John Lawrence Tone, "The Machete and the Liberation of Cuba,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 7-28.
One sacred legend of Cuban nationalist historiography is that Cuban forces had defeated the Spanish by 1898, implying that United States intervention was unnecessary to the liberation of Cuba and served only American imperial designs. This thesis rests on a number of assertions; one of these is that Cuban soldiers, armed with machetes, proved deadly against Spanish regulars, making victory possible even without U.S. shipments of arms and men.
Based on new archival material, the author demonstrates that the machete was a poor weapon of war that produced very little damage in the Spanish ranks. On the contrary, the legendary machete charge of the Cuban cavalry often resulted in disaster for the Cubans. Naturally, the Cuban military leadership realized this, and they rarely used the machete on the battlefield, relying instead on rifles seized from the Spanish or shipped from America and on tactics appropriate to those weapon systems. The machete served many purposes in the war, especially as an instrument of terror against Cuban neutrals and collaborators, but without United States intervention it is difficult to imagine a ``Cuba libre'' in 1898 or any time soon thereafter.
Nicholas A. Lambert, "'Our Bloody Ships' or `Our Bloody System'? Jutland and the Loss of the Battle Cruisers, 1916,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 29-55.
This article examines the circumstances surrounding the loss of the three British battle cruisers at the Battle of Jutland in May 1916. The main arguments are built upon evidence that officers and seamen manning the guns inside the turrets encouraged cordite safety regulations to be ignored, to the extent of leaving the ship vulnerable to catastrophic explosion in the event of turrets being hit by enemy shells. Safety was ignored, it is shown, to reduce congestion in the main magazines and to meet pressure from the squadron commander (Admiral David Beatty) and his staff to shoot as quickly as possible--even at the expense of gunnery accuracy.
Lambert demonstrates that investigations in 1916 convinced the Board of Admiralty that this was the main reason for the loss of the battle cruisers. But a change in administration several months later, and the promotion of several former fleet officers to posts inside the Admiralty, notably Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, who had commanded the fleet at Jutland, resulted in further investigations being abandoned and the evidence already collected being shelved.
Moshe Gershovich, "The Ait Ya`qub Incident and the Crisis of French Military Policy in Morocco,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 57-73.
The Ait Ya`qub incident of June 1929 was a relatively minor affair in the annals of the French conquest of Morocco. However, it revealed the depth of the personal and strategic crises at the summit of the French occupation corps during the second half of the 1920s. Using hitherto unconsulted French archival sources, this article examines French military strategy during the post-Lyautey era, focusing on the evolution of the ``Maroc utile'' concept and the stagnation of the ``pacification'' of the Moroccan countryside.
Erik Lund, "The Industrial History of Strategy: Reevaluating the Wartime Record of the British Aviation Industry in Comparative Perspective, 1919-1945,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 75-99.
The low aircraft production and apparent technological backwardness characterizing the British aviation industry in 1919-1945 has drawn close scrutiny from historians. This article argues that these weaknesses are a mistaken perception and offers a case history to show that strategic history must be aware of not only the productive resources of the aviation industry, but also the capabilities and skills which it can offer. In particular, the British aircraft industry balanced a smaller production with a larger design output in comparison to the United States and Germany.
George F. Hofmann, "The Tactical and Strategic Use of Attaché Intelligence: The Spanish Civil War and the U.S. Army's Misguided Quest for a Modern Tank Doctrine,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 101-133.
Employing a wide range of primary sources from Europe and U.S. military attachéreports, the author examines tank warfare in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), military intelligence analysis of those operations, and the U.S. Army doctrinal decisions which followed these decisions were flawed by a defective cultural bias rooted in the traditional army branch organization dominated by the maneuver branch chiefs and controlled by the ``Queen of Battle,'' the infantry. As a result, the U.S. Army was unable to execute an operational level of warfare with a combined arms mechanized force on the eve of World War II.
Donald E. Shepardson, "The Fall of Berlin and the Rise of a Myth,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 135-153.
This article examines the continuing debate on General Dwight D. Eisenhower's decision to halt at the Elbe River in the spring of 1945. The author links the decision on Berlin to the Anglo-American war against Japan. Any assault on Berlin would have cost men and material needed for the Pacific war. The article also notes that the Red Army was obsessed with taking Berlin, and that any "race'' with the Anglo-Americans might well have led to a conflict between the advancing armies that neither the American nor British people would have supported.
John Willoughby, "The Sexual Behavior of American GIs During the Early Years of the Occupation of Germany,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 155-174.
This essay explores the controversies surrounding the sexual activity of many American soldiers in occupied Germany immediately after the conclusion of World War II. It describes the Army's initial failure to prevent fraternization between American GIs and German women and the somewhat more successful efforts to control exploding venereal disease rates through an aggressive public health campaign. The paper also explores attempts by German and American male commentators to portray impoverished German women as seductresses and prostitutes rather than as victims of Germany's collapse.
The essay argues that the importation of American families and the ability of a few German women to marry into the U.S. military were important factors in the creation of less disruptive sexual arrangements between German women and American men in postwar Germany.
Mark Grimsley, "In Not So Dubious Battle: The Motivations of American Civil War Soldiers,'' Journal of Military History 62/1: 175-188.
This review essay examines recent trends in the understanding of the Civil War soldier. It focuses on three books: Gerald F. Linderman's Embattled Courage (1987); Earl Hess's The Union Soldier in Battle (1997); and James M. McPherson's For Cause and Comrades (1997). Linderman's book argues that the volunteers of 1861-1862 embraced an ethos of courage, religious faith, and integrity which broke down as the stress of war took its toll. By 1864-1865 most soldiers had become hardened, disillusioned, and pessimistic. The works of Hess and McPherson are essentially responses to Linderman's thesis. Both argue that Linderman overlooked the important role of political ideology in soldier motivation and both dispute his portrayal of a shift from idealism to disillusionment. But although McPherson and Hess directly dispute Linderman on a number of points, they essentially accept, extend, and refine his core notion of ``courage.''