Another Sino-Japanese War in the offing?

For some time now I have been trying to call attention to the increasingly dangerous situation in the East China Sea, where Japan and China are snapping and growling at each other over a tiny set of islands.

The disputed islands, called Senkaku by the Japanese, Diaoyu by Communist China, and Tiaoyutai by Nationalist China (Taiwan). Source: Wikipedia.

These islands, called Senkaku by the Japanese, Daioyu by the Chinese Communists, and Tiaoyutai by the Nationalist Chinese on Taiwan, appear to have little or no strategic value. There has been speculation that the islands may sit atop significant mineral resources, but that has not been substantiated. Yet the islands have sparked naval incursions, fighter scrambles, and increasingly belligerent language, especially from China.

What is going on?

In an article titled "Someone Just Said Something About The Japan-China Conflict That Scared The Crap Out Of Everyone" Henry Blodget of Business Insider gives a chilling explanation in the form of a comment made at a reception at the 2014 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland:

One of the guests, an influential Chinese professional, talked about the simmering conflict between China and Japan over a group of tiny islands in the Pacific.
China and Japan, you may recall, each claim ownership of these islands, which are little more than a handful of uninhabited rocks between Japan and Taiwan. Recently, the Japan-China tension around the islands has increased, and has led many analysts, including Ian Bremmer of the Eurasia Group, to worry aloud about the potential for a military conflict.
The Chinese professional at dinner last night did not seem so much worried about a military conflict as convinced that one was inevitable. And not because of any strategic value of the islands themselves (they're basically worthless), but because China and Japan increasingly hate each other.
The Chinese professional mentioned the islands in the context of the recent visit by Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo. The Yasukuni Shrine is a Shinto shrine where Japanese killed in Japan's many military conflicts over the centuries are memorialized — including the Japanese leaders responsible for the attacks and atrocities Japan perpetrated in World War 2. A modern-day Japanese leader visiting the Yasukuni Shrine is highly controversial, because it is viewed by Japan's former (and current) enemies as an act of honoring war criminals.
That's certainly the way the Chinese professional at the dinner viewed it.
He used the words "honoring war criminals," to describe Abe's visit to the shrine. And, with contained but obvious anger, he declared this decision "crazy."
He then explained that the general sense in China is that China and Japan have never really settled their World War 2 conflict. Japan and America settled their conflict, he explained, and as a result, the fighting stopped. But China and Japan have never really put the war behind them.
The Chinese professional acknowledged that if China asserted control over the disputed islands by attacking Japan, America would have to stand with Japan. And he acknowledged that China did not want to provoke America.
But then he said that many in China believe that China can accomplish its goals — smacking down Japan, demonstrating its military superiority in the region, and establishing full control over the symbolic islands — with a surgical invasion.
In other words, by sending troops onto the islands and planting the flag.
The Chinese professional suggested that this limited strike could be effected without provoking a broader conflict. The strike would have great symbolic value, demonstrating to China, Japan, and the rest of the world who was boss. But it would not be so egregious a move that it would force America and Japan to respond militarily and thus lead to a major war.
Well, when the Chinese professional finished speaking, there was stunned silence around the table.

The technical term for this Chinese professional is "idiot." And he was called out on it:

The assembled CEOs, investors, executives, and journalists stared quietly at the Chinese professional. Then one of them, a businessman, reached for the microphone.
"Do you realize that this is absolutely crazy?" the businessman asked.
"Do you realize that this is how wars start?"
"Do you realize that those islands are worthless pieces of rock... and you're seriously suggesting that they're worth provoking a global military conflict over?"
The Chinese professional said that, yes, he realized that. But then, with conviction that further startled everyone, he said that the islands' value was symbolic and that their symbolism was extremely important.
Challenged again, the Chinese professional distanced himself from his earlier remarks, saying that he might be "sensationalizing" the issue and that he, personally, was not in favor of a war with Japan. But he still seemed certain that one was deserved.

Interesting word choice, "deserved." Not sure if it was Blodget's or the Chinese professional's. Even less sure what it means.

But his thinking is idiotic, to put it mildly. Let's assume that China does pull off this "surgical invasion," that they land troops on the islands, plant their flag, and then leave.

What happens after that?

I'll tell you what happens: Japan lands their own troops on the islands, removes the Chinese flag, and plants their own.

And we're back at Square One -- except the precedent of use of military force to assert sovereignty over the islands will have been set. And you will have the stupidly named People's Liberation Army Navy (though some reports have said the Chinese have finally realized the stupidity of the name and changed it to the "People's Liberation Navy") and the awkwardly named Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force ("Imperial Japanese Navy" or Nihon Teikoku Kaigun, regardless of the bad history, is actually far cooler) will be hanging around the islands.

And when was the last time Chinese and Japanese forces hung around each other peacefully? May I suggest 1937?

Which brings me to an interview Gideon Rachman of the Financial Times had with Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. Rachman tweeted that Abe told him "China and Japan now are in a 'similar situation' to UK and Germany before 1914."

That's not actually true. A far better analogy would be US and Japan before 1937, but obviously Abe can't say that, as it would be admitting the Japanese were the bad guys in World War II.

But a 1937 analogy very much is true. In 1937 Imperial Japanese Army troops of the Kwantung Army stationed in Japanese-occupied Manchuria were across the Marco Polo Bridge from Nationalist Chinese troops on the other side. As usual, Imperial Japan was doing some katana-rattling in the form of maneuvers. On the night of July 7, 1937, during these nighttime maneuvers, someone opened fire. To this day no one is sure who -- arrogant Japanese, panicked Chinese nationalists, or devious Chinese communists hoping to provoke their two foes into fighting each other. Whatever the party, it was the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War, a war that exposed the sheer barbarism and brutality of the Imperial Japanese Army soldier in such incidents as the Rape of Nanking. It was during this time that Japanese navy bombers attacked and sank the US gunboat Panay in the Yangtze upriver from Nanking. The attack was unintentional inasmuch as the navy pilots and their commanding officers did not know they were attacking an American target -- they had apparently been deceived by the army into making the attack. Only a quick apology and some dollar-and-yen diplomacy averted a US-Japan war in 1937.

Now, like 1937, we have an aggressive fascist power in the Chinese Communists (who are communist in name only these days). We have an arrogant leadership, this time in the Chinese Communists, with a sense of entitlement and a basket full of grievances, both real and imagined. We have in the Chinese a country that has taken to bullying its neighbors. Remember that these islands are by no means the only ones China is trying to gain by intimidation. The Spratlys come to mind.

And, now, we have an admission that the Chinese, like the Japanese before World War II, are not basing their actions on a rational assessment of self-interest but on emotion and ego. This idea of a "surgical invasion" that supposedly would not provoke a response is a classic self-delusion.

And wars based on national emotion and national ego are often the most intractable, the most devastating of wars. See World War II in Europe and the Second Punic War for examples.

Hang on. This is going to be a bumpy ride.

Mohenjo BOOM-o?

I'm a big fan of the mysterious Indus River Valley ancient civilization of Pakistan. The Indus Valley has given us the two creepy cities known as Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, very cities that look like ancient versions of the suburbs of Communist Bucharest. Boring, generic buildings: no art; defensive citadels dominating the residential centers; even a statutette of a sneering "king." Very little is known about them, as their writing as yet tobe deciphered and there are few accounts of their contemporaries that deal with them. No one knows how they started or ended, in part becaue very few bodies have been found among the ruins of Mohenjo-daro:

[I]n contrast to the well-appointed houses and clean streets, the uppermost levels at Mohenjo Daro contained squalid makeshift dwellings, a careless intermingling of residential and industrial activity and, most significantly, a series of more than 40 sprawled skeletons lying scattered in streets and houses. Paul Bahn (2002) describes the scene: In a room with a public well in one area of the city were found the skeletons of two individuals who appeared desperately to have been using their last scraps of energy to crawl up the stair leading from the room to the street; the tumbled remains of two others lay nearby. Elsewhere in the area the ‘strangely contorted’ and incomplete remains of nine individuals were found, possibly thrown into a rough pit. In a lane between two houses in another area, another six skeletons were loosely covered with earth. Numerous other skeletons were found within layers of rubble, ash and debris, or lying in streets in contorted positions that suggested the agonies of violent death.

For that reason, many archaeologists have concluded that these people violently in a futile effort to defend the city. Except ...

There was no evidence that the skeletons belonged to ‘defenders of the city’ as no weapons were found and the skeletons contained no evidence of violent injuries.

So ...

An alternative theory was put forward that the city suffered extensive flooding and that people died off as a result of water-borne diseases such as cholera. Recent investigations revealed considerable evidence of flooding at Mohenjo Daro in the form of many layers of silty clay. The Indus River was prone to change its course and through the centuries moved gradually eastward, leading periodically to flooding within the bounds of the city. [...] The conclusion that many mainstream archaeologists now make is that the ‘massacre’ victims from Mohenjo Daro were simply the victims of the natural tragedy of fatal disease rather than that of human aggression. But this conclusion also has many holes – why did the remains of individuals appear in contorted positions, almost frozen at the very moment of death? Why did they appear to have been struck down suddenly? Surely if they died of disease their bodies would have been buried and not found scattered around the city?

So, now what?

There exist a growing number of ‘alternative archaeologists’ and researchers who have not settled for theories that do not satisfactorily explain the conditions of the skeletal remains and who have sought other explanations. One such individual is David Davenport, British Indian researcher, who spent 12 years studying ancient Hindu scripts and evidence at the site where the great city once stood. In his book Atomic Destruction in 2000 B.C. he reveals some startling findings: the objects found at the site appeared to be fused, glassified by a heat as high as 1500°C, followed by a sudden cooling. Within the city itself there appeared to be an ‘epicentre’ about 50 yards wide within which everything was crystallized, fused or melted, and sixty yards from the center the bricks are melted on one side indicating a blast. A. Gorbovsky in his book Riddles of Ancient History, reported the discovery of at least one human skeleton in the area with a level of radioactivity approximately 50 times greater than it should have been due to natural radiation. Davenport claimed that what was found at Mohenjo Daro corresponded exactly to what was seen at Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Davenport's theory was met with intense interest from the scientific community. Nationally known expert William Sturm said: “the melting of bricks at Mohenjo Daro could not have been caused by a normal fire”, while Professor Antonio Castellani, a space engineer in Rome said: “it's possible that what happened at Mohenjo Daro was not a natural phenomenon”. Since there is no indication of a volcanic eruption at Mohenjo-Daro, one answer that has been put forward is that the ancient city might have been irradiated by an atomic blast. If true, it would be impossible to ignore the conclusion that ancient civilization possessed high technology.

Yikes! The folks at Ancient Origins think the theory bears some examination:

If Mohanjo Daro was destroyed by a nuclear catastrophe, who created the weapons and how? If not, then what was it that produced enough heat to vitrify rock and bricks? What could explain the high degree of radioactive traces in the skeletons? How did all of them die, in one instant? We believe it is time to stop accepting the sanitized view of the world provided to us by mainstream science and to begin digging a little deeper.

Pearl Harbor and the Fiddler Crab Flu

In case you have been wondering where I have been for the past month, it has been crazy. In mid-November, Rising Sun, Falling Skies was due to the printer, so we had to make the final edits to the text and finish up the maps. We got it turned in on time, and the book is on schedule for its March 2014 release. Just as I turned that in, I got what I think was the flu. Since nowadays every strain of influenza has to be named after an animal, I'm calling it the Fiddler Crab Flu. Because why not? It rendered me literally unable to get out of bed for an entire weekend, then left me with among other things, a shattering cough that destroyed my voice and my ability to sleep. I am still not quite recovered from that. On top of all this, my laptop, from which I do most of my blogging, is dying. It's only ten years old. So I've been struggling to get anything posted. So if some of this post seems a bit dated, you know why.

In the interim we have had, inter alia the anniversary of both the disappearance of Flight 19 in the Atlantic off the Florida coast in 1945 and, obviously, the Pearl Harbor anniversary. The December 7 edition of "Civil Discourse Now" discussed Pearl Harbor, with me as a guest. You can listen to the podcast -- and my shattered voice -- here. In my Veterans Day Post, I shared a picture of the attack by the Japanese Kido Butai on Pearl Harbor. I want to show that picture again, because I want to point out an often overlooked detail.

Look at the far right at the very edge of the picture. Maybe about 40% of the way up. You should see what looks like something poking its nose into the picture. Entering it at maybe a 45-60-degree angle from the horizontal.

We talk about the USS Arizona and her horrific destruction when her forward magazines exploded. And she gets most of the attention. What is often lost in the equation is the sinking of the battleship USS Oklahoma. Disemboweled by Japanese aerial torpedo hits, she capsized and sank into the mud at Pearl Harbor. For her crew trapped below decks almost upside down, it must have been horrific. Most died of suffocation before rescue crews could cut their way through the hull to them.

That angled thing at the right edge of the picture is the mainmast of the Oklahoma in the midst of her capsize. It's one of the few images of any kind of her sinking.

Please do not forget her or her crew.

A big THANK YOU

To all of our veterans, who had to endure unspeakable horrors to protect and defend our freedom, our civilization, and our way of life.

The Pride of the American Side

Yesterday was the anniversary of the sinking of the ore carrier Edmund Fitzgerald in a storm on Lake Superior just short of Whitefish Point, Michigan, on the evening of February 10, 1975. The exact cause of the sinking is still unclear, but was most likely caused by the accidental grounding of the Fitzgerald (caused by the storm-related loss of her radars) on a poorly-charted reef, which caused her to ride lower in the water and leave her vulnerable to foundering under a series of rogue waves known as "The Three Sisters."

The Edmund Fitzgerald's skipper, Ernest McSorely, a 44-year veteran of the Great Lakes, was from Toledo, OH, which was also a frequent stop for the ship. Thus, her sinking was a big story there. My father covered it extensively when he worked for WTOL. They used the same stock picture of the Fitzgerald:

For little 4-year-old me at the time, this picture was both fascinating and frightening. That ominous-looking black crane in the background, apparently used to dispense coal and taconite, looked to this toddler like some sort of monster.

I guess it was best that I never saw this picture:

May Captain McSorely and his crew always be remembered.

A too-novel legal theory of self defense

Criminal defense lawyer Andrew Branca highlights this weird story from Colorado:

A Colorado judge denied immunity under the state’s “Make My Day” law to a woman charged with 1st degree murder. The defendant, Marla Abling, has been charged with first degree murder for the strangulation killing of her estranged boyfriend, Rory Alba.
The couple had a history of alleged domestic violence, and Abling had obtained a temporary restraining order that forbid Alba from going to Abling’s apartment. Despite this, Alba was in Abling’s apartment when she killed him.
Abling made a pre-trial motion for immunity from criminal prosecution under Colorado’s “Make-My-Day” law. In relevant part, §18-1-704.5 “Use of deadly physical force against an intruder” authorizes the use of deadly force, and provides both criminal and civil immunity for such use of force, even against a person who does not present an imminent threat of death or grave bodily harm if all of the following conditions are met:

(1) The person using the deadly defensive force is the occupant of a dwelling at the time, AND
(2) The person against whom the deadly defensive force is used has made an unlawful entry into the dwelling, AND
(3) The occupant has a reasonable belief that the other person has committed a crime in the dwelling (in addition to the uninvited entry) OR the other person is committing or intends to commit a crime (in addition to the uninvited entry) AND
(4) The occupant reasonably believes that such other person might use any physical force, no matter how slight, against any occupant.

Abling argued that she meets the conditions of the “Make-My-Day” law because (1) she was the occupant of the dwelling; (2) Alba’s entry into the dwelling was unlawful because of the presence of the temporary restraining order; (3) based on his prior conduct she had a reasonable belief that he intended to commit a crime in addition to the unlawful entry; and (4) for similar reasons she had a reasonable belief that he might use physical force against her.
Unfortunately for Abling, however, over the course of six days of testimony on the immunity motion, the prosecution presented evidence that convinced the judge that Abling’s conduct did not fall within the scope of the “Make-My-Day” statute.
There was evidence that Alba may have been invited to the apartment by Abling, rather than being an intruder. Phone records indicated ongoing and mutual communication between Alba and Abling, and the two had also been seeing together around town, despite the prohibitions against this by the restraining order.
Further, Alba’s keys were found hanging neatly on the key hook by the front door. It also appeared that Alba spent hours at the apartment with Abling before he was killed, and that the two may have engaged in consensual sex during that time. All of this seems behavior more consistent with that of an invited (and welcome) guest than of an unwanted intruder.
Most damning, however, was the prosecution witness that testified to overhearing Abling at a hair salon days before Alba’s death talking about ways to kill him. Oops.

You don't need a law degree to get to the logical heart of this self-defense claim, but Branca, a specialist in the law of self defense, gives it anyway, in the somewhat understated form for which we lawyers are generally known:

[W]hile I have seen a great many items used as defensive weapons in my years as a defensive trainer and in my legal work in the law of self-defense, the claimed necessity to kill an attacker by means of strangulation via electrical cord is certainly novel to my experience.

I wonder if Abling will next try the Chewbacca Defense.

Book review -- John Bell Hood: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of a Confederate General.

Sorry for the extremely light posting. Between work and final preparations for the book, I’ve had very little time for blogging, though if you follow my Twitter feed I’ve been fairly active over there.

But it has not stopped me from reading my usual dozen or so books at one time, so let’s do a book review.

My latest interesting read is John Bell Hood: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of a Confederate General, by Stephen M. “Sam” Hood, who is a distant relative of John Bell Hood.

John Bell Hood is a controversial figure in Civil War histories, generally seen as brave (he lost the use of one arm and one leg to battle wounds), but overly aggressive and rather stupid. He is most (in)famous for the ill-fated 1864 Nashville Campaign, in which he led the Confederate Army of Tennessee in an invasion of its namesake, with the operational objectives of liberation of the state and potentially driving up to the Ohio River, and the strategic objectives of forcing Union General William T. Sherman to abandon his march to the sea and move west to stop Hood.

It was a desperate move, but by this point in the war with the Mississippi, Chattanooga, and Atlanta now in Union hands, the Confederacy was well-past desperation.

Sherman did not move west. To stop Hood’s move, Union General George (“Rock of Chickamauga”) Thomas was collecting federal troops in a blocking position at Nashville, which had been held by the Union for 3 years and was heavily fortified. The trick was that those troops had to beat Hood’s army to Nashville.

For Union General John Schofield, this was kind of a problem, since his troops were directly in Hood’s line of march. That problem became a grave crisis on November 29, 1864, when Hood managed to outflank Schofield and get between the Union army and Nashville near Spring Hill. But through command and control problems and a poor deployment of the army, Hood’s troops did not block the road which Schofield was using to march to Nashville, and Schofield’s troops marched within a football field of Hood’s sleeping troops during the night and escaped. When Hood woke up the next morning, he went had breakfast with his senior generals at a mansion with the bizarre name of Rippavilla and supposedly threw a tantrum for the ages.

Schofield continued his flight northward towards Nashville, but was blocked by the flooded Harpeth River at the town of Franklin. As his forces repaired two damaged bridges and started his supply train across, his infantry and artillery were forced to deploy in defensive positions facing south. Sure enough, late that afternoon, Hood’s troops caught up with him.

The result was the Battle of Franklin, one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War and Hood’s most controversial action. With the fading light, Hood ordered a frontal assault, and the Confederate infantry charged over two miles of open ground with no artillery support against prepared Union positions with enfilading artillery coverage from an artillery position on the north side of the Harpeth called Fort Granger. It was a slaughter. The Confederates suffered 6,252 casualties, including 1,750 killed and 3,800 wounded. Fourteen Confederate generals (six killed or mortally wounded, seven wounded, and one captured) and 55 regimental commanders were casualties. Among the dead were “The Stonewall of the West” Patrick Cleburne and the talented States Rights Gist (yes, that was his real name).

As one might expect given that Sam Hood is a relative of John Bell Hood, John Bell Hood is a defense of the Confederate general. In fact, it is more of a defense than it is a history, and it, while it does present excerpts of many of the accusations against Hood,   assumes considerable knowledge on the part of the reader of both the Civil War and the conventional opinion of Hood’s actions.

One might say that at times Sam Hood tries too hard to defend the general. One of the generally accepted beliefs is that Confederate General Robert E. Lee had a low opinion of General Hood and was not happy at the prospect of his selection for commander of the Army of Tennessee to replace General Joseph Johnston (himself another controversial figure) during the Atlanta campaign. Sam Hood, who is honest in presenting contradictory evidence, gives Lee’s statements about John Bell Hood to Confederate President Jefferson Davis. First is this:

Telegram of today received. I regret the fact stated. It is a bad time to release the commander of an army situated as that of Tennessee,. We may lose Atlanta and the army too. Hood is a bold fighter. I am doubtful as to other qualities necessary. (Page 12.)

Lee would later elaborate:

I am distressed at the intelligence conveyed in your telegram of today. It is a grievous thing to change the commander of an army situated as that of the Tennessee. Still if necessary it ought to be done. I know nothing of the necessity. I had hoped Johnston was strong enough to deliver battle. We must risk much to save Alabama, Mobile and communications with the Trans Mississippi. It would be better to concentrate all of the cavalry in Mississippi and Tennessee on Sherman’s communications. If Johnston abandons Atlanta I suppose he will fall back on Augusta. This loses us Mississippi and communications with Trans Mississippi. We had better therefore hazard that communication to retain the country. Hood is a good fighter, very industrious on the battle field, careless off, and I have had no opportunity of judging his actions, when the whole responsibility rested upon him. I have a high opinion of his gallantry, earnestness and zeal. General (William) Hardee has more experience in man aging an army. (Pages 12-13.)

 Sam Hood’s conclusion:

In the morning, Lee had rejected not Hood, but rather the act of changing the Army of Tennessee’s command. However, later that same day, after considering the broad geopolitical and military consequences of losing Atlanta, Lee agreed that a change in commanders was necessary. Lee, upon further thought, seemed to endorse Hood, making five positive comments and one negative about his former subordinate. Lee […] noted only Hardee’s previous army management experience but had nothing else to say about him. […]

Lee’s cautious advice to Davis about one of his favorite former subordinates an hardly be taken as a rejection of the proposal to install Hood, although many authors and historians have stated that Lee advised against elevating Hood. The full text of Lee’s longer reply to Davis, rarely provided by authors, speaks for itself. (Page 13.)

Indeed it does, but it does not say what Sam Hood says it says. He calls Lee’s response “cautious” and says Lee “seemed to endorse Hood.” Really? Given that John Bell Hood was indeed one of Lee’s favorite subordinates, don’t you think he would have given a more glowing endorsement than this? If Lee was endorsing Hood, so you think he would have ever said “I am doubtful as to other qualities necessary?” Lee compliment’s Hood’s bravery and fighting ability, but little else. Lee’s statements read like specifically not endorsing Hood while not coming out and saying as much, so as not to be seen as betraying a friend.

For a second example, Sam Hood tries very, very hard to refute the charge that John Bell Hood accused his troops of cowardice, especially after the “affair” at Spring Hill. He does present the quote that is used to support the charge, which comes from John Bell Hood’s own memoirs Advance & Retreat. The quote is a full paragraph:

The best move of my career as a soldier, I was thus destined to behold come to naught.  The discovery that the Army, after a forward march of one hundred and eighty miles, was still, seemingly, unwilling to accept battle unless under the protection of breastworks, caused me to experience grave concern. In my inmost heart I questioned whether or not I would ever succeed in eradicating this evil. It seemed to me I had exhausted every means in the power of one man to remove this stumbling block to the Army of Tennessee. And I will here inquire, in vindication of its fair name, if any intelligent man of that Army supposes one moment that these same troops one year previous, would, even without orders to attack, have allowed the enemy to pass them as Rocky-faced Ridge, as he did at Spring Hill. (Page 214.)

 Sam Hood comments:

Nowhere do the words “fear,” “bravery,” “cowardice,” or “courage” appear in this or any other paragraph relating to this event. All Hood explained was his frustration at the army’s apparent unwillingness to accept battle unless from behind breastworks, which he believed was a “stumbling block” instilled by the tactics of the previous commander. (Page 214.)

A fair interpretation, but by no means the only one or, in my opinion and that of many other historians, the most likely one. For one thing, you do not need to use the words “fear,” “bravery,” “cowardice,” or “courage” to accuse someone of cowardice. Just call them “chicken.” Accusing someone of an “unwillingness to fight” someone unless behind breastworks can reasonably (and easily) be interpreted as cowardice. 

Such stretches are found throughout the book. But that is merely a minor note. Most of Sam Hood’s defenses of John Bell Hood are well reasoned, worthy of consideration, and in many cases persuasive. For instance, as ugly and perhaps Quixotic as the Nashville campaign was, it was done with the complete knowledge and support of Jefferson Davis. Far from keeping Richmond in the dark as to the desperate plight of his army, Hood kept them well informed. Hood also did try his best to take care of his troops, requesting reinforcements and supplies at every opportunity, only to be repeatedly turned down. Sam Hood presents John Bell’s Hood’s tactics as desperate but defensible, which is a reasonable position.

Sam Hood’s John Bell Hood is more case than history, and not always a convincing case, but it presents enough of a case to merit a re-examination of John Bell Hood. And it is a very enjoyable read. The publisher Savas Beatie has made a habit of making high-quality history books focusing on the United States. This is yet another. While not agreeing with all of Sam Hood’s conclusions, it is well worth it to buy John Bell Hood: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of a Confederate General and decide for yourself.