Military Review English Edition November-December 2013 | Page 104

BOOK REVIEWS
artillery, and poison gas? Or had Haig’s forces,
by 1918, evolved into a more skilled and adaptive
command “style” than their German opponents?
Jonathan Boff tackles this question in his new
book, Winning and Losing on the Western Front.
He places special focus on Gen. Julian Byng’s
Third Army, a formation that helped drive the
Germans back to the Hindenburg Line, then
cracked the line and pursued the German Second
and Seventeenth Armies into Belgium in the last
days of the war. Making imaginative use of his
sources, Boff investigates the manpower, training, morale, weapons, tactical skill, and command
style of the Third Army and the Germans that
faced them. He finds none of the explanations
for the outcome of the victory—the evaporation
of German strength; the preponderance of Allied
tanks, men, and planes; the improvement of British
tactical orchestration; or the relative effectiveness of British and German “command culture”
are sufficient to explain why the war ended the
way it did. Each, however, is necessary. Perhaps
his most interesting findings have to do with the
unevenness of “learning” by the combatants. Some
units managed their battles with an approach that
looked like what we call “mission command,”
others kept a tight leash on initiative. Beyond
that, he argues that the Germans signally failed
to adapt their doctrine and command procedures
to the desperate circumstances they faced in the
last months of 1918.
If this reviewer finds Boff perhaps a little
generous in his evaluation of British commanders and harsh in his judgment of their German
counterparts, it warrants a disclaimer. In my own
work, The Final Battle, I have considered many
of the same questions that Boff examines in this
book. However, when it comes to understanding
the battlefield of 1918, Boff’s research is more
comprehensive, his analysis more imaginative,
and his conclusions more persuasive than my
own. Winning and Losing on the Western Front is
a remarkable book that takes us a quantum leap
forward in our understanding of the how the “Great
War” ended in 1918.
Dr. Scott Stephenson, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas

102

VICTORY AT PELELIU
The 81st Infantry Division’s Pacific Campaign
Bobby C. Blair and John Peter DeCioccio
University of Oklahoma Press, Norman
2011, 320 pages, $34.95

F

EW THINK OF the U.S. Army when recounting the glories and horrors of ground combat
in the Pacific theater during the Second World
War. Indeed, several recent memoirs and the wellreceived HBO series The Pacific focused national
attention on the exploits of the Marine Corps, and
perhaps rightfully so. This includes the vicious
battle for the island of Peleliu in the Palaus group,
which was noted specifically for its ferocity and
brutality—on the part of both sides.
However, little has been written about the role
of Army divisions during the battle for the Palaus.
Authors Bobby Blair and John DeCioccio effectively break this paradigm in their accounting
of the Army’s 81st Infantry Division during the
Pacific campaign. The 81st played a major role
in securing Peleliu’s neighboring Angaur Island,
seizing the key Ulithi archipelago in the Carolines,
and relieving its more well-known brethren—1st
Marine Division—on the island of Peleliu itself.
Blair and DeCioccio effectively argue that rather
than simply “mopping up” after the 1st Marines on
Peleliu, the 81st employed innovative leadership,
effective tactics, and endured intense combat in a
fight against a desperate enemy whose defeat was
not necessarily predetermined.
Written in no-nonsense staccato prose, the book
deftly covers the strategic, operational, and tactical
levels of war, effectively setting the larger context
for the Palaus and Ulithi campaigns, recounting the
crucial decisions that agonized the key leaders, and
detailing the tactical innovations of both sides on the
ground. Regarding the latter, the authors effectively
describe the new Japanese policy for the Palaus
campaign that focused on digging in, avoiding
direct engagement at all times, and killing as many
Americans as humanly possible. On the American
side, the 81st countered these desperate and deadly
measures with some innovative techniques of its
November-December 2013 ? MILITARY REVIEW