Here we start Morison's account of the Mediterranean theater, one of the more overlooked of the war, at least so long as we're counting places Americans served.
This chapter seemed somewhat disordered, which isn't surprising, as it was drawing from three different books in the original, including all of Operations in North African Waters, which I remember as one of the more interesting books in the series. I also don't love the amount of time spent discussing allied strategy, and the (probably related) short shrift given to what may have been the only naval battle Morison himself witnessed. As a describer of strategy, Morison is not particularly brilliant, and I really wish we'd gotten more detail on the actual landings.
But he goes a long way to redeem himself at Sicily (helped by the fact that the account is quite a bit longer), where I really enjoyed the combination of "introduction to WWII amphibious operations" and the anecdotes about the landings (featuring my own hometown 45th Infantry Division). In particular, the callout to the landing craft crews felt appropriate, although he didn't mention that many of those were crewed by the Coast Guard.
The inclusion of a lot of the Battle of the Atlantic stuff was is particularly weird, and is making me wonder about the way this was written. There's no particular reason that the stuff here shouldn't have been in Chapter 5 except for length, and it was really weird to switch from amphibious operations to convoy battles and then back to amphibious warfare. My only real guess is that Morison was trying to keep the chapter lengths roughly equal, and couldn't afford to make Chapter 5 any longer than it already was. While that's handy for what we're doing, I think it makes the book weaker overall. Particularly weird is that the submarine campaign against Japan ended up shoehorned into the Philippines chapter.
A couple of other notes: first, the LCVPs were wood, not steel, and that's another error on the list of "that should have been easy for a competent proofreader to catch", and we see him again diving into politics c.1963 with the discussion on "Unconditional Surrender", although that one has aged better than most of the other examples we've seen, given that it's still live today. (I think he has the right of it, as the Japanese were proposing terms that amounted to "we're going to do this again in 10-20 years" right up until the end. But that's an issue for a later chapter.)
Comments
In a later chapter Morison strongly implies He Was There for some surface action or other in the Pacific. (I forget right now why I thought that, I'll try and make note when I go back to stay current with the Club). And while he's not coy about pointing out "You Humble &c was Here" in this chapter, it is still blink-and-miss.
The whole tone of the book, that it was obviously written by a Real Human With Real Opinions (And Boy Are You Gonna Hear Them) is refreshing compared to more modern styles. Occasionally like a bucket of cold water to the face is refreshing, admittedly. He Does Not Like Monty And Wants To Make Sure We All Know Why That Is.
And, since TOW is the current volume of the series of naval-focused histories of WWI and WWII I've been reading for over a year, and you can't read any of those without seeing the name of Mahan...
I've come to the conclusion that Mahan was (and is) not merely overrated; but is basically only viable/applicable to the US and/or UK because of the unique geographical circumstances of each. And it's because of different reasons for each.
OTOH, Mahan ought to be applicable to Japan (IJN certainly seems to have framed everything in Mahanian language). But at the same time, I feel like their adventures in China are completely against the Spirit of Mahan...
It was one of the ones in the upper Solomons, which he mentions in Chapter 9. I just am writing these as I read, and had forgotten that. I think I checked his wiki article, which is surprisingly quiet about his war service, and took a chance.
That's a good way of putting it, and it's a lot of what makes him good as literature. I do wish he'd tone down the applicability a bit, but that's sort of a different thing.
Re China, it's worth pointing out that that was the Army's decision, not the Navy's.
Ian Argent:
Very much so, in many ways Japan was a second England, at a time when such things were being demoted in the international system.
Slicing up the anti-submarine warfare between different chapters is weird, yes. Then again, topical coverage and then jumping back years to another topic has its own problems for getting the reader to understand.
I thought you'd be more sympathetic to "Allied strategy should have been different, but Churchill and Monty."
"the Mediterranean theater, one of the more overlooked of the war, at least so long as we’re counting places Americans served."
Surely this is at least the third-most looked at part of the war for Americans? In the superficial American overview, Patton and Monty in Western Europe take first place with the sea war against Japan second, and the Mediterranean serves as prologue to the first with shared main characters (Patton coming to Africa after Monty had to fight Rommel without American intervention). Unless you just meant the naval ops?
It's not that I'm not sympathetic to that. But if I wanted that, I'd go read a specific book on it. I'm here for "Morison does literature about naval battles", and he's cutting the space for that to talk about strategy.
So to some extent, yes, but that's because there were only three that saw any real action, and the Med is definitely at the bottom. I was thinking somewhat more broadly, where, for instance, the US in North Africa gets less attention than the Eastern Front. The new intro for Operations In North African Waters was IIRC pretty grim on sourcing. Besides An Army At Dawn, which is admittedly very good and has raised the profile of the campaign quite a bit, there just wasn't much 10 years ago, and I don't think things are that much better today. As an example, I have maybe half a dozen books on the entire naval war in the Med (including the entirely British bits), and I buy most any that I run across. I have about the same number of books about Leyte Gulf, and there's probably as many more that I know about but don't have.
I might describe the "Dark Valley Time" of Japan as a time when there are basically 3 "Japans" The civilian one, which is dominated by the IJA and IJN (the other two "Japans", with the IJA as the senior)
I find it very interesting that FDR is deified and Churchill is demonized in the middle of the chapter.
There's a few places where Morrison is VERY complimentary to the US Navy where it appears that its undeserved.
Finally, he's VERY critical of the USAAC pretty much everywhere its mentioned, with no effort to explain why the USAAC did what it did. At the time he's writing this, there's been plenty of time to find out what actually happened and include it. I understand the need for brevity, but there's a lot going on here that Morison ignores.
Belushi TD
Belushi TD
Is there a way to delete duplicated posts?
This is certainly NOT the first time I've had this problem.
Belushi TD
Belushi TD:
Just wait and all but one will magically disappear.
@Bean Look into Vincent P O'Hara, he has written a number of books about the naval war in the Med during WWII.
Also the ship histories of HMS Renown, HMS Faulknor and to a lesser degree HMS Warspite add additional first hand views to the naval war in the Med.
@Chantry
His books are about half the ones I was thinking of. As I said, doesn't get a lot of attention relative to other stuff.
March 27, 2026 @Bean
The Mediterranean gets more attention that Burma, which was an important front.
And the South West Pacific campaign under MacArthur don't seem to get a lot of attention either.
Of course it could be I'm a bit odd...
There's a reason I put "where Americans fought" in the intro, and Burma was one of the places I was thinking of. Some of it depends on level of generality we work at, but I agree that a lot of SWPAC gets ignored, too.
It's not a Chapter 8 comment, specifically, but I wanted to thank @bean for the online book club. I haven't opened my copy of TTOW for years, but it has been fun reading it again.
In how many other dry narratives would you find a passage like this from Chapter 8:
I can't think of many other times I have laughed out loud while reading a history, as if he were P.G. Wodehouse, not an "Eminent Historian." Ha ha and strong work, Morison. He must have been quite a character, riding his horse into Harvard every day.
So thanks again, Bean!
It's not a Chapter 8 comment, specifically, but I wanted to thank @bean for the online book club. I haven't opened my copy of TTOW for years, but it has been fun reading it again.
In how many other dry narratives would you find a passage like this from Chapter 8:
I can't think of many other times I have laughed out loud while reading a history, as if he were P.G. Wodehouse, not an "Eminent Historian." Ha ha and strong work, Morison. He must have been quite a character, riding his horse into Harvard every day.
So thanks again, Bean!