Volume 15, Number 2, Spring Edition …

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Churchill’s Mavericks: Plotting Hitler’s Defeat     Written by: Giles Milton John Murray Publishing, 2016,  ISBN 9781444798951, 356pp, Reviewed by: Lieutenant Colonel Matt Patching The use of sabotage in war is often something westerners associate with the enemy: dirty tricks that are outside the rules of ‘gentlemanly’ warfare. That was certainly the view of the British polity in the late 1930s. Despite this view, a small and carefully selected group of men and women …

War, Strategy and History. Essays in honour of Professor Robert O’Neill   Edited by: Daniel Marston and Tamara Leahy,  ANU Press, 2016,  ISBN: 9781760460235, 312 pp, Reviewed by: Lieutenant Colonel Mark O’Neill War, Strategy and History is an apt title for this Festschrift honouring the influential career of soldier, strategist and historian, Professor Robert (‘Bob’) O’Neill. From Intelligence Officer of the 5th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (5 RAR) in South Vietnam in 1966–67; to involvement with …

Margins of Victory   Written by: Douglas Macgregor Macgregor, D (2016) Margin of Victory , Annapolis: Naval Institute Press ISBN: 9781682476901, Reviewed by: Major Mick Cook, Army Headquarters A battle can determine the outcome of a war. The outcome of a battle can be determined by decisions made decades earlier. The reform program that Sir Richard Haldane began to impose on the British Army in 1905 enabled it to hold the line at the Battle of Mons in 1914. General Kazushige Ugaki was able to implement a …

The Battle of Long Tan: Australia’s four hours of hell in Vietnam   Written by: David W. Cameron Penguin Random House Australia, 2017, 392pp, Reviewed by: Major Lindsay Amner Military history is generally written by the winners. If the losers write their version of history, they will generally add a bit of glory to their actions so they appear glorious losers rather than just losers. But whichever side writes the history, it is generally told from only one side, from the cultural perspective of the writer. …

The Australian Imperial Force   Written by: Jean Bou & Peter Dennis Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2016 ISBN: 978-0195576801, 320 pp, Reviewed by: William Westerman This is the final volume of a five-book history of Australia in the Great War published by Oxford University Press during the war’s centenary years. Previous volumes have explored the war against the Germans, the war against the Ottomans, the war in the air and the home front. This book completes the picture, doing away with battle …

Command Culture: Officer Education in the U.S. Army and the German Armed Forces, 1901-1940, and the Consequences for World War II     Written by: Jörg Muth University of North Texas Press, Denton, 2013,  ISBN: 978-1574415339, 376 pp,   Reviewed by: Captain Dale O’Shannessy The quality and performance of military forces throughout history is often founded foremost on a compelling narrative. Narratives about naturally-gifted soldiers and officers, who possess superhuman courage, what historian Michael Howard …

In peace, the function of tactical air support of land operations is apt to fade, but in war its urgency will increase. 1 - Field Marshal Viscount Slim Abstract Any history of the campaign in Burma highlights the vital importance of air power to the eventual victory over the Japanese by the 14th Army. The purpose of the paper is to explore how the Allies achieved air-land integration (ALI) during the Burma campaign during the Second World War. The key research question was to establish why ALI was so …

Abstract ‘Sua Tela Tonanti’ is the motto of the Royal Australian Army Ordnance Corps (RAAOC), which is translated as ‘To the Warrior his Arms’. This task has increased in difficulty over time. The growing sophistication of Army platforms, the higher tempo of Army operations, and the high diversity of Army operational locations has greatly complicated the task of bringing the warrior their arms. Thus, Army logisticians currently face considerable difficulties in decision-making. These primarily stem from …

Abstract In 2006 the Government of the United States of America lodged a reservation against the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR (2005)) that effectively nullified certain provisions with respect to the operations of USA Armed Forces. The aim of the IHR (2005) is to detect, prevent and control public health events of international concern; it does not contain provisions that explicitly relate to the militaries of States Parties. While public health …