Toll leaves little to the imagination as he continues, again with colorful coverage of the attacks on the Philippines, and a discussion of General MacArthur’s staff reactions who were “effectively paralyzed.” (pg. These detailed paragraphs continue through the following pages and chapters.

The reaction in Washington is described, highlighting the confusion we all have come to know. xxix-xxxi) was certainly remembered by Japanese Navy crews as carrier torpedo and bomber aircraft devastated Pearl Harbor.īy 1914, the U.S recognition of the potential of the Japanese as a rising power led to War Plan Orange becoming a part of the studies on the gamming floor at the Naval War College in Newport, RI (xxxiii)Ĭhapter One covers the attacks on Hawaii with eye witness realism - not just smoke and flames, but believable and uncomfortable scenes of the aftermath. At the same time the treatment of the Japanese emigrants following the San Francisco earthquake in 1906 (pp. On the other side of the Pacific, the overwhelming victory at Tsushima in 1905 gave the Japanese international recognition. As Mahan remarked: “.more of my works have been done in Japan than into any other one tongue.”(xix) As the 20 th Century arrived the United States was beginning to realize that it did have two coasts, in part due to the Spanish American War, and the deeds of Teddy Roosevelt including the Great White Fleet. The lengthy prologue weaves Mahan and The Influence of Sea Power Upon History smoothly into the back ground, focusing on its impact on the thinking of Japan. Toll pulls it all together with logic and vivid word pictures of the action. And the more recent books, as Japanese records became available, Shattered Sword, The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway Jonathan Parshall and Andrew Tully, (2005), and even more recently A Dawn Like Thunder, (2008), by Robert A.

Then, Mitsuo Fuchida’s Midway: The Battle That Doomed Japan (1955). (Volumes were taken on several cruises leaving dog-eared dust jackets.) Walter Karig, USNR, and, of course, Samuel Eliot Morison’s History of the United States Naval Operations in World War II. This reviewer, having started – you can guess the dates, with the original printing of Guadalcanal Diary (1943) by Richard Tregaskis, and proceeding through Tarawa, The story of a Battle, Robert Sherrod (1944), all World War II volumes of Battle Report, Capt. The continued series of books that cover the Pacific War, most centered on Midway, is somewhat amazing. Richard Gentz, USN (Ret.)ĭo not expect an objective review to follow! I was an immediate fan of Ian Toll when I found his first book Six Frigates in a gift shop on the Newport, Rhode Island waterfront. Norton Company, New York, London, (2011).

Six frigates by ian w toll