American Samurai: Myth and Imagination in the Conduct of Battle in the First Marine Division 1941-1951 [Paperback]

Craig M. Cameron (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 25, 2002

Events on the battlefields of the Pacific War were not only outgrowths of technology and tactics, but also products of cultural myth and imagination. American Samurai offers a bold and innovative approach to military history by linking combat activity to cultural images. Marines projected ideas and assumptions about themselves and their enemy onto people and events throughout the war--giving life to formerly abstract myths and ideas and molding their behavior to expectations. This fascinating book concludes by considering what happened to the myths and images and how they have been preserved in American society to the present.

Editorial Reviews

From Kirkus Reviews

In a revision of his 1990 doctoral dissertation, Cameron (History/Old Dominion Univ.) attempts to anatomize the esprit of the 1st Division of the US Marine Corps on the basis of its performance during WW II and after. In aid of his implicitly pejorative inquiry, the author addresses ways in which ``historically invisible'' cultural beliefs, perceptions, traditions, and other band-of-brothers bonds related to the actual conduct of battle. After sketching in the limited pre-Pearl Harbor role played by the publicity-mined USMC in the American military, Cameron critiques its training regimens, frequently comparing them to those employed by the Waffen SS or other killer elites. Getting down to cases, the author offers anecdotal accounts (drawn largely from contemporary sources) of how shared ideology, myths, and self-images affected the 1st Division's campaigns against Japanese troops in the Pacific theater (Guadalcanal, Peleliu, Okinawa) and their subsequent clashes with other Asiatic adversaries in China and Korea. Among other things, Cameron concludes that Marines not only demonized but denigrated their foes, frequently on racial grounds; and that they were encouraged further to consider themselves far superior to their counterparts in other branches of the armed services. Exactly what point the author's arguable findings have, though, is unclear. To illustrate, he implies without stating that the USMC's methods of preparing for and engaging in warfare were deplorable and need to be understood if they are to be set right (albeit in undisclosed fashion). The actual result if our armed forces were to modify the ways they ready themselves to fight remains another story--one Cameron avoids altogether. In brief, then, an academic's examination of a presumptive pathology, which will strike many readers as rotten to the Corps. (Photos, line drawings, and maps.) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

"...an interesting, readable, well-researched examination of the First Marine Division..." Teaching History

"Well researched and well written, the book is well worth reading." Choice

"Craig Cameron offers the most careful, complex, and critical study yet of the relationship between imagination and conduct for America's World War II soldiers. Deftly combining older and newer historical methods, and avoiding the jargon and myopia of both, Cameron creates a sensitive, often chilling portrait of how soldiers are prepared for war, changed by it, and encouraged to remember it." Michael S. Sherry, Northwestern University

"This is a stimulating pursuit of accepted aspects of the Corps usually not delved into. I recommend it." Richmond Times-Dispatch

"[Cameron's] effort to subject to analysis what has often been passed over is worth reading, certainly for anyone who has ever wondered about the sources of unit cohesion and combat motivation." Marine Corps Gazette

"Cameron's book makes the reader think about the acts of war and military institutions in an entirely new light. The great effort of the past half-century to look on soldiers as social beings has been brought down to earth. The hoary art of battle description has been provided with a new hand-maiden. And those who, like the author of this review, spend their days examining the dry bones of doctrine and tactics, are forced, if only for a few hours, to confront the horrible truth that wars are fought by human beings." Bruce I. Gudmundson, Journal of Military History

"Cameron has created a superb portrait of how soldiers are prepared for war, changed by it, and encouraged to remember. Combining the best of historical methods, boys classic documentary research and newer statistical models, he manages to avoid the blind spots and propaganda, and to seek a unique social psychological analysis of the transformation of young men into soldiers and then battle-hardened soldiers into patriotic veterans. Highly recommended." Reader's Review

"...sophisticated and fascinating...Cameron's anaysis of the multiple uses and meanings of gender in this war is perhaps the best part of an exceptionally good book." Beth Bailey, American Historical Review

"...an insightful and provocative study of the role cultural myths and images play in the construction of an American warrior elite....Cameron's book is a good example of how a sensitive historian can shape a revealing cultural history from military sources. He raises timely questions about the ownership of memory and about the ongoing clash between liberal and conservative narratives of World War II, now read through the filter of the Vietnam experience." Edward T. Linenthal, Journal of American History

"Only the most disinterested reader will fail to be challenged by American Samurai. For this reason alone, Cameron is to be commended and, one hopes, widely read." Social History

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 316 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (July 25, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521525926
• ISBN-13: 978-0521525923
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,640,873 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What War Makes, October 20, 2011

By 

Bryan Gibby (Madrid, Spain) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: American Samurai: Myth and Imagination in the Conduct of Battle in the First Marine Division 1941-1951 (Hardcover)

Cameron's analysis of the making of the Marine Corps and its WWII operations (as relating to the 1st Marine Division) is an exceptional reading experience. This book is not for everyone - contrary to an endorsement on the back cover, there is plenty of jargon embedded here and some made-up words. This is probably where the "ivory tower" criticism comes from. But, once the reader gets past the introduction, which establishes the theoretical foundation for the book, the issues that Cameron raises and the methodology he uses to deconstruct the making of fighting men are quite fascinating. War is not a gentle enterprise and it should be expected that nations and military institutions will do whatever they think necessary to train and indoctrinate their young men (and women) to risk their own lives and take those of the enemy. How the USMC did this in the years between WWI and WWII, and sustained their own unique myth and ethos is an important story.

Cameron does give justice to the fighting environment of the Pacific theater and the qualities and tenacity of the Japanese; factors which did and should have conditioned the mentality of the Marines fighting there. Cameron openly discusses tactical blunders (Col. Puller's insistance on frontal assaults as a measure of manliness) and the Marine's general tolerance of high casualties. This is an ethos born from the myth that Marines are "the first to fight," etc. Some will disagree with the conclusions and methods employed (the author freely makes much of and extrapolates freely from literary fiction written by veterans after the war) and the cutting comments about Marine operations and fighting skill are certain to hit a sensitive mark. Nonetheless, American Samurai is a book worth reading and considering for how one American military institution crafted its fighting prowess and sustained it over several years in one of the most hellish envirnoments imaginable and against a formidable and skilled opponent.

19 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Its about time, June 12, 2000

By 

Mark "markyy3" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: American Samurai: Myth and Imagination in the Conduct of Battle in the First Marine Division 1941-1951 (Hardcover)

Finally someone has the guts to admit what actually occured in the Pacific war in WW@. Both my uncles were Marines involved in the battles of Peleliu, Okinawa and Tarawa, and their experiences are mirrored exactly in this book. It was almost a ritual for the Marines, once after killing Japanese soldiers, to harvest various body parts, including teeth, ears, and even cutting off the heads and boiling the flesh off dead Japanese soldiers and sending them back to families in the states to use as cigarette trays! My uncles were taught from the first day of boot camp that the Japanese weren't even human and deserved such treatment. I congratulate the author for being brave enought to withstand the obvious charges of "revisionism" and "political correctness" that his book would elicit.

15 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars American Samurai : Myth and Imagination in the Conduct of Battle in the First Marine Division 1941-1951, September 5, 2005

By 

Nick M. - See all my reviews

This review is from: American Samurai: Myth and Imagination in the Conduct of Battle in the First Marine Division 1941-1951 (Paperback)

While the author uses complex and delineated occurances in military history, his opinion openly and incorrectly bears his philosophical presuppositions on war and the nature of fighting war. It is evident that the author is a social commentator on the subject and not an actual participant in said events. The fact of the matter is that war by its very nature and existance is a brutal and vile scourge on humanity. I understand this all to well. What belies opinions and books like this is a false belief that superior knoweledge of anti-war will stop them (future wars) from happening. How can this explain the religious fanaticim exemplified in the mideast under the auspicious of an Islamic Jiad. No, there is no war that is clean and antiseptic. You cannot with any intelligence send men or women into combat without preparing them fro the stark realities of it. The better prepared an individual is ensures an improved chance for survival. If I had to go back into a combat situation I would gladly take any Marine over this author or any one else with an hallucination of reality. Seemingly intelligent and opinionated people which espouse the "Athinean, right never has to fight" view (to the Spartan world) should always preface their books and opinions with the caveat that they have never had to do "dirty work" in the real world. Remember, it was men like Chamberlin that cost the world over 60 million dead.