Patton and The Soul of Battle | The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great...

Thought-provoking historical comparisons of exceptional military leaders: | The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny | Victor Davis Hanson

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	• The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny Victor Davis Hanson Anchor, 2001 - 496 pages average customer review:based on 59 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

The Importance of Moral Conviction in War

This book explores three immensely effective generals: General William Tecumseh Sherman, General George Patton and the lesser-known Epaminondas of Thebes. General Sherman planned and led the infamous "march to the sea" during the U.S. Civil War. This campaign annihilated everything in its path, including the city of Atlanta. However, this march did shatter the spirit of the Confederates and was instrumental in securing the victory for the North.

Patton was an innovative general who always demanded hot meals and clean socks for his men but also expected prompt compliance, tidy appearance and flawless execution of his edicts. Patton is also known for his ruthlessly efficient campaigns in North Africa, Sicily as well as his leadership during the Battle of the Bulge and his blitzkrieg-like march from Normandy to Czechoslovakia.

Epaminondas is a little known general from the Greek city-state of Thebes who heroically led his people out of subjugation from the brutal Spartan rule. Unfortunately, I found this section more difficult to read, as I had almost no prior context of knowledge of Epaminondas to build on.

Hanson draws many convincing parallels between the three. All three enjoyed legendary success during their military campaigns. All three also understood the unfortunate necessity of engaging in total war when forced into war with an ideological enemy. Moreover, all three led highly controversial campaigns despite being instrumental in winning the war. Sherman is known for the devastation that he left behind him in Atlanta. Patton's career was nearly ended for slapping a weeping soldier who claimed to suffer from battle fatigue.

Most importantly, all understood the importance of moral conviction. Hanson persuasively argues how having moral certainty was crucial to the success of each of these leaders. Each recognized that they were combating a true evil (Epaminondas - Spartan oppression; Sherman - chattel slavery; Patton - Nazism). Sherman would frequently write about the savage racism and the brutal treatment of slaves that he observed in the South. Patton would constantly make fiery moral condemnations of Nazi Germany. Contrast the success of these conflicts to the failures of conflicts when one army lacked the moral certainty to fight (e.g., U.S. in Vietnam or Athens during the Peloponnesian war.)

Overall, despite some unnecessary repetition, this book is well worth reading simply as a biography on these three great generals. Moreover, Hanson's thesis is fairly good, but it can certainly use some polishing. In particular, I would have preferred to see Hanson delve into what these men were fighting *for*; not just what they were fighting against. Hanson does repeatedly claim that they fought for "democracy". However, since Hanson never really clarifies what the essentials of a democracy are (i.e., Is it the democratic elections? Is it the limited government? Is it the fact, for Sherman and Patton, that they fought for a country whose government was established to protect individual rights?). Unfortunately, this makes Hanson's thesis more superficial than it could be.

If you enjoyed this book, then I also highly recommend Six Days of War by Michael Oren and Old Soldiers Never Die: A Biography of General Douglas MacArthur by Geoffrey Perret. Lastly, I encourage you to brace yourself for Nothing Less Than Victory: Military Offense and the Lessons of History by John David Lewis, which should be available around March of 2009!

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Patton and The Soul of Battle

The Soul of Battle by Victor Davis Hanson examines more than just the wartime accomplishments of three military leaders from democratic societies. Professor Hanson explains why three Generals - Epaminondas, William T. Sherman, and George S. Patton differ from other great military figures, (such as Caesar and Alexander), that lead wars to conquer, acquire territory, and enslave: Generals who lead democratic soldiers and who achieve greatness in battle reach a level not found in others. This spiritual dimension he calls the soul of battle.

What then is the soul of battle? A rare thing indeed that arises only when free men march unabashedly toward the heartland of their enemy in hopes of saving the doomed, when their vast armies are aimed at salvation and liberation, not conquest and enslavement. Only then does battle take on a spiritual dimension, one that defines a culture, teaches it what civic militarism is and how it is properly used.

PART III - The Third Army, Patton's Race into Germany

This review is limited to Part III, which presents a portrait of Patton the "simple soldier." Patton the military figure is brought to life as a unique officer for his times and a warrior who seemingly prepared his entire life to defeat the Nazis in World War II. We learn how Patton was able to create a level of morale unique among the allied forces even though the Third Army was a makeshift force cobbled together as a diversionary tactic. We gain an appreciation for Patton's insights into warfare and why his favorite expression and guiding principle about audacity saved lives and could have saved tens of thousands more, but for the failures of Eisenhower and Bradley. We discover how the challenges facing Patton differed from those encountered by Epaminondas and Sherman and why to some extent Patton's accomplishments rival or exceed these earlier figures.

Many today think of Patton as reckless and not politically correct, but these pages provide a profile showing Patton as eminently prepared and confident. Professor Hanson writes: "Critics forget that behind the foul mouth, sometimes offensive and near-lunatic pronouncements, and showy dress, Patton was without question the best educated, most experienced, and most widely read general in the American Army." We learn that Patton was dyslexic and an average student at West Point, but unlike many of his contemporaries, such as David Eisenhower and Omar Bradley who were more bureaucratic and bothered with his zeal, Patton was intellectually curious and combined a lifelong habit of reading with his studies of military history, warfare, and leadership. He represented America in the 1912 Olympics and placed fifth in the pentathlon, served in World War I, was a talented horseman and Calvary officer, and joined General Pershing to travel into Mexico to catch Pancho Villa. Patton befriended the King of Sweden, took fencing lessons during a two-year period in France from the master of arms of the French Calvary School, and through a disciplined regimen of study he read about the great battles including those of ancient and modern Europe. He was the best-prepared and most knowledgeable American tank commander, and he read Field Marshall Rommel's book on tank warfare. He made time to walk the battlefields of Europe and absorbed the lessons from those battles and the role of geography in warfare in a way than none of the other senior Allied officers fighting in Europe had done. The Germans feared him more than any other allied officer. While Eisenhower and Bradley sounded compassionate and caring, they were more concerned about the sensibilities of the British and Russians, appearances, and public comments. Their concerns cost a tragic number of lives. It was Patton's audacity and ruthlessness in battle that could have ended the war in Europe in the fall of 1944 when Patton saw an opening to march through the heartland of Germany, take Berlin, and then march on to Czechoslovakia to stop the Russians from taking Eastern Europe.

Professor Hanson follows Patton in his march through Europe and examines each of the numerous occasions when allied commanders (Eisenhower and Bradley) refused to take Patton's advice, placed roadblocks in his way, were unable to see the tragic consequences of a flawed battle plan or delay, and prevented him from racing forward. In each case tens of thousands died in German death camps, the German army, and the allied forces, as the war dragged on longer than necessary.

While each General is covered in a separate part, in Part III focusing on Patton there are comparisons to Epaminondas (his battle against Sparta) and Sherman (the Civil War) - how their challenges differed; the size of their Armies and the particular problems they faced with re-supply, terrain, the enemy, and their own chain of command; and how the changing nature of warfare created new obstacles or advantages for each.

In one chapter, for example, we learn how slavery differed in early Greece, from America during the Civil War, and Germany during World War II. Professor Hanson explains how Germany was unique in its efforts to murder entire categories of Jews, Poles, Slavs, and gypsies. In addition to the efficient delivery of death to the Jews, Professor Hanson explains how in the two earlier cases the Greeks and the South looked on their slaves as property and maintained them as valuable assets. This rationale was entirely absent for Germany and more died from slave labor than the number of Jews murdered in the concentration camps.

For anyone who has recently seen the George C. Scott performance of Patton, scenes from the movie come alive on these pages as Patton races recklessly to the front to lead his men into battle. Furthermore, the past speaks to us about the pressing issues facing us today in Iraq, the Middle East, our military leadership, our news media coverage of the war, and how we conduct warfare.

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Thought-provoking historical comparisons of exceptional military leaders:

A treatise on wars fought over the centuries, and what makes for leadership for victory, keeping casualties on both sides as low as possible. Victor Davis Hanson uses his great knowledge of Greek culture to springboard into comparisons with Civil War General Sherman, and World War II General Patton and their philosophies.

This book will make you rethink a lot of your conceptions of World War II and the Civil War, and the contributions Gen. Sherman and Gen. Patton made to final victory.

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Strongly-Argued, Intriguing, but Unconvincing

Victor Davis Hanson's "The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny" is a thought-provoking, interesting, but too-lengthy study of three great democratic military leaders: the Theban Epaminondas, Sherman, and Patton. Hanson argues that the democratic armies under these three leaders, engaged in noble fights to save the oppressed and end tyranny, used their moral soul to defeat enemies that most considered superior.

Hanson devotes one section to each of the leaders, giving brief biographies as well as highlighting their major campaign: Epaminondas' successful campaign to free the Spartan helots; Sherman's march through Georgia; and Patton's breakout from the Normandy beachhead. Hanson eschews traditional narrative history and tells the stories of these campaigns in a random order, sometimes starting at the end and working backwards, hopping around at other times, and never leaving any doubt or suspense about the conclusion. The book reads more like a discussion of the subject than actual history.

Hanson harps on his thesis that, by fighting to free the helot slaves in Sparta, black slaves in the American South, and Jews and many other minorities being exterminated in the Greater Reich, the democratic armies' moral ascendancy translated into ascendancy on the battlefield; and that great military leaders with a vision, leading these armies, can ignore traditional military tenets and crush enemy forces: Epaminondas' army of farmers attacked the heretofore invincible Spartan professional army and homeland; Sherman cut his supply lines and marched through the heart of enemy territory; and Patton succeeded when all other Allied generals were too timid and could have ended the war in 1944 if he was not held back.

Despite Hanson's eloquent writing, he is numbingly repetitious: at times it feels as if he's repeatedly beating you over the head with the same point or quotation. Readers familiar with his writing will again see his sweeping generalizations repeated while he ignores or belittles opposing viewpoints without giving them due consideration. (And anyone with any sympathy for the Southern viewpoint in the Civil War will not like Hanson's vitriolic condemnation of almost every aspect of the antebellum South.)

As sympathetic as I am to Hanson's argument that a democratic army fighting tyranny is superior to all others, I found this book intriguing and persuasive, but ultimately unconvincing. Hanson could have made the same ambitious arguments without the lumbering repetition or overstated conclusions, expanded his narrative history to tell the whole story instead of part of the story, and still written a much shorter book. Ultimately, despite these shortcomings, this is a stimulating book that anyone with a serious interest in military history should read.

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Victor David Hanson, author of the highly regarded classic The Western Way of War, presents an audacious and controversial theory of what contributes to the success of military campaigns.

Examining in riveting detail the campaigns of three brilliant generals who led largely untrained forces to victory over tyrannical enemies, Hanson shows how the moral confidence with which these generals imbued their troops may have been as significant as any military strategy they utilized. Theban general Epaminondas marched an army of farmers two hundred miles to defeat their Spartan overlords and forever change the complexion of Ancient Greece. William Tecumseh Sherman led his motley army across the South, ravaging the landscape and demoralizing the citizens in the defense of right. And George S. Patton commanded the recently formed Third Army against the German forces in the West, nearly completing the task before his superiors called a halt. Intelligent and dramatic, The Soul of Battle is narrative history at it?s best and a work of great moral conviction.

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