Book Review - Mastering the Art of Command

Admiral Chester W. Nimitz and Victory in the Pacific

by Trent Hone

Naval Institute Press, 2022, 430 pp

Hardcover ISBN: 9781682475959

Reviewed by: Jordan Beavis

In Mastering the Art of Command, noted US naval historian Trent Hone investigates the leadership of Admiral Chester W Nimitz as Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC) and Commander in Chief of the Pacific Ocean Areas (CINCPOA) during the Second World War. Both as a personality and as a fleet commander, Nimitz has already been the topic of significant study by Pacific War and naval historians, and depicted on the big screen by Henry Fonda (Midway, 1976) and Woody Harrelson (Midway, 2019). Hone, however, re-examines previously well-trodden ground to demonstrate how Nimitz’s leadership fostered the creation of a staff and organisation that ‘blunted Imperial Japanese offensives, seized the initiative in the Pacific, and rapidly brought war to the shores of Japan’.^[1] He concludes that Nimitz’s accomplishments as CINCPAC and CINCPOA suggest how, in a top-down way, military organisations can ‘adapt, reorient, and reconfigure themselves to achieve greater effectiveness’.^[2]

Mastering the Art of Command comprises an introduction, a conclusion, and 10 chapters informally separated into three main sections. Following a comprehensive introduction (which prepares the ground for Hone’s study and introduces the reader to key aspects of organisational theory against which Nimitz’s leadership is assessed) the first three chapters examine the period December 1941 to June 1942. After being selected for the role of CINCPAC by US President Franklin D Roosevelt and Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox, Nimitz worked to restore the morale and confidence of the Pacific Fleet staff, many of whom were in a state of shock following the Pearl Harbor attack and successive defeats on land.^[3] Leading through personal example, he aimed to inspire confidence and aggression in his subordinates’ plans. Nimitz emphasised that offensive operations were necessary to counterbalance the Imperial Japanese Navy, then ascendant throughout the Pacific. In these first, pressing months, he also began to lay the foundations for a staff, administrative and command organisation that would ensure ‘a consistent approach to capturing lessons, identifying improvements, and disseminating new doctrines’, thereby enhancing the Pacific Fleet’s combat strength.^[4] 

Chapters 4, 5 and 6 explore the period July 1942 to October 1943, as the Allies secured the initiative in the Pacific following the Battle of Midway and the seesaw operations at Guadalcanal. Hone examines this high-tempo, high-stress period of command as Nimitz pushed his subordinates to accept reasonable risk through uncompromising joint operations, replacing commanders such as Vice Admiral Robert L Ghormley as Commander, South Pacific, and Rear Admiral Robert Alfred Theobald as Commander of the North Pacific Force (TF 8) when they failed to live up to his expectations.^[5] In this period, Nimitz emphasised decentralised and unified command approaches wherein ‘each of his subordinate commands would have a single officer in charge who would command all forces allocated to him, regardless of their nationality or service branch’. This philosophy came to fruition in mid-1942, corresponding with the gradual emergence of Allied superiority in materiel.^[6] Nimitz continued to modify his command and administrative structures throughout this period as his staff and subordinates introduced new tactics, planning procedures, doctrine, and shipboard organisational structures (the Combat Information Centre) in light of hard-won experience.^[7]

Hone’s final four chapters follow the course of the Central Pacific offensive from November 1943 to August 1945. By 1945, Nimitz and his staff had developed efficient operational planning processes which allowed them to develop and implement plans at a speed that defied the natural inertia generated by the overwhelming mass of Allied forces in the Pacific Area. Through leaps and bounds, and with an ever-more complicated logistics tail and manpower difficulties, Nimitz’s forces rapidly pushed through the Pacific to the very shores of Japan, isolating enemy strongpoints where possible and taking ground where necessary. As their operations became more cooperative, such as in the liberation of the Philippines, Hone compares Nimitz’s command structures to MacArthur’s, indicating a difference of inter-service cooperation philosophy between the two commanders. While Nimitz pushed his subordinates to establish joint commands at the lowest possible level to encourage inter-service cooperation, joint command in MacArthur’s headquarters existed only in his personage.^[8] Yet as the potential invasion of Japan loomed in late 1945, and with neither Nimitz nor MacArthur willing to subordinate themselves to the other for the operation, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) adopted MacArthur’s centralised command system, discarding Nimitz’s ‘integrated approach to joint command’ and effectively making the JCS the General Headquarters for the Pacific Theatre.^[9] Indeed, the supposed ‘joint’ planning between MacArthur and Nimitz in preparation for the invasion was fraught, as the two commanders failed to find common ground or subordinate their egos for the successful conduct of military operations. Such a command structure also meant delays in calls for inter-service support. In 1944 Admiral Raymond Spruance, as the Fifth Fleet commander, had exercised control over land-based aircraft and issued orders to them for support as required; by July 1945 Admiral ‘Bull’ Halsey had to request supporting strikes from land-based air commands through Nimitz and the Air Force commander, which, Hone notes, resulted in a ‘lengthy series of messages before any action was taken’.^[10]

On the whole, Hone has crafted a well-researched and incisive analysis of Nimitz’s abilities and practices as a leader and commander. This reviewer suspected a tendency for the author’s depiction of Nimitz to border on hagiography, with comparatively little space allocated to missteps or the perspectives of those outside of the Fleet Admiral’s admittedly long list of admirers. There are hints that not all of Nimitz’s subordinates agreed with his leadership style or command decisions—particularly in relation to Halsey at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, and in naval operations in support of MacArthur’s invasion of Leyte.^[11] Few, if any, individuals, especially military commanders operating in such high-stress and high-tempo environments, are universally beloved, and recognition of any such counter-perspectives (or even an acknowledgement that such perspectives were looked for but not identified) would have given the book a greater sense of balance.

In Mastering the Art of Command, Hone has crafted a well-researched and incisive analysis of Nimitz’s leadership methods. Hone is clear in his central thesis: Nimitz’s Pacific War career offers many lessons to modern military leaders in organisational management and leadership, especially for those considering substantial, integrated, geographically decentralised operations in a theatre such as the Pacific. Despite the naval focus of the book, many leaders within Army or Defence more broadly will find much to learn from Nimitz’s Second World War command experience, particularly in relation to influencing, energising and encouraging the best out of their team in high-pressure environments.

About the Reviewer

Dr Jordan Beavis is an Academic Research Officer at the Australian Army Research Centre, having formerly worked as a Researcher for the Australian War Memorial’s Official History of Australian Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. His research focuses on the militaries of the British Empire/Commonwealth in the interwar period (1919–1939), international engagement, professional military education, and mobilisation.

Endnotes