John Chambers’ wide-ranging scholarship, which includes studies of the Progressive era, the peace movement, United States foreign relations, conscientious objectors, the Army Corps of Engineers, the draft—and, most recently, the Office of Strategic Services—has attracted a diverse set of students and admirers. This volume, focusing on the Second World War, brings together essays from many of those whom John has mentored and befriended over the years. To varying degrees, each contributor’s interests—and, therefore, the work that follows—have been shaped by our relationship with John Chambers and by our study of his eclectic, approachable, and penetrating scholarship....

In early June 1941, the former Republican presidential candidate and exgovernor of Kansas Alfred M. (“Alf”) Landon received a confidential communication from his erstwhile running mate, Frank M. Knox. At that time Secretary of the Navy in the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Knox wrote of his recent meeting with John G. Winant, the U.S. ambassador to England, “who gave me the very latest news of the situation in London. Frankly and confidentially, the situation is that we must get in or see England go down with Hitler dominating the world.” Knox pleaded with his old friend to “subordinate...

Admiral Yamamoto knew that the Empire’s future rested on the opening battle of the war. His task force had to sail undetected over a vast sea and destroy the enemy fleet in port. If his ships were detected or if the enemy set a trap, all would be lost. A smashing victory in the war’s early hours could lead to a negotiated settlement but not victory because the enemy possessed a true two-ocean navy and Japan’s European ally had not proven that it could prevent the redeployment of this second mighty armada. Compared with its opponent, whose people numbered more...

History has not been kind to the World War II propaganda initiatives of the U.S. government. The work of the Office of War Information (OWI)—the best known and most influential of the wartime propaganda agencies—has received very little acclaim indeed (nostalgic appreciation for the iconic images of Rosie the Riveter and The Four Freedoms notwithstanding). During the war, the OWI provoked howls of protest, mostly from conservative critics, who complained about incompetence, waste, and liberal bias. In subsequent years, historians have redirected those criticisms, but not the overall judgment, in characterizing the organization as mismanaged and ineffective.¹ Overall,...

In June 1943, the Senate Committee on Military Affairs held hearings to examine several proposals to increase the allotment paid to enlisted men’s families.¹ Although the legislation’s intent was to soothe soldiers’ worries about the welfare of dependent wives, children, siblings, and parents, Senator Edwin C. Johnson (D–Colorado) urged Army administrators present at the hearings to use this opportunity to address “the problem of immoral women marrying soldiers.” General Miller G. White, Assistant Chief of Staff, Army Personnel, dodged the issue by charging that any policy designed to punish unfaithful wives might unfairly penalize innocent women, because charges of...

Thirty years after World War II, General Isaac D. White, the highly respected former commander of the U.S. Army’s 2nd Armored Division, was asked to write the introduction toSherman: A History of the American Medium Tank, the seminal work on the most famous American tank of all time. Contrary to what would be expected from a reminiscing former general writing on what was one of the primary instruments of his military success, White pulled no punches and scathingly disparaged the tank. “To those of us who pitted our out-gunned Sherman against German armor,” he wrote in 1978, “the book...

Historians have devoted considerable attention to the planning and execution of Operation Neptune/Overlord, the Allied cross-channel invasion in June 1944. Although numerous books and articles have been written about the experience of Allied navies off Normandy on D-Day, naval gunfire support for the American beaches, code-named Utah and Omaha, deserves further examination, especially with regard to the experience of Allied warships in the Mediterranean theater during the years prior to June 6, 1944. For, as Captain Roger Hill, Royal Navy, has written in his memoirs of the war, “The invasion was the culmination of all the developments, inventions, organization and...

As the twentieth century came to a close, Americans displayed an increasing interest in the history of the Second World War. Anniversary ceremonies commemorating D-Day in 1994 and V-E Day in 1995 garnered extensive national coverage on all major television networks. Hollywood produced scores of new movies with World War II themes that were box office successes and often achieved significant critical acclaim. The works of Stephen E. Ambrose and other historians of the Second World War found their way onto the bestseller list. There was also a pronounced interest in listening to the voices of the World War II...

The United States Coast Guard, which can trace its founding to 1790, is the nation’s oldest continuous maritime service. The Coast Guard and its predecessors have participated in every war since 1790, including the wars against Saddam Hussein. Yet in 2003, the Coast Guard came under attack by the secretary of defense. AWashington Postarticle appearing on August 31, 2003, claimed, “Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has all but decided to remove the U.S. Coast Guard from participation in future wars, a prospect that is devastating morale in the maritime service because of its pride at having taken part...

Journalist Tom Brokaw has dubbed the citizen soldiers who endured the Great Depression, won the “good war,” and reformed postwar America, the “greatest generation.” Both in wartime and in peace, the greatest generation championed liberty, democracy, and progress—at home and abroad. Even though Brokaw stresses the courage, heroism, and sacrifice of the uniformed citizen soldier, he also celebrates civilian contributions to the greatest generation’s project of economic recovery, war, and social reform. The greatest generation thesis, though deeply flawed, provides a useful approach to the discussion of World War II pacifism and pacifists.³

Less known and uncelebrated, tens of...

An article published in a leading Japanese newspaper reported that John Dower’s prize-winning book Embracing Defeat became “must reading” among high-ranking officials in the White House just before the outbreak of the Iraq War in early 2003. Dower’s book is a grand narrative of the American occupation of Japan (1945–1951), historically rated as a highly successful model of “democratization from above.” That is to say, the American occupation of Japan succeeded in transforming a semi-feudal, authoritarian society into a modern democracy in a relatively short period. It is understandable that officials in charge of policy toward Iraq would eagerly...

For more than 60 years, Americans have showed remarkable ambiguity concerning the use of the atomic bomb during World War II. In the immediate postwar years, there emerged triumphal narratives, which maintained that the atomic attack on Japan ended the ferocious war and saved numerous American lives that would have been lost in the event of a U.S. invasion. Although a majority of Americans accepted this discourse, concerned minorities expressed grave antagonism and publicly criticized the use of atomic weapons as a moral wrong and a strategic mistake. Later, during the 1960s, diplomatic historians challenged the mainstream narrative through their...