Pearl Harbor Books

Medusa's Daughter had me from the opening flight scene. The dialogue is witty and sharp, the characters multidimensional, the action fast-paced and fun, the setting pure Hawaiian paradise, and the plot looks like a real cliff hanger. I am dying to read the rest!"

Michael Boyd sweeps the reader into the story. Snappy dialogue, believable characters, and an exotic locale provide the backdrop for fast paced action and intrigue. The author obviously has an extensive knowledge of the Hawaiian Islands and flying. I would recommend this book to those seeking an instant island getaway, and want to read the complete book.

Panic attacks seem to be on the rise, and so I love the idea of a theme that many of us either relate to personally or we know someone who suffers from such. I already feel connected to the main character. I am curious to know more, and I am also curious about regression therapy. The characters in the excerpt are believable, the pacing is great. I want to continue reading.

This is the kind of book I want to read. Interesting characters are introduced well, with enough detail to make me want to know more. Holly is a talented woman who has pursued her dream and lives in a place I'd love to be, even though her life isn't perfect. I was already ready to know where this interesting woman and her life would lead, and then the accident and subsequent hinting at possible hidden mental secrets created the twist that left me definitely wanting to read the rest. In just these few words, there is good flow, easy to visualize descriptive narrative, credible characters (even Buck!)and a developing thread that entices. Great job!

Really enjoyed reading this excerpt. Particularly the section with Holly in the T-bird suffering the panic attack. I was once a passenger in a car when the driver began suffering a panic attack while on the interstate. We didn't crash, but Boyd's description here rings so true to me that it brought back those memories.

Also, I'm a bit of a commerical airline buff, and so really enjoyed the solid flight details, especially in the opening pages.

Hara gives an unusual and frank insight in the workings of the Japanese Navy during WWII. He describes in great detail how he fought many battles as a destroyer captain and what he, his colleagues and enemies did right or wrong: many battles were stacks of blunders and were won by who blundered the least or simply was the luckiest.

Couldn't put it down: had to keep reading which cost me some sleep....

This may be one of the best first person accounts of the Pacific theater of operations, that I have read from either side. Not only does Capt. Hara explain the individual battles in which he participated in vivid detail, he also gives his own perceptions of Japanese leadership (or lack thereof) during this incredibly demanding period. With his background in torpedo warfare, Hara shares his perception of both the abilities and short-comings within his own navy, but also those of the USN (praise and condemnation where he deemed appropriate, including himself). Overall a very good and fast paced oral history of the Pacific War, I would recommend to anyone.

Japanese Destroyer Captain is an excellent written account of Captain Hara missions in the Pacific theater during World War II. This work gives a rare insight into the Japanese perspective regarding the great naval battles of World War II from early campaigns to the last desperate struggles of the Japanese Empire. This account provides a reason why the Japanese lost the initiative in the Pacific by exposing the ill concieved naval tactics which lead to the defeat of the Imperial Navy. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in Naval battles of World War II.

I found this revision to be a little too generic in the type and spelling, but very informative none the less. I used to have the early 70's copy of this book in paperback. I enjoyed it then as I do now.

Probably one of the two books anyone interested in the Pacific naval war simply MUST have in his libraray (the other the brilliant 'Battle History of the Imperial Japanese Navy' by the unfortunately named Paul S. Dull). True experts and affecionados should overlook the occasional mis-identification of ship types (undoubtedly a result of either negligent editing or translation problems), but otherwise a superb recollection of the Pacific war from the point of view of a famous Japanese destroyer captain.

Having studied this war and its naval campaigns, one thing that always struck me was the peculiar paradox of the near-deification of Admiral Yamamoto (engineer of the Pearl Harbor attack) by the Japanese at the time, and many foreign historians as well. Frankly, from any objective point of view, it was Yamamoto who almost single-handedly ensured the disasterous defeat of the Japanese navy, first, by not in fact taking out the most important targets at Pearl Harbor (the enormous fuel tank farm, and the even more important ship-repair facilities and machine shops), and secondly, by repeatedly committing vastly insufficient forces at the places of most importance, and invariably sending these elements through the most convoluted and tortuous separate routes to get there (each element could be easily defeated one at a time).

Further, it appears that at no time during the war did the Japanese have the slightest interest in obtaining or using intelligence, by either method or desire, and this led them into one catastrophe after another. Guadalcanal is probably the best exemplar of this failed strategy, where neither the Japanes Navy, nor the Japanese Army had any idea of the strength of the American presence there, apparently weren't even interested, and instead committed and lost battalions, regiments, whole divisions of troops and squadrons of ships again, and again, and again, until both the Army, and Navy were bled white.

The Japanese submarine fleet was even more useless, not because of any real defect in the subs themselves, but the ridiculous manner in which they were used. This is even more stunning when you consider that not only was the Japanese submarine fleet largely founded by German engineers and specialist after the First World War, but the Japanese maintained close communications with the Germans throughout the war, even sending submarines to Germany and back several times, as well as German U-Boats sailing to Japan and being used by the Japanese Navy. Yet despite the continued availability of the very finest in submarine expertise, the Japanese apparently never bothered to discuss the topic of strategy and/or tactics with the Germans. Incredible!

With all my various studies of this war, I never came across any real recognition of these fundamental flaws, until I read this book, and it is apparent that not only were these flaws as real as i thought, but that many members of the Japanese Navy itself were fully cognisant of these same mistakes, and yet, were unable to convince their own senior command of the need for changes, and so went down together. Starting to sound familiar?

I HAVE READ JUST BOUT EVERY WINGMAN BOOK WRITTEN AND AFTER I ORDER THESE MY QUEST WILL BE COMPLETE. MACK MALONEY IS A TRUE AMERICAN AND HIS BOOKS PROVE IT. HIS BOOKS WILL MAKE YOUR IMAGINATION SOAR. THANKS MACK.

The whole Wingman series is great, but Sky Ghost and Return of the Sky Ghost really put a new twist into the story line. I am dying for the next installment to come out to find out how it ends!

maloneys books keep getting wearder and wearder. also hunter didnt show up in the book untell page 120. other than that it was great.

Read this book as fast as I read all the others. I'm trying to collect them all again after my parents threw out all my books. But as a fan to a good book, I'm continuing on reading and collecting. Still waiting for Hawk to make it back to the real world. Keep'em coming!!!!!

I STARTED THIS SERIES WHEN IT FIRST CAME OUT AND WAS HOOKED ON IT EVER SINCE.MACK MALONEY PUTS MOST AMERICAN'S VIEWS INTO HAWK HUNTER.AMERICAN' WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT AMERICA STAYS FREE, AND MY VIEW IS THIS"YOU CAN HAVE MY FLAG WHEN YOU PRY IT FROM MY COLD DEAD FINGERS"

I knew only a little bit about the Japaneese internment camps during the bombing of Pearl Harbor. I had learned a little from reading novels by Gail Tsyukiyama. I learned a lot more after reading this one by the very talented Ann Tatlock. I had no idea the degree of predujice the Japaneese went through in America. I also had no idea how predjudiced Mississippi was in the 60's. This book really is an eye opener about how stupid racism is. We are all human and make terrible mistakes at times. We are all capable of being consumed by hate and violence. This book clearly shows that we all need to forgive since none of us is near perfect. I wish I could get a couple prejudiced friends of mine to read this book, but none of them read much(if they did they might learn more!), and hate long books. That is actually the reason I didn't give this book 5 stars. It was a bit too long, with too much repeating. It has taken me 6 weeks to finish it. I think the book would be more popular if the author had decided to cut out about 1/4 of the pages. I like to be able to finish a book within 3 weeks tops.
I absolutely adored Tatlock's "A Room of my Own", so I will probably check out another novel of hers soon. She makes history fun, real, and interesting. I agree with the reviewer who said this should be on high school reading lists.

This is such a great story! I had just finished "Farewell to Manzanar" when I read this book and learned more about the treatment of Japanese Americans during the war through the eyes of a young girl. The story did not get bogged down in war and politics though. The most intriguing aspect was the desire of the caucasian girl to be part of the Japanese family based on internal emotions and the challenge of the Japanese family to be accepted as Americans based on their external features. If only man were able to look at the heart the way God does! This is an inspirational story of belonging and the adverse treatment of "enemy" culture during the war.

All the Way Home is a touching story, teaching us how the world events of WWII and the Civil Rights Movement touched everyday lives. The author weaves the story with questions of faith--real ones that real people struggle with--without being preachy in the least.

I enjoyed the book so much that I read it very quickly, but it's also worthy of a longer more thoughtful reading. Quality writing from an award winning author. Highly recommended.

What a wonderfully well written story. I have never read this author before and was pleasantly surprised. There were so many issues for discussion and so much history in the story that I am pushing for this to be on the required reading list at the high school where I work.

ALL THE WAY HOME by Ann Tatlock
November 15, 2007


Rating: 3.5/5 Stars

I wanted to like this book a lot more. While I enjoyed the two subplots (that of the story of a Japanese American family living in Los Angeles before the start of W.W.II, and life for Black Americans in the Deep South during
The 1960's), I felt this book could have been better if either one or the other subplot had been eliminated. I understand that the author was trying to compare two terrible injustices played against two sets of minorities in America, but I think this could have been easily two separate books, or written differently (to be specific, shorter).

With that said, ALL THE WAY HOME starts off as the story of Augie Schuler, who in the 1960's is flying from California to the Deep South, to meet with a woman who wants to tell her story about her project helping Blacks to use their right to vote. On the plane, she meets a woman who is on her way back home to the South, and Augie flashes back to memories of another time, living with a Japanese American family who made her feel like she was one of them. Augie's home life was terrible, having lost her father early in life and now her mother was forced to move in with a brother, living in a crowded house with children from both families. Augie chose to spend most of her time away from home, and eventually came to live with the Yamagata's and became best friends with Sunny, who became more like a sister to Augie. The first half of the book details the friendship between the two girls, and the awful family situation that Augie had to endure at her uncle's home. But when W.W.II broke out, and with the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Augie lost her adopted family, who were sent to the camps. Augie waited for that letter that would tell her that Sunny and her parents were doing OK, but no letters ever arrive.

And now it is the 1960's, and Augie has since learned to keep those memories of her childhood away, feeling she had been betrayed by the Japanese family she had once loved. But what she finds in Mississippi, will shock her, and bring her childhood memories back to the forefront.

This is a good book for one to be introduced to the plight of the Japanese Americans in the years before and during W.W.II. As a Japanese American (Third generation), there is only a little that I know about those years when my father and his family lived at Manzanar. While I am not sure how accurate this book was in terms of life for the Japanese American before WW II in Boyle heights, California, an area of Los Angeles I am familiar with, I think I did get a better idea of how my father's generation may have felt. However, I did have a hard time believing in the portrayal of Sunny's parents, who were 2nd Generation Japanese Americans (meaning, their parents were from Japan). They behaved too much like Caucasians, and not like the reserved traditional Japanese Americans that I connect with who were born in America before W.W.II. Still, I did enjoy reading the story of Augie and Sunny and their remarkable friendship prior to W.W.II. The book was a just a tad bit too long however, and that is why I'm giving it a 3.5 rating.

Of all the material I have read concerning U.S. Naval Aviation in WWII, this book is tops.
Read about the minutemen who were on the front line when WWII erupted.
The heroic exploits are at times so dramatic as to be almost unbelievable.
These are the men who held things together when the war started, and also the equipment with which they did their job.
This ex NAS aircrew (1943 - 1946) flew in TBF'S/TBD's, and SB2C's. I can tell you the smell of truth permeates these pages.
A great read for anyone who is interested in how it began.....

This is an amazing book for a number of reasons, including the fact that all of the reviews previously posted (as I write this) are four or five star (mostly five). The text of some of the four-star reviews even sound like they should have rated a five. Few books on Amazon get near-perfect appraisals--the fact that this one does is a telling mark of its quality.

Today (in 2006) John Lundstrom enjoys a much-deserved reputation as a preeminent author and historian in the field of U.S. naval aviation, particularly when the subject is his core specialty, the early years of World War II. That said, it is interesting to go back and read this 1984-vintage volume and compare it to his later award-winning works. Does it exhibit the growing pains of a budding expert still learning his craft, or does it rate as world class not only today but among its peers when it was first published? The short answer is: five stars, then and now.

This reviewer's specialty is the Battle of Midway, which only comprises the final third of the book. But even though his primary focus is on the fighter squadrons, Lundstrom's short history of that battle is among the very best references available anywhere. It is meticulously accurate, thanks to the author's deep research into archives and veteran testimony not available or not explored by other Midway chroniclers, including Lord and Prange. That it came out many years before other modern references on the battle that similarly improve upon earlier works is a tribute to the author's diligence. As a Battle of Midway resource, I rate it in the top three or four along with Cressman's "A Glorious Page in Our History" and "Shattered Sword" by Parshall & Tully.

The author does a fantastic job of providing the day-to-day operations of carrier fighter aircraft from just before the beginning of the war. He includes such topics as production quantities, training and individual aircraft models performance stats. I was unaware that the Lexington still operated Brewster Buffaloes well into January 1942 until I read this book. Also surprising that was the Hornet's air group comprised many biplane aircraft when she was comissioned.
The author was very thorough in his research of both sides of the campaigns (American and Japanese). What I like about this book is he did not just focus on the individual battles. He provide the operational details building up to the battles in a day-to-day, diary-type format.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in WWII aircraft combat and carrier operations.

'The First Team' was the group of Navy fighter pilots serving with the Pacific carriers at the beginning of the war. In addition, this book might be called something like 'The First Team.' It is the definitive work on the subject.

This was the time when the US had few carriers in the Pacific. It was the time of the Wildcat fighter up against Zeros. It was the time when fliers like Thatch and Butch O'Hare were first learnign their trade. It was the time when the Japanese were expanding at an unbelievable rate. The Japanese also had a 'First Team' of experienced pilots with a lot of hours. And it was the time when Midway broke the back of the Japanese advance.

This book is as close to the complete story as it is possible to get. It covers what happened, the strategy that was being followed, the tactics that were changing as they learned more. This is the book that the others use as a reference when they are writing about this area. It is accurate, it is well written, it is a pleasure to read.

The First Team - Pacific Naval Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway
and
The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign
John B. Lundstrom
Naval Institute Press


I have been studying naval aviation combat since the early 1960s, and I have never come across a book half so comprehensive, from a historical basis - nor half so useful, from a modeling perspective - as this two-volume set recently reprinted by the Naval Institute Press. The title - "The First Team" - refers to US Naval Aviator fighter pilots who were in service at the start of World War II; a convenient way of focusing on naval fighter combat from December 7, 1941 to the end of the Guadalcanal campaign in early February, 1943. This was a time when the F4F Wildcat bore the brunt of the aerial warfare - a few F2A Buffalo fighters served in the Navy during this time-frame, but the only Buffalos that saw combat were serving with the Marines (who are outside the scope of this two-volume study).

This book covers literally every incident of aerial combat that included US Navy fighter aircraft from December 7 through the end of Guadalcanal. I mean EVERY incident, every American shoot-down (and every American shot down) and every American carrier attack on a Japanese island target fought during the first 14 months of the war in the Pacific: the Wake relief force, the Gilbert, Marshall and Marcus Island raids, the assault on Rabaul, and the attacks on Tulagi, Lae and Salamaua - and of course, Guadalcanal. The books also cover every carrier vs. carrier battle that was fought in the Pacific before 1944: Coral Sea, Midway, Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz. In short, The First Team two-volume book is incredibly comprehensive. Maps and charts illustrate each battle, each significant combat incident, each movement of carriers and air groups - the detail is remarkable. Author John Lundstrom makes these battles come alive in ways that no other history I've read have been able to accomplish. But for all their value as pure history, these books go way beyond that.

For instance, The First Team covers combat tactics - the prime reason why the vastly-inferior F4F-4 Wildcat was able to best the incredible Japanese Zero in almost every encounter (including decisive victories at Midway and Guadalcanal). Pre-war, the US Naval air service - alone among the world's air forces - trained its pilots to successfully use deflection shooting, permitting pilots to attack from beam positions, instead of just from directly astern. To perform a deflection-shooting attack successfully, the pilot couldn't aim at the target; instead, he had to aim for where the plane would be when the bullets arrived.

Deflection shooting is a kind of lead-the-target targeting performed by duck hunters and skeet shooters; a process vastly complicated in aerial combat because both the attacker and the target are moving at several hundred miles per hour, generally in different planes. However, when successfully executed, deflection attacks are almost unbeatable. This kind of deflection shooting permitted American Naval fighter pilots to attack the enemy with limited risk of counter-battery fighter from defending aircraft. Deflection attacks were decisive in attacks on bomber aircraft, but this approach also gave U.S. Naval aviators a significant advantage over the more maneuverable and - at most altitudes - faster Japanese fighters.

Other tactical elements explored in great detail were the comparative tactical formations - American transition from four-aircraft divisions to two-aircraft divisions while the Japanese held onto the far more awkward and inflexible three-plane formations - as well as the evolution of the "Thatch Weave," a mutually-supportive defensive formation the Japanese were never able to effectively counter.

The First Team also looks - in depth - at the training of Japanese and US Naval aviators. In 1941, Japanese naval aviators were, man-for-may, the best-trained pilots in the world, yet thanks to different tactical approaches, they were consistently outfought, first by well-trained US Naval Aviators and later even by grass-green Ensigns not long out of advanced training programs. Training and organization were critical - Japanese were taught to move in units of three aircraft, and to take advantage of their aircraft's incredible maneuverability.

American Naval Aviators were trained in deflection gunnery, in pilot-wingman cooperation and in emphasizing mutually-supporting defensive tactics culminating in the unbeatable Thatch Weave - which remarkably was under development before the outbreak of the war, though "conventional wisdom" has held that Commander John "Jimmy" Thatch developed the mutual-support tactics in response to initial combat with the Japanese.

Another factor that The First Team explored which worked against the Japanese was the very different organizational structure of the two countries' carrier air groups. In the US Navy, carrier air groups were fungible organizations - new squadrons and new pilots could be shuffled through the air groups, and these groups could be shuffled from carrier to carrier as needed. By contrast, Japanese carrier air groups trained as a unit, and were permanently assigned to a specific aircraft carrier.

When a Japanese group suffered significant combat casualties, not only were the individual squadrons no longer combat-capable, but the carrier itself was out of the battle. As a result, after the bloody draw at Coral Sea, surviving Naval aviators from the sunken Lexington were able to go back into combat onboard the Yorktown at Midway - less than a month later - effectively replacing losses the Yorktowners suffered at Coral Sea with combat-tested pilots. Even though the Yorktown had been badly damaged, it was patched together and able to field a combat-ready air group that proved decisive at Midway less than a month later.

However, as explained in The First Team's assessment of Japan's carrier air group organization, the Zuikaku - which, unlike the surviving Yorktown, was undamaged but which also suffered heavy pilot losses - was unable to serve at Midway because the Zuikaku's carrier air group had been decimated, and a carrier without an air group is little more than a target. Although sufficient combat-experienced pilots from the heavily-damaged Shokaku had survived and were at least technically available, because of a long-standing organizational policy, the Japanese were unable to restore the Zuikaku's group.

Instead, both air groups had to be restored to full combat capability only after receiving infusions of trainees, which required a long work-up period. The Yorktown's presence at Midway was decisive; the absence of Zuikaku was at least potentially just as decisive. Had two Japanese carriers - Zuikaku and Hiryu - survived the first devastating US Naval attack, their return strike may have done more than just knock out the Yorktown.

The books even get into fascinating controversies, such as the odd decision to put six .50 caliber machine guns into the Navy's new folding-wing F4Fs, even though they'd add a further weight penalty that would - along with the weight of the wing-fold mechanism -cripple the Wildcat's climb, range and overall combat capabilities. The early-war fixed-wing F4F-3 carried four .50 caliber machine guns - which US Navy fighter leaders felt was sufficient to knock down unarmored Japanese bombers and fighters. However, the fixed wing took up deck and hanger space and sharply limited the number of fighters a carrier could handle. With fighter squadrons growing from 18 to 27 to 36 aircraft, the need for folding wings was essential, even though the weight penalty imposed by the folding mechanism would inevitably degrade performance.

The initial decision to go with six .50 caliber guns in a folding-wing Wildcat was made by the British Fleet Air Arm, which did not routinely face fighter-to-fighter combat - minimizing the need for high-end performance - yet rightly felt it needed the heavier firepower inherent in six .50 calibers to swiftly knock down armored and well-armed German and Italian bombers. Oddly, instead of listening to their own fighter leaders, the US Navy's "Brass Hats" listened to the Brits, and decided - in the name of production efficiency - to standardize on the British design.

The result was the F4F-4 - a sluggish, slow-climbing short-range fighter which had six .50 caliber machine guns but fewer total rounds of ammo (and, therefore, a much shorter firing time) than the older F4F-3. This plane had a harder time climbing to a decisive altitude. It had difficulty conducting CAPs of more than a couple of hours or escorting bombers farther than 175 miles; and when it did find targets, this new Wildcat all-too-quickly ran out of ammunition. When front-line Naval Aviators complained about being asked to fight what was arguably the best carrier planes in the world with an increasingly second-string fighter plane, the Navy Brass in Washington told these front-line troops to fly their Wildcats with a 2/3rds fuel load and two unloaded guns - absurd advice to pilots who knew they needed every bullet and every gallon of gas every time they went head-to-head in combat with the best-trained naval aviators in the world, the Japanese.

These limiting factors for the new F4F clearly had an impact in the loss of the Yorktown at Midway, as well as the loss of so many torpedo planes at that same battle - and these F4F deficiencies may have also contributed to the loss of the Hornet at the Battle of Santa Cruz four months later. Nobody from the greenest Naval Aviation Ensign all the way up to Admiral Chester Nimitz had a good thing to say about the F4F-4 - but it was only after the end of the Guadalcanal campaign that the General Motors-built FM-1 reverted to a four-gun armament - too late to face down the Japanese.

Yet remarkably, the US Navy seldom fought the Japanese head-to-head without coming out on the winning end. Ultimately, the Wildcat scored a three-to-one winning margin over the Japanese - not because the Wildcat was a better fighter aircraft, though it did have some advantages, but because American Naval Aviators had better tactics, from the two-plane division to the Thatch Weave.

As noted, while it had dramatically shorter range, at least a marginally lower speed at most altitudes - and it was far less maneuverable than the Zero - the Wildcat that fought the Japanese from December 7, 1941 to February, 1943 did have some significant advantages over its adversary. The Grumman was solidly built - earning for its manufacturer the affectionate nickname "Grumman Iron Works." The Grumman fighter was also well-armored (at least where it counted), and - early in the war - it began to receive functional self-sealing fuel tanks that would absorb a 7.7 millimeter (.30 caliber) Japanese machine-gun bullet.

While it was slow to climb, the Wildcat could dive like a bat out of hell - given enough altitude, American Naval Aviators could always break off combat with Japanese Zeros - and given an initial altitude advantage (hard to come by, but not impossible to achieve), the Wildcat could initiate combat - attack Zeros and other Japanese aircraft - with no recourse by the Japanese. They couldn't escape a diving Wildcat; they could turn and fight, but couldn't run away.

Further, in a head-to-head attack, the Wildcat's rugged structure and .50 caliber armament (either four-gun or six-gun) easily outmatched their Japanese adversaries. The Japanese Zero's 20 mm cannons were low-velocity weapons useful only at short range; the longer-ranged Japanese 7.7 mm (.30 caliber) machine guns had too little hitting power to ensure a quick victory over the Wildcat. On the other hand, the standard American .50 caliber Browning heavy machine guns were fast-firing, long-ranged and hard-hitting enough to knock down any Japanese fighter - or bomber - they could hit.

All of these factors were covered in fascinating detail in The First Team, making them a feast of information, insight and factual data for the historian - and the history buff.

Beyond that, the two "First Team" volumes also offer a great deal to modelers. Each book is heavily illustrated with contemporary photos which show evolving markings on US Navy fighters. Not a few of these photos will also offer modelers display and deck-handling diorama ideas.

In addition, Appendix 3 of The First Team and Appendix 4 of The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign each features side-view profiles of F4F fighters in use during the time periods covered by the books. Together, these let modelers authoritatively paint-and-mark virtually any F4F that fought off one of the USN fleet carriers during the first year of the war - including carrier-based planes that temporarily served on Guadalcanal. With the recent spate of new F4F Wildcat releases in 1/32nd scale (including the soon-to-be-here Trumpeter Wildcat), this kind of reference will prove invaluable to modelers.

Bottom line: These two books are remarkable. For those interested in carrier-based fighter combat during the dark early days of World War II in the Pacific, these are "must-reads." The books have been released in Trade Paperback format by the US Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland - it's also available from Amazon.com.

Very down to earth description from the men that were there on that date. Worthwhile read.

Being a baby boomer, I have not truly experienced war, albeit was born during WWII and have never failed to be impressed by its stories of bravery, of sacrifice, of unrelenting determination to pursue the glory that awaits those WWII heroes who have not died in vain, for all of us, and for our country. I have only read the book reviews but I feel that I have read the entire book. I also fully concur with my fellow book reviewers that the WWII veterans are, perhaps, not the most recognized, to this writing, as opposed to those veterans of recent wars. Some of the WWII veterans have long died, as well, such as those from the Bataan Death March, waiting to be recognized in vain. This is what truly hurts the most.

Characteristic of Mr. Brokaw's deservedly multi-awarded journalistic style, he has, and continues to impress on the whole world how vital and necessary it is for us to love history (as does this Filipino-American journalist reviewer with all of my strength, my mind, my will, my heart, and my soul so much so that it runs in my veins).

The book is a must-read for all future journalists. I cannot but add it to my personal library.

This book brings the dangerous and trouble-laden world of the 1930s and 1940s to life in a remarkably vivid and compelling way. Almost every letter comes with a photograph or memorabilia that make you realize that many of the servicemen and women were just kids when they moved into their place in history. They wanted to fall in love, marry, and raise a nice family. But first they had to take on incredible risk on land, on the beaches, at sea, and in the air around the world in places that they had never heard of. If they didn't become injured or killed, they knew that it was just a quirk of fate that they did not. Everyone lost family members, friends, buddies, and heroes. If they worked as a medic, they saw more ravaged bodies than we can imagine. Many still bear the pain of their wounds today. Nightmares continue to haunt the dreams of many others. Yet most have spared their families the full horror of that experience. Through Mr. Brokaw's books, we can better imagine some of what it might have been like.

My Dad was pretty open about many of his experiences in the Eighth Air Force, but every so often a new one slips out. I suspect that even in these stories we are getting a censored version of what the actual experience was like. Dad did share the number of times that Luftwaffe bombs blew up part of his barracks (while he was sleeping there) and obliterated his sleeping area (when he was away on leave). What he remembered most searingly were the horrors of the shot-up crews returning from bombing runs over Europe (especially when they crashed in a ball of flames) and officers committing suicide by jumping off the top deck of his ship on the way home. As a youngster, I was terribly surprised and thrilled when former president Eisenhower came through our hometown and recognized my father in the crowd at the train station, and called Dad by name and rank. We had no inkling that Dad had met the president. Dad's response was simply that he had met a lot of the top brass, but he never told us any of their names.

Our family was lucky. My parents met because of the war, so my life was immeasurably influenced for the better. None of my father or mother's families were killed or physically injured in World War II. One uncle did experience shell shock as a teenager in the Battle of the Bulge, and had to avoid stressful situations for the rest of his life. From this book, I was able to imagine what it was like for families that were not so fortunate.

I was surprised to see that many of the veterans and their families had never been back to the battlegrounds and cemetaries. I asked Dad a number of years ago if he wanted to go back. He said he didn't care if he did or not (a typical Greatest Generation answer), but my Mother did. So my wife and I gave them a trip to England as a present. They had a ball, and saw many of the old sights. My Mother said that it seemed to do him a lot of good to see things back in peaceful circumstances. But there was no way that we could presuade him to go to France or Germany on the trip. He gave no reason. I suspect that the pain of the memories of those he had known who had died om bombing runs over that territory would have been too great for him.

Since then, I have attended a reunion of Dad's old unit, and was pleasantly surprised to see how much the men care for each other. I don't know of another man my father was ever close to after World War II, but here were dozens he knew well and liked. It was a side of him that I had never seen.

This book contains many memories like these. Often written by family members, the introduction then puts letters from the veteran into evidence at the court of history for us to experience.

You will be powerfully moved by the stories of sacrifice (whether from being POWs, lack of supplies, discrimination, or the chilling experience being exposed to grave danger), loss (families losing their only child, wives losing husbands after just becoming pregnant, and veterans losing their buddies), and willingness to serve (great efforts to volunteer when too young or too old, to volunteer for tough duty, and trying to help all and sundry). One of the most powerful for me was the description of the horrors of a concentration camp that was considered well kept by the Nazis in order to make a good impression on the Red Cross. Most moving for me was the sense of forgiveness that many veterans felt towards their former enemies.

If you know someone who served in World War II (whether a family member or not), I hope you will consider giving them this book and saying "thank you." After a few months have passed, ask them if they will tell you their story. If they will share, why not ask them if they would be willing to let you make copies of old letters and memorabilia so that you can send them to Mr. Brokaw? In this way, we can capture more of what happened then, honor these wonderful people, and pass on their legacy to generations yet unborn.

May the best and most important of these memories live forever!

Brokaw provides another moving tribute to what he refers to as the "Greatest Generation." Many of the letters included here are quite emotional and touching. This book also includes timelines for the war in Europe, the Pacific, and the homefront, as well as the depression, and also touches on areas not addressed in the two earlier books. There is also an abundance of period photographs and copies of documents, submitted by the letter writers. These help to put a human face on the various stories.

I found this book while searching on Amazon.com for gift ideas. I have not read the book but it seems to be just what I need to finish a gift for my father. My parents grew up during the Great Depression and as a result saved everything. Last year I cleaned out the attic of the family home and sorted through bags and boxes of what we now refer to as disposable items such as bags of pencil stubs (did they really think they would use them again...especially if they are stuffed in the attic?). However, being the child of "savers" has paid off. I am preparing an "album of memories" of the original letters that my father, Roger Griffith, a WWII Navy veteran, sent to his parents during the war. I plan to buy Mr. Brokaw's "An Album of Memories" as a companion to the my album. Mr. Brokaw has again made gift giving easier for the older and greater generation. Thank you.

As the Fleet Intellegence Officer of Admirals Kimmel and Nimitz Edwin Layton was in a unique position to see and to understand what was going on regarding the battles at Pearl Harbor and Midway. This welcome reprint to the 1985 book has to be considered one of the more definitive books of the couple of hundred on the subjects.

Layton was a language officer stationed in Japan before the war to learn Japanese. He followed Japan and the Japanese developments closely. He was at Pearl before the attack and remained there throughout the war. He was on the Missouri at the Japanese surrender.

There are a series of revisionist history books that propose such things as Roosevelt and Churchill conspiring to let the Japanese attack at Pears. Yes there is evidence that we had some intelligence pointing to the Japanese attack. But you have to look carefully at how much material there was, how many messages had been intercepted, how few had been translated and you come up with the basic understanding that it just hadn't been put together. A lot like the situation with 9/11, Monday morning quarterbacking is much easier than being in the midst of the game.

Layton was there, he knew what Kimmel and Short knew, indeed he had briefed them with the material on hand. Could they have been better prepared, yes, Layton says, if Admiral Richmond K. Turner had forwarded the information. But like any inter-departmental power struggle, Turner held the information to himself.

I was also surprised by the relatively little animosity shown towards the Redman brothers who bounced Rochefort and Safford out. Indeed Layton points out that the do it themselves style of Rochefort and Safford probably wouldn't have done a very good job of managing the Navy Radio Intelligence activities that grew to almost 8,500 people by the end of the war.

All in all, a must read for anyone interested in what happened at Pearl and Midway.

And I was there.
This is a great book by one who was there, Adm Layton. He was Adm Kimmels intelligence officer at Pearl Harbor.
He shows how the incompetence of the Navy in Washington led to the surprise attack at Pearl, by the Navy, specifically adm Stark and Kelly Turner, not giving Pearl the vital information they had about Jap intentions, but refused to give Pearl. The Navy also had 2 intelligence groups fighting for the information, and control, evaluating, and dissemination of the information. This too sabotaged the intelligence efforts, and does to this day.
Gen Marshall is also responsible for the debacle. He was reprimanded, but Roosevelt set aside the Congressional verdict on him.
Kimmel was judged not guilty of any wrongdoing by the Navy, but found derelict by Congress, a tragic miscarriage of justice, due to lies under testimony by Stark, and Turner.

The Redmon brothers are faulted too for ousting the most brilliant Navy intelligence officer, Rochefort, who correctly guessed the time and location of the Midway battle.

Another tragic aftermath of Pearl, was the loss of Wake Island. Kimmel had a carrier task force sailing to resupply and relieve the garrision that was under attack by the Japs. This would have surprised the Japs and could have sunk many Jap ships, saved Wake Island, and kept open the supply lines to the Phillipines. Unfortunaely, Kimmel was relieved, and Adm Pye replaced him Pye lost his nerve and cancelled the mission.

MacArthur is noted, as being in charge of the Phillipines, and being under orders to attack Formosa with his B17's when Pearl was attacked. He had a 9 hour warning after Pearl had been attacked, and had been told to attack. It was not until years after this book was published that the records of why Mac did nothing in the Phillipines were found. He was paid $650,000 by Pres Quezon of the Phillipines to do nothing, as he wanted to be neutral. MacArthur lost the Phillipines, a far more important strategic outpost than Pearl, as well as half the B17's we had, and 1/5 of our fighters, on the ground, just as what happened at Pearl, only 9 hours later, after he had multiple phone calls from Washington to attack the Japs.

The battle of Guadalcanal and other Pacific battles is also gone into in some detail
It was Nimitz, not Mac Arthur that devised the island hopping idea.
A great book by a hero who was there.

First and major portion of book covering Pearl Harbor is excellent. However, after Layton's death, the book was continued from his notes and descriptions of campaigns after Pearl Harbor suffer in quality by comparison.

Before you jump on some revisionist books about Pearl Harbor, like Stinnet's Day of Deceipt, you should get it from the horses mouth! Layton, et al, tell a little known side of the war in the pacific. His opinions of some famous naval personalities like Stark and R.K. Turner will really have you thinking about how war is run when powerful, ambitious officers are running the show. It's a shame that lives had to be wasted while the U.S. got its act together to finally win the war in the pacific, but Layton's tale will give you a new perspective and supports much of what was previously written, like Prang's "At Dawn We Slept", about the debacle of Pearl Harbor and the genius that followed at Midway. Buy it!

Edwin T. Layton served as Fleet Intelligence Officer for Admirals Kimmel and Nimitz. He, along with the other members of station Hypo, were assigned the task of breaking into Japan's secret codes, especially their JN-25 cypher. Through exhausting efforts by its members, they were finaly able to penetrate enough of the JN-25 code to make reasonable assumptions as to what the Japanese navy was planning. "Magic" was the term used for the intercept and decryption of these secret codes.

However, no decoding was actually done at Pearl Harbor, because there was no "Purple" decoding machine there. All intercepts had to be sent to Washinton for decryption, and Hawaii relied on Washington for their information. Layton's thesis is that Pearl Harbor was denied vital intelligence which, if issued in a timely fashion, could have alerted Pearl Harbor to the impending attack which occurred on December 7, 1941. Although I agree with some of his thesis, I also believe that the Pearl Harbor commanders made terrible mistakes of their own which also contributed to the unpreparedness of Pearl Harbor.

One message that Washington failed to send Pearl Harbor which I believe, along with Layton, could have alerted the fleet to the attack was the so-called "bomb plot" message. In a nutshell, this message divided Pearl Harbor into several sections and placed ships in each section; almost like laying an invisible grid over the harbor. Of all the messages that Pearl Harbor failed to receive, this was probably the most important.

However, with this stated, I also believe that the commanders made grievous errors of their own. On November 27, 1941, a "war warning" message was sent to both commanders at Pearl Harbor. Both seemed perplexed and unsure of the course of action to be taken. Why was this? Both Admiral Kimmel and General Short were high ranking members of the military, yet they both dragged their feet when they received this message. Short simply ordered defense against sabotage instead of ordering an all-out alert, while Kimmel failed to order any further long-range patrols, plus he didn't order the battle force to sea. They seemed incapable of making any independent judgement of their own. Instead, they needed to be told directly what to do. These omissions are unforgivable.

Inter-service rivalry also played a role in the failure. As pointed out by Layton, there was very little inter-service cooperation or sharing of messages, so most of the time, one usually didn't know what the other was doing. Further, during the Midway operation, a rivalry betwen station Hypo and the Washington-based intelligence unit nearly cost us the battle, but fortunately, Layton and commander Joe Rochefort were able to convince Nimitz that Hypo, not Washington, was correct.

I thought this was a good book, but I disagree with Layton's assertion that Kimmel and Short were scapegoats and had no clue what was happening. Granted, there was some intelligence that was definitely denied to them, but they should have been able to interpret events on ther own, namely the war warning message. This book is a good counter-argument to other works, such as "At Dawn We Slept". The information about the battle of Midway is especially interesting, plus the story of the codebreaking activities was well-done.

Nice detailed reference on the battleship Arizona. Detailed history. Very useful collection of pictures. Great reference for modelers.

When the pacage arrived from Amazon, I did realise that it would be such a big book just on one Battleship! The detail for any history buff, model maker is great. A good purchase but you will need a reading table to hold it!

Mr. Stillwell has brought BB-39 to life in a way that hasn't been matched by anyone else who has attempted. His rendering of the life of the ship from her birth in the NY Navy yards to her death in the waters of Pearl Harbor is amazing in its clarity & detail.

OK, some detail might be lacking for the technical buffs but his description of the construction, manning, & day-to-day operation of a US naval vessel in the 1st half of the 20th century is superlative. He blends both the hardware & the human element so that Arizona & her crew leap off the pages as a living, breathing combination of steel & flesh.

Highly recommended for those who are interested in the Arizona herself & for anyone who would like to know many of the hows & whys of US Naval operations between the wars.

PS: Scale modelers invariably recommend "Battleship Arizona" as -the- definitive work to those who are researching details of BB-39 for their own modeling projects.

IN A NUTSHELL: AN ILLUSTRATED READER THAT INCLUDES TECHNICAL APPENDICES

One could say that the above says it all.

WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT: THE LIFE & DEATH OF THE ARIZONA AND HER CREWS

In great detail, this book begins as the ship's keel is laid, [16 MARCH 1914] with a picture of FDR who was on hand as the Assistant Secretary of the Navy for the ceremony. It ends with the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. Included, after the end of the book, are 5 appendices that include all the information that modelers and naval history enthusiasts will be seeking.

FOR THOSE READERS THAT ARE A LITTLE IMPATIENT - -

The first seven chapters of the book is about the peacetime life aboard one of the U.S. Navy's super-dreadnoughts. It is an interesting and well illustrated historical reader.

This changes abruptly for Chapter 8, "DAY OF INFAMY" which details a basic reconstruction of the morning of December 7, 1941, as it pertains to the Battleship Arizona. Highlighted most of all are the individual acts of heroism and the selflessness of many of the crew in their desperate efforts to save their fellow crewmen, their ship and themselves. Also included is a sketch which illustrates where the damage to the ship occurred, which is a huge aid in understanding what happened so quickly to the Arizona on December 7, 1941. This is short, seemingly all too short, but one must realize that the Arizona's magazines' exploded only about 10 minutes after the attack began. 1177 men of the Arizona's crew were killed in that short time with only 337 survivors, many of whom were on leave so they were not there at the time. In other words, about 85% of the crew on-board were killed in basically ten minutes. Nevertheless, the detail is quite accurate and more importantly, easy to follow and appreciate.

Chapter 9, "AFTERMATH" is pretty gruesome in some places, but this is after all a rather gruesome real life disaster. This chapter does include the attempted salvaging of the Arizona and some stories about the men who remained on board [forever in most cases].

THE APPENDICES: HISTORIAN & MODELERS HEAVEN

- APPENDIX 1 - CHRONOLOGY from 1916 - 1941, 42 pages includes a great deal of day to day missions and events of interest.

- APPENDIX 2 - COMMANDING OFFICERS - DATES INCLUDED

- APPENDIX 3 - CREW LIST - 7 DECEMBER 1941, includes fatalities and survivors separately of both the Navy and Marine Corp. Includes summary at the end.

- APPENDIX 4 - A SAILOR'S LETTERS - SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES

- APPENDIX 5 - SHIP'S DATA, include detailed specs with individual breakdown of the weights of different components of the ship [eg. armor, machinery, hull etc.] both originally and after the modernization in 1931.

Within Appendix 5 there are numerous sketches [1:600 scale] which are probably copies of the ships blueprints. These are detailed to show individual compartments and components and are labeled. The alterations that were made to the ship over time have been included. A very important addition.

BOTTOM LINE:

Paul Stillwell and "The Naval Institute Press" have another winner in this volume.

I chose to read The Illustrated History of the Battleship Arizona, written by Paul Stillwell. This is not the first book of this format that he has written The Illustrated History of the Battleship Missouri, follows the same format as well. The book started in the shipyard as the U.S.S. Arizona was being built then the author takes you through the daily routine of the ship as if you were a sailor on the great battleship. You feel as though you're in the middle of Pearl Harbor looking over the Arizona as the battle is taking place. The ship was built in 1918, and was the pride of the Pacific fleet threw out the 20's. The Arizona was featured in a Famous movie called, Here Comes the Navy. After Pearl Harbor the ship was made into a now world famous memorial.

This had been one of the best books I had ever been able to read there is so much information given on this great ship, and the pictures make the ship come alive. I would suggest this book to anyone who has an interest in ships and the way they run, or a fan of history. I have not read any other books that Paul Stillwell has written, but if they are half as good as this one I would recommend it to anyone.

The Second World War completely changed its major participants and exacted some huge sacrifices from all involved. This and other books about the people who did the fighting shows how similar the attitudes were on all sides. The main character changes some of his thinking after the war, but his thoughts and actions during the war are really interesting, especially when compared to the thoughts and actions of the people on other sides.

If ever a book (other than the Bible) showed the divine hand and providence of God, this is it. I wish I could have met the man.

Excellent detailed story of Pearl Harbor's lead Navy pilot who through special circumstances wrought only by God found himself after the war travelling in the USA with Billy Graham and preaching the Gospel in Christian Crusades.

A friend of mine introduced me to this book in April of this year. He told me it was unlike any book about the Pacific war that he had ever read. Although skeptical at first, I sill went ahead and purchased the book. I left it on my book-shelve for several months and forgot all about it. As I began packing up in July to move I noticed this book again, so I picked it up and began reading it. I found the style of writing extremely fluid, and the chapters were concise. This well balanced account of Mitsuo Fuchida life traces it from his days as an Imperial naval aviator to Christian evangelist. 'God's Samurai' is a truly inspirational book filled with numerous accounts of honor, bravery, loyalty, and sacrifice - all the codes of a Samurai warrior. I have enjoyed this book tremendously, and I have just begun reading, 'Midway: The Battle That Doomed Japan: The Japanese Navy's Story' by Mitsuo Fuchida, Roger Pineau (Editor),Masatake Okumiya(Contributor). Both 'God's Samurai' and 'Midway' are 'must-have' books for anyone who is truly interested in the Pacific war and naval battles!

An awesome true story. Definitely one of the three best books I've read in the past decade. In a time like this of Osama bin Labens and shocking inter-civilizational conflict, Fuchida's life story shows how true reconciliation and inter-cultural brotherhood can be experienced. It gives hope in spite of the huge obstacles to inter-cultural understanding. A powerful human interest story. Don't miss it!

The role of the American army in the Pacific between the Spanish-American war and the Second World War is often forgotten. Most don't even know the American army ahd a role so far away from home. Indeed the army was small but the stakes were high. In the wake of the war with Spain in 1898 the U.S gained a number of small protectorates and colonies in the Phillipines and Samoa and elsewhere. Eventually this became part of a defense system, but it was not merely to defend against outsiders. The Army also had a role with the local people and creating institutions. Moreover it also had to fight insurgencies that took place in the Moro area of the Southern Phillipines where Muslim insurgents fought Americans. The insurgency goes on to this day. However at the time the likes of General Pershing were used to put down this uprising with the least possible loss in lives.

This fascinating and detailed book opens up a new history of the American army and its role in the Pacific.

Seth J. Frantzman

Linn notes that the big question of WWII is, "why, with almost four decades to prepare, these (US Army) military forces proved unable to defend the nation's Pacific possessions against Japan." The author notes that the traditional approach has been to focus on events in the short-term prior to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines, however his effort is to, "offer a somewhat longer perspective through a narrative history of the U.S. Army in Hawaii and the Philippines from 1902 to 1940....its task is not to delineate the road to Pearl Harbor, but to illuminate the numerous paths the army trod in its long search for a viable Pacific defense....For years it had foreseen both the threat and its own inability to ward it off." From a strategic perspective, this book does a good job of putting America's failure into context. It points out that although the surprise attack of 7 December 1941 was not detected, from a military capabilities standpoint there was little the Army could have done. Although I believe one needs to be careful with historical parallels, a student of strategy can see how political and economic considerations drive strategy. Indeed, a similar issue between today (2004) and then was the tension between what is required to hold ground when forces are deployed vs. the ability to deploy and sustain those same forces over a great deal of distance.

During the first forty years of the 20th Century the U.S. Army had the mission of protecting the Philippine and Hawaiian Islands from attack by the nation of Japan. Although Japan was not originally thought to be a threat, from the 1922 Naval Conference onward the army high command considered Japan as the only real threat in the Pacific. This book provides a unique and very good history of what came to be known and the U.S. Army of the Pacific.

The book provides a good deal of fascinating information on all aspects of the Pacific Army from the life of enlisted men to the strategic thinking that informed its planning. But perhaps the most interesting theme running through it is how the U.S. Army identified the Japanese threat to the U.S. Pacific Islands and sought to mitigate it.

Because of budget and manpower constraints imposed by congress, the U.S. Army in the period between the WWI and WWII was incapable of fighting any kind of war. Yet as this book shows that did not prevent the Army General Staff and the Department Staffs of the Philippines and Hawaii from developing often very well thought out strategies for the defense of the islands. In the case of the Philippines the Archipelago was first considered vital to U.S. interests in the Western Pacific and a keystone in U.S. strategy. Gradually this view changed and by the thirties, the Philippines were considered indefensible against Japan and a strategic liability. Army planners sought to minimize the U.S. military presence there. This same thinking made Hawaii and especially the Pearl Harbor naval base on Oahu the keystone of a defensive arc running from Alaska to Panama which was designed to protect the U.S. Pacific Frontier.

One thing that is clear from this book and that is that the Army General Staff and the Islands' Departmental Commands were quite accurate in their defining the potential threats posed by Japan and fairly realistic in planning defensive strategies against those threats. For example the army was only too aware that the elaborate harbor defense systems that defended Pearl Harbor and Manila Bay were obsolete almost from the day they were completed. Still army planners at both the General Staff and department level tried to develop effective defensive plans. The problem was, as this book states, that there was a tradition that developed early on that allowed department commands to override general staff planning and design their own defensive plans. Thus in 1941General Short of the Hawaiian Department defined the threat from Japan primarily in terms of sabotage while the General Staff correctly saw it as a threat from air attack.

Brian Linn believes that the American annexation of the Philippines damaged rather than helped the U.S. position in East Asia. Even before the outbreak of the Second World War, American military planners knew that the Philippines were extremely vulnerable to Japanese invasion but were relunctant to raise a native force that could also be a threat to the American Army. The security problems only became worse when before the attack on Pearl Harbor, MacArthur authorized the defence of the entire Philippines and not just the Bataan peninsular. As a result of America's fear of a native force to protect the Philippines and MacArthur's overly ambitious plans, the United State suffered a humiliating defeat to the Japanese in 1942. I would reccomend this book foy anyone who believes that a new American empire would enhance national security but has ignored the disasterous example of the American experience with the Philippines.

This is a splendid and pioneering study of the Army in the Pacific, a subject badly in need of more light that it has hitherto received. It brings the Pacific Army to life in a way that no one else had even attempted.

Like any book, however, it has its limitations, and as is usually true it is the ones that author was not aware of (at least at the time) and did not flag for our attention that we must take most care of. In this case the principal limitation lies in strategic view.

The Philippines, as the author makes clear, never had any intrinsic significance for the United States (or for the earlier colonial power, Spain, for that matter) -- no riches or resources to be reaped. The sole significance of the islands lay in their position. Initially, Americans had calculated (like the Spaniards before them) that possession of Manila would provide an important advantage in gaining the rewards of the rich China trade. Luzon and the rest of the islands simply came with the deal. Almost as soon as they had been seized, however, other events eroded Manila's importance in this role greatly. (Perhaps we should say "seeming importance," as there never were the prospects which had been envisioned in 1898.) Finding themselves in possession of a colony of little value, Americans not unnaturally felt reservations about spending large sums to garrison and defend it. Thus a purely nominal force was assigned to its defense, adequate only for internal security and the assertion of sovereignty. The oft-proclaimed "bastion" of the Philippines was in reality no more than a sentry post, bound to be overrun quickly in any serious assault. To invest in a real Philippine fortress or in mobile forces strong enough to quickly relieve it would involve an expense that few Americans could see as justified.

Distant events changed all that. By the late 1930s, of course, the propensity of Japan for aggressive military expansion was manifest, but that did not seem particularly threatening in itself, given that the economic resources of the country were so small relative to those of the U.S. But the outbreak of the European War in 1939, followed by the Nazi defeat of France and threat to Britain in 1940, heightened American security concerns vastly. Then in September, 1940, Japan joined the Axis Pact, making itself an ally of Germany. Japan had intended this to change American perceptions and it did that, but not in the way that had been hoped. Japan ceased to be a disagreeable nuisance in a distant place and instead clearly became a potential part of a serious threat, to be blocked if possible and crushed if necessary. Very suddenly, the importance of the Philippines' geographic position changed dramatically.

It is this transition that Prof. Linn misses in focusing on the local realities rather than the global strategic picture that dominated the awareness of Washington decision-makers in 1940-41. This broader reality is well presented in Waldo Heinrichs, "Pearl Harbor in a Global Context," in _Pearl Harbor Revisited_, edited by Robert W. Love, Jr. (London: Macmillan, 1995) (ISBN 0312095937), and in more extended fashion in the same author's _Threshold of War: Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Entry into World War II_, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988) (ISBN 0195061683). For the same issue from a different perspective see Gerhard L. Weinberg, "Global Conflict: The Interaction Between the European and Pacific Theaters of War in World War II," in _Germany, Hitler, and World War II: Essays in Modern German and World History_, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995) (ISBN 0521474078), or his book, _A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II_, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994) (ISBN 0521558794).

Beginning with the Japanese occupation of Vietnam in July of 1941, thereby making manifest their determination to continue down the road of active alliance with Hitler, the U.S. began to rush all available military power to the Philippines, reserving only that which was essential to the security of America itself. But years of penuriousness and neglect had left the cupboard largely bare, and re-armament was yet to produce major material results. So the Philippine defenders, like the exposed sentry, became casualties of the brutally inexorable logic of war. Brian Linn's book provides a major and largely-overlooked piece of this picture, but is somewhat weak on the overall context.

There are also other sources which the interested reader may wish to consult in order to get a fuller picture. These include John J. Stephan, _Hawaii Under the Rising Sun: Japan's Plans for Conquest After Pearl Harbor_, (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1984) (0824825500) and the article by Richard B. Meixsel, "Major General George Grunert, WPO-3, and the Philippine Army, 1940-1941," _Journal of Military History_, 59, No. 2 (Apr 1995): 303-24. Both offer insights not fully captured by Linn. In a more recent article, "Manuel L. Quezon, Douglas MacArthur, and the Significance of the Military Mission to the Philippine Commonwealth," _Pacific Historical Review_, 70, No. 2: 255-92, Meixsel introduces some new evidence regarding the events in the Philippines in the 1930s and uses it to call into question some of Linn's claims.

While I have focused on its limitations, I want to emphasize again that this is a very valuable and unique book, even taking them fully into account.