Two Book Reviews on Pacific Crucible

choi

Two book reviews on Ian W Toll, Pacific Crucible: War at sea in the Pacific, 1941-1942. Norton, 2011.

(1) Ronald Spector, When We Were the Underdog. Wall Street Journal, Nov 26, 2011.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB ... 24143531507710.html

The first two paragraphs:

"A common theme of many World War II books is that the United States was victorious because of its ability to out-produce and to a great extent out-invent its enemies. After all, only two years after Pearl Harbor, the United States was producing 89,000 aircraft a year, 40% more than the British and Germans combined. It built 29,000 tanks in 1943, almost twice as many as the Germans, and completed 369 major warships, over five times the combined total built in Britain, Germany and the Soviet Union. The country built close to 2,000 cargo ships in 1943, around 13 times the number lost to U-boats in that year.

"Contemplating these figures, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that the United States fought the first year of the war against Japan with inferior numbers of men, warships and planes—and often with inferior equipment and technology. Because of the need to keep substantial forces in the Atlantic, the U.S. Pacific Fleet was only barely equal to the Japanese navy even before the disaster at Pearl Harbor, which put most of the fleet's battleships out of action. In what turned out to be the critical category of aircraft carriers, the Japanese had 10 while U.S. had seven, and never more than three or four available in the Pacific in 1942.


Note:
(a) The book review said, "Japanese overran all of Burma, Thailand, Hong Kong, the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies and captured the American bases at Guam and Wake."

On the day Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, the former simultaneously assaulted Guam (captured hours later that day), Wake Island and Hong Kong--the last two fallen on Dec 23 and 25, 1941, respectively.
(b) Wake Island
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wake_Island
(located about two-thirds of the way from Honolulu to Guam [closer to guam]; named for Captain William Wake, master of the British trading schooner, Prince William Henry, who visited in 1796)
(c) Husband E Kimmel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Husband_E._Kimmel
(1882-1968; Commander in Chief of US Pacific Fleet: February to mid-December, 1941)
(d) Chester W Nimitz
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chester_Nimitz
(1885-1966; Ten days after the attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 he was selected Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Fleet)
(e)  Sadao ASADA  麻田 貞雄 (1936- ; 同志社大学名誉教授)


(2) Michael Beschloss, In the Air, on the Sea. New York Times, Nov 27, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/2 ... ll-book-review.html

Note:
(a) The first letter A (in "At times") in this review is missing.
(b) Benzedrine is a trademark of amphetamine.
(c) The "capsule" in "capsule portraiture" is an adjective (First Known Use 1938) that means:
"1: extremely brief
2: small and very compact"

In contrast, capsule as a noun has its First Known Use circa 1693.
www.m-w.com
(d) The "derange" in "deranged their plans" in a transitive verb (French déranger, from Old French desrengier, from des- de- + reng line, row)
that means "to disturb the operation or functions of."
(e) Victory over Japan Day
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_over_Japan_Day
(V-J Day; a name chosen for the day on which the Surrender of Japan occurred, effectively ending World War II;  the official US commemoration is September 2)
(f) The "shopworn" in shopworn tales" is an adjective that means
"1: faded, soiled, or otherwise impaired by remaining too long in a store
2: stale from excessive use or familiarity <shopworn clichés>"
(g) Public Record Office
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Record_Office
(of the United Kingdom is one of the three organisations that make up the National Archives (the others are the Historical Manuscripts Commission, and the Office of Public Sector Information))