Journal of Military History
Article Abstracts
Vol. 69, No. 3
July 2005

Articles:

Kaushik Roy, "Military Synthesis in South Asia: Armies, Warfare, and Indian Society, c. 1740-1849," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 651-690.

Following the rapid collapse of the Mughal Empire after 1707, the Mughal Successor States attempted to modernize their state apparatus and their armies. Both the Indian kingdoms and the British led East India Company (EIC) attempted the construction of hybrid military organizations. How, then, can one explain the continuous military victories of the EIC? For opening up new dimensions on the military supremacy of the Europeans in Afro Asia, the analytical tool of Military Synthesis might be more useful than the concept of Military Revolution or Military Evolution. This essay focuses on the period from the 1740s to 1849.

 

Stephen M. Miller, "In Support of the "Imperial Mission"? Volunteering for the South African War, 1899-1902," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 691-712.

In mid-December 1899, the British army suffered three consecutive defeats in the opening phase of the Second Anglo-Boer War in South Africa. The government responded to the events of "Black Week" by calling for able-bodied men willing to abandon their homes and families and risk their lives to serve their country. Although some men who answered the call joined the regular army, most who traveled overseas opted for a shorter term of enlistment in the Volunteers, Militia, and Imperial Yeomanry. This article examiness the extent to which patriotism informed the decision-making process of these recruits.

 

Joe Lunn, "Male Identity and Martial Codes of Honor: A Comparison of the War Memoirs of Robert Graves, Ernst Jünger, and Kande Kamara," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 713-736.

This article compares and contrasts the memoirs of three combatants from the First World War: Robert Graves, Ernst Jünger, and the West African Tirailleur Kande Kamara. Though the soldiers' distinctive cultural heritage and service in the British, German, and French colonial armies, respectively, informed each interpretation, they shared similar, though particular, concepts of male identity and military duty that were socially specific, which they strove to honor. Their interpretations addressed particular audiences-categorized as "the victorious,"·"the defeated," and "the exploited"--that contributed to and reflected the political liturgies informing mass movements-especially in Germany and the Third World--throughout the twentieth century.

 

Michael J. Neufeld, "The End of the Army Space Program: Interservice Rivalry and the Transfer of the von Braun Group to NASA, 1958-1959," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 737-758.

The Army-Air Force struggle over ballistic missiles and space policy in the late 1950s was one of the worst episodes of U.S. interservice strife during the Cold War. The papers of General J. B. Medaris provide an important new window onto the process by which the Army avoided transferring its ballistic missile and space capability to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in 1958, and then reluctantly did so in 1959, in part to prevent the Air Force from obtaining it. Medaris's papers illustrate how interservice rivalry shaped the actions of the Secretary of the Army and the leadership of Army Ordnance.

 

Andrew Priest, "'In Common Cause': The NATO Multilateral Force and the Mixed-Manning Demonstration on the USS Claude V. Ricketts, 1964-1965," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 759-790.

In mid-1964, the USS Claude V. Ricketts began an eighteen-month operation known as the Mixed-Manning Demonstration. The Ricketts (formerly the USS Biddle) carried men from seven different North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) nations and was intended to demonstrate the viability of "mixed-manning" as part of NATO plans for the so-called Multilateral (Nuclear) Force, a purpose-built flotilla of nuclear armed ships to be owned, operated, controlled, and manned by Alliance members. While the Multilateral Force never came to fruition, the Mixed-Manning Demonstration proved to be a considerable success. This article aims to provide an alternative perspective on the history of the Multilateral Force by examining the development of the multilateral mixed-manning concept, showing how officers from the Ricketts attempted to overcome the difficulties encountered in operating with an international crew, and analysing the inherent long-term disadvantages of manning a ship in such a way.

 

 

Notes:

Richard Meixsel, "A Uniform Story," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 791-800.

Few biographers of General Douglas MacArthur have failed to mention the pompous field marshal's uniform he designed for himself as Philippine military adviser in the 1930s. This "uniform story" has become symbolic of the wide gulf that separated MacArthur's grand rhetoric from the paucity of his achievement. But the story is fake, the creation of a poorly informed journalist in 1937 who mistook a recently introduced U.S. Army white dress uniform for a distinctive field marshal's attire.

 

Brian Hanley, "The Myth of Iwo Jima: A Rebuttal," with a response by Robert S. Burrell, The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 801-810.

The author is critical of the methodology and conclusions of an essay by Robert Burrell published in the October 2004 JMH asserting that the invasion of Iwo Jima in 1945 was unnecessary and in part a function of interservice rivalry. Burrell is engaging in retrospective criticism, neglects the role of the impending invasion of Japan, and engages in the sort of parochial-mindedness he detects in the Army Air Forces and the Navy. Captain Burrell's response is appended.

 

Zeev Elron, "Remarks on Air Power and the Six-Day War," with a response by Moshe Gat, The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 811-20.

The author cites numerous shsortcomings in Moshe Gat's essay published in the October 2004 JMH regarding the Israeli Air Force's evolution and its behavior during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. Dr. Gat's response is appended.

 

Review Essays:

Keith Bird, "The Tirpitz Legacy: The Political Ideology of German Sea Power," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 821-826.

Review of Maritimer Imperialismus: Seemachtideologie, seestrategisches Denken und der Tirpitzplan 1875 bis 1914, by Rolf Hobson (Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 2004), and Albert Hopman: Das ereignisreiche Leben eines "Wilhelminers." Tagebücher, Briefe, Aufzeichnungen 1901 bis 1920, edited by Michael Epkenhans (Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 2004).

 

Jeremy Black, "War Stories," The Journal of Military History 69 (July 2005): 827-832.

Review of John Mosier, The Myth of the Great War: A New Military History of World War One (New York: Harper Collins, 2001), and John Mosier, The Blitzkrieg Myth: How Hitler and the Allies Misread the Strategic Realities of World War Two (New York: Harper Collins, 2003).