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Easy Living in a Hard War

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I just finished MHQ Summer 2012’s article Easy Living in a Hard War by Meredith H. Lair in the issue’s new department, BEHIND THE LINES. It’s about rear echelon troops in Vietnam and the stark contrast between the war they saw, or more accurately, did not see, and that fought by the combat troops who made actual contact with the enemy. There has always been a big “tooth to tail” question with the U.S. Army – almost all armies really – but in Vietnam the problem was very stark. The article was great, kudos to Meredith Lair, and I look forward to seeing more such items in the BEHIND THE LINES department. If I can make my own suggestion – how about legionary recruitment in the Roman Empire?

Yes, he is skateboarding!

 

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Japan’s Armament and China’s Rise

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Michael Auslin in his piece Japan Awakens in Foreign Policy captures well the strategic predicament of modern China.  Japan is increasing its military capability, with an eye toward deterring Chinese moves in the East China Sea and elsewhere.  A cursory glance at the map of East Asia will reveal that China, a continental power, is surrounded all along its maritime periphery by islands or other territories under the control of states that are not friendly to it.  The sea lanes around China are intensely vulnerable to disruption.  The Chinese navy, without significant overseas bases, is effectively boxed in by its prospective opponents, just as Imperial Germany’s High Seas Fleet was cornered by the Royal Navy before and during the First World War.

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China and the United Sates – Are they on a Collision Course?

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There is a good discussion at today’s The New York Times about whether a new cold war between America and China is in the offing.  China’s economy is growing very quickly, as is its military, but China is not as powerful as many alarmists seem to believe.   China is surrounded by nations that are, by and large, not friendly to it, and are necessarily threatened by perceived aggressive or expansionist moves by their massive neighbor.   We can’t ignore geography and the role that it plays in the geopolitical thinking of the world’s great powers.

The U.S. seeks to balance out China, in much the same way that Britain balanced out European powers on the Continent in the nineteenth century.  The U.S. should not take this too far, however, because China’s actual power – what it can exert or project across the Asia-Pacific region – is more limited than a simple calculus of the numbers of soldiers, ships, airplanes, and tanks would suggest.

Everyone should take a deep breath and calm down.

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MHQ Spring 2012 – Now for Kindle!

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MHQ Magazine has been the nation’s foremost journal of scholarly military history for more than two decades.  Its authors are all professionally published, and typically are noted authorities on the topics about which they write.  MHQ has been available for years in a glossy, perfect-bound format, appearing four times a year.  It has always been known for its elegant layout and wonderful artwork, in addition to its top-notch writing.  Now it is available as a download for Amazon’s Kindle family, and I decided to take a look at how the magazine translates to the electronic e-reader format.

Happily, it looks great, especially on the Kindle Fire, which is full color, and so does not lose any of the rich, vibrant hues found in the print magazine.  Navigation is relatively simple – nothing electronic will be so easy as thumbing through a print edition of course, but if you have used an e-reader before, such as the Fire, an older version of the Kindle, or the Nook, for that matter, you will quickly pick up the tricks of moving through the electronic edition.

The articles are the same as those that you would find in the print journal, and have not been abridged in any way.  Each article averages between three and four thousand words, and can be comfortably read in about twenty minutes.  This is important, as I envision that most will read the magazine on their Kindles an article or feature at a time, perhaps while on the train to work, or over a lunch break, not cover to cover.

Features new to the magazine with this issue include Weapons Check, which is a look at an individual weapon of significance in military history.  I enjoyed this very much – an examination of the Danish “Viking” axe of around 950 A.D.  These were devastating weapons, and it is said, a wielder could fell a rider and his horse with one in a single blow.  That sounds pretty potent to me, but these big axes disappeared from European warfare, for the most part, by the end of the eleventh century.  In my previous reading the reason for this was never truly answered.  Was it simply fashion, or was it something more substantive?  The Normans came in for a big shock at the Battle of Hastings in 1066 when the Anglo-Danish huscarls of King Harold Godwinson showed up carrying these man-killers.  The author, Chris McNab, helpfully suggests that the introduction of longer swords, poleaxes, and halberds made the use of the axe inadvisable.  It simply lacked the reach to cope.

The old standby, Fighting Words, by Christine Ammer, which examines the development of military terminology, is also in the Kindle edition.  Did you know that “belfry” was originally a movable siege tower with a pivoting ramp at the top?  Later, it became the term for the church tower where bats hang out.  Also, a constable was a high-ranking official who held command of a castle, but when the title was switched to the civilian realm, it received a demotion, and a constable ranked below that of sheriff.  Today, it signifies a policeman in the United Kingdom.

The cover article is “The 27-Day Secret War,” which relates the remarkable achievements of a handful of American special forces who guided precision airstrikes against Taliban targets in late-2001. The rapidity of the fall of the Taliban regime was stunning, and only throws into stark relief the difficulties that allied forces have encountered since then, now that the Taliban have regrouped. The photograph of the commando on the cover, “Cowboy,” true name and rank unknown, is almost worth the price of the issue.

“Payback” is Alistair Horne’s telling of the Doolittle Raid on Japan in April 1942. Seventy years have passed since eighty American airmen in sixteen B-25 bombers took off from the deck of the USS Hornet on a one-way mission. They lacked the fuel to return to the Hornet, and even if they had carried it, they could not have landed their big aircraft on its deck. The actual damage that they inflicted on Japan was minimal, but the psychological impact of their raid was enormous. The Japanese would overreach themselves in trying to plug the gap in their defenses through which the Hornet had slipped, and lose four aircraft carriers at the Battle of Midway less than two months later.

“The Fireball at Zonchio” is the story of a Venetian-Ottoman Turkish naval battle of 1499. One of the many things that I enjoy about MHQ is that I learn something new with every issue. At Zonchio, the Turks sailed with two large carracks – think a primitive version of one of Nelson’s ships-of-the-line.  It was armed with cannon, but also, in a nod to the Mediterranean’s fickle winds, could deploy oars for use when the wind failed. I had never read of these Turkish ships before, which must have stood out from the great mass of low-slung war galleys that were the mainstays of Mediterranean naval tactics.  As you probably have guessed, the fireball of Zonchio was caused by the detonation of the gunpowder stored aboard one of these vessels in a truly horrific explosion that, in the fifteenth century, truly was something new under the sun.

But the Venetians had little to cheer after Zonchio. The civic spirit that had made Venice a medieval maritime great power was not in evidence in the battle, and internal rivalries hampered the Venetian battle plan. They failed to capitalize on their initial successes, not least of which was the destruction of the Turkish carrack, and the Turks not only survived the battle, which might otherwise have proved a crushing Venetian victory, but went on to win the war.

Joseph E. Persico has contributed an opinion piece, “Did Roosevelt Doom Us to a Longer War?” in which he takes President Roosevelt to task for unnecessarily delaying the invasion of Europe. Persico makes some valid points, but I think that all second-guessing of Allied military strategy in the Second World War tends to overlook or undervalue the crucial role played by the Soviets in breaking the back of the German Wehrmacht. The German army of June 1944 was powerful, but it was nothing compared to the mighty force that could have, and would have, been deployed to France if the Western Allies had opted to land there in the summer of 1943. Instead, the panzer troops, as well as dozens of crack infantry divisions, were decimated in the brutal 1943 combat at Kursk and elsewhere that eventually saw the Germans thrown back all along the eastern front. About 80% of all German losses occurred in the East. That just about says it all.

MHQ for Kindle is available from Amazon’s Kindle Store by subscription for $2.99 a month, or $11.99 per single issue. The Kindle is a fine way to enjoy the magazine, possessing all of the advantages of portability found in an e-reader, without sacrificing the visual appeal of the print issue.  I recommend the Kindle Fire, on account of its color screen, but the electronic edition looked great on my older e-ink model too.

MGD

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Game of Thrones – Garden of Bones

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On the Legitimacy of Kings

Robb Stark continues to prove his mettle by defeating the Lannisters (again) in battle.  His sister Sansa Stark, engaged to be married to King Joffrey, but as much or more of a hostage in his court, is whipped on account of her brother’s success.  She is rescued from further harm, however, by Tyrion, a man who claims to have no honor but is proving to be the most honorable of all, perhaps in spite of himself.  He asks her quietly is she wishes to put an end to the engagement.  When she demures, and says with consummate tact, that Joffrey is her lord, Tyrion recognizes a kindred diplomat in Sansa.

Littlefinger’s visit to Renly Baratheon’s court is filled with ambivalence.  He offers to open the gates of King’s Landing to Renly.  He also returns Ned Stark’s remains to Catelyn Stark, and says that they – Littlefinger and Catelyn –  can at last be together.  But this is an unrequited love.  Catelyn does not want Littlefinger, and he has allowed himself to fall in love with a woman far above his station.  I am not certain if I can feel any sympathy for Littlefinger.  He betrayed Ned, which was a terrible thing, and he was perhaps motivated to do so by his desire for Catelyn, whom he has loved for so long, without hope.

Catelyn tries to make peace between Stannis Baratheon and Renly, without success.  Stannis by all rights – for what those are worth in Westeros – is the legitimate king, and one would expect that the eldest brother of the prior king would simply accede to the throne without much fuss.  However, at least some do still believe that Joffrey is Robert’s own son, and thus the true king of the realm.  Also, this raises the question of why so many follow Renly instead of Stannis.  Renly is more outgoing, and Stannis is humorless and dour.  Perhaps though it is also a question of legitimacy.  It should be borne in mind that the Baratheon “dynasty” is less than a generation old at the time of the death of Robert Baratheon.  Robert himself deposed the old Targaryen king, and you can make your own decision as to whether he is thereby legitimate.

I admire Martin for creating a political situation in which there are plausible reasons for men to support any one of the contenders vying for the throne, or at least a throne, since Robb Stark at this juncture simply wishes to be King in the North,

Speaking of Targaryens, Dany finally gets to be in a scene with some real dialogue, and not simply be thirsty.  Her Dothraki have arrived at the gates of Qarth, at the edge of the Red Waste, and her entrance is denied by the city’s rulers, the Thirteen.  Their spokesman wishes to see her dragons, but Dany is reluctant to allow them a view.  I am not sure why she would not show them. Could it be that they are so small that they would not impress?  Or does she hear that the Qartheen would try and steal them?

She is at last granted entry when Xaro speaks on her behalf.  The gates open to reveal a vista of a wondrous city within, akin to Babylon in its days of greatness.  But what are Xaro’s motives?

Arya and Gendry are in deep trouble.  The prisoners of the almost comically cruel Lannister soldiers are being tortured by the application of a rat, shoved in a bucket applied to the prisoners chest, which is then heated by fire.  Gendry is saved from this horrible death by the arrival of Lord Tywin Lannister, who puts a stop to this sordid affair.  Lord Tywin, he is the real deal.  One wonders whether the situation in Westeros would be different if he could be everywhere.  He is by no means a good guy.  He is simply a more effective man than the brutes he has working for him.  There was no real point to the torture and murder of the prisoners before Gendry.  The Lannister men were just bored.

MGD

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Game of Thrones: What is Dead May Never Die

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What is Dead May Never Die – Season 2, Episode Three

Game of Thrones’ second season continues to build.  The more that I watch it (and entertain the heretical notion that the HBO series is more fun than the novels) the more apparent it becomes that GoT is really a political opera more than it is a fantasy series.  Oh sure, it has all the trappings of traditional fantasy – the swords, the strange names, murky, make-believe, ancient history – but it is in actuality an alternate-world War of the Roses with the complexity cranked to eleven.

Tyrion Lannister naturally gets the best parts.  He craftily tells three different men, the brothel owner Littlefinger, the eunuch Varys, and Maester P:ycelle, that he plans to wed Cersei’s daughter Myrcella to three different aristocrats, telling each that Cersei must not know.  When Cersei angrily confronts Tyrion afterwards, he realizes that the leak is Maester Pycelle, who claims to be an informant for the Lannisters, which of course seems plausible.

Brienne of Tarth at last makes her appearance.  She defeats Ser Loras in tournament combat and is made a member of King Renly Baratheon’s Kingsguard.  Brienne is one of the most engaging of all of the characters of Martin’s otherwise unappealing cast.  She is tall, gawky, and unlovely, but she is true, honorable,  and utterly loyal to her hero, Renly.  She is one of the few characters that displays real loyalty to anyone.  In some sense she is, in her almost complete outsiderness, a stand-in for us, the readers, in her struggle to comprehend and fit into the hostile world around her.

Brienne also seems to one of the few who might measure up in the difficult times ahead.  Catelyn Stark arrives in Renly’s domain, but warns that his men are “knights of summer and winter is coming.”  For many in Westeros, the War of the Five Kings is still a sport.  It will not be for long.

Theon Greyjoy is still being disrespected by his Ironborn father, Balon, who maliciously plans to give just one raiding ship to Theon while his sister Asha is to receive thirty.  Theon wisely points out that the could get more from an alliance with Robb Stark, the King of the North, instead of raiding his lands.  The Ironborn seem unconvincing to me.  They are meant to be Norman/Vikings, living on the edge of Westeros and not fully integrated into their culture.  However, their insistence, as exemplified by Balon, in taking things by force, the “iron price,” while interesting from a sociological standpoint, does not hold up when compared to real history.  The Vikings took what they could get and never insisted on doing things the hard way.

MGD

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Lockout – Star Wars Has Nothing To Fear

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I can’t begin to describe Luc Besson’s Lockout without making reference to Star Wars.  Not because Lockout deserves to be mentioned in the same galaxy as that 1977 classic, but to highlight that the similarities between the two do not make Lockout especially interesting.

Han Solo, I mean, Snow (Guy Pearce) is framed for espionage in 2071 America. He is given a chance to redeem himself if he goes aboard the Death Star, I mean, maximum security orbital prison to rescue the princess, I mean, First Daughter of the President of the United States, Emilie Warnock (the lovely Maggie Grace).

As you can imagine, there is little rhyme or reason as to why the First Daughter was even allowed to enter this space prison, nor why she did not go with at least a battalion of Marines to guard her.  Yes, the inmates are all kept in stasis while there, but why the prison warden allowed her to meet with the lunatic Hydell (Joseph Gilgun) is beyond plausible explanation.  Nor do I care.  The entire setup of this movie ignores logic at almost every turn.  What follows is a station crawl as Snow and Emilie try to evade and escape from the Imperial stormtroopers, I mean, prisoners, hunting for them.

Spoiler Alert (and lots of them):  Given the chance to escape, Emilie refuses to go, allowing her escape pod to leave without her.  Ugh.  The leader of the prisoners (who of course all come out of stasis – did you have to ask?) is Alex (Vincent Regan) brother of the crazy Hydell, who assumes command of the prisoners without explanation as to why they would follow him in particular.  Perhaps it is his cool beard.

Also, the orbital prison is destroyed at the end of the film by an attack of X-wings, I mean, American space fighters, which shoot a missile into the center of the station to blow it up.  No, really, that is what happens!

Snow is your typical wisecracking tough guy/special ops/cop type, and his character shows promise at times.  I could also see him being put into a sequel that is better than this first installment.  That being said, he is not very much different from any other tough guy of the genre, and apart from the heavy Star Wars similarity, the film most reminds me of Die Hard, with the lone American battling an international cast of space bad guys.

Lockout is not terrible.   It is not that good either.

MGD

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Game of Thrones – The Night Lands

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So Sunday evening has turned out to be television festival night.  Between Game of Thrones and Mad Men, this is the best small screen twosome right now.  Game of Thrones keeps getting better.   Martin’s novels are long and complex, but they pay off hugely in the end.  Last Sunday’s episode, The Night Lands, was a tour de force of the genre.  A lot happened, and the table is still be set, so to speak, for events later in the season.

A handful of things should be noted.  Gendry knows that Ary is really Arya.  King Joffrey’s men are also looking for him, and this puts them both in danger.  But it is a good thing to be part of the Night’s Watch.  They don’t take guff from anyone.

Tyrion – has there ever been a cooler character? – has laid off Janos Slynt from command of the Kingsguard.  He betrayed the previous Hand of the King and Tyrion doesn’t trust him not to do the same to him.  But could Tyrion also be displaying some moral qualms about a man who murdered an infant?  Tyrion is a good guy in spite of himself, a darker version of Han Solo, perhaps more appropriate for the modern age.  We have also discovered that Cersei was unaware of Joffrey’s order to murder the bastards of the last king, Robert.

In the Iron Islands, Theon Greyjoy, after nine years as a hostage with the Starks in Winterfell, receives a cold welcome from his father, Balon.  The Ironborn are a different kind of people from the ordinary Westerosi.  They are from elsewhere, their historical analogue being Vikings in medieval England, and their code is strict  and alien.   They are very old-fashioned, and scorn anything that they have not taken by force.  That is the iron price of things.  The salt price is what is obtained with money.  That is not valued.

Elsewhere, Stannis Baratheon, to  my mind, the one  man with the best claim to the throne, is busily recruiting ships to take on his rivals.  Danaerys is still stuck in the midst of the Red Waste, and poor Rakharo has come back with his head stuffed in his own saddlebag.  The Dothraki are dying of thirst.  Dany does not know what to do.  She has not had much to do lately.  Given the explosive nature of the first season finale – Dany emerged from her husband’s funeral pyre with three dragons in tow – her activities so far have been anti-climactic.   That won’t last forever.

MGD

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The Future of the American Economy, Part Two

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Here is Derek Thompson of The Atlantic‘s interesting take on the David Brooks piece to which I linked in my previous post.   My take is that the relentless drive for efficiency – in itself not a bad thing – will ultimately pose insuperable obstacles in the way of a “full” employment economy.   Even the distinction between fast and slow sectors of the economy may become increasingly blurry as more things can be done by machines.  You may not be able to ship a dentist around the world, but one day, you may have a robot dental machine cleaning and fixing your teeth.

Whither the poor dentist?

MGD