Stupid Wars - Ed Strosser and Michael Prince

   2008; 321 pages (but only 299 of that is text).  Full Title: “Stupid Wars: A Citizen’s Guide to Botched Putsches, Failed Coups, Inane Invasions, and Ridiculous Revolutions”.  New Authors? : Yes & Yes.  Genres: History; War; Military History; Non-Fiction.  Overall Rating : 9*/10.

 

    Stupid Wars.

 

    They happen occasionally.  Sometimes the stupidity is caused by glory-seeking political leaders.  Sometimes the stupidity is due to incredibly inept and clueless generals.  Sometimes the stupidity is driven by national pride.  One was fought to protest the taxing on whiskey.

 

    To be clear, though, not all wars are stupid.  World War 2, for instance, was fought for very noble reasons.  So was the Korean War.

 

    Two things are worth noting about Stupid Wars.  First, history generally doesn’t supply a lot of details about them.  There’s not much glory to be gained in winning a Stupid War.  And if you’re the loser, you really don’t want to talk about it.

 

    And second, as Ed Strosser and Michael Prince discovered when they studied those Stupid Wars: once started, they are terribly hard to end.

 

What’s To Like...

    After an overview in the Introduction, Stupid Wars is divided into sixteen chapters covering one war apiece.  I’m happy to say I’d heard of all of them except one (the first one), but usually knew only the barest of details about the conflicts, including those that have happened during my lifetime.

 

    My favorite chapters/wars were:

1. The Fourth Crusade (1198)

2. The Whiskey Rebellion (1794)

3. The US Invasion of Russia (1918)

4. The Winter War Between Russia and Finland (1939)

5. The Falkland Islands War (1982)

6. The US Invasion of Grenada (1983)

 

   The chapters generally follow this format:

a. Introduction

b. The Players

c. The General Situation

d. What Happened

e. What Happened After

 

    I was impressed by the politically equitable approach of the book.  Russia starts three of these Stupid Wars (Finland, Afghanistan, the Gorbachev coup); the US matches that with three of its own (Russia, Bay of Pigs, Grenada); with Reagan initiating one of those (Grenada), and JFK initiating another (Bay of Pigs).  Hitler is both a plotter (the Beer Hall Putsch) and the target in one (the Generals’ Coup). 

 

    The 16 Stupid Wars are presented in chronological order, ranging from 337 AD to 1991.  The text is packed with historical details.  You’ll learn where the first Molotov cocktails were made and used, and why western Pennsylvanians (My native state!  Yay us!) rose up in rebellion in 1794 over a tax upon their beloved whiskey.  That revolt was doomed though: the insurgents were hopelessly outnumbered.  The total population of Pittsburgh in the 1790 census was only 376 citizens.   

 

    Stupid Wars is written in what I call a “Sarah Vowell” tone: lighthearted and witty.  Chapter 12 starts the “in my lifetime” portion of the wars.  My Kindle said the book was 321 pages long, but the text actually ends at page 299, with the rest of the book being “Extras” consisting of “Sources”, “About the Authors”, and “Searchable Terms”.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.1/5 based on 73 ratings and 33 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.41/5 based on 298 ratings and 55 reviews.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Louche (adj.) : disreputable or sordid in a rakish or appealing way.

 

Excerpts...

    It should be noted at this point that Paraguay was very small and poor, with the barest whiff of an arms industry.  Brazil, on the other hand, had everything that Paraguay lacked: men, wealth, arms, and contacts with the outside world.  While exact figures are difficult to achieve, Paraguay had about half a million people.  Brazil’s population numbered over 10 million.  Lopez, however, was not constrained by the logic of simple math.  Besides, it would be a quick war, he convinced himself, and the Brazilians would soon tire of pounding him and sue for peace.  Ah yes, the old formula for success—wear out the enemy by dying too frequently before them.  (loc. 1117)

 

    The primary aspect of the Falkland Islands has been their complete insignificance in every way.  The islands have no practical use except as a whaling station, weather observatory (although dreary is what people usually observe), or naval coaling station, useful in the rare case your ships still use coal.  When English sea captain James Cook discovered the islands, he declared them “not worth the discovery.”  On the other hand, he did feel it was worthy to note that it was not worth discovering.  (loc. 3566)

 

Kindle Details…

    Stupid Wars currently sells for $6.99 at Amazon.  ANAICT it is the only collaboration between these two authors.  In fact, it seems neither one even has any e-books to offer with them as the sole author.

 

 

He was truly a diplomatic idiot savant.  (loc. 1141)

    The quibbles are rather nitpicky.  The cussing is sparse: only 13 instances in the whole book, and seven of those are “birdshit” because one of the Stupid Wars was fought over the valuable commodity of guano.

 

    The book is heavily weighted towards the recent past—eleven of the sixteen chapter are set in the 20^th century.  It is also weighted, as the authors point out, towards Western civilization.  However, I think such “slanting” is inherent: we have a lot more information available on wars of recent vintage, and those that take place in our neck of the woods, as compared with wars fought in Africa and the Far East.

 

    A few reviewers groused that some of these conflicts don’t qualify as “wars”, most notably Hitler’s “Beer Hall Putsch”.  They have a point, I suppose, but OTOH, military personnel were involved in every one of these sixteen selections.

 

    9 Stars.  For me, Stupid Wars was a great read.  I may have heard of all but one of these conflicts, but the only information I knew of was whatever could be found in the newspapers, which would be neither comprehensive nor objective.  The history of any war is just a PR spin by the victors; it is accurate only if it serves to justify the winning side.  Thank goodness for authors like Ed Strosser and Michael Prince who present alternative viewpoints.

Grunt - Mary Roach

   2016; 272 pages.  Full Title: Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Military History; Scientific Research; Non-Fiction.  Overall Rating : 9*/10.

 

    There are all sorts of ways to get killed or horribly disabled while serving in the US Armed Forces.  The most obvious are the direct ones: the enemy can shoot you,  stab you, or blow you up with bombs which he can either drop on you, detonate under your vehicle, or launch at you from the side.

 

    The indirect ways are often the more lethal ones.  Horrible wounds such as loss of limbs leave the victim prone to infection and a long-term struggle to live a normal life.  And this assumes the medic who’s treating you on the battlefield remains level-headed and professional while giving you emergency first aid.

 

    Mother Nature can also be a killer.  Fighting in the desert heat affects a soldier’s performance, the loud noises of the machines of war can cause subtle hearing loss leading to lethal mistakes, and flies and diarrhea due to unclean conditions historically claim just as many lives as bombs and bullets.  Even birds, both alone and in groups, crash into Air Force jets thousands of times each year, usually at the most critical times: landing and taking-off.

 

    Serving in the navy has its own risks.  Ships can sink, making survivors floating shark bait.  Any mistake by a sleep-deprived sailor on a submarine can instantly create a death trap for all his shipmates.

 

    What sort of research is the military doing to deal with all this?  That’s what Mary Roach wanted to know, and Grunt details what she found out.

 

What’s To Like...

    Mary Roach divides her research efforts for Grunt into 14 chapters, plus an Introduction, each with a catchy title and subtitle.  A couple of examples:

    Chapter 1 : Second Skin: What to Wear to War

    Chapter 5 : It Could Get Weird: A Salute to Genital Transplants

    Chapter 8 : Leaky Seals: Diarrhea as a Threat to National Security

    Chapter 12 : That Sinking Feeling: When Things Go Wrong Under the Sea

 

    There’s a nice balance in the text between humor and seriousness.  Kevlar underwear made me chuckle, so did blue camouflage uniforms used by the US Navy (“so no one can see you if you fall overboard”).   But hearing from men who have lost limbs or are facing genital reconstruction (or a transplant?) was sobering, such as when a survivor describes what it’s like to step on an IED.

 

    Acronyms abound in the military.  Mary Roach had fun getting used to them, some of which are: BASH, BAM, FRACU, JUON, MRAP, WIAMan, TCAPs, WBGT, HULC, SALSA, JETT, and many more.  FYI, “BASH” stands for “Bird Aircraft Strike Hazard”.  You can learn what the rest mean either by reading the book or enlisting. 

 

    I particularly liked how the Scientific Method was applied in the studies.  How do you accurately evaluate the impact a turkey vulture has on a jet taking off?  How do you determine what attracts sharks to the water around a ship that’s just sunk?  How do you measure which type of clothing will keep you the coolest in the Iraqi desert?  The answer to that last one, BTW, is by using something called a Thermes rectal probe, which the author got to try out firsthand.

 

    Grunt is incredibly informative.  I enjoyed reading about the biochemistry of sweating.  The use of maggots as an anti-infection measure amazed me.  I rolled my eyes when I read the official “US Army Appearance and Grooming Policies”.  And both Mary Roach and I learned that the phrase “going kinetic” is Army-speak for “people are firing guns at you”.

 

     Each chapter begins with an intriguing and usually historical photograph or drawing.  There are lots of footnotes, which are both informative, and at a Terry Pratchett-level of witty.  Do not skip them!

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Sisyphean (adj.) : of a task such that it can never be completed.

Others: Wicks (as a verb).

 

Excerpts...

    The chicken gun has a sixty-foot barrel, putting it solidly in the class of an artillery plane.  While a four-pound chicken hurtling in excess of 400 miles per hour is a lethal projectile, the intent is not to kill.  On the contrary, the chicken gun was designed to keep people alive.  The carcasses are fired at jets, standing empty or occupied by “simulated crew” to test their ability to withstand what the Air Force and the aviation industry, with signature clipped machismo, call birdstrike.  The chickens are stunt doubles for geese, gulls, ducks, and the rest of the collective bird mass that three thousand or so times a year collide with Air Force jets.  (pg. 13, and the book's opening sentences)

 

    Jack passes me the M16.  “Have you shot a gun like this before?”  I shake my very heavy head.  He hands me a magazine and shows me where to load it.  I’ve seen this in movies – the quick slap with the heel of the hand.

    Hmm.

    “Other way.  So the bullets are facing forward.”  (pg. 67)

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.5/5 based on 764 ratings.

    Goodreads: 3.92/5 based on 17,129 ratings and 2,153 reviews.

 

“If you want to destroy every last bacterium and shred of dead tissue, a maggot is your man.”  (pg. 174)

    Grunt was my third Mary Roach book, and there’s never much to quibble about in any of her books.  If you’re utterly offended by cusswords in what you're reading, be aware that there were 20 or so instances here, most of which were in remarks uttered by servicemen and half of which referenced fecal matter.

 

    Naturally, I found some of the chapters more interesting than others.  Your faves will be different from mine.  The research into making stink bombs to drop on any enemy, anywhere seemed silly to me, and I wondered whether other submarines had the “sleep deprivation” problem to the same degree as Mary Roach observed during her time aboard the USS Tennessee.  There's a teaser about this at the end of this review.

 

    Overall, I found Grunt to be a fascinating read, easily on a par with the other two Mary Roach books I’ve read Bonk and Gulp (reviewed here and here).  Three more of her books are on my TBR shelf, but I do find one thing worrying:  per the Wikipedia page on her it seems like she hasn’t written any more books since Grunt came out in 2016.  I for one would be bummed if she’s discontinued her writing career.

 

    9 Stars.  The promised teaser:  What was the average daily sleep time on a US submarine when it was monitored in 1949?  And what was the average daily sleep time on the USS Tennessee when Mary Roach was doing her research?  Answers in the comments.

Sharpe's Tiger - Bernard Cornwell

   1997; 379 pages.  Book  1 (storywise) or Book 15 (in order written) out of 24 in the “Sharpe Novels” series.  Alternate Title: “Richard Sharpe and the Siege of Seringapatam, 1799”.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Historical Fiction; Military Fiction; English History.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

    Life is hell for Private Richard Sharpe, a member of low standing in His Majesty’s 33^rd Light Company.  He’s a long way from his native England, trudging through the hot, mosquito-laden parts of southern India, on his way to some woe-begotten city called Seringapatam in the spring of 1799.  Chances are he won’t live to see 1800.

    He has no one to love, except maybe Mary, the widow of the lately-departed Sergeant Bickerstaff.  But why would she want to be with a lowly private?  The proper thing for her is to marry an officer who can give her better protection and security this long, long way from home.

    But Private Sharpe has bigger problems than a war that can kill him and a woman who’s socially out of his reach.  Captain Morris, who he indirectly answers to, doesn’t like him, and Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill, who he does directly answer to, hates his guts.  Hakeswill especially would like to see Sharpe dead, either in battle or flogged to death.  He’s a conniving so-and-so, and when you combine that with Sharpe’s hot temper and sassy tongue, it’s only a matter of time before bad things happen to “Sharpie”.

    So it’s a godsend when Sharpe is offered a chance to go on a suicide mission behind enemy lines.  The odds are overwhelming that he’ll never come back alive, but those are slightly better than the odds of surviving Hakeswill’s wrath.  Besides, if the mission is a success, Sharpe’s been promised a promotion to sergeant.

    And Sergeant Sharpe versus Sergeant Hakeswill is what we call a “fair fight”.

What’s To Like...

    Sharpe’s Tiger is the first book in a “prequel quintet”, chronicling the early years of Bernard Cornwell’s famed protagonist's military career in the British wars in India.  Sharpe will eventually rise through the ranks to become a lieutenant, but for now he is just a lowly private, bored to death, seeing no future for himself, pondering the circling vultures, and weighing the pros and cons of desertion.

    I liked Bernard Cornwell’s balanced treatment of the two opposing forces here.  The British may be the good guys, because Sharpe’s part of their army, but they have some rotten officers in their ranks and their justification for marching on Seringapatam is far from noble.  The opposing leader, “the Tippoo”, has a streak of cruelty in him, yet he’s also a charismatic leader who inspires his men by acts of personal bravery.  If there’s an overlying theme here, it’s that war is hell, no matter what side you happen to be on.

    The three religions involved – Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity – are also treated equally.  Each has one or more dedicated believers in this tale, and at times each of their gods seems to give divine messages and/or answer prayers.

    The book is written in English, so you have picquet lines, jewellery, and saltpetre; and things can be meagre, sombre, and grey, but I didn’t find it distracting.  There’s a brief mention of chess, a smattering of French, a potent booze called “arrack” to drink, lots of potent-but-inaccurate rockets to shoot, and a way to determine whether some unknown black substance is or isn’t gunpowder.  Hey, you never know when that last one will come in handy.

    There’s a 7-page “Historical Note” at the end of the book, where Bernard Cornwell details who/what is historical face and who/what is literary fiction.  It gives you some idea of the depth of the author’s research for this novel, and I always like it when a writer of this genre takes the time to provide these details.  There’s a few instances of cussing – probably less than a dozen, and a fair amount of blood and gore, courtesy of battles and executions.  It’s certainly not a cozy, but neither does it wallow in R-rated stuff.

    The ending is reasonably exciting: some baddies get to live to fight another day, some don’t.  The good guys suffer some casualties along the way as well.  Things close with a “sombre” funeral cortege where those in attendance can reflect upon the cost of taking part in war.

Kewlest New Word...

Kirks (n., plural.) : a church.  (a Scottishism, and/or northern Britishism)

Others: Brailed (v.); Havildar (n., Indian rank).

Excerpts...

    “Assaulted me, sir, he did!”  The Sergeant could scarcely speak for the pain in his belly.  “He went mad, sir!  Just mad, sir!”

    “Don’t worry, Sergeant.  Hicks and I both saw it,” Morris said.  “Came to check on the horses, ain’t that right, Hicks?”

    “Yes, sir,” Hicks said.  He was a small young man, very officious, who would never contradict a superior.  If Morris claimed the clouds were made of cheese Hicks would just stand to attention, twitch his nose, and swear blind he could smell Cheddar.  (pg. 76)

    “I think the British army lost a good man in you, Sharpe,” Gudin said, standing and guiding Sharpe deeper into the trees.  “If you don’t want to stay in India you might think of coming home with me.”

    “To France, sir?”

    Gudin smiled at Sharpe’s surprised tone.  “It isn’t the devil’s country, Sharpe; indeed I suspect it’s the most blessed place on God’s earth, and in the French army a good man can be very easily raised to officer rank.”

    “Me, sir?  An officer?”  Sharpe laughed.  “Like making a mule into a racehorse.”  (pg. 220)

“Fight like the Englishmen you are.”  “I’m a Scot,” a sour voice spoke from the rear rank.  (pg. 17 )

    For some reason, Sharpe’s Tiger was a slow read for me.  I’m not sure why – the writing is good, which is the norm for any Bernard Cornwell effort, and it’s not a difficult read.  I suspect it’s due to the subject matter:  sieges just aren’t as exciting as glory-filled running battles.  The author does his best to liven things up – with sorties and skullduggery and lots of intrigue – but we read his novels for the epic battle scenes and that doesn’t occur until the British begin their assault on Seringapatam.  No matter, once that commences, things hum along nicely.

    Other than that, well…  the horse dies, and the cat dies.  Oh, and Amazon inexplicably lists this as a “Sea Adventure Fiction” for the paperback version, which is the format I read it in, and nobody here even gets close to the ocean.  The other options – Hardback, e-book, audiobook, don’t call it that, which makes me wonder just how Amazon chooses the genre options for its books.

    This is my third Bernard Cornwell book; the other two are reviewed here and here.  All have been superb works of historical military fiction and if I don’t rate this one quite as high, it’s not because it was bad; it’s because the other two were  Just.  That.  Good.

    8 Stars.  We’ll close with a teaser.  One of the characters here is a British officer named Colonel Arthur Wellesley.  He’s a “grey” character – young, headstrong, and Sharpe and him don't think much of each other.  Wellesley was a real historical figure, and went on to fame and fortune under a different and more familiar name.  Who was he and what is he known for?  (Answer in the comments)

Dead Wake - Erik Larson

   2015; 359 pages.  Full Title: Dead Wake: The Last Crossing Of The Lusitania.  New Author? : No.   Genre : Non-Fiction; History; World War 1; Ships.  Overall Rating : 9½*/10.

    Everything I know about the Lusitania comes from history classes, either in high school or college.  Here’s what I remember from those classes.

    The sinking of the Lusitania caused an outrage in America that immediately caused us to enter World War 1 on the side of the British and French.  Since we did that in 1917, that means the Lusitania was sunk in 1917 as well.

    It was torpedoed by a German U-boat.  There were two giant explosions.  The Germans say that proves the luxury liner was secretly carrying ammunition from the US to England.  The British say it proves that the U-boat fired not one, but two torpedoes, those dirty dogs.

    The Lusitania was an American ship, so the sinking of it was an act of war.  The attack took place somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.  There were some survivors, but a lot of passengers died because there weren’t enough lifeboats.  Most of them were Americans.

    Hmm.  Strangely enough, the only true statement in those last three paragraphs is that the Lusitania was torpedoed by a German U-boat.

What’s To Like...

    Dead Wake is Erik Larson’s most recent book, and is a departure from his usual style of interweaving two disparate stories, such as in The Devil  in the White City, where he tells about the 1893 World Exposition in Chicago (which showcased the a marvelous invention called the Ferris wheel), and a detective's dogged hunt for a serial killer named H.H. Holmes.  Here, no such blending takes place, but the POV does skip around from the perspectives of the U-boat, the Lusitania, President Woodrow Wilson in Washington DC, and Room 40  in London, the headquarters for British Intelligence during the First World War.

    Larson divides the book into five sections, arranged chronologically, and chronicling the voyages of both vessels.  They are :

Part 1. (pg 5) Bloody Monkeys (background and pre-voyage preparations)
Part 2.  (pg 133) Jump Rope and Caviar (the voyages themselves)

Part 3. (pg. 215) Dead Wake (the paths of the two ships meet)

Part 4. (pg. 245) The Black Soul  (the torpedoing, sinking, and rescue efforts)

Part 5.  (pg. 315) The Sea of Secrets  (the aftermath and consequences)

    The torpedo impact takes place at 2:10 PM on May 07, 1915, which, book-wise, is on page 247.  You might think that means a whole bunch of boring pre-explosion stuff to slog through, but Erik Larson did meticulous researching into the lives of the various passengers and crewmen, and their lives and intertwining fates makes for fascinating reading.

    The book isn’t overly technical, but I enjoyed learning about the U-boat technology of World War 1.  Submarines were viewed as a joke at the beginning of the war.  They were small, their torpedoes had a 60% fail rate, and their batteries needed charging frequently.  But after they sank a couple British warships, they developed into a deadly threat.  Indeed, it led to an official British policy forbidding any of their large warships from being dispatched to rescue survivors from a torpedoed ship.  This would have a grave impact when the Lusitania went down.

    As usual, Erik Larson throws all sorts of details and trivia into the account.  Arthur Conan Doyle writes a fictional sub story that turns out to be remarkably prescient.  I learned about the long-forgotten “Straw Hat Day” celebrations.  There’s an eerie quote about the horrors of trench warfare by some German soldier named Adolf Hitler.  And you’ll be amazed by how much coal has to be loaded onto a ship that’s about to embark on a transatlantic voyage.  Overall, it was really neat to get a “feel” for life in the 1910’s – in Germany, in the US, and in England.

    The title is explained on page 241.  The ending is great, which is no small feat since most readers will know ahead of time how things turn out for the Lusitania.  The blame-games played in the aftermath will sadden you.  Winston Churchill, then the Secretary of the Navy, comes across particularly poorly.  The “Epilogue” section is in a “whatever happened to” structure, and I greatly enjoyed  that.  The closing paragraphs (pg. 353) about Theodate Pope’s search for her shipboard friend, Edwin Friend, will bring both a tear and a smile to your face.

    There are no pictures in the book, which was mildly disappointing.  I would’ve liked to see a larger-scale map of the watery areas of interest.  The “extras” in the back of the book include 6 pages of acknowledgements, 58 pages of notes, and an 11-page index.  I highly recommend reading the "Sources and Acknowledgements" section, as it details just how much work goes into writing and publishing a book like this.

Kewlest New Word ...

Sequelae (n., plural) : conditions that are the consequence of a previous disease or injury.

Excerpts...

    Men served as ballast.  In order to quickly level or “dress” his boat, or speed a dive, Schwieger would order crewmen to run to the bow or the stern.  The chaos might at first seem funny, like something from one of the new Keystone Cops films, except for the fact that these maneuvers were executed typically at moments of peril.  U-boats were so sensitive to changes in load that the mere launch of a torpedo required men to shift location to compensate for the sudden loss of weight.  (pg. 121)

    He and Pierpoint swam together.  Turner saw the bodies of the ship’s firemen floating nearby, upside down in their life jackets – he counted forty in all.  Seagulls dove among corpses and survivors alike.  Turner later told his son, Norman, that he found himself fending off attacks by the birds, which swooped from the sky and pecked at the eyes of floating corpses.  Rescuers later reported that wherever they saw spirals of gulls, they knew they would find bodies.  Turner’s experience left him with such a deep hatred of seagulls, according to Norman, “that until his retirement he used to carry a .22 rifle and shoot every seagull he could.”  (pg. 296)

 “If you had to jump six or seven feet, or certainly drown, it is surprising what ‘a hell of a long way’ even older people can jump.”  (pg. 272)

    Dead Wake was a riveting book for me, especially the “what ifs” and the subsequent events.  The British navy tries to make Captain Turner a scapegoat, but instead, you, and Erik Larson, have to ask: Why wasn’t there a destroyer escort for the Lusitania as it approached Liverpool?  After all, it was in a war zone, and Germany had sent out explicit communications that they would sink any and all vessels their U-boats encountered there.

    It should also be noted that, by its own shipping records, the Lusitania was carrying much-needed rifle-carriages and shrapnel shells to England, making it fair game in the conflict.  Still, the popular conspiracy theory that it carried another, secret trove of highly-explosive munitions is pretty much debunked by Larson.

   The actions of the United States are also head-scratching.  No matter what your and my 8^th-grade teacher told you, we didn’t declare war because of this.  The Lusitania was sunk in May 1915.  We didn’t enter the war until two years later (half the duration of the four-year conflict), and that only after our indignation over the infamous “Zimmerman Letter”.  Wiki it, or read this book.  Talk about skewed priorities.

    9½ Stars.  Dead Wake is a fantastic read for history buffs, and I've never yet been disappointed in an Erik Larson book.

    We’ll close with some of the more poignant stats and trivia given in the book.  764 people survived the sinking of the Lusitania, including the ship’s captain, William Turner.  1,195 people died, including 27 of the 33 infants aboard  and 3 German stowaways, who had been caught at departure snooping around, and were incarcerated below-decks.  The bodies of more than 600 passengers were never found.  123 Americans perished.

    The Lusitania was just 16 hours from arriving at its destination when it was torpedoed.  The total time between the impact and sinking: just 18 minutes.  Although each passenger had been issued a life jacket, many of them died because they didn't know how to put it on and/or where they had stashed it in their cabins.  Think about that last piece of trivia the next time you take a cruise and have to participate in the mandatory life jacket drill.

The History Buff's Guide to the Civil War - Thomas R. Flagel

   2003; 366 pages.  Full Title : The History Buff’s Guide to the Civil War – Top Ten Rankings of the Best, Worst, Largest, and Most Lethal People and Events of the Civil War.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Non-Fiction; Military History; Lists.  Overall Rating : 7½*/10.

    Hey, did you know that almost 30 years before the Civil War, South Carolina had already threatened to secede from the United States? (pg. 60).  Or that some other names proposed for the Confederate States were (among others) Chicora, Columbia, and Alleghenia?  (pg. 65).  How about the fact that they used to use Mercury in the manufacture of hats?  (pg. 117).  Or that General Ambrose Burnside, one of the many incompetent Union commanders, would later become the first president of the NRA?  (pg. 280).

    If you like cluttering up your brain with trivia such as that, and I do, The History Buff’s Guide to the Civil War will be a sheer delight to you. OTOH, if you’re a serious History buff, well, this book is still for you.  And if you really like the “mystique” of the Civil War – the “Dixie” mindset of diehard Southerners, the “Lincoln the Great Emancipator” mindset of diehard Northerners – you may want to avoid this book.  Thomas Flagel’s objectivity is going to shatter your illusions.

     Okay, one trivia question to whet your appetite.  What was General Robert E. Lee’s overall record in the major engagements in which he commanded the CSA forces?  Useless hint : the total number of these battles was 23.

   The answer is given in the comments section of this post.

What’s To Like...
    The History Buff’s Guide to the Civil War is done in the same style as the previous Thomas R. Flagel book  I read (reviewed here): all sorts of aspects of the conflict presented in “Top Ten Rankings” format.  These are not merely “Top Ten Lists”; each entry is usually several paragraphs of in-depth facts and analysis, and each entry finishes up with some fascinating bit of trivia.  One example that I really enjoyed was learning about the origin of Memorial Day, which, once upon a time, was known as “Decoration Day” (pg. 361).

    I liked the balanced approach employed by the author.  Sorry, Johnny Reb, but the war really was, first and foremost, about slavery, although there were lots of other reasons as well.  But also sorry, Yankee Doodle, Lincoln’s motivations for going to war had little to do with emancipation, at least initially.

   The book is divided into 7 sections listed below.  My favorite topics in each section are listed; “T10” stands for “Top Ten”.

1. Antebellum
   T10 Causes of the Civil War.
2. Politics
   T10 Differences between the USA & CSA Constitutions.
3. Military Life
   T10 Weapons.
4. The Home Front
   T10 Acts of Dissent.
   T10 Songs (including pacifist/protest tunes).
5. In Retrospect
   T10 Best Commanding Generals.
   T10 Worst Commanding Generals.
   T10 Military Blunders (#4 is Pickett’s charge).
6. Pursuing The War
   T10 Ways to be an accurate reenactor.
7. Epilogue
   Some final thoughts from Thomas R. Flagel (and well wroth the read).

    Section 5 is the “meat” of the book – the fighting itself.  Naturally, it was my favorite part.  There are also plenty of pictures scattered throughout the book, both etchings/drawings and actual photographs.

Excerpts...
    Before a march began, foot soldiers were instructed to pack three days’ rations including salt pork, which they habitually ate in one sitting.  This wolfing was sometimes a matter of weak willpower but usually an act of practicality.  Stuffed in a haversack or in pockets, sowbelly oozed grease, gathered lint and dust, jumbled with the other contents, and rotted quickly.  Better to eat it all, figured most soldiers, and take one’s chances with foraging or resupply than to wait a few days and watch the rations become even more repulsive than they already were.  (pg. 102)

    Most reenactors spend a pretty shinplaster on their replicated duds, subsequently treating their uniforms better than a Sunday suit.  Even those attempting to represent the mismatched nature of Civil War outerwear, sporting a homespun shirt or a hand-me-down hat for example, still appear pristine compared to the real campaigners.  To an actual soldier, there were four kinds of clothes: lost, tossed, dress, and damaged.  (pg. 313)

 An ardent oversimplifier with freakish stamina, John Brown failed at everything save breeding children and agitation.    (pg. 22)
    There are a couple quibbles.  For starters, a full one-third of the book (pgs. 367-497) is taken up by the sections “Notes”, “Bibliography”, “Image Credits”, and “Index”.  I recognize the need for these, as nitpickers and dissenters-of-opinion are going to try to tear apart the points made in The History Buff’s Guide to the Civil War that chafe their undies.  But come on, now.  We live in the Digital Age.  Can’t all this be listed on-line and readers/arguers simply given a link to that stuff?  Save the trees!!

    Second, it seemed to take a long time to get to the “war” parts of the book.  The non-tree-killing parts covered 366 pages, and really interesting parts about the fighting itself were limited to pages 206 to 301.  While there were some kewl lists in the other sections, there were aome boring parts too.

    I don’t recall as many slow sections in The History Buff’s Guide to World War 2, although it’s been a while since I read that one.  Maybe the innovative way of presenting history was fresher when I read the WW2 book.  Or maybe the author became more polished between writing the two books.  “Civil War” was written nine years before “WW2”.

    But let’s not overemphasize the few negatives.  As the title implies, this book will appeal to any and all history buffs, and there’s enough interesting stuff there to more than compensate for a couple of slow stretches.  I enjoyed “Civil War”, even if it didn’t quite measure up to “WW2”.

    7½ Stars.  Above all, I appreciated this book addressing a question that puzzled me way back in 5^th-grade, which was: If the Civil War was all about freeing the slaves (I grew up in Pennsylvania), and the fighting started in 1861, how come Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation wasn’t issued until 1863?.  Thank you, Thomas R. Flagel.

Sharpe's Rifles - Bernard Cornwell

    1988; 304 pages.  Book # 6 (story-wise) out of 24 in the “Sharpe” series; Book #9 (published date-wise). New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Historical Fiction.  Overall Rating : 9*/10.

Nothing is worse when you’re in the army than to have to retreat across a foreign country with the enemy nipping at your heels.  That’s what Sir John Moore’s British troops are doing in the opening months of 1809.  They’re trudging through northwest Spain  (Galicia province), trying to stay ahead of Napoleon’s dreaded dragoons, and hoping they make it to Portugal before the French catch up to them.

    It’s even worse if you have the bad luck to be part of the rearguard of Moore's army.  You have to turn around, give token resistance to the French dragoons chasing you, then turn tail yet again, and hope that not too many of your comrades (including yourself) get killed carrying out the delaying action.

    And even worse than that is if you’re a lieutenant in that ragtag rearguard group, lacking the loyalty and support of the soldiers you’re giving orders to.  After all, you’ve been promoted from within the ranks, and everyone knows that leadership skills are something that only highbred men from the upper classes possess.  And you aren't one of those.

    So they've made you a quartermaster to keep you from mucking things up.  Procuring food, clothing, and other supplies for the honest-to-goodness fighting men.  Let’s just hope the other officers stay alive so that you don’t have to be put into any meaningful command.

    Welcome to Lieutenant Richard Sharpe’s daily hell, quartermaster for the British 95^th Rifles unit.

What’s To Like...

    Sharpe’s Rifles is set in what is known as the “Peninsular War” (the Wikipedia article on it is here), which, quite frankly, I’d never heard of.  This is embarrassing since I’m a history buff.  There’s lots of action, and it starts immediately.  The brutality is vivid, with plenty of blood and gore, but hey, war is dirty, and this one was especially nasty.

    There are two main story lines: Sharpe (British) and his crew trying to escape the French, and Vivar (Spanish) and his crew trying to safeguard a mysterious trunk (which I thought was a macguffin at first). while also being pursued by the French  Vivar's and Sharpe’s paths cross pretty quickly, which is not a spoiler, then continue as an on-again/off-again alliance.

    The character studies are as fascinating as the warfare.  Sharpe is a great anti-hero: hated by his men and inferior in leadership skills to both Vivar and Rifleman Harper.  Heck, even Sgt. Williams commands more respect than Sharpe.  And the chief bad guy, the French Colonel Pierre de l’Eclin, is a worthy enemy, outthinking and outfoxing Sharpe every step of the way.  I like it when an antagonist is on equal footing with the hero.

    The story is written in “English” as opposed to “American”, so you get words like waggon, sabre, ageing, picquets, grey, foetid, and doxie.  That's always a plus for me.  There’s also some cussing, but hey, war is hell.

    There is also a secondary religious motif throughout the story.  Catholic France is brutalizing Catholic Spain, and Protestant England finds itself an uneasy Spanish ally.  Sharpe himself can best be called an Unbeliever, and some of his Irish underlings are Catholic to boot.  Bernard Cornwell treats all these religious viewpoints with remarkable balance, something you rarely see in novels nowadays.

    The ending has some nice twists, including the revealing of the contents of the strongbox, and everything ends with a climactic battle.  Despite being part of a 24-book series, this is a standalone novel.

Kewlest New Word...

Doxie (n.) : floozy

Others :  byre (n.); rumbustious (adj.).

Excerpts...

    They were the sting in the army’s tail.  If they were lucky this day no Frenchman would bother them, but the probability was that, sometime in the next hour, the enemy vanguard would appear.  That vanguard would be cavalry on tired horses.  The French would make a token attack, the Riflemen would fire a couple volleys; then, because neither side had an advantage, the French would let the greenjackets trudge on.  It was soldiering; boring, cold, dispiriting, and one or two Riflemen and one or two Frenchmen would die because of it.  (pg. 16)

    “Mind you, I knew an officer in India who converted the heathen to Christianity,” Sharpe said helpfully, “and he was most successful.”

    “Truly?” Mr. Parker was pleased to hear this evidence of God’s grace.  “A godly man?”

    “Mad as a hatter, sir.  One of the Royal Irish, and they’ve all got wormscrew wits.”

    “But you say he was successful?”

    “He threatened to blow their heads off with a musket unless they were baptized, sir.  That queue went twice around the armoury and clear back to the guardhouse.”  (pg. 111)

“I’m sure God did his best, but where was the sense in putting Ireland plum next to England?”  (pg. 262)

    For some reason, I thought this was the opening book in the series, but instead I wallowed into the storyline at Book 6.  Bernard Cornwell gives bits and pieces of the backstory, mostly Sharpe’s prior wartime activities in India, and his unwanted promotion to lieutenant.  It was also obvious that several of Sharpe’s Riflemen comrades had been introduced in earlier books.  But I never felt like I was missing crucial background information, and that was a real plus.

    It should also be mentioned that Cornwell didn’t pen this series in chronological order, so even those who have read the books in the series as soon as they were published have had to do some jumping around timeline-wise.  Wikipedia gives the chronological and literary order of the books here).   Since I plan to read some more of the series, it is nice to know that I don’t have to worry about which order I read them in.

    9 Stars.  I’ve been meaning to check out Bernard Cornwell for quite some time, and it was a real treat to finally get acquainted with his works.  He is a prolific writer of Historical Fiction, and I have two more of his books, set in England during the Dark Ages, awaiting my attention on my Kindle.  I doubt it will be long before the next review of one of his books appears on this blog.

The History Buff's Guide To World War II - Thomas R. Flagel

   2012; 350 pages.  Full Title : The History Buff’s Guide to World War II – Top Ten Rankings of the Best, Worst, Largest, and Most Lethal People and Events of World War II.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Non-Fiction; Military History; Lists.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

    Do you love to read non-fiction books about World War 2, but find they often bog down into hundreds of pages of military minutiae?  If so, you’ll find Thomas R. Flagel’s book refreshingly enjoyable.

    Or do you prefer some “light reading”, such as a book of “Top Ten” lists, but find them often just too silly?  Is it really necessary to read a list of ten different Eskimo worlds for snow?  If you’re yearning to learn something meaningful from a bunch of Top Ten lists, you’ll find this book pleasurably enlightening.

    Are you tired of the American-centric view of history, and wonder if there’s more to World War 2 than just Pearl Harbor, D-Day, and the Atomic Bomb, then The History Buff’s Guide to World War II will deepen your understanding of global history.

    Finally, if you only read genres like Romance, or Sci-Fi, or Murder-Mystery, then …um… well, then this book isn’t for you.  But it will still broaden your literary horizons, so why not give it a try?

What’s To Like...

    As the title states, the target audience here are history buffs, of which I am a proud member.  Thomas R. Flagel presumes you have at least a basic understanding of the players and events of World War 2, and aims to give the reader a better understanding of the causes, the decisions, and the cost of the conflict.

    To do so, the author employs a “Top Ten List" template, which I found to be an original approach to the subject matter.  At first glance, it would seem to be an awkward fit, but it works nicely here, due in no small part to the fact that each of the ten “items” on every list is accompanied by several paragraphs justifying its inclusion in the list.  Moreover, each entry is has a fascinating piece of trivia appended to it.  One example : “For each citizen of the Axis, the United States had three artillery shells.  There  were enough bullets made worldwide to shoot every living person on the planet forty times.”  (loc. 1336)

    My favorite lists (and yours will probably be quite different) were :

         “Wars Before The War” (1)

        “Songs” (44)

        “Worst Military Commanders” (53)

        “Military Blunders” (57) and

        “Popular Myths and Misconceptions” (70)

    I was impressed by the objectivity and ‘balance’ in Thomas R. Flagel’s writing.  The war may have begun on December 7^th for the USA, but for Europeans, it started two or more years earlier, when Hitler commenced grabbing chunks of Austria and Czechoslovakia.  And for those in the Far East, the horrors of war commenced in 1937, with the invasion by Japan of China and Manchuria.

 Kewlest New Word ...

Lebensraum (n., proper) : the territory that a state or nations believes is needed for its natural development; literally, “living space”.

Excerpts...

    Compared to other eras, this frequency of unrest was relatively standard.  What had changed by the twentieth century was the volume and tempo of armed conflicts because the “art of war” was giving way to science.

    In less than a lifetime, battleships tripled in size.  The largest artillery shells grew from the weight of a man to the weight of an automobile, from a maximum range of two miles to more than fifty.  Aircraft evolved from puttering mobile machine guns to deafening heavy bombers.  This onslaught of “progress” provoked a haunting fear that warfare was spiraling out of control.  (loc. 93)

    From Denmark to Spain, pressed tight against the meandering Atlantic coastline, stood the wall to Hitler’s Fortress Europe: bunkers, trenches, pillboxes, siege guns, machine-gun nests, barbed wire, thousands of antitank and antiship obstacles, and five million mines.  The defensive perimeter ran more than seventeen hundred miles, equivalent to the distance from Boston to Denver.  It required three years and half a million workers to erect, and it was the largest construction project ever attempted since the Great Wall of China.  It was also almost completely useless.  (loc. 3493)

Kindle Details…

    The Kindle version of The History Buff’s Guide To World War II sells for $9.99 at Amazon, which seems a bit steep to me.  Heck, the paperback version is less than $2 more, costing $11.73.  There are two other books in the series, dealing with the Civil War and the US Presidents, and they too sell for $9.99.

“God is always on the side with the biggest battalions.”  (loc. 3831 )

    There are some weaknesses, most of which are only applicable to the Kindle version.  Thomas Flagel has included a bunch of neat WW2 photos, but they are incredibly small on the Kindle Fire.  However, if you access Amazon’s “Look Inside” feature, you’ll see that they are full-sized in the paperback version.  There were also some annoying page-to-page glitches; this too is Kindle’s fault.

    The last 20% of the book is nothing more than copious amounts of notes, which is NBD on the Kindle, but is not very tree-friendly for the “real” books.  I recognize those notes are a necessity for any non-fiction history book because there will always be puffed-up nitpickers looking to find anything and everything to disagree with.  But really, who reads the notes?  Couldn’t they just as easily be placed online, with a link for the nitpickers?

    Finally, while I was thoroughly entertained for most of the book, the last few lists just kinda pootered out for me.  Specifically, the 10 Best Books about WW2 (and no, the author doesn’t include his own), the 10 best Historic Sites (and what hotels to stay at when visiting them), and the last list, “Ways To Get Involved”.  OTOH, the “Top Ten Movies About WW2” was an absolute delight.  We readers are a fickle lot.

    8½ Stars.  Subtract 2 Stars is you're a tea-bagger who only likes reading history after Glen Beck or Bill O'Really has rewritten it.