"All the Genera´s Men: Lessons from Pershing's..." Topic

… SUBORDINATES IN THE AMERICAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCES

"After three years of neutrality, the United States declared war on Germany in April 1917. That neutrality and President Woodrow Wilson's policy that—in the words of retired Brig. Gen. Robert Doughty in his foreword to Pershing's Lieutenants—prevented "US Army officers from making even limited preparations for such a war" would see the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) enter the war dangerously unprepared. With a force, in 1917, of just over three hundred thousand, the AEF was essentially grown overnight, reaching just over 3,700,000 personnel by the end of 1918, over half of which were in Europe.

Given that context, what was the value of American military leadership during the First World War? Can anything be learned from the actions and decisions of AEF leaders? Those questions are at the heart of the new book edited by David Zabecki and Douglas Mastriano.

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Amicalement
Armand

The GOs of that conflict are the most completely forgotten set of senior leaders in American military history. Any halfway literate person can tell you who Phil Sheridan or George Patton were, but how many people have ever even heard of CP Summerall or Hunter Liggett?

Agree!….

Amicalement
Armand

Most in the USA, below, say 50(?) wouldn't recognize any of those Generals' names regardless. Most of the USA is very ignorant of our own history, etc.

And it won't get any better by tearing down statues and renaming high schools, etc. Seems those in leadership positions don't seem to care either …

"Outcome-based education."

It's not a byproduct; it's the goal.

You are sadly correct.

General Doughty, who wrote the introduction, is a genuine old-school, follow-and-analyze-the-evidence historian, from the days when the West Point history faculty was a genuinely impressive crew (and almost entirely military). He was one of the people (if not the person) who got the old West Point atlases reprinted after the secondhand price skyrocketed. If he wrote the intro, that's a recommendation in itself.

BTW, if you can find a copy, a book worth having on the American experience in WWI is "A Soldier's War," by MG Joseph Patch, who served in the First Division until he was wounded at Soissons (his brother Alexander commanded the 7th Army in WWII – Patch Barracks in Germany was named for him). Patch was a battalion commander, and there is a great deal in the book about Summerall and Sibert (whose relief by Pershing he thought unjustified). He was an Old Army guy, and had been with the division since it's formation, so he knew almost everyone. There is a picture in the back of a small reunion of First Division officers from 1925, including Summerall and a young Theodore Roosevelt, Junior. Interspersed throughout the book are wonderful cartoons, done by some talented young trooper, not in the Bill Mauldin or Bruce Bairnsfather style, but something more like the American magazines of the time.

I don't think it had a large run- my copy was a gift, special edition from a family member, but it's richly illustrated and touches on everything from organization and uniforms to individual reminiscences from other division vets.

Good to know ! Thanks !

Thanks!.

Amicalement
Armand