U.S. Naval Academy Class of 1957 Book Reviews

Class of 1957 Book Review Site. ©2007. To add a Book Review, or to comment on a book already in this listing, send your material or review to Sam Coulbourn at Persnav@shore.net. Photo at top of each page shows ENS Arleigh Burke beneath 14-inch gun aboard Battleship USS Arizona, 1923. Revised 27 March 2008.

Text Box: United States Naval Academy Class of 1957 Book Reviews

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Text Box: HISTORY A Short History of Nearly Everything By Bill Bryson, 2003. This is one of those books that should be read by everyone, and it should remain in their personal library. Making scientific discovery readable is a challenge for a writer: most scientists are encapsulated in their own arcane world and do not communicate well. Writers are mostly wordsmiths without a scientific bent or background. Bryson actually understands this "stuff", and can communicate it with a sense of humor that makes the failures, foibles, and occasional success stories of scientists interesting. (That he makes no serious attempt to discuss "String Theory" or “M-Theory" is gratifying because no reader would follow it anyway.) It is astonishing how many "facts" in science turn out not to be so, and indeed today's facts" are true only for today even "facts" that have unanimous current support. Until the 1970's there was no scientific recognition of plate tectonics, (although geologists working for oil companies knew it, oil geologists do not publish papers.) Similarly, the catastrophic demise of dinosaurs was not accepted until 1980. Neither plate tectonics nor catastrophic death of dinos may prove, eventually, to be true as we "know" today. Science is the ultimate dynamic. Reading of the personal foibles, intense personal jealousies, and downright bizarre behaviors of the brilliant scientists who have at least brought us to today's understanding is great reading and the "facts" as we now know them, are brilliantly described. Bryson can write and write with a British accent. Highly readable. A book that requires a new highlighter, and a patient spouse to whom you will read entire chapters, not just passages. HISTORY Falange: A History of Spanish Fascism By Stanley G. Payne, 1967 Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. 316 pp. Paperback. In the early 1930s there was a lot of apprehension in Spain about the rise of the proletariat and the threat of communism. José Antonio Primo de Rivera (1903-1936) was a young lawyer, son of a former dictator who seemed to have a lot of skill for organizing, and a dedicated zeal for building national syndicalism, or a rightist answer to organizing labor organizations, as opposed to the communist appeal for organizing labor. Author Payne, himself a distinguished historian of European fascism, and a conservative historian now retired, but attached to the University of Wisconsin, gives us a very detailed story of how José Antonio worked with leaders of various factions to develop a new Spanish fascist party. On July 17, 1936 troops in Spanish Morocco touched off a rebellion which grew quickly into the Spanish Civil War. The rebels were military people who were vaguely dissatisfied with their government, joined by the Carlists, an old right-wing organization that had the support of the Church, and many wealthy Spaniards. Primo de Rivera’s party1, a fairly small number of students and middle and working class workers who called themselves Falangists, and other groups of people who basically wanted to kill communists made up the Popular Front. At the time war broke out José was in prison, but Francisco Franco, an army general, picked up the leadership. The war began to fizzle shortly after it began, with victories only in two or so cities, and rebel troops dangerously short of ammunition. Franco quickly contacted Nazi German diplomats in Spain and soon Germany was supplying airplanes, trucks, tanks, ammunition and much more. The strong ties between the Falange and the Church distinguished it sharply from other European fascist organizations, especially after it joined forces with the Carlists, who were 1000% pro-church, ultra conservative. The government, supported by the left, approached the Soviet Union, and obtained armaments from them, so that the world began to see a sort of dress rehearsal for World War II—fascists vs. communists. José Antonio was killed by a firing squad in prison on November 20, 1936. Franco gradually changed nearly everything about the Falange that José Antonio had fought for, but still called this party Falange, and as the Civil War ended in April, 1939, Falange became the party of the state. Payne’s commentary about Franco is dismissive. Franco and his closest associates gutted the Falange of its “poetic” and its intellectual content, and Franco’s government throughout was aimed at protecting itself and perpetuating itself. Falange remained the party all during Franco’s rule, which ended with his death in 1975. The party exists in Spain even today, although it is no longer Partido del Estado. Payne’s history is very academic, loaded with details and names of Spaniards who may appear only once and never show up again. It lacks the flow of a good history for the less scholarly, and in some instances locks on phrases and assumes the reader understands them. For instance, José Antonio’s party was founded on syndicalism2, and it was devilishly hard to find out what this was really about. Thank goodness for Google. 1 Falange Española Independiente Frente de Estudiantes Sindicalistas Sindicato Español Universitario Juventudes Falangistas 2Syndicalism refers to a set of ideas, movements, and tendencies which share the avowed aim of transforming capitalist society through action by the working class on the industrial front. For syndicalists, labor unions are the potential means both of overcoming capitalism and of running society in the interests of the majority. Industry and government in a syndicalist society would be run by labor union federations. Review by Sam Coulbourn, September 2007. HISTORY Gulag, A History By Anne Applebaum, 2003 Ms Applebaum, a member of the editorial board of the Washington Post, won numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize, for this monumental work. She offers a sobering account of the Soviet Gulag ¾ labor camps that brought mass terror to real and alleged opponents of the Russian Revolution ¾ from their inception to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Ms. Applebaum uses memoirs published in the ‘80s and research from Soviet archives not available earlier to construct her history. She begins with an historical perspective of the Gulag before describing the arrest, imprisonment, and transportation of prisoners to the camps, and their life, work, punishment, and escape or death in the camps. Unlike the Holocaust, very little has been written on the Gulag, since, to quote Ms. Applebaum, “To condemn the Soviet Union too thoroughly would be to condemn a part of what some of the Western Left held dear as well.” The author includes a splendid analysis of why Hollywood and the mainstream media are loathe to provide the same accounting of Stalin’s crimes against humanity that they routinely provide to Hitler’s Nazism. This is a book of profound importance. Ms. Applebaum writes, “This book (Gulag) was not written ‘so that it will not happen again,’ as the cliché would have it. This book was written because it almost certainly will happen again. Totalitarian philosophies have had, and will continue to have, a profound appeal to many millions of people.” Anne Applebaum’s book testifies to this truth lest we forget, lest we forget. Review by Paul Roush. HISTORY Night By Elie Wiesel, 1972, New translation, 2006. A dramatic first hand account of what it was like to suffer in the concentration camps during WWII. Wiesel, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize brings home the cruelty of the Germans and what it would mean in the future if persecution is tolerated. HISTORY Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World By Margaret MacMillan. Foreword by Richard Holbrooke. 2003. New York: Random House. Trade paper. 570 pp. So many of the problems we have in the world can be traced back to the momentous Peace Conference in Paris in 1919. Whether we are talking about Japan, Israel, Iraq, Kosovo, Serbia, Poland, Russia, Europe, Africa— this conference got into it. Hitler blamed this Peace Conference for Germany’s troubles, and those troubles helped him to become Chancellor of Germany in 1933. This is the story of the elegant, elaborate peace conference hosted by the French, to settle the world after the turmoil of The Great War, which we now call World War I. The author, Margaret MacMillan, received her PhD from Oxford University and is a provost of Trinity College and Professor of History at the University of Toronto. She is the great-granddaughter of David Lloyd George. There were four key players at this conference: Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States, who came with a widely publicized “Fourteen Points”; David Lloyd George, Britain’s Prime Minister; Georges Clemenceau, Prime Minister of France; and finally, Vittorio Emanuele Orlando, Prime Minister of Italy. This conference attempted to restore boundaries to countries, and to create new boundaries of countries just being born, after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It created Yugoslavia from the stew of nationalities in the Balkans --- the Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, Montenegrans. It created Czechoslovakia. It brought Poland back into existence. It created Iraq and Lebanon, and gave Germany’s colonies away. In many ways, it created troubles that the world is having to deal with to this day. The Conference continued into 1920, but the principals left after settling with Germany – the main business of the conference. It’s a lively and intensely interesting book. Review by Sam Coulbourn, December 2007 HISTORY Reagan’s War: The Epic Story of His Forty Year Struggle and Final Triumph Over Communism By Peter Schweizer, 2002.
This book is not intended as a complete history of the cold war. From the flyleaf: "it is the story of Ronald Reagan’s personal and political journey as an anti-communist,-- and his central role in winning the struggle for global dominance.” Schweizer brings to light dozens of previously unknown facts about the cold war, based on secret documents obtained from archives in Russia, Germany, Poland, Hungary and the U.S.
HISTORY The Dark Valley By Piers Brandon, 2000 This extraordinarily readable history is a panorama of the 1930's, the decade in which all of us were born. Available in paperback, it has five stars on Amazon.com. The problem with most light journalistic style accounts such as Shirer's Decline and Fall of the Third Reich or some popular Civil War books is that they view events through hindsight as if everything were an inevitable march toward the known conclusion. Good history like this lets the perceptive reader find alternative courses as events unfold. There are also hundreds of fascinating but forgotten facts. The Great Depression scarred so deeply that the Royal Navy even had a mutiny. Olympics prior to Germany's familiar 1936 production were big track meets with speeches and the Nazis were the first to make them a political showcase, changing Berlin from a drab, undistinguished city. They built an exact replica of the difficult equestrian cross-country course a safe distance away where the German equestrian team practiced for 18 months, duly winning the Gold in Berlin. (I'm sure this sort of thing is happening now in China.) The head of the German general staff reviewed the Italian armed forces in 1938 and told an aide, "The winner of the next war will be whoever has Italy as an enemy." HISTORY The Boxer Rebellion: The Dramatic Story of China’s War on Foreigners That Shook the World in the summer of 1900 By Diana Preston, 2000. China at the start of the year 1900 was in danger of being carved up into spheres of influence for western nations. Just like Africa, western nations and even Japan looked at China as a nation of backward people who could be exploited. For over a century, western missionaries had been operating there, converting Chinese to Christianity. In Peking (now called Beijing) eleven nations maintained diplomatic legations, all closely clustered in one district. Eighty miles to the east, and near the coast, lay Tientsin (now called Tianjin), another enclave of westerners. The Manchus, from Manchuria, ruled the country; the leader was a 65-year-old Empress Dowager, Tzu Hsi, a woman of unimaginable sexual appetites and political ambition, who had been on the throne for nearly 40 years. Tzu Hsi and other highly placed Chinese had long been uneasy with the growing western influence, and with the thousands of Chinese who were being converted to the religion of the west. At about this time an obscure peasant movement began in the north of the country, called I Ho Tuan, or Boxers United in Righteousness. This was translated “Boxers” because of the physical exercises they practiced. Its formation was influenced by two earlier organizations. One was a group of vigilantes, made up of land owners, farmers and peasants with property; another was a group of poor men from Shantung province called the Spirit Boxers. They set up public boxing rounds and indulged in mass spirit possession. It didn’t take a lot of urging to get I Ho Tuan stirred up with anger at foreigners. Foreigners had brought the telegraph and the railroad to China, both which caused Chinese to lose jobs. It was widely rumored that Christian missionaries were cutting out orphan children’s hearts and eyes to make medicine. The frenzy began to build rapidly, and resulted in attacks on Chinese Christians nation wide, and then attacks on western missionaries, and then business people and diplomats. Ms. Preston tells the story of the siege in Peking, as well as Tientsin, and how westerners, and Russians and Japanese lived during some two months it lasted, and how they fought to lift it. It is a story of heroism and brilliance, of sloth, laziness, cowardliness, as well as incredible brutality and cruelty, with the spotlight always on the small groups of westerners huddled under constant attack in both cities. The author draws heavily upon some delightful journals and diaries to tell this story, mostly from American and British sources. The rebellion ends with many westerners still alive, but all over the west, the image of “The Yellow Peril” is very persistent. The events of the summer of 1900 brought on the end of the Manchu rule; but they affect China today, and doubtless they affect those nations who were represented there. Review by Sam Coulbourn
HISTORY The Epic of New York City (A narrative History) By Edward Robb Ellis, 1966. A very well written, lively history of NYC (as well as the development of our country). Ellis breaks this 600 page work into short vivid chapters describing what happened behind the scenes as the Big Apple became the center of World Commerce.

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