Journal of Military History
Article Abstracts
Vol. 68, No. 3
July 2004

Articles:

Wayne E. Lee, "Fortify, Fight, or Flee: Tuscarora and Cherokee Defensive Warfare and Military Culture Adaptation," The Journal of Military History 68 #3 (July 2004): 713-770.

This article explores and compares how two southeastern Native American societies responded to the challenge of defending their home territories against European incursions in the eighteenth century. As the Tuscaroras and the Cherokees learned more about their European opponents, they progressively adapted their defensive techniques. The Tuscaroras relied on increasingly elaborate fortifications, at first successfully, but ultimately leading to a disastrous defeat. The Cherokees, observers of the Tuscarora defeat, continued to use fortifications through the middle of the eighteenth century. As the European threat drew closer to their mountain homeland, however, they shifted to a strategy of dispersal, ambush, and attacks on supply trains.

 

Elizabeth Greenhalgh, "Myth and Memory: Sir Douglas Haig and the Imposition of Allied Unified Command in March 1918," The Journal of Military History 68 #3 (July 2004): 771-820.

Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig's claim to have taken the initiative in getting General Ferdinand Foch appointed to the allied supreme command in 1918 needs re-evaluation. After a discussion of the reliability of Haig's diaries, the five elements of the traditional narrative of this crucial event are examined in turn, using both British and French archival records. All five are shown to be mis-representations. Finally, an examination of the postwar record permits a tentative explanation for the persistence of the traditional narrative.

 

B. Michael Bechthold, "A Question of Success: Tactical Air Doctrine and Practice in North Africa, 1942-43," The Journal of Military History 68 #3 (July 2004): 821-852.

The campaign in North Africa in 1942-43 was an essential step on the road to the creation of an effective tactical air support doctrine for the U.S. Army and U.S. Army Air Forces in the Second World War. American theory prior to the campaign was found lacking in a number of areas, especially when exposed to the crucible of battle. The ineffectiveness of Allied units in North Africa, both air and ground, American and British, led to a reorganization in early 1943. For the tactical air forces, the key to the reorganization was the adoption of the British Eighth Army-Western Desert Air Force model of ground-air cooperation which had proven successful in combat.

 

Roger V. Dingman, "Language at War: U.S. Marine Corps Japanese Language Officers in the Pacific War," The Journal of Military History 68 #3 (July 2004): 853-884.

This essay analyzes the origins, training, experiences, and recollections of Caucasian American Japanese language officers in the Pacific War of 1941-45. It focuses on the problems that they and the Marine Corps as an institution faced in trying to achieve effective cross-cultural communication in battle. It shows how their function shifted from simply translating so as to facilitate life-taking, to life-saving activities that helped bring the fighting to an earlier and less costly end. The essay challenges earlier portrayals of Marine behavior in the Pacific War as simply inhumane and emphasizes the necessity of the armed services' maintaining effective foreign language training programs in peace and war.

 

David Tal, "Between Intuition and Professionalism: Israeli Military Leadership during the 1948 Palestine War," The Journal of Military History 68 #3 (July 2004): 885-910.

Despite its achievements in the 1948 Palestine War, the military performance of the Israeli army was less impressive than is usually assumed. Attacks by the Israel Defense Force (IDF) on the regular Arab armies (Syrian, Jordanian, Iraqi, and Egyptian) ended in most cases in Israel's defeat. Israeli victories, which allowed the extension of the territories under its control, were gained in the fighting against the unorganized Palestinians and the semi-military Arab Liberation Army. The only significant military achievement in the war was the victory of Yigal Allon's forces over the Egyptians in southern Palestine. This success was gained at the conclusion of a debate between Allon and another IDF senior commander over the best way to conduct of offensive operations, a debate that provides a key to understanding the reason for Allon's remarkable achievement compared to the lesser performance of other IDF commanders. However, Allon's brilliant military leadership was the result of intuition and not of professional military education, a factor that had a negative effect on some of his decisions.

Carter Malkasian, "Toward a Better Understanding of Attrition: The Korean and Vietnam Wars," The Journal of Military History 68 #3 (July 2004): 911-942.

This article attempts to provide a historically accurate description of attrition as an operational strategy. The Korean and Vietnam Wars contain prominent and commonly recognized examples of attrition. These examples clash with the popular image of attrition as a futile and bloody slogging match in which a commander ruthlessly trades the lives of his men in order to weaken the enemy at a relatively favorable rate. In these conflicts, attrition was a basic process of warfare, characterized by a variety of methods. Although not necessarily optimal, it was a useful alternative to other operational strategies that were too costly or risky. Accordingly, the popular image of attritionØshared by many historians, political scientists, and military officersØmay not reflect the actual history of attrition.