Customer Reviews

An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942-1943, Volume One of the Liberation Trilogy

5 star:		(128)
4 star:		(38)
3 star:		(19)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I read the first two pages of the prologue to this hefty volume and I was HOOKED! Mr. Atkinson writes beautifully, sensitively, and fairly about this huge, complex historical era.

The first of a projected three volumes about the U.S. role in the World War II liberation of Europe, _An Army at Dawn_ deals with the North Africa campaign, which many general readers have tended to neglect in favor of Italy, Normandy, and beyond. Atkinson admirably addresses this problem.

Somehow, the author has found just the right mix of detail -- from personal notes out of soldiers' diaries and letters home, to the reparations paid to Algerians for traffic fatalities caused by Allies -- versus big picture aspects, from the British and American political maneuverings at Casablanca to the larger troop movements and battle strategy. I got a kick out of the references to GI passwords in various battles, jokes and ditties (although it's not clear whether Atkinson realizes the couplet quoted on p. 526 is from Spike Jones's wartime hit, "Der Fuehrer's Face"), as well as the graver tales of of triumph and tragedy.

Don't let the size of this tome intimidate you (541 pages of text, 83 pages of notes, 28 pages of bibliographical source listings) -- because the book reads smoothly and compulsively. And there are plenty of excellent maps sprinkled throughout the book, at just the right places.

The author does not spare us the details of Allied political and personal squabbles (particularly British condescension toward American battleworthiness and courage -- not altogether undeserved, but not fair, either), absurdities, and atrocities.

Hard core historians may quibble with some of Atkinson's judgments, or even his facts, but I can't imagine anyone writing a more excellent account for the general reader. General Fredendall is said to be "unencumbered by charisma." With excellent intelligence, Ike's team decided there would be no German offensive on the eve of Kasserine Pass, which was "measured, reasonable, and wrong."

Don't take my word for it: Read those first two pages, and I guarantee you'll want to read this book (and await the other two volumes breathlessly) too.

This book will be the definitive work, from the American point of view, on the war in North Africa, covering the period when the United States got involved (November 1942) up until the German surrender in Tunisia (May 1943). Mr. Atkinson effectively sets the stage by showing the sorry state the U.S. military had fallen into prior to the decision to invade North Africa. He points out that in September 1939, when Germany invaded Poland, the U.S. Army had ranked seventeenth in the world in size and combat power, just behind Romania. When 136 German divisions conquered Western Europe in the Spring of 1940, our War Department reported that we could only field five divisions! Mr. Atkinson writes, "Equipment and weaponry were pathetic. Soldiers trained with drainpipes for antitank guns, stovepipes for mortar tubes, and brooms for rifles...Only six medium tanks had been built in 1939.....This in part reflected an enduring loyalty to the horse...The Army's cavalry chief assured Congress in 1941 that four well-spaced horsemen could charge half a mile across an open field to destroy an enemy machine-gun nest without sustaining a scratch." This sort of information helps you to appreciate what had to be overcome in order for us to play our part in the expulsion of the Axis forces from North Africa! Mr. Atkinson doesn't fail to show us what other problems had to be overcome...Eisenhower having to learn "on the job" how to be Supreme Commander; having to build and then hold together the Allied coalition...this was very difficult, as many top men in the British military had nothing but disdain for Eisenhower's abilities and also for the abilities of the American troops (and many of the top American brass, such as Eisenower, Bradley and Patton were Anglophobic, so it worked both ways!); the administrative and logistical nightmares....the actual amphibious landings, getting supplies to the troops, coordinating the actions of the British and American forces, etc.; plus the number one problem of building an effective fighting force, made up of officers who hadn't been in battle since WWI (and that was a type of battle that had little relevance in the current situation!) and green troops that had never experienced combat. So, as Mr. Atkinson states, North Africa was the place where U.S. forces (and their superiors) learned to integrate and coordinate their actions both with themselves and with their Allies; and on a more basic level, where we learned how to hate and kill the enemy. North Africa prepared us for what we had to do later on in Italy and, of course, after June 6th, 1944. Mr. Atkinson is very evenhanded in his account. He doesn't hesitate to point out the mistakes made by both the British and the Americans. Eisenhower, Patton, Montgomery, Alexander, etc. all come in for their share of criticism as well as being praised, when praise it due. One thing that really surprised me was the sheer level of backbiting that went on...the nasty comments made by the British about the Americans, and vice-versa. The author is also very good at pointing out the numerous strategic and tactical errors made on the various battlefields. Mistakes were made by not only the top brass, but also by people in charge at lower levels. Very basic errors were made....such as not sending out reconnaisance units, initiating tank attacks without proper artillery or air support, etc. Many brave men were sent to their deaths in useless and ill-conceived actions. Sometimes just the sheer confusion of the battlefield was responsible, or just plain error....planes bombing their own men or artillery falling short, etc. Another area where Mr. Atkinson excels is in the "thumbnail" sketch of the numerous personalities that are integral to the story. The writing is sharp, witty and, quite often, eloquent. Here are just a few sentences concerning General Patton: "More than a quarter-century had gone by since his first intoxicating taste of battle and fame, during the Punitive Expedition to Mexico in 1916, when he had briefly become a national hero for killing three banditos and strapping their bodies to his automobile running boards like game trophies.....At the age of fifty, upon reading J.F.C. Fuller's classic 'Generalship: It's Diseases and Their Cures,' Patton had wept bitterly because eighty-nine of the one hundred great commanders profiled were younger than he. Now, when he was fifty-six, his hour had come round." Mr. Atkinson is also very good at describing the nuts and bolts of the various battles. The descriptions are clear, vivid and exciting. Some readers with a strong interest in the military aspects may be a bit disappointed in the maps. They are few and, barely, adequate. But this is a minor quibble. A more serious criticism might be that there is very little here concerning the view from the German and Italian side. But I don't think such criticism would be fair, because Mr. Atkinson's intent was never to show the war in North Africa from all points of view. He wanted to show the difficulties involved in the U.S. becoming an effective fighting force, the animosity that had to be overcome so that the Americans and British could start to form an effective alliance and, lastly, to set the stage for volume II of his "Liberation Trilogy"- the Allied invasion of Italy in 1943. He has accomplished what he set out to do, and he has done so brilliantly.

Rick Atkinson has been writing military history for about a decade now. He started with books on West Point (which covered Viet Nam rather thoroughly) and the Gulf War, and now he's turned his sights on World War II. He definitely has a modern appraisal of war: the one previous reviewer who complains about Atkinson not recounting any acts of "selfless heroism" by U.S. troops is basically correct. The difference is in focus, though, not that Atkinson doesn't want to portray American soldiers as brave. He doesn't recount any instances of selfless heroism on the part of Germans, Italians, or British soldiers either. To Atkinson, war is a nasty, merciless, vicious, bloody mess, where mistakes cost lives, and almost everyone makes these mistakes, at least starting out.

For one thing, while the book does concentrate a good deal on the front-line soldiers and their ordeals, it spends more time concentrating on the command structure of the U.S. Army, and its compatriots and opponents. While he doesn't name *every* regimental commander, he sure names a lot of them, and the division commanders in the American army at least are described in some detail. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., son of the first president Roosevelt and cousin of the second one, gets a wonderful portrait that makes you sympathize with him, and almost gives you the feeling you know him, though he died in 1944. The author's particular favorite among the generals (he's said this in an interview) is Terry de la Mesa Allen, the commander of the 1st Infantry Division (and Gen. Roosevelt's boss), but even he isn't spared when he makes an unwise attack and loses several hundred casualties.

There are things the book doesn't cover, that's true. It makes almost no mention of the technical difficulties American troops had when first confronting the Axis armies, and almost no mention of the inferiority of early equipment like the Stuart tank or early tank destroyers. When later equipment arrives (the M-10 Wolverine for instance) you only know it when the American army has some destroyed. Atkinson, however, is much more interested in the people, and especially the leaders, than he is in the gizmos.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It's not that long (less than 600 pages of text) and the narrative flows wonderfully. There are numerous anecdotes that are priceless: Italian soldiers surrendering carrying dirty pictures in their pockets along with the address of a cousin who lives in Detroit or Brooklyn, Patton complaining at Casablanca that the president's Secret Service agents all smelled of liquor, Ernest Harmon (the second commander of the 1st Armored Division in the campaign) is described as a cobra without the snake charmer. The narrative flow is wonderful, the maps illustrate the action well. The only quibble I did have was wondering which actions involving the British Army he was choosing to include, or exclude. Never could tell what his criteria was. That aside, and the note about the author not wanting to emphasize heroism, this is an extraordinary and compelling book, perhaps the best on World War II in a decade, perhaps even longer.

I've got a lot to do. Yet Mr. Atkinson has forced me to put my affairs on hold until I finish his 700 pages.

The United States could no more "decide" to field a professional, effective fighting force than a first grader could "decide" to be a college student. Arming a crowd is not all it takes to make an army. I was not aware what an important chapter North Africa was in the largest war the U.S. has ever fought. The description of our learning process is fascinating.
It's not a flaw that Mr. Atkinson has been mistaken for a journalist by the professional reviewers. As if the job of history requires a scholar. Critics tend to forget we are no longer in school. They've forgotten that a work can be entertaining without being fiction. Mr. Atkinson is a first-rate storyteller. I won't repeat what was covered in the excellent reviews by the professional critics. I agree. But I'm not concerned by what has been labeled "melodrama" or "journalism". Men were dying by 10 or 1,000 at a time. The British really did lose an empire that they had spent 350 years building, and became a second-tier power. The French were humilliated, occupied and never have learned to cope with it as a nation. The Germans were better soldiers, and the Itallians were not. Topology is certainly key, although I think Logistics is just as underated and unrecognised(I've got opinions, too). The description of what occured is well told and an important part of that conflict. I see parallels as we prepare to nationalize my brother's National Guard unit for this conflict today. I just bought him a copy of the book. I hope it gives him a perspective as his unit gears up to be shipped out.

This is a fine history of the US Army's campaign in North Africa. Rick Atkinson writes with great skill and this book is a pleasure to read. The US Army entered the campaign poorly trained, ill equipped, and in some cases poorly led, and the German Army made it pay dearly until incompetent officers were relieved and the combat units learned how to fight effectively against professionals. The author does not hold back and relates the bad with the good. I was disgusted with the "cover your butt" attitude that prevailed that got many good field commanders canned and incompetents rewarded. One can only wonder at the waste and stupidity that cost so many fine young Americans their lives. It was the battles fought in North Africa that trained the likes of Eisenhower, Bradley, and Patton, Clark, and others for the coming campaigns in Europe, and the lessons were expensive. The book covers all the major engagements with views from the command positions down to small unit actions in a lively manner. As the title indicates, "An Army at Dawn" was "An Army Just Waking Up"!
--Ken Smith ...

"An Army At Dawn" is some of the most exceptional, accessible World War II writing I have ever come across. In his Wall Street Journal review, the erudite Max Boot compares "An Army At Dawn" favorably to the legendary works of Cornelius Ryan ("A Bridge Too Far," "The Longest Day," "The Last Battle"). I heartily agree.

Rarely has a 530-page tome held me in thrall the way this book did. Rick Atkinson presents a brilliant account of the U.S. Army's baptism by fire on the shores, plains and mountains of North Africa in 1942-43 -- the campaign in which the commanders learned to command (or were relieved), the officers learned to lead, and the troops developed an impassioned enmity for the Axis enemy.

In many years of reading, I have found that journalists (like Cornelius Ryan) often make the best historical writers. Rick Atkinson -- a former Washington Post reporter/editor whose story-telling prowess was abundantly demonstrated in "The Long Gray Line" -- follows in that tradition.

Please do not be intimidated by the book's girth; even the World War II novice will find "An Army At Dawn" to be a fast-paced, engaging, often spellbinding narratve.

There can be no doubt that this book represents an impressive synthesis of its massive source material with flashes of stylistic brilliance glinting in the narrative, but, it is not so much history as historical journalism written with a pre-conceived point of view that can be found on p. 4 of the author's Prologue: "The brave and the virtuous appear throughout the North African campaign, to be sure, but so do the cowardly, the venal and the foolish." It is the latter group on which Atkinson dwells throughout this unremittingly grim account of the North African campaign. And when a would-be historian has an agenda, all bets are off.
The book's title suggests he's going to tell the story of the American army in its baptism of fire in the European theater. Fine, then tell the whole story. There is precious little information here about the combat training the participating divisions prior to deployment. There is zero info on their amphibious training, and TORCH was the largest amphibious assault ever attempted.
If the author is going to tell the reader how green the troops were, he needs to tell them why.
Intent upon stressing the horror of combat and ugliness of war, the author cannot bring himself to offer the reader countervailing views, such as the generosity and selfless heroism of the American GI.
As an example of this tunnel vision, we read on pp. 143-44 about 60th Infantry's attempt to take the Kasbah and the nearby lighthouse. We're told only that its commander, after meeting heavy resistance, ordered that objective bypassed. We're not told that two of LTC Dilley's men, LT Dushane and Cpl. Czar, did take the lighthouse after charging across barbed wire to, then bringing out enemy POWs. Or that, during the Kasbah attack, those same 2 heroes commandeered a damaged artillery piece and fired it at advancing French armor, Dushane being killed in the process. (Atkinson doesn't name the 60th's CO in his & does not put names to other such persons throughout his book.)
The author provides many quotes from Ernie Pyle, but you won't read the one from HERE IS YOUR WAR about GIs giving emaciated Arab children their rations, the only ones they had coming ashore, so that for days they had to eat oranges.
And while Atkinson cites numerous accounts from books and diaries written by commanders and troops, plus other official and unofficial sources, not once does he describe at length one act of selfless valor. And there were many. For instance, during the months of April and May 1943 alone, 10 Distinguished Service Crosses (2nd only to the Medal of Honor) and 100s of Silver Stars were awarded to officers and men engaged in combat during that period. After all, this would contradict his grim, negative thesis.
This is not to say that instances of cowardice, lousy leadership and command snafus weren't evident throughout the campaign, but it is meant to state that this author owes his readers a more balanced view than the one he delivers in this exercise in journalistic history.

This is a conventional and only partly successful history of the US Army in the North African campaign in WWII. Atkinson has done a great deal of research to assemble a generally well written and fairly thorough narrative of the campaign. In assembling the narrative, Atkinson has the advantage of a theme to unify his book; the inexperience and gradual maturation of the American Army. Atkinson describes well the general inexperience of the rapidly expanding American Army and how the Americans struggled when they experienced real combat conditions. After the short but violent conflict with the French during the invasions of Algeria and Morocco, the Americans and the British had to confront the Axis in Tunisia. The Axis forces were composed primarily of experienced German troops led by aggressive officers fighting on good defensive ground and under the overall command of one the very best theater commanders of the whole war, Field Marshal Kesselring. Not surprisingly, the inexperienced Americans did not do well, though neither did the British forces. Eventually, improving combat capacity and the sheer weight of resources led to a substantial Allied victory. Atkinson emphasizes other aspects aspects of the North African campaign; it was forging ground for Allied command structure and American-British cooperation. While long regarded as a sideshow, Atkinson argues (as have quite a few others) that the North African campaign was actually crucial to Allied success. For a more thorough and convincing discussion of this issue, see the work of Douglas Porch.

The defects of this book are several. It is not really a history of the campaign as a whole. To be a real campaign history, Atkinson would have to provide a good deal more information about the Germans and Italians. Not does Atkinson provide much information about crucial aspects of the campaign such as the air war, which clearly proved to be decisive, or naval features. He concentrates on the American Army but here the treatment is not entirely satisfactory. His approach is very much the usual "chaps and maps" approach. There is little description or analysis of the actual experience of campaign from the soldier's point of view. If the campaign did produce improvements in American combat capacity, how did this actually happen? Changes in tactical doctrine, training, equipment? Even at the "chaps and maps" aspects, this book has problems. Atkinson does relatively poorly in describing geography, usually a key feature in determining the character of battle. Finally, Atkinson is generally a good writer but he occasionally veers into unfortunate purple prose.

An Army at Dawn narrates the story of the North Africa campaign in World War Two. Although the work contains many themes present in earlier histories of this era, the author's combination of intriguing "bird's eye" anecdote with play-by-play strategic analysis holds the reader's attention. Some of the "stock debates" from this time period are presented once more--the British/American leadership tension, the preparedness/unpreparedness of the American military for a world war and the curious personalities, from Patton to Montgomery.

Yet the work does not feel like a rehash of other war stories.
Atkinson wisely realizes that he must do more than reach conclusions about the war--he must go further and give the reader a sense of place and time.

This book is a narrative entertainment rather than rigorous history, but for all that, it is sufficiently detailed and sufficiently interesting for either buff or novice. The book is both an easy read and intellectually satisfying--the type of non-fiction all too rare, particularly in this prolific genre.

I recommend this as a jaunty read about the onset of a tremendous war. I look forward to reading the remainder of the trilogy.

Atkinson does a dazzling job of exploring the early part of the American campaign in Europe. In November 1942, war in Europe was not an American experience and D-Day in France remained eighteen months away. The American army was untested against the Germans. Atkinson provides a rich, colorful - his use of the language and the local flora add a dimension that goes well beyond historic reporting - story of an army defining itself in battle. He is a lively writer, not a dry historian. He offers deep, personal glimpses, snippets of conversations, excerpts of letter home. And he teaches the reader.

Africa became a school for the Americans. Through a careful recount of the battle, from the November landings to the May triumph in Tunis, Atkinson shows that there were painful lessons to be learned:
1. The American army had been through lean years prior to the war. Few in numbers, ill equipped, poorly trained, the first U.S. forces to fight the Germans came mentally unprepared and, too often, naïve and overconfident.
2. American military leaders, like its foot soldiers, often lacked experience, savvy and the leaders lacked the killer instinct needed to drive their own forces and to accept the inevitable losses that come in the horrors of war. Decisions that led to the death of men haunt any commander; delaying decisions may lead to even more deaths. Leadership started with credibility and some senior officers simply lacked it.
3. Logistics can win or lose a battle: trucks, railways, ports, shipping.
4. The Americans had to learn to work with skeptical Brits and to hate the Germans. Neither task was easy. Thousands of American soldiers died in making the point.
5. Massive American resources and numbers were not going to be enough to overcome German military skill and tenacity.
6. German tank technology and infantry tactics could resist American numerical superiority for a long battle.
7. Terrain and rain matter.

For six months, the American army went to war and to school. Timidity and ill-formed strategies extracted a high price. Without these lessons learned, the victories that followed the campaign in Tunisia would have been even more expensive if a reality at all. "Army at dawn" is an excellent history of a historically less visible theater of the war.

With more than one hundred pages of endnotes, data are abundant. There are many very good maps, although some direct map links to the text, perhaps some numbered sequences, detailed captions for the maps would have provided more clarity, more than Attaching dates to the rapid, complex movement of forces is helpful but hard to parse at times.