“The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944. Volume Two of the Liberation Trilogy”, by Rick Atkinson

848 pages, Holt Paperbacks, ISBN-13: 978-0805088618

This is the second volume Rick Atkinson’s “Liberation Trilogy”, which is essentially the story of the U.S. Army in the African and European Theater from 1942 to 1945. Atkinson has a gift for description, evoking a scene, and bringing together details to highlight a situation, writing history the way I would aspire to: so that just about anyone, even with a breadth of previous knowledge of the war or military in general, could pull at least something interesting, and human, out of the narrative. He must have read boxes of letters by individual soldiers, depicting as he does the campaign from the grit, exhaustion, hunger and fear in the trenches to the comforts of Army headquarters and the settings of the great Big Three conferences that debated and then set overall policy. The level of research is as exhaustive as possible and beyond reproach; as a result, even persons knowledgeable about the campaigns and the war in general can learn something new or an interpretation not considered. It was not at all certain the campaign reviewed in this book would occur at all (indeed, many US generals opposed it), and he does not let the generals – all the way up to and including Ike – off easily. Their blundering and slow learning are disheartening to read about, as well as several ghastly operational blunders that led to legendary fratricidal incidents where brave men died needlessly.

What is obvious is that the Allied leadership – Yanks and Brits alike – were a very, very mixed bag; most are regarded by historians as brilliant generals (and there’s no disputing they won the war in the Mediterranean against a fanatically determined enemy) but, damn, at what a price. Especially illuminating are the point-counterpoint disputes, the rivalries and the blunders involving the Allied leadership who ran the war in the Mediterranean theater. Winston Churchill, who pushed for this whole campaign, arguing that after Italy’s official surrender pushing up the peninsula would be relatively easy. Dwight Eisenhower, whose inept strategy for the invasion of Sicily allowed hundreds of thousands of German troops to escape to the mainland and bedevil his soldiers for months to come. Mark Clark, whose paranoia toward the British and desperate need for fame led him to disobey an explicit order and drive his troops to liberate Rome instead of tending to the strategic business of demolishing the German armies in central Italy. George Patton, whose disdain for logistics led his troops to run short of ammunition, his medical corps to lack medicine and bandages, and other vital supplies to languish in North Africa.

As Atkinson notes: “the saddest lesson, to be learned again and again…as they fought across Sicily, and in the coming months as they fought their way back toward a world at peace: that war is corrupting, that it corrodes the soul and tarnishes the spirit, that even the excellent and the superior can be defiled, and that no heart would remain unstained.” Would that more leaders learned these terrible lessons.

“An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942-1943. Volume One of the Liberation Trilogy”, by Rick Atkinson

736 pages, Holt Paperbacks, ISBN-13: 978-0805087246

This is the first volume Rick Atkinson’s “Liberation Trilogy”, which is essentially the story of the U.S. Army in the African and European Theater from 1942 to 1945. This is a detailed and magisterial account of the battles themselves and of the politics and politicians involved, and for me, at least, this first volume is the most revealing: we’ve all read previous histories of the North African campaign (right?), but often with an unjustified concentration on Patton and Rommel. This volume covers everyone, including some American generals less flamboyant, but also less uncaring of the lives of their men who were equally successful. Rommel’s devolution toward exhaustion and defeat is affecting; the continuing agitation between American and British generals – particularly the interestingly awful Montgomery – is fascinating, as is Eisenhower’s progress from relatively clueless to relatively determined and focused. Another issue that Atkinson focuses on, that I don’t think gets much shrift in other histories, is just how brutal the war in North Africa was; and some military, both officers and enlisted men on both sides, just as cruel and sadistic as military in the war in the Pacific against the Japanese and in subsequent wars.

The battle in North Africa showed the deficiencies of logistics early in the war: the planners estimating ammunition needs based on World War I “discovered that modern divisions, although comprising half the manpower of their Great War counterparts, used more than twice as many shells and bullets” [whoops] “Other deficiencies could hardly be blamed on green soldiers. Virtually no bazookas had been shipped to Tunisia; Patton had plenty in Morocco, a thousand miles from the front”. But as on British soldier said, “’The American Army does not solve its problem’, one general noted, ‘it overwhelms them’”. Damn straight, Brit. Eisenhower had much to learn on how to balance his time between politics and strategy. He also had to learn how to be more ruthless in making sure his orders were followed, in replacing poor performing generals and in ordering men to their deaths. Prior to reading this book my knowledge of the North Africa campaign came from the movies Patton and The Big Red One; but Patton played a smaller role than I had been led to believe (he was replaced by Omar Bradley in the early spring so Patton could concentrate on the Sicily invasion), and the suffering of the common soldier was worse than that shown in the latter movie.

The allies also had much to learn in how to coordinate tanks, armor and infantry and needed to learn to work together. High ranking generals such as Patton, Alexander, and Montgomery could be extremely self-centered and distrustful of their counterparts. This was a great read laying out the problems and successes of this campaign. Atkinson does an excellent job of weaving personal stories with the facts and figures of the events.

“The Grass Crown”, by Colleen McCullough

894 pages, William Morrow & Company, ISBN-13: 978-0688093693

The Grass Crown by Colleen McCullough is the second book in her “Masters of Rome” series and spans the years 97 to 86 BC. The series has a thesis (first introduced in 1939 by Sir Ronald Syme in his epic historical treatise “The Roman Revolution”): as Rome became more powerful within the Mediterranean world, the old ways of doing things – through the deliberation of various interests, mainly aristocratic and mercantile – became impossibly cumbersome. It became more and more difficult to govern an empire with institutions originally designed to administer a city-state. Certain powerful leaders (especially Marius, Sulla, and Caesar) tried to create a state in which they had autocratic power but also preserved the externals of the old ways. They were opposed by the conservatives (called the optimates by classical historians, though they themselves preferred the title boni or “good men”). The obtuse or simply ignorant resistance of these reactionaries, who are all (except for Cato) presented as degenerate or self-serving, made the creation of an autocracy necessary. The result was the birth of an imperial monarchy, and a radically different organization of power. Each book in the series features a detailed glossary, hand-drawn illustrations of the major characters, and notes by McCullough detailing her reasoning for portraying certain events in certain ways.

Although these two powerful Eastern rulers would eventually declare war on Rome and slaughter thousands of Roman citizens, the plot of the novel centers on the Social War of 91 to 88 BC, a civil war which Rome fought against its mutinous Italian Allies after they were refused full Roman citizenship. Marius and Sulla, still friends and professional colleagues, face the Italian threat together, and succeed in putting down the rebellion of the Italians; however, Marius suffers a serious stroke (his second) and is forced to withdraw from the war. During this struggle, Sulla, rallying his troops against certain destruction near Nola, is hailed as imperator on the field of battle and presented with the highest honor a Roman general can receive: the corona graminea, the eponymous Grass Crown; this was only awarded a very few times during the Republic, and only ever to a general or commander who broke the blockade around a beleaguered Roman army or otherwise saved an entire legion or army from annihilation. Once Rome has settled this pressing domestic matter, and can begin to plot revenge against Mithridates and Tigranes, Marius and Sulla have their first serious falling out over the question of who should lead the legions east. Marius, now an aged and discredited statesman previously dubbed the Third Founder of Rome, is pining for further glory and believes only he has the talent necessary to defeat the allied Kings; Sulla feels as though his old mentor is unwilling to step aside and wants to destroy Sulla’s chance of outshining him. The Senate cites Marius’ age and poor health as a reason to back Sulla, who moreover is the sitting consul and therefore has the side of right. The seeds of serious discord are planted. The Roman comitia quickly becomes a source of political conflict between the two men, and leads to Sulla’s first shocking march on Rome. It also leads Gaius Marius to pursue an unprecedented seventh consulship, which he wins and undertakes after suffering a series of strokes, and is depicted in this novel as going mad.

The Grass Crown is truly a worthy sequel to The First Man in Rome; again, just like the first book, it is well-researched and detailed, with great narration and dialogue that brings real events and real people to life (a glossary in the back of Roman and Latin terms does not make the work cumbersome but instead fascinating and easier to read). The great storytelling is the lure, and a good deal of erudition is the result; the tale is fleshed out in ways where the history and the fiction blend together imperceptibly (for instance, some of the nefarious actions taken by characters are real, while others are McCullough’s novelistic insertions or speculations). That makes the books much more enjoyable as novels, but means that the historical accuracy should be assumed only at the large scale. The protagonists are by and large unlikeable (indeed, Sulla and Marius are generally regarded as villains). McCullough does not paper over that, yet she draws out the characters in ways that humanize them and show their motivations and weaknesses that make them interesting and even somewhat sympathetic at times. these are the best historical fiction I’ve ever read, and some of the best novels; they demand a bit of attention to keep things straight but you will be rewarded with great stories and learning much about one of the most important and fascinating times in history.