Rick Atkinson's "The Day of Battle", his detailed account of the Sicilian and Italian campaigns of 1943-44. Less humor than his "An Army at Dawn" and much more critical of the upper command levels' carelessness with the lives of their troops. Author seems to feel that the blunders of the North African campaign were perhaps understandable due to the inexperience of all command levels as well as at the small unit levels. By the time of the Italian campaign, begun more than a year after the Torch landings, many of the worst commanders had been replaced. The commanders in the Italian campaign should have known better the tactical difficulties entailed by modern mobile industrialized warfare against their veteran German opponents and so should have made fewer foolish unrealistic plans than they did. In their defense, they needed a lot more air and artillery than they had available.
The author relies a good deal on the men's letters home to give a grunts-eye view of the day to day. They were written by the officers and men engaged in the battles on which he reports.
The author relies a good deal on the men's letters home to give a grunts-eye view of the day to day. They were written by the officers and men engaged in the battles on which he reports.
Statistics: Posted by JPM — Sun Sep 01, 2024 3:41 pm — Replies 8066 — Views 1824841