[.ca] Commander in Chief: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, His ... (ISBN 1591144558)

Well Researched and Highly Regarded:
This masterpiece book provides an excellent introduction to the top American military commanders, including the commander in chief, and the great work they did during World War Two. As a military enthusiast I found this to be one of the most well researched and informative books on America's involvement in World War Two. It won awards for historical scholarship, both for military history and regular history, such as the Francis Parkman Prize given by the American Historican Society for the most outstanding work of history in a given year. This book is required reading for officers, ,military historians and casual readers interested in the war. You will not find a better one-volume book on the American commanders. Roosevelt and the American commanders emerged as the most important leaders for the Allies, which is not to suggest that other players were not important and excellent; they were. At first Churchill was the most important player for the Allies - a fine job he did - and the British military leaders were the veterans, while the Americans were still inexperienced and ill-prepared. However, Roosevelt and the American commanders soon earned the command of the Allied war strategy and execution. What is so remarkable about Roosevelt is that he was magnificent at picking the right people for the right positions. Read the book and you will know what I mean. A great example is admiral Ernest King, a tough, demanding and resourceful leader. Roosevelt elevated him to commander of the United States Navy shortly after the Pearl Harbor attack, and King proved to be the ideal man at the right time. King was, afterall, the first aviator to obtain command of the navy, and carrier warfare would emerge as the key to naval warfare during the conflict. King was a great hero and should receive more recognition for his work. Another great leader, well known in the military community but less known to the general public, is George Marshall. He was essentially the commander of the United States military leading up to the war, and he maintained his position as chief of staff during the war (and later Truman's Secretary of State). His work was superb and, no doubt, ranks him among the greatest American leaders ever - maybe of the war. Read about it in the book. Many expected that Marshall would be given command of the D-Day invasion (and all it's glory), but when Roosevelt leaned towards Eisenhower (the ideal choice) and asked Marshall for his advice, leaving the door open for Marshall to lobby FDR, Marshall dutifully told Roosevelt that he should do only what he thought was best for the country. Roosevelt then moved immediately to appoint Eisenhower. The information on Eisenhower is even better. Read about it in the book. One last thought. Roosevelt was simply superb as commander in chief. He played a very important role in setting the correct war strategy and balanced the political forces. For example, he ordered the invasion of North Africa over initial objections from his commanders who wanted to concentrate only on an invasion of occupied France. Attacking North Africa turned out to be a brilliant move. For the first time the American people feel like they were actively involved in the war. Roosevelt was correct to assert that it would be a bad decision to wait years to fight the Germans. The invasion also gave the military invaluable experience managing a military invasion and essential combat experience - they previously had none. Overall, Roosevelt made all the right moves and surprisingly few mistakes; far fewer than any other world power. Despite being an active leader, Roosevelt's other strength was that he delegated to his excellent commanders and let them do their work freely. Here is a quote from Admiral King: "Churchill, fancying himself as a great strategist, and being so powerful personally, ruled his Chiefs of Staff with an iron hand, forcing them at all times to compliance with the policy as he and the War Cabinet laid it down... Roosevelt, on the other hand, trusted his Chiefs of Staff and thus gave them much more personal authority and immeasurably more freedom of action and of speech than was enjoyed by their British opposite numbers." We all know about the enormous blunders that Hitler made as the dictator general, overruling his generals. He caused Germany to lose the war. Roosevelt, on the other hand, was sublime. My last thought is directed towards the reviewer who clearly is trying to slander Roosevelt by denouncing this excellent, scholarly and highly regarded book. To say that this exceptional book is bad history to attack Roosevelt is simply outrageous. For the record, nobody with any serious military education believes the charge that Roosevelt knew about the Pearl Harbor attack. He did not. A book came out a few years ago completely lying about several key pieces of evidence, after most of the people originally involved and could speak out were dead. The book blatently misrepresented the MAGIC projects, such as stating that certain messages were encoded by the Japanese in the diplomatic code when they were in fact CLEARLY coded in the naval code, which had not been broken yet. The Pearl Harbor commission concluded years ago that nobody knew about he Pearl Harbor attack, and EVERY reputable World War Two historian and book agrees. I know. I've almost read them all!

Commander in Chief:
This is one of the most useful and well written books that I have read on World War II. Larrabee discusses in depth some of the leading American commanders, including: Nimitz, Eisenhower, Lemay, MacArthur, King, Marshall, and Stilwell. His discussion of Vandegrift included a lengthy discussion of Chesty Puller and his exploits on Guadalcanal. Obviously, any discussion of Chesty Puller can be extremely humorous, but Larrabee's anecdotes left me in stitches. I have also read a review on this site alleging that Franklin Roosevelt was aware of the pending attack on Pearl Harbor. The reviewer alleges that based upon the correspondence between the German foreign minister and the Japanese government should have made Roosevelt aware of the attack. My only response is that if German participation was a foregone conclusion, then why did Germany wait until December 11th to declare war? This is an extemely useful overview of the American leaders and the strategy that they employed in World War II. It should be required reading by any American history class studying the 20th century.