STRATEGY AND COMPROMISE

With eleven volumes of his mammoth History of the United States Naval Operations in World War II published, and a twelfth underway, Morison is certainly in a position to speak authoritatively on America's strategy in World War II. The material in this brief book falls into two parts:- the war in Europe and the war in the Pacific. In the first case, America's contribution to the strategy of the European theatre was largely compromise. The publication of Bryant's The Turn of the Tide doubtless precipitated some of the almost violent statements of difference of viewpoint, opinion and procedure from that indicated by Alan Brooke, and the revelation of steps by which compromises were reached makes revealing and enlightening reading. The decision to beat Hitler first was never disputed; but the threat posed by the Pearl Harbor defeat and its aftermath necessitated our deflecting material Alan Brooke and others demanded from the European theatre. Disagreements and compromise were the pattern of strategic planning for the African campaign, the Italian campaign, the invasion of France and the Operation Dragoon (Southern France) which went, directly counter to Churchill's wishes. Morison feels this was not the blunder Hanson Baldwin, considered it, but acknowledges that political considerations impinged on military.... The War in the Pacific was virtually all ours, though the British fleet took part in the final operations. Our compromises, strategically speaking, were between McArthur and the Navy's plans. Pearl Harbor upset our first calculations and forced us into a defensive war, strategy of weakness, but with our comeback, and finally with the atomic bomb, the war was won. The alliance between Great Britain and the US must survive.