of successfully mollifying German demands, it is unlikely that war on the western front would have broken out.

The most fascinating chapter is on the US, as Beatty underscores the anti-imperialist stance of President Wilson, and his break with the Taft policy of supporting Mexico's dictator, the favorite of Wall Street. Beatty shows how Wilson's motives in landing troops in Veracruz, Mexico in April 1914 was to support the rebels, by blocking arm shipments to the president of Mexico - but the fact of American troops on Mexican soil was portrayed as renewed imperialism. Provoked by Villa's 1916 raid on Columbus, NM, Wilson sent General Pershing on a wild-goose chase after the rebel formerly supported by Wilson. The renewed presence of American troops on Mexican soil prompted closer ties between Mexico and Imperial Germany, culminating in the disastrous Zimmermann telegram of 1917, promising Texas, New Mexico and Arizona to be restored to Mexico. Beatty argues that the telegram was even more decisive than the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare against American merchant ships in generating a fever for war in the heartland.

There is much more in Beatty's book; I have not even touched on the last four chapters, covering the last months of 1914, as the spade replaces the machine gun as the key instrument of war.  Beatty's book is well-written, and well worth the time and attention of anyone interested in how the war could have been avoided.

Book Review: Profiles in Folly - History's Worst Decisions and Why They Went Wrong

Alan Axelrod's breezy and quick-reading book from 2008 covers 35 of the "worst decisions" in history, often in wartime, from 1250 BC (the Trojan horse) to 2005 (Hurricane Katrina). (The decisions are very Euro-centric.) As Axelrod himself notes, this is not "objective history," a balanced look at why decisions were made. He is particularly (if justifiably) hard on the Bush-Cheney administration, which gets tarred four times (space shuttle, Iraq war (twice), hurricane Katrina), with a glancing blow from Enron as well. 

Axelrod formats his stories well into six parts, each entitled "The Decision to _________." Specifically: Gamble and Hope; Manipulate; Leap (Without Looking); Retreat; Destroy; and Drift. While most of the stories are familiar, Axelrod's ability to cut away extraneous matter makes each a strong example of the section's theme, and reinforces the role of obstinance, stupidity, cupidity and ignorance in bad decision-making. 

I would only take exception to one account, that of Austria's decision to present its ultimatum to Serbia in 1914. Largely, I see the faulty account by Axelrod as rooted in his use of the very popular, but erroneous, Guns of August (by Barbara Tuchman), as one of only two sources.  Consequently, the severity of the ultimatum is over-stated.

I look forward to reading more of Axelrod's many books.

Book Review: Warrior Race - A History of the British at War

I should have guessed from the back cover: "telling anecdote," "storyteller," "lively anecdote," "entertaining," "anecdotes are wonderful," "personal vignettes." Yep, despite its subtitle, this is not a history, which requires thematic analysis, but a compilation of stories. General Wolfe's capture of Quebec in 1759 is here not important for its decisive effect on North American and world history, but because of the maudlin, "inspiring," portrait of his death at the climax of the battle. Similarly, Trafalgar is not the decisive check to Napoleon, but the source material for an "heroic" depiction of Admiral Nelson dying on, and at the point of, Victory. Bernard Montgomery does not figure at all for his role as the quintessential leader of Britain's armies in World War 2, but for wrongly guessing as a lieutenant in 1914 that the war would be quick and decisive.  

Author Lawrence James switches his focus back and forth as he brushes his own picture of the effect of war on Britain since Roman times. The result is several books between two covers. England's interference in Ireland is reasonably well-covered, but India gets scant coverage and Africa almost none. The RAF's continued desire for upper class officers as "natural leaders" is noted, but no discussion is made of how British officers interacted with so-called "native" troops, e.g., Indians or Africans. We do get a lot on the difficulty of maintaining discipline in the presence of barflies and camp-followers (i.e., "amateur" prostitutes) in 1940-45 UK - but not the camp-follower's experience.

The inside dustcover states James' subject as: "the question of British national identity and character." Close. I'd say English rather than British. This is a book for the Anglophile, narrowly cast, who is already well read in the chronology and history of England's wars, campaigns, battles and leaders, who wants the steady succession of vignettes from on low presented here.