Note for Readers

Note for Readers

The previous 61 posts are the reviews I wrote before the end of 2012.  Future posts will depend on when I receive books to review, but I hope that I will be able to post up to four of five reviews each year.  Please keep visiting, as I cannot forecast when reviews might be posted.

John Donovan

Avoiding Armageddon

AVOIDING ARMAGEDDON: From the Great War to the Fall of France 1918-40

Jeremy Black

Bloomsbury, 2012, 304pp

ISBN: 978-1-4411-5713-3

Professor Jeremy Black has written a very interesting book. Unfortunately, his writing style buries the analysis in complex sentences and paragraphs.

Black presents a strong argument for parallels between the present day and the period between the two World Wars, with low-level conflicts underway around the world during both periods. Statesmen between the wars would not have found credible the idea that the ‘war to end all wars’ had achieved that Utopian objective. From 1919 until 1939, internal and international conflicts were endemic in the vast area between the Rhine and the Pacific Ocean, and south to North Africa and the Indian Ocean. In Latin America, as well as internal conflicts, the Chaco War was a major international conflict.

As Black demonstrates, using the Second World War to judge the correctness or otherwise of British military policies between the wars ignores reality. For most of the period British forces were focussed on events in British colonies, or on protecting those colonies from attack, not on a resurgent Germany or an aggressive Japan. The Indian Army, for example, which was criticised by reformers between the wars, performed the tasks required of it effectively.

Black shows that ‘as the number of “players” in [a] conflict rose, the notions of a clear-cut definition of military forces, and of war as the prerogative of the state, were put under severe strain’, as now. The objectives of specific conflicts, and the actual opposing sides, were often obscure. This is familiar now, as is the importance of tribalism in Afghanistan.

The correct balance in armies between men and machines was not as clear between the wars as hindsight might suggest, nor was the appropriate balance between protection, firepower and mobility. The end of dominance by the battleship was not obvious when carrier aircraft were flimsy biplanes. Claims by air power enthusiasts between the wars were not borne out by events, and military power remained hostage to economic fortune. Lessons from the Great War experience aimed to ensure that another major war would not be fought like the Great War, not that there would never be another world war.

As Black reminds us, Hitler was a political failure in the 1920s, with the 1923 Munich putsch being promptly suppressed. In the 1920s Germany was planning against a Polish invasion, not to conquer Europe. The Soviet Union was contained, and France was the dominant land power in Europe. The British, Dutch and French empires retained control of their territories, largely using locally recruited forces. The Islamic world then, as now, caused much difficulty.

Reviewing the early campaigns of the Second World War, Black concludes that the German forces were not prepared for a blitzkrieg in 1939, but learned from the Polish campaign. The German Army remained largely dependent on railways and draught animals for mobility, and infantry and artillery provided essential support to its armoured spearhead. The quality of German tactical and operational leadership was not matched by strategic acumen at the highest level, and early German success owed much to errors by Poland, France and Britain. Given time and experience, other armies learned to defeat blitzkrieg tactics.

Black concludes that ‘variety and unpredictability, the importance of the Far East, and the significance of civil wars’, major themes between the World Wars, are again important. In this context, he sees the rise of China complementing the development of China’s modern identity in the civil and international conflicts of the 1920s and 1930s. Black sees parallels between the issues facing Britain then and those facing the US now, including difficulties with allies and the influence of ‘small wars’ on military development.

JOHN DONOVAN

The Hard Slog

THE HARD SLOG: Australians in the Bougainville Campaign, 1944-45

Karl James

Cambridge University Press, 2012, 319pp

Karl James has written a comprehensive account of the Bougainville campaign. Unlike some earlier historians, he rejects the notion that this was an ‘unnecessary’ campaign, arguing that Australian leaders of the period, unlike their later critics, did not know that the war would end suddenly in August 1945. Rather, they expected that it would continue into 1946, if not beyond, and that success in Bougainville would release ‘manpower for future operations against Japan’, and for the economy. However, some contemporary critics are not as easy to ignore, including at least one brigadier serving on Bougainville (Hammer), and a battalion commander who was relieved of his command for his negative attitude to the campaign.

James’ account gives greater detail of the operations on Bougainville than the Official History. A key personality in the Bougainville operations was the commander of II Corps, Lieutenant-General Stan Savige. His role as a moderating influence on his more enthusiastic brigadiers is covered well, supplementing the work of Gavin Keating in The Right Man for the Right Job. Savige was ably supported by Major-General Bill Bridgeford, commanding the 3rd Division.

Interestingly, like some other critics of the campaign, many Japanese thought that an offensive against them would be pointless. Their commander, Lieutenant-General Hyakutake, thought that a ‘slow, fanwise advance from Torokina’ would also be pointless, but this was the technique used by Savige. Somewhat unusually, Savige wrote a pamphlet on the Tactical and Administrative Doctrine for Jungle Warfare, which was used as the basis for II Corps orders and instructions.

One of its most interesting aspects of this book is the coverage of the morale and disciplinary issues that arose in the army after more than five years of war. Stress occurred at all levels. Some junior officers and soldiers were at times reluctant to carry out their duty, while a few experienced, but still relatively young, battalion commanders found the strain of a sixth year of operations too much. They had to be relieved of their commands, as did a brigadier, whose planning, judgement and personality were considered inadequate. The brigade commander was replaced by Noel Simpson, who had previously taken command of a battalion in similar circumstances, and seems to have become the ‘turn to’ man for such problems.

The AIF-militia rivalry was a constant background irritant during the campaign. The 55th/53rd Battalion, with its chequered history of the failure of the 53rd Battalion on the Kokoda Trail, responded with resentment towards the AIF, while Noel Simpson was not happy to take command of a militia brigade. Despite this friction, the militia battalions generally performed well, particularly when they had good leaders. When leaders were inadequate, or tired, problems arose.

James describes the failed landing at Porton Plantation well. He had noted earlier the deficiencies in numbers of landing craft, and the failure at Porton illustrates well the consequences of attempting too much with inadequate support. One key lesson of the campaign must be the continuing need for combined arms operations. Regrettably, Savige did not have an adequate range of supporting arms and services.

By the end of the war the Japanese forces were concentrated around Bonis in northern Bougainville, Kieta Bay and Numa Numa Plantation on the east coast, and in southern Bougainville. The 2/8th Commando Squadron and native guerrillas organised by Allied Intelligence Bureau parties operated away from the main lines of advance, where they contributed significantly to the success of the campaign.

There are some minor editorial quirks, such as mention of Gazelle Peninsula in a couple of places, when presumably Gazelle Harbour was intended.

JOHN DONOVAN

Grab Their Belts to Fight Them

GRAB THEIR BELTS TO FIGHT THEM: The Viet Cong’s Big-Unit War Against the US, 1965-1966

Warren Wilkins

Naval Institute Press, 2011, 283pp

Warren Wilkins has drawn extensively on North Vietnamese and Viet Cong records to write this compelling account of the battles between Viet Cong Main Force units and US forces in 1965-66.  While mention is made of North Vietnamese units, the principal focus is on the Viet Cong.  The battle of Long Tan, however, is mentioned as an example of allied use of firepower.

Many western historians discussing the Vietnam War offer a narrative of indigenous Viet Cong fighters, largely part-time guerrillas wearing black pyjamas and sandals made from old truck tyres, and armed with captured weapons, defeating a clumsy US force armed with the latest military technology.  Wilkins demonstrates the falsity of this narrative.

Using North Vietnamese documents, Wilkins traces the North’s involvement and leadership from the earliest stages of the conflict, with deployment to the south of ethnic South Vietnamese who had ‘regrouped to North Vietnam in the aftermath of the North-South division’.  They were armed with modern Soviet weapons, and followed orders from the Central Office for South Vietnam, which was wholly subordinate to the North.  Northern soldiers reinforced even nominally Viet Cong units.

The major limiting factor for the Viet Cong was US firepower.  This caused a Viet Cong squad leader to tell his men to ‘grab the enemy’s belts to fight them’, to close with US forces to prevent them using the full force of their firepower, to avoid causing friendly casualties.  As Wilkins demonstrates, the real difficulty was in passing through the firepower zone to grab the belts!

Wilkins’ descriptions of battles between Viet Cong and US forces highlight the courage of many Viet Cong soldiers, but demonstrate their command structure’s inflexibility, which restricted Viet Cong options once their forces were committed.  US firepower also led the Viet Cong to develop another tactic that became a hallmark of their activities – digging.  Whether for the construction of field fortifications, bunker systems, or tunnel complexes, the spade became a key Viet Cong tool.

Wilkins uses North Vietnamese documents to show that the communist leadership was not unanimous in supporting the big-unit war.  Many, including some southern leaders, preferred to revert to a guerrilla campaign while the north built up its economy, but they were over-ruled.  The result of this debate, and the failure of the big-unit strategy to cause the US to withdraw, was the 1968 Tet Offensive. This cost North Vietnam and the Viet Cong massive casualties, but gained them a psychological victory that paved the way for ultimate military victory, though not as quickly as desired.

Both sides fought a war of attrition, the US intending to use its firepower advantage, the Viet Cong to close with their enemy for hand-to hand combat.  In attritional terms the US should have prevailed; even in less successful engagements, the casualty ratio favoured the US by a factor of three; in more successful battles, ten or more Viet Cong casualties were inflicted for each US casualty.

Had Field Marshal Haig or Marshal Joffre been able to inflict casualties at that ratio on the Western Front in 1915 or 1916, they would probably have won their war of attrition.  The North Vietnamese, however, were prepared to accept heavy casualties to gain victory.  Whether the victory was worth the cost is for them to judge, but the key lesson for western nations might be to choose tactics other than attrition when fighting opponents who place a low value on their subordinates’ lives.

JOHN DONOVAN

To Salamaua

TO SALAMAUA

Phillip Bradley

Cambridge University Press, 2010, 372pp, $59.95

Many Australians will be familiar with Damien Parer’s film sequence showing a wounded digger being helped across a creek near Salamaua.  However, because Australian television stations often use that sequence, or photos taken from it, to illustrate stories about the Kokoda campaign, they might not be aware where and when the event occurred.  Phillip Bradley has followed his book on the 1942-43 Battle for Wau with this account of the 1943 Salamaua campaign, covering the correct context for that film sequence.

The humanity of Major-General Stan Savige, commanding the forces advancing on Salamaua, stands out in the book, exemplified by his threat to ‘snarler’ one unit commander if he ‘waste[d] one man’s life unnecessarily’.  His chief staff officer, Lieutenant-Colonel John Wilton, ably supported Savige. The heroism of Corporal Leslie Allen, who rescued many wounded men under fire, and the persistence of the American Lieutenant Wendell Messec, whose platoon followed a Japanese raiding party for five days before catching and ambushing it, exemplify the courage and perseverance of the soldiers involved in the campaign.

There has been recent discussion in Australian military historiography of an ‘Australians as natural soldiers’ mythology. This book records the emphasis military leaders of the time placed on training, suggesting that they were not taken in by such ‘pub yarn’ mythology.  Where training was inadequate and experienced leaders were few, as initially in the 58th/59th Battalion, poor results were almost inevitable.  However Bradley highlights that even well trained units, such as the 2/3rd Independent Company in its first action at Wau, could have a difficult introduction to jungle warfare.

As he did in his earlier book, Bradley describes the important support provided to the Army by other services, particularly the native carriers and the air forces with supply dropping, without which the campaign could not have succeeded.

Savige’s efforts were hampered by Lieutenant-General Edmund Herring’s concealment from him until well into the campaign that the intention was to draw Japanese forces away from Lae, not to capture Salamaua quickly.  If Herring did not feel that he could trust Savige with this information, he should have selected another commander, who could be fully informed of the constraints on his actions.  Even late in the campaign, Herring left ambiguities in his instructions.  Other difficulties were caused by the confusing command arrangements established with the US forces landed at Nassau Bay later in the campaign.  These matters were also covered in Gavin Keating’s recent biography of Savige, The Right Man For the Right Job.

Savige and Wilton were replaced just as Salamaua was about to fall, in an echo of Major General ‘Tubby’ Allen’s replacement the previous year, just as Kokoda was about to fall.

Bradley has written a fine tribute to the men who fought in what must surely have been the longest diversionary campaign in Australia’s military history.  It is, however, unfortunate that the publication quality falls below standard in places.  The printing on some maps is faint almost to the point of unreadability, and some places mentioned in the text are not marked on the relevant map. Some of the recent photos (presumably from colour originals) lost much of their contrast in the printing process, obscuring the detail.

With John Coates’ book on operations between Finschhafen and Sio (Bravery Above Blunder) and Bradley’s earlier works on Wau and the Ramu Valley campaign (On Shaggy Ridge), a modern account of the Australian Army’s part in the 1943 New Guinea campaign is almost complete. Only the capture of Lae remains to be covered.  Perhaps Bradley will write this next?

JOHN DONOVAN

To Villers-Bretonneux

TO VILLERS-BRETONNEUX: Brigadier-General William Glasgow, DSO and 13th Australian Infantry Brigade.

Peter Edgar

Australian Military History Publications, 2006.  284pp.

Peter Edgar sets out to study the ‘Australian soldier of the First World War [and decide how] effective he was, and if he was effective, how … he [became] so’.  He accepts that such a study must consider both the ANZAC legend and the views of the revisionist historians who ‘have debunked that legend’ (or, perhaps more accurately, attempted to do so).  His method is to select one of the 15 Australian infantry brigades that fought in France and Belgium, and follow its experiences while in battle, holding the line, and training.

Edgar chooses the 13th Brigade of the 4th Division, and follows it from its formation in Egypt in 1916 to its best-known battle, Second Villers-Bretonneux, in April 1918.  This Brigade included many Gallipoli veterans, as it was raised by ‘splitting’ the original 3rd Brigade of the 1st Division.  Edgar notes that the Brigade had the same commander, Brigadier-General William Glasgow, from its formation until after Villers-Bretonneux.  When Glasgow left to command the 1st Australian Division, and the 52nd Battalion was disbanded to provide reinforcements for the other three battalions, it was changed substantially.

Edgar starts by noting some of the views of the revisionist historians, and comparing them with the writings of C.E.W. Bean, described as their particular bête noir.  He also quotes some of the revisionist historians’ (generally peevish) comments about Bean, but poses the idea that the ANZAC legend might have existed even without Bean’s writings.  He also mentions some clear fallacies that have become ‘accepted’ in Australia, at least in part as a result of the work of some modern Australian historians.

Edgar’s first attack on the revisionists comes in a discussion of the reasons Australia participated in the First World War.  He notes that, contrary to the suggestion that Australia could have stood aloof, the change in the world order following a German victory would have had severe implications for a nation whose ‘great and powerful friend’ had been defeated, and was also next door to an existing German colony.  In particular, he notes that while the Treaty of Versailles is considered harsh, it was not so in comparison to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, under which newly Communist Russia left the War.  Indeed, the reviewer recalls reading a description of Brest-Litovsk by Lenin, along the lines that it was a treaty which Russia, ‘grinding its teeth, is forced to accept’.  Germany, in Edgar’s view, would have sought to profit from a victory.  Such profit might well have included colonial ambitions in the Pacific, and he suggests that a German victory would have ended our British culture.

Edgar gives some credit, however, to one school of revisionist history, led by John Terraine, which has attempted to rehabilitate the reputation of Field-Marshal Sir Douglas Haig.  It is not necessary to accept fully the views of Terraine and others that Haig has been unfairly criticised, to acknowledge that, whatever his failings, he was probably the best of the available potential commanders.  Edgar provides some background to the problem Haig faced on the Western Front by discussing briefly the difficulties of crossing ground swept by fire.  He illustrates this by brief descriptions of the battles of Waterloo and Gettysburg.

What struck the reviewer from these descriptions, however, was that in each case, and on each side, the strengths present and casualties incurred were broadly similar to those of the Australian forces engaged at Pozières/Mouquet Farm.  However, Waterloo lasted but a day, and Gettysburg three days, while Pozières/Mouquet Farm lasted some seven weeks.  It would appear that, despite the great improvements in firepower that Edgar describes, changes in tactics had reduced battlefield lethality rather more than is sometimes accepted.  The greater overall deadliness of the Western Front appears to have derived from the extended duration of individual engagements, and the ongoing trickle of casualties even when just holding the line.

In this book Edgar makes a strong case that the part of the ANZAC legend that sees Australians as natural soldiers, needing only uniforms and weapons to conquer on the battlefield, is overblown.  While this is hardly a surprising conclusion, that element of the legend might have been encouraged by the limited attention that Bean gave to the AIF’s activities while out of the line, particularly their training.  As Edgar shows, units out of the line trained continuously, to the extent that many men went for extended periods without leave.  Whenever time was available, ranges were established, brigade and divisional schools of instruction commenced, and men were detached for training in specialist skills.

This is a useful balance to the impression that might be left by Bean’s writing (almost certainly not deliberately) that periods out of the line were dominated by rest or fatigue duties.  Edgar also shows, however, that the training provided early in the war, particularly before Gallipoli, might charitably be described as inappropriate.  The increasing skill of the Australian soldiers came with both experience and better, more relevant, training. 

Planning also improved as the war progressed.  The plans for Mouquet Farm (both battles) and Noreiul, in particular, seem unnecessarily complex, while both Mouquet Farm attacks also suffered from being in a series of small-scale, uncoordinated attacks, against each of which the Germans could concentrate their efforts sequentially.  Within the 13th Brigade, understanding of the need for units to coordinate with each other was not well developed at Mouquet Farm, albeit it was improving at Noreuil.  However, the plan there was still unnecessarily complex, involving as it did attacks along different axes and a right wheel during the attack by the 50th Battalion.  Pace John Terraine, both Haig and his troops were still learning at this stage of the war.

By Messines, planning had improved further but the skills of troops and commanders remained insufficiently developed to implement the plans fully.  Poor communications were considered partly to blame, exacerbated by the wounding of two battalion commanders.  Only three months later, at Zonnebeke, more training and better planning and staff work produced for the ‘first time in the brigade’s experience an operation [that] had gone completely in accordance with the plan’.

At Dernancourt and Second Villers-Bretonneux the benefits of training and experience became clear.  Although some men broke and fled at Dernancourt, admittedly only after several hours’ resistance, the loss of a key officer and being enfiladed, others promptly covered the gap.  By Villers-Bretonneux, the Brigade was so well trained and its staff work so skilful that, in a little over twelve hours, it moved some eight miles (around 13 kilometres) on foot to deploy on the battlefield, the Brigade staff reconnoitred the ground and coordinated the plan with both ‘Pompey’ Elliott’s neighbouring 15th Brigade and the 8th British Division, and orders were issued for the attack.

Commanders, too developed with greater experience.  Glasgow had accepted without demur poor plans given to him in earlier battles.  By Villers-Bretonneux, he was willing to challenge senior officers and demand changes where he considered them necessary.  Others also developed in both skill and confidence.  At Villers-Bretonneux, two battalion commanders rejected an order to move forward in daylight, suggesting that the task be undertaken after dark.  Glasgow accepted this, demonstrating that his own development was not just one-dimensional. 

Later, after the events described in this book, the Brigade’s battalion commanders ‘varied’ a plan personally drawn up by Monash.  They still succeeded in the task, but in their own way, not by following orders blindly.  ‘Pompey’ Elliott believed that the experienced Australian soldiers of 1918 would simply not have attempted some of the tasks that were ordered in the early part of the war, but would have sought other means to achieve their objective.  Surely this must be a true test of their ultimate professionalism?

Edgar’s descriptions of the seven battles in which the 13th Brigade participated up to Villers-Bretonneux are detailed, and generally easy to follow.  However, some of the maps are unclear and can be difficult to use, as they have very light printing, while they are not always contiguous to the relevant text.  There are some inconsistencies between map and text, such using as the English name Abbey Wood on a map, and the French Bois L’Abbé in the text.  He also occasionally describes the actions of different units sequentially.  Where the action extends over more than one day, it is not always clear when the ‘clock is set back’.

The scale of operations in the First World War can seem daunting to the modern reader.  Edgar points out that Second Villers-Bretonneux was a small-scale action, involving only two divisions from some 60 in the British Expeditionary Force (and a greater number in the other allied armies).  However, in three days, the four battalions of the 13th Brigade, which was only one of the two Australian brigades involved, suffered 201 fatalities.  This is about 40 percent of the Australian deaths in the decade long commitment to Vietnam that peaked at three battalions.  Officers led from the front, two-thirds of those in the attack being killed or wounded.

There are occasional inconsistencies in the text.  Before Gallipoli Major Beevor is described as being ‘of an athletic appearance’.  After Gallipoli, the now Lieutenant-Colonel Beevor has become ‘a portly gentleman’.  While the witnesses were different, this change in stature seems remarkable!  There is also a contradiction between at least one young officer being recorded as joining the AIF early, and a comment about others that their enlistment was delayed because regulations prevented officers under 25 from enlisting. 

What, then, of Edgar’s self-imposed task to assess the Australian soldier in the First World War?  He concludes, and offers reasonable supporting evidence, that the ANZAC legend would still have developed even without Bean’s writing, because it is based on reality, not mythology.  This is a point that some of the revisionist historians seem to have missed.  Bean did not create the ANZAC legend from nothing; he recorded what happened.  The battlefield successes were real, and such successes were not achieved against the German Army of that era without courage and skill.  The troops trained hard and learned eagerly.  They understood, even if some modern critics do not, the real crisis that Australia faced.  That said, not all Australian soldiers were perfect, and Bean was inclined to gloss over that issue.  Edgar records an incident at Noreuil where an officer calling his platoon forward believed that one member shot and wounded him.  Others fled the battlefield, including as late as Dernancourt.

Edgar concludes that the Australians were not necessarily natural soldiers.  Training, good organization, skilful leaders and battlefield experience were all essential parts of their success.  Some 70 percent of the 13th Brigade’s existence was spent training, and only about 30 percent in battle or holding the front line.  The Brigade started with first-class fighting material, and both it and they developed with time.  By the time of Dernancourt and Second Villers-Bretonneux, the full flowering of the Australian soldier’s skills was on display.  Edgar’s assessment of the Australian soldier in the First World War supports Bean’s, but is more rounded, acknowledging that performances and individuals did not always meet the desired standard.

Edgar claims, probably with justification, that later in the war neither of the Mouquet farm battles would have been fought as they actually were, on narrow fronts and with limited artillery support.  While Glasgow had the moral courage to abandon an attack at Gallipoli that had the potential to be another Nek, his skills (and, perhaps, confidence) early in the Western Front battles were not sufficient for him to do the same there.  By 1918, however, he would tell a British Major-General that if ‘God Almighty … gave the order, we couldn’t do it in daylight’.

Who, then, had the best of the contest between Bean/Edgar and the revisionist historians?  In this reviewer’s opinion, Bean and Edgar are the clear winners.  They have been helped because some of the revisionist historians attempted to achieve the impossible, to destroy completely rather than simply qualify the ANZAC legend.  There, the revisionists came up against the inconvenient truth that the exploits did occur, and broadly as Bean described them.  Many of the revisionists also seem to have an ‘attitude problem’, apparently believing that, to misquote Manning Clark, one of those mentioned by Edgar, ‘Dear, kind Charlie Bean could not understand that the role of an historian is to denigrate anything that might support the Australian culture that existed before the 1970s!’  Peter Edgar returns the ANZAC legend to its factual roots.

JOHN DONOVAN

Storm Over Kokoda

STORM OVER KOKODA: Australia’s epic battle for the skies of New Guinea, 1942

Peter Ewer

Pier 9, 2011, 256pp

A potential reader picking this book up in a bookshop and reading the title might expect that that it would cover all of the events of the air war over Papua New Guinea during 1942. Unfortunately, that reader would be disappointed, as the story essentially ends with the Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942. Despite the implication in the title, air operations in support of the Kokoda Trail campaign are not covered. Nor are the magnificent efforts of the RAAF in support of the Army at Milne Bay and operations over the Papuan beachhead battles of late 1942/early 1943, where airpower made a significant contribution.

That said, what is covered in the book is covered well, and in a readable style. This includes the early reconnaissance and bombing operations by Catalina and Hudson aircraft, and the fighter operations of Number 75 Squadron from its arrival in Port Moresby in mid March 1942 until the squadron was withdrawn in early May.

Dr Ewer provides useful background on the development of aviation in New Guinea between the world wars. He also makes some acerbic (but well sourced) comments about the development of Australian air power in the same period, summarising the broader treatment of this subject in his earlier work Wounded Eagle: The bombing of Darwin and Australia’s air defence scandal.

Dr Ewer’s unflattering comparisons between the products of the inter-war British aviation industry and those of the more free-wheeling US industry are a timely reminder of the need to ensure that Australia purchases military equipment (not just aircraft) that is capable of performing the task, rather than favouring the output of those with whom we might be more familiar or comfortable.

The inadequate assessments of Japanese aviation capability made between the world wars, and well into the second, emphasise the need for intelligence analysts to focus on facts, not prejudices. Japanese pilots were very effective, and their aircraft had significant advantages compared to allied aircraft (albeit they also had weaknesses that allied pilots learned to turn to their own advantage).

The final chapter recounts the fate of many of the protagonists, a sad proportion of whom died later in the war, too often in flying accidents. The fate of many captured airmen is also recounted; while their captors treated some reasonably, many received a cruel death. The remains of some were found in shallow graves after the war, while others have not yet been recovered.

While the focus of the book is on Australian efforts and those of their American allies, the Japanese are not neglected. Surely the adage that fortune favours the brave must apply to the Japanese naval reconnaissance pilot Nobuo Fujita, whose floatplane was carried to its operational areas in a submarine. Fujita made reconnaissance flights over Sydney, Melbourne Hobart and Auckland in February 1942. Later in 1942 he made a lone bombing attack on the American northwest, in an attempt to ignite forest fires. Wet conditions defeated him, but it is surely a just reward for his valour that Fujita survived the war, dying peacefully in 1997.

There are some minor quirks in the book. One Japanese formation appears as both the 25th Air Flotilla and the 25th Air Group, while it seems unlikely that the coastwatcher Leigh Vial walked from Port Moresby to the outskirts of Salamaua in twelve days (page 140). A flight to Wau and then walking across the Kuper Range seems more likely.

JOHN DONOVAN

Sir William Glasgow

SIR WILLIAM GLASGOW, Soldier, Senator and Diplomat

Peter Edgar

Big Sky Publishing, 2011, 407pp.

As a student in the 1960s, I occasionally walked past the statue of Sir William Glasgow in its then obscure location. At that time I knew little of Glasgow, except that he was Queensland’s senior military officer of the First World War. Peter Edgar has filled the gaps in my knowledge with this biography.

Glasgow started his military career in the Queensland militia. He soon met men who could later influence his career, serving with Chauvel in the Queensland shearers’ strike and in Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee contingent, while Brudenell White was a fellow bank clerk in Gympie. Chauvel was also Glasgow’s company commander in South Africa, where Glasgow served under Sir Edward Hutton, GOC of the Australian Army after Federation, and Hamilton, British commander on Gallipoli.

Glasgow’s principal military service was during the First World War. Initially second-in-command of the 2nd Light Horse Regiment in Chauvel’s 1st Light Horse Brigade; Glasgow was wounded at Pope’s Hill, on Gallipoli, and later commanded the 2nd Light Horse Regiment. Rather than remaining with the Light Horse, he took command of the 13th Brigade, apparently at White’s instigation. It seems unlikely that Glasgow would have had the same opportunity to develop as a soldier had he remained with the Light Horse in Palestine.

Military planning improved in parallel with Glasgow’s career. Within the 13th Brigade, the need for units to coordinate with each other was not well understood at Mouquet Farm, albeit it improved at Noreuil, as Glasgow’s skills developed. By Messines planning had improved, but the skills of troops and commanders remained insufficiently developed. At Zonnebeke, the operation went according to the plan for the first time in the 13th Brigade’s experience.

By Dernancourt and Villers-Bretonneux, the benefits of training and experience to Glasgow and his men were clear. The brigade and its staff were so well trained that they moved around 13 kilometres on foot to the battlefield, the staff reconnoitred the ground and coordinated planning with ‘Pompey’ Elliott’s 15th Brigade and the 8th British Division, and orders were issued, all in around twelve hours.

Training, good organisation, and experience were essential parts of Glasgow’s success, as was moral courage. While Glasgow abandoned an attack at Pope’s Hill that had the potential to be another Nek, his skills (and, perhaps, confidence) in the early Western Front battles were not sufficient for him to do the same there, and he accepted poor plans without demur. By 1918, however, he told a British major-general that if ‘God Almighty … gave the order, we couldn’t do it in daylight’.

On 30 June 1918, Glasgow took command of the 1st Division. Under his command the division followed the 8 August offensive with an advance to Chuignes. It took Hargicourt in mid-September, but Glasgow’s final action was marred by a mutiny in the 1st Battalion. Believing that men should accept the consequences of their actions, Glasgow rejected Monash’s suggestion that those convicted should be released. They were pardoned after the war ended by Hobbs, then commanding the Australian Corps.

After the war, Glasgow entered Parliament, later becoming Minister for Defence, with Chauvel as CGS. Edgar traces Glasgow’s efforts to improve Australia’s defences in the late 1920s. Later, Glasgow rose in the Senate to honour the life of his comrade, ‘Pompey’ Elliott, who committed suicide in 1931.

After being defeated in the 1931 election, Glasgow’s last public duty was during the Second World War, as High Commissioner in Canada. His responsibilities included oversight of Australians training there under the Air Training Scheme. The reader can get the impression that, except for the Air Training element, Edgar found this chapter less interesting to write than earlier chapters, but it is covered in a workmanlike fashion.

Late in the book, Edgar describes Glasgow explaining to the present Queen that one of his medals was received for attending her great-great-grandmother’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations early in his career.

This is a readable biography of a great Australian, whose statue now stands in central Brisbane overlooking ANZAC Square, memorial to so many of his comrades.

JOHN DONOVAN

The Right Man for the Right Job

THE RIGHT MAN FOR THE RIGHT JOB: Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Savige as a Military Commander

Gavin Keating

Oxford University Press 2006

While the Official Histories generally treated Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Savige’s performance during the Second World War favourably, other observers, notably Lieutenant Generals Herring, Berryman and Robertson and Major General Vasey, were more critical, as were books on Herring, Robertson and Vasey.  Gavin Keating’s book gives some balance to these conflicting views.  His excellent work reinforces Savige’s claim to have been a successful general and widens our understanding of the internal politics of the Australian Army during World War II.  It should be read in conjunction with Stuart Braga’s biography of ‘Tubby’ Allen, Kokoda Commander, another title in the Army History series, in which many of the same characters and issues recur.  The book complements W.B. Russell’s uncritical 1959 biography, There Goes a Man. 

There are parallels between Savige and Allen.  Both came from humble backgrounds, Savige the son of a rural meat worker, Allen of a railway worker.  Both left school early, Savige at the age of 12 to work as a blacksmith’s striker, Allen at 14, to become a messenger boy for the Postmaster-General’s Department.  Savige later completed a teacher-training course, but worked in drapery before entering business after the First World War; Allen became an accountant.  Each clashed with Berryman, Robertson and Herring, although the result was not detrimental in Savige’s case.  The health of each started to fail around the end of the Second World War, and both died relatively young.

Keating covers Savige’s early life and experience in the First World War briefly (Savige was among the last off Gallipoli, and at different times adjutant of the 24th Battalion, acting brigade major of the 6th Brigade, and a member of Dunsterforce).  Keating notes the strong influence on Savige’s development of the then Brigadier General Gellibrand, the subject of another of the Army History series, The Paladin, by Peter Sadler.  Savige seems to have developed his antagonism towards permanent officers between the wars, but paradoxically one of the sources of his antagonism was Gellibrand, a former British regular officer, who later commented on the Squires report of 1939 that they ‘will give us a Regular Army, and at the same time make it impossible to have an Army’. 

The rivalry between Australia’s regular and citizen soldiers is critical to understanding both the history of the Australian Army and Savige’s career.  The issue is unlikely ever to be resolved to the satisfaction of both groups, probably because the situation is not as ‘black and white’ as either claims.  However, Keating argues convincingly that the militia officers between the wars had little opportunity, with time constraints and under-strength units, to develop a full understanding of modern war. 

Whether most of the regular officers had better opportunities in the small permanent force is moot.  Indeed, some of the inter-war criticisms of regular officers do seem to have been justified.  In his biography of General Sir Francis Hassett, for example, Essex-Clark comments that with ‘the exception of “Red Robbie”, none of the military staff or instructors [at Duntroon during Hassett’s time as a cadet] was to prove outstanding in later years’.  However, Savige was wise enough to accept the support of regular staff officers as he moved to higher command levels.  Indeed, he did not have such support for the battle for which he was most criticized, Bardia.

Keating’s book highlights a dark obverse to this rivalry – the extent to which the Staff Corps became ‘a compact and defensive group within the army as a whole’ as a result.  This might have made them more critical of those not part of the group.  However, as Keating also shows, the rivalry was never exclusively between regulars and citizen soldiers.  There was tension also between citizen soldiers, most notably between Herring on the one side and Savige and Allen on the other.  Herring, citizen soldier and pillar of the Melbourne legal establishment, was both a strong critic of Savige and Allen’s ultimate nemesis. 

This rivalry sometimes had a detrimental effect on operations, as before Bardia, when Berryman excluded Savige from a major pre-attack conference, even though his brigade was to have a complex role in the operation.  As Keating shows, the end result of Savige’s exclusion from the conference, and what can most charitably be described as a litany of mixed messages after it, was the abortive attack on Post 11, which cost heavy casualties for no benefit.  Neither Savige nor Berryman comes out well from this incident.  Clashes with Robertson also ensued, as the 19th Brigade was brought into the battle.  In that case, Savige seems to have been more at fault.  Overall, Keating indicates that there was fault enough for all at Bardia, but that this might be expected in the AIF’s first battle of the war. 

Afterwards, however, like the Staff Corps, Savige became compact and defensive, and probably with reason.  Keating acknowledges that on at least one occasion Vasey seems to have played a vital role in ensuring priority for Robertson over Savige, and also to have worked actively for his removal.  Keating acknowledges that Staff Corps members were ‘not particularly impartial critics’.  Vasey, for one, admitted to a hope that he might replace Savige.

Savige’s involvement in Greece and Syria was limited.  In Greece, Savige displayed great personal courage, as did others of his rank.  He received better staff support there, while in Syria he commanded only a small force, albeit at an important time.  His action in forcing continuation of an advance by tired troops ensured rapid success, probably for fewer casualties, and shows that he had the strength to push an issue if needed.  In Syria Savige again clashed with Berryman, who, unaware of specific orders to Savige, interfered with units on the battlefield.

Keating makes a reasonable case that Savige, and others, were not suited physically or temperamentally for the kind of war waged in the Middle East.  He shows, however, that Savige’s skill at fostering a team sense was highly developed, as was his rapport with the ordinary soldiers, another characteristic he shared with Allen.  He was always conscious that orders from senior headquarters would ‘ultimately be carried out “by common soldiers at the point of a bayonet”’.  One photo of the senior officers of the 6th Division during the First Libyan campaign is symbolic.  Of the six officers shown, Mackay, Robertson, Berryman and Vasey wear officers’ pattern uniforms, Savige and Allen wear soldiers’ pattern.

Savige returned to Australia at the end of 1941, taking command of the 3rd Division, thus rescuing his military career from probable obscurity.  His robust approach to training focused the division on preparing for war, and led to the removal of a large number of officers.  Important support at this time was provided by Lieutenant Colonel John Wilton, Savige’s GSO1, who developed a high regard for Savige.  Later, as a corps commander in Bougainville, Savige was again supported by highly effective regular staff officers, including Brigadier Ragnar Garrett as BGS. 

The important point that Keating makes about Savige’s relationship with Wilton is that the latter was always highly regarded, so that any criticism of Savige’s conduct of the Salamaua campaign either should also apply to Wilton, his trusted GSO1, or can be dismissed as personal.  Keating also suggests that someone (probably Herring) did not want Savige in New Guinea.  Certainly, once he arrived in New Guinea, Savige found his relations with Herring, commanding New Guinea Force (NGF), trying.

Keating examines the controversy between Savige and NGF over Salamaua, and concludes that much of the fault lay with NGF.  Herring did not establish a clear command chain with the US forces operating in the area, and his guidance to Savige on wider issues, particularly the need for Salamaua not to fall too soon, was at best ambiguous.  Keating concludes that Savige played a critical part in controlling a competent and relentless campaign ‘that did much credit to those in command’.  Herring’s reputation is diminished by his failure to understand, or indeed even apparently to enquire into, the tactical and logistic problems of the campaign, a fault he also displayed during the Kokoda campaign.

Berryman was sent forward to investigate the battle’s conduct towards the end of the campaign.  Until Berryman’s arrival there had been few visits to the front by senior officers of NGF, as in the Kokoda campaign.  Berryman found that Savige had ‘done well and we had misjudged him’.  This was surely one of the strongest endorsements that Savige could have hoped for.  Berryman (not usually a supporter of either Savige or Allen) also considered that Allen’s operations on the Kokoda Trail were effective.  However, Savige’s prediction in June 1943 that he would be relieved when it became simple to capture Salamaua came true (yet another parallel with Allen, relieved by Vasey just as the Japanese defences before Kokoda broke). 

Keating discusses the choice of Savige over Vasey for promotion to lieutenant general.  Putting aside the issue of Vasey’s health, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that he would not have been ‘the right man for the right job’.  Herring once famously stated that he preferred ‘Vasey tired to Allen fresh’.  Vasey (tired) launched a number of attacks at Gona and Sanananda that gained little or nothing, but left many casualties.  It is hard to see Vasey in command on Bougainville restraining activist brigade commanders like Hammer and Potts, as Savige did.  Blamey seems to have made the correct choice.  Ironically, however, Savige ended the war doing one of the things that he had criticized Headquarters 6th Division for at Bardia – giving detailed instructions to subordinate commanders as to how they should operate!

Savige’s final contribution to the regular/citizen soldier rivalry in Australia came in a statement to the press in 1946, where he commented, inter alia, that a large number of Duntroon graduates by ‘their general attitude and actions  … clearly lived in a world apart’.  His First World War and inter-war mentor, the Sandhurst graduate Gellibrand, also had an intense dislike of for the concept of a select regular army officers school, because he believed the officers produced stood aloof from the nation.   In 1995, a Parliamentary committee described the Australian Defence Force Academy as a ‘military nunnery’, suggesting that the attitude deprecated by Savige and Gellibrand existed, and has been passed on to the newer Academy.

Keating accepts that Savige’s forte was as a leader of men, a critical talent during the Salamaua campaign.  His weakest point was his limited grasp of the technical nature of modern warfare, for which he relied on good staff support.  Keating lauds Savige’s ‘ability as a trainer of raw troops’, evident throughout his command of the 3rd Division.  His greatest strength, however, remained his understanding of and concern for the soldiers.  One of his greatest weaknesses, in contrast, was his reluctance to act against ineffective subordinates, especially if he had appointed them.  His empathy for the troops was again shown at the end of his service, when, asked to be Coordinator of Demobilisation and Dispersal, he sought to ‘serve the men who fought … [but] … Salary of no interest’.

Throughout his book, Keating makes the case that militia commanders depended on their regular staff officers for advice on the technical aspects of modern war.  He regards this as a weakness in the Australian military system, occurring by default not design.  It might have been a weakness, yet all commanders rely on the support of their staff, and it was arguably the explicit intent of the Australian system, up until the end of the Second World War, that citizen commanders should receive the support of regular staff officers. 

That system worked effectively, as demonstrated by Savige’s career during the Second World War.  Whether it could have been successful in the circumstances following the war is unlikely, but not relevant to the earlier period.  Keating suggests that studies of the Australian Army in the Second World War focus too much on commanders and not enough on their staff officers.  A good first step to rectify this deficiency would be a study on Berryman, whose presence at controversial moments through much of the war seems ubiquitous.

There is a degree of irony in a couple of the quotes in the book, deliberate in one case, but perhaps unintended in another.  Given the pervasiveness of the ‘Bataan Gang’ in his court, MacArthur’s warning to Curtin about Blamey surrounding himself with favourites must be a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black.  Also, Vasey’s quoted comment, comparing a senior professional British officer to the ‘amateur soldiers we have in the senior grades’, loses some of its force when we now know that Brooke, as Chief of the Imperial General Staff, spent hours poring ‘over the Army List in search of suitable divisional commanders’.  He is said to have wanted to be ‘merciless with divisional and corps commanders whom he thought not up to their job, but he did not think he could find better men to replace them’.  Neither system produced perfect results.

Keating quotes, but does not fully support, the comment by A.N. Kemsley, formerly Director of Organisation at Army Headquarters, that Savige was ‘a good brigadier-doubtful as a major general-far over-promoted as a lieutenant general’.  This has echoes of Gavin Long’s description of Allen as ‘a fine colonel, a better brigadier than divisional commander and not a suitable corps commander’.  Both descriptions reverse the order of C.E.W. Bean’s description of Monash as a leader who ‘would command a division better than a brigade and a corps better than a division’, cited on page 588 of Bean’s Volume II.  Given that Monash often seemed somewhat cold and detached from the troops, it seems probable that Savige (and Allen) might have preferred their descriptions. 

Whatever Savige’s limitations as a military commander, Keating demonstrates that he was The Right Man for the Right Job, and that in 1959 Russell chose a good title for his biography, There goes a Man.

JOHN DONOVAN

Ted Serong

TED SERONG The Life of an Australian Counter-Insurgency Expert

Anne Blair

Published by Oxford University Press 2002

During the 1960s, with the exception if the Vietnam War Victoria Cross winners, Ted Serong was probably the best known individual Australian soldier.  It is therefore entirely appropriate that the Army History Series should devote a volume to him.

Anne Blair ranges widely across the events of Serong’s long life.  She produces a convincing case that Serong was an excellent tactician and trainer, and shows also that many of his interventions at the military operational level were productive.  However, the repetitive use of the word ‘strategy’ and its variations in an apparent attempt to give greater significance to Serong’s achievements, when ‘operational’ might be a more appropriate word, becomes a distraction.  Also, Blair’s descriptions of some of his actions at the real strategic (government interface) level suggest that Serong did not always understand the processes and priorities of governments, particularly in democracies.

Perhaps it would have been better to leave Serong as he is best pictured – the exemplar of the tactical proficiency of the Australian Army in jungle warfare from the mid-1950s until the withdrawal from Vietnam in 1972.  After all, as this book records, he was a pivotal influence in achieving that level of tactical excellence.  That, in itself, is surely a worthwhile achievement (and monument) for one man.

Anne Blair portrays the respect with which the Serong family held the pre-Second World War Staff Corps.  Given the later events in Serong’s life, one wonders if he still had that respect in the final decade of the Twentieth Century, when he saw and regretted the loss of the traditions of the Citizen Forces.  Other writers, such as Albert Palazzo, have demonstrated that this loss was at least partially the result of the actions (or inactions) of the regular officer corps.  Like David Horner (writing in Crisis of Command in 1978), Serong came to the conclusion that officers with flexibility and imagination could best be developed by service with the citizen forces - not a popular concept these days!

The influence of his religion on Serong’s life is well recounted in the book.  In today’s multicultural society, few might now recall the sectarianism that gave a subordinate position to Catholics in Australian society in the early part of the Twentieth Century.  The attempt of the Catholic Church to break out of that subordinate position by educating selected children was an influence in Serong’s schooling (where he met and formed associations with other Catholics who became well known in future years, like B.A. Santamaria).  Also, his early contacts in Burma were Catholics, as were many of the Vietnamese with whom he worked from 1962 to 1975.

Anne Blair shows how Serong, with great prescience, recognised during the Second World War that Australia’s future lay in the Pacific, not in the Middle East.  Others more senior and experienced would take many years to accept this reality!  She also shows that a lesson Serong absorbed early in his time in Asia in the 1960s was the need for military forces to match their ambitions and tactics with the available level of resources.  In Burma, he was advised that the Burmese navy found that ‘When our young officers go to Britain, they see lots of big ships, and they come back and want them here.  That sort of thing is not for us’.  In Vietnam, Serong commented on the American tendency to place ‘too much reliance on forthcoming mechanical marvels’.  He considered that the Vietnamese Armed Forces improved as the level of American support declined. 

Throughout his active life, Serong was driven by a sense of purpose based on a feeling that he had somehow been ‘chosen’.  In some people, this form of self-belief could have led to delusions of grandeur, but he seemed successfully to avoid these.  It is unfortunate that his marriage seems to have essentially ended in a ‘parting of the ways’ during his long service in Vietnam in pursuit of his life’s goals, and not to have recovered after he returned to Australia, yet this did not seem to make him bitter. 

While Serong remained active after the Vietnam War ended (when he was almost 60), he seems to have kept a sense of proportion often lacking in driven people.  In his later years, he pushed ideas for Australian defence, and became involved with the unofficial militia movement and the One Nation Party.  Again, however, he seemed to avoid any drift into extremism, and, as Anne Blair recounts, may have exerted some moderating influence, specifically warning against ‘New Guardism’ on one occasion.

In his later years, when defence became less fashionable in the community, and the concept of citizen service became less fashionable in the Army, he supported both an active defence effort and expansion of the citizen forces.  Yet he also displayed the abiding weakness of many in the Australian forces – an inability to understand the strategic/government level of defence planning.  The tactical excellence of the Australian Army in jungle warfare during the Malaya/Vietnam period and the training system established at Canungra by Serong are his legacy, but his actual influence at the strategic level was limited.

The picture that emerges of Ted Serong is in some ways the idealised picture of the ANZAC legend.  He was the boy from the (religious) wrong side of the tracks who joined the citizen forces, overcame apparent social prejudice to gain entry to Duntroon and become a regular officer, then went on to become an exemplar of the Australian tradition of tactical excellence.  As a senior officer, he retained his empathy with the junior soldiers (witness his joining a nervous soldier in jumping off the tower at Canungra) and both his respect for and the respect of the senior non-commissioned officers.  Whatever his weaknesses, this is surely a worthwhile legacy.

JOHN DONOVAN 

Warrior of Kokoda

WARRIOR OF KOKODA  A Biography of Brigadier Arnold Potts

Bill Edgar

Published by Allen and Unwin 1999,  $29.95

This book is an unusual product to have come from the Army Military History series.

While it focuses on the life, and particularly the military career, of Arnold Potts, it is far from a standard military biography.  Rather, largely through the medium of Potts’ letters to his wife, it recounts the story of the great love of between them, against the background of Australia in the first half of the Twentieth Century.  The background does, however, have its interest in the manner in which it sheds light on the events in Papua in the latter part of the critical year 1942.

The general events of the period are well known.  As the fighting ebbed and flowed across the Owen Stanley ranges, three senior Australian officers were relieved of their commands.  Bill Edgar’s book brings out the distant family connection between Potts and Blamey (Potts’ sister’s ‘erstwhile gentleman friend’), but makes little of it.  However, Edgar does make it painfully clear that the principal cause of the relief of the three officers was the bureaucratic (in the widest sense of the word) survival of Blamey, and particularly MacArthur.

The position regarding the relief of the three officers can be summarised briefly.  Although his troops succeeded in delaying and wearing down the advancing Japanese, Potts was relieved for failing to carry out orders that, in the prevailing circumstances, were quite unrealistic.  Allen was relieved for being too slow to carry out the extremely difficult task of pushing the Japanese back across the mountains, just as the last significant resistance before Kokoda, at Eora Creek, was breaking.  This gave Vasey the honour of raising the flag over the recaptured village a few days later.  And Rowell was relieved essentially because he could not put up with the presence of Blamey at his Port Moresby headquarters for a few days.

In the final analysis, it is likely that the reliefs of Potts, Allen and Rowell had no practical effect on the outcome of the campaign.  Other capable officers were readily available to replace them (just as other capable officers could have replaced Blamey and MacArthur), and only the sense of injustice remains.  Perhaps more sympathy could generally be given (as it is in this book, through the medium of Potts’ letters to his wife) to the soldiers who were wounded or died trying to carry out the impossible task given to Potts, and the difficult one set for Allen.  Certainly Blamey had his chance to do this in his Koitaki speech, failed miserably, and possibly didn’t even realise at the time that he had lost a golden opportunity to improve the morale of his troops, and incidentally, his reputation.

In summary, a good book, both for its perspective on Australian military history, and for the insight it gives to the personality of a man who deserves to be better known.

JOHN DONOVAN