Customer Reviews

The Depths of Courage: American Submariners at War with Japan, 1941-1945

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I was eager to see how this book portrayed the US submarine effort in the Pacific, and how it would stack up against what has to be the Gold Standard, Clay Blair's "Silent Victory". One of the authors, Ron Smith, was himself a submariner during WWII, and Flint Whitlock is an experienced author. Basically, I wanted to like this book, but in my opinion, it just came up short.

The book takes an interesting tack; interspersed with descriptions of the submarine actions during the course of the war, the authors also describe highlights of the Pacific campaign itself. Intertwined with the historical descriptions, we also follow Ron Smith as he enters the Navy, and his somewhat circuitous route to submarine school, via aerial torpedo training. The author ends up aboard one of the older submarines, the USS Seal, one of the mid-1930's designs on the road to the definitive fleet submarine design, epitomized in Gato. We get a parallel narrative which details the problems with torpedoes, and covers many of the early key exploits and losses (such as Howard Gilmore and Mush Morton's Wahoo). If you have never read a history of WWII US submarine action, these will be new to you. However, for those familiar with the historical record from reading "Silent Victory" or a number of other prior histories, these will be rehashes. Nothing new added to these already well know tales. The stories that revolve around Smith himself are certainly very interesting and make for worthwhile reading, Smith is assigned to the base torpedo shop at Pearl in 1943 and then transferred stateside as an instructor. He more or less exits the story at that point, making minor appearances later in the book.

The story continues, with the alternating submarine warfare and the Pacific "island hopping" campaign. Surface fleet battles are described, along with submarine roles in these engagements. In terms of the personal focus, the latter part of the book relates the tragic story of Richard O'Kane's Tang. Tang was sunk off the Chinese coast when, in a surface attack, one of her torpedoes made a circular run and struck the stern of the submarine, rapidly sinking it. This is told with the spotlight on Clay Decker, one of the crew members who escaped from Tang, and imprisoned in Japanese POW camps along with a handful of other crew members (including O'Kane) who escaped Tang. Again, this makes a very good human interest story, and the suffering they experienced at the hands of their captors is truly disturbing. This part of the story is interspersed with later war history, such as the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the exploits of Gene Fluckey in Barb, and George Street's action with Tirante.

And speaking of history, several "facts" presented in the book are inaccurate. Submarines were never painted in a mottled camouflage pattern of "blue and gray splotches". Barb was not greeted at the pier by Nimitz, MacArthur and Roosevelt after her 11th war patrol (for which Fluckey received the Medal of Honor). Fluckey met the President and the two commanders privately after the 9th patrol. Also, afterwards he was not making his 12th patrol as captain of Barb, it was his fifth. Barb had gone out under other captains in earlier patrols. Finally, Admiral Halsey did not die in Pasadena, California, but rather on Fisher's Island, off the coast of Connecticut. If you're going to write history, check your facts!

In the end, I think the authors attempted to take on too much in a 386 page book. The entire scope of the Pacific War, the US submarine force role, and two very interesting human stories is too much to do more than sketch out in a book that long. While I would not discourage anyone from reading the book, I don't feel particularly strong about it either. It wouldn't be the first book I would recommend to someone interested in WWII submarine history.

This is Ron Smith's 2nd book and it adds a lot that wasn't in the "Torpedoman." It tells of his growing up and becoming a submarine sailor. But it does so in a unique way. Every other chapter is written by his co-author, Flint Whitlock, who is a major military writer in his own right. Flint marches across the Pacific and time with his story of the submarine service while Ron tells of his tribulations and his life from a young man wanting to be an aviator to becoming a Torpedoman. The near death experiences aboard a WWII submarine are very dramatic and will give the reader an appreciation of the horror these men faced.
A great read from two established writers.

I just finished reading this book and I have to say, it's one of the best I have run across in a long while. This book now only talks about the experience of Ron Smith, it also does a good job illustrating the struggles America faced in War World II. It's starts in Pearl and ends with the official surrender of Japan and details the battles fought, along with all the important events that happened elsewhere in the war.
The book also has many illustration, photos and maps that are placed in pages where they relate, not in the middle of the book, like most other books are done.

Ron Smith was my grandfather. His stories in both this book and Torpedoman are as true as can be. From a kid until a full grown adult, I can remember him recounting his days in the submarine service. He was so proud of his service that his F-150 even had the submarine insignia on both sides. You will find no truer stories than The Depths of Courage or Torpedoman. The tales he retold to us were brutally honest at times, but were always the truth. My grandpa was passionate about his country, his service, and his family. I believe this is expressed in both of his books.

Unfortunately, he passed away last night (9/12/08), but his memories remain in the pages he's written and the stories he has told.

A few years ago I read the historian Stephen Ambrose's last book, "The Wild Blue". While it was at times interesting, it felt sort of disjointed; it was too much a war biography of George McGovern to be considered a history of B-24 bombers in Europe, but on the other hand not enough of the book was devoted to a history of the bombers in general for it to be considered that. The book felt as if the author was conflicted, as if he'd wanted to write a book about McGovern, and didn't have enough material, so he filled out what he had with other, extraneous stuff to lengthen the book into a viable publishable book.

The Depths of Courage feels the same way. Ron Smith, one of the coauthors, served on U.S.S. Seal for awhile. He's already written a memoir of this time and his service in World War II ("Torpedoman"). For whatever reason (I didn't read the earlier book, so I don't know if he held things back) a second book has been written. Flint Whitlock, his coauthor, is a historian of World War II, best known for three books that deal with divisions that served in the ETO. I'm not sure how he got involved in this; you get the feeling he perhaps knows Smith somehow. Regardless, he's rather in the mode of a fish out of water, and the resulting book is rather uneven and unsatisfying.

Smith joined the Navy as the war started, and served through to the end of the conflict. He did a couple of cruises on the Seal, then was sent Stateside to train other torpedo crewmen for the rest of the war. This obviously doesn't constitute enough of a story for a book, at least the way it's presented here, so Whitlock steps in to recount the history of the U.S. submarine force during the war, in a rather scattershot, anecdotal fashion. Interviews with a few retired submariners flesh out this narrative somewhat.

The problem is that if the book is trying to be a complete history of U.S. submarines in the Pacific during World War II, it's too short and brief. Theodore Roscoe and Clay Blair's books, while longer, are at least complete and comprehensive. Whitlock seems to think that his reader won't know anything about the war, so he attempts to provide context, but the results are mixed, to say the least. There is, as a result, a rather weak account of World War II in general, based as far as I can tell on secondary sources, which are quoted repeatedly. Blair's book, along with Roscoe's and a handful of others are quoted repeatedly.

As usual these days, there are mistakes and errors throughout the book. At one point he says 3500 yards is almost ten miles, at another he misspells Oerlikon, later he messes up the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, having the Hiei either retreat from the battle successfully or get sunk by U.S. surface ships, depending on how you read his narrative. He even screws up one of the more important submarine sinkings of the war, when the Albacore sank the Taiho, saying that Taiho was only damaged. He completely misses another sinking that was at least as famous, in that the ship sunk was so enormous: that of Shinano, the third superbattleship that the Japanese converted into an enormous aircraft carrier.

I liked The Rock of Anzio, Whitlock's book recounting the divisional history of the 45th Infantry Division in World War II. Unfortunately, The Depths of Courage shouldn't have The Rock of Anzio in its bibliography, and the fact that it does include it (along with The Fighting First, his book about the Big Red One at Normandy) is a good indicator of what's wrong with this book.

There are some wonderful and very detailed specialized histories of the submarine campaigns of WW II, notably by Clay Blair. This book is a little different. First, the authors assume (wisely) that people who want an exhaustive history can consult one of the specialized books or the copious information available on the internet. Second, the authors assume (again wisely) that today's general reader may not know much more about the overall course of the Pacific War than the names of a few famous battles like Iwo Jima. Thirdly, one of the authors, Ron Smith, is a surviving WW II submariner who saw considerable combat.

This books is thus an interesting blend. You get a general overview of the Pacific War, including naval and amphibious operations as well as the submarine war. You get Smith's personal narrative, which is fascinating and frank. And you also get a good overall view of the Pacific submarine campaign, which even casual students of the war soon realize was very important.

Smith has a particular talent for describing the experience of a submariner -- not only life aboard the ships and in combat, but also training, life on the various bases he was stationed at, and how the war affected his personal life and those of his friends.

Perhaps because he's aware of how distant the world of the 1940s is now, Smith tells you about the details of life on the boats and on liberty. He doesn't just tell you he spent a few weeks at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, he describes what it was like to arrive there still stinking and rumpled from a submarine and tells you what he and his fellow submariners did once they showered and shaved (beer, women, and sunbathing figured heavily). The book gives you an excellent sense of what it was like to be caught up in such a huge effort: the struggles, the absurdity, the heroism, tedium, hard work, and sheer randomness of life in the Navy. And also, strangely, the fun and humor and camaraderie. And the beer and women.

The Depths of Courage isn't likely to make you wish you'd been there, but more than any book I've read on the submarine war in the Pacific, it gave me a sense of what it was like.

I was a bit disappointed by this book. The author bounces around in his narration quite a bit, and at times he seems distracted by various land battles. The parts which chronicle the co-author's experiences aboard a submarine are very interesting, and there are some very good personal recollections from other submariners as well. However, the book really doesn't give any new information to the reader unless this is their first book on World War II submarine warfare. Add in various factual inaccuracies and an occasionally messed up timeline and you have a book which comes up short. As another reviewer stated, it seems as if the author tried to do too much in too short of a space.

After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December, 1941, the Americans had very little left to fight back with. The Pacific fleet's battleships lay in the mud, and, fortunately, the American carriers escaped the attack. But, one force was left undamaged: the American submarine force. Shortly after the attack, the order was given for the subs to conduct "unrestricted warfare" on Japanese shipping. So, the few boats based at Pearl Harbor plus the ones of the Asiatic fleet went off in search of the enemy. Facing incredible odds, these few submarines managed to take the war to the enemy.

Over the course of the Pacific war, American sub commanders were forced to deal with faulty torpedoes which either failed to explode, or exploded prematurely. Many times, torpedoes would strike enemy ships without exploding, thus forcing the sub to dive and evade the now alerted enemy. To make matters worse, the Bureau of Ordnance refused to admit that there was a problem with the torpedoes. But, thanks to the persistence of Admiral Charles Lockwood, the torpedo problem was finally solved, and Japanese shipping began to pay the price.

In this book, authors Flint Whitlock and Ron Smith re-live much of the American submariners' war with the Japanese. Smith himself served on the USS Seal, and he provides many personal insights into the life of an American submariner. Many of the more recognizable names in submarine warfare, including "Mush" Morton and Dick O'Kane, are discussed in this book. Morton's USS Wahoo and O'Kane's USS Tang became legendary in the American submarine force. Wahoo and Tang sunk dozens of enemy ships and rescued many downed American aviators, and the authors devote several chapters of the book to the heroics of these two commanders.

This is a very good book. Smith describes his own life in the submarine force, from his enlistment until the end of the war. All major battles of the Pacific war are covered, and the authors describe the submarine actions involved in each battle.

I highly recommend this book. For anyone interested in a brief overview of the submarine war with Japan, this book would be a good one to start with.

My interests in submarines is because my step grandmother lost her son on the USS KETE in March 1945. They were on their way home and gave a weather report and that was the last they were heard from. Speculation is a Jap sub caught them on the service and then in turn was sunk before they reported in to their home port or they hit a mine. Earl Logsdon was a baker and had also served on the USS Tarpon.
The author makes the book very readable and interesting on the life of a submariner and I could hardly put the book down when I began
reading. I say to all submariners you are a special breed and especially those of WW II era. Being in a bomber in early W W II was
also a hazzardous job in knowing the percentage of flying your 25 missions was against you, so it was with the submariners and I am in
awe of those that served in the bombers and submarines and why I titled my review, "Men of guts and courage". A must read for the
WW II buff.

This is the only book that I have ever pitched without completing. I've read hundreds of WW II Pacific Theater and ships' history books. Many are written by authors unfamiliar with the topic--although they don't know what they don't know. Many of these authors use interviews with sailors aboard a particular ship at the time. My experience with these type interviews is that the ones being interviewed forget what happened or confuse what they've heard or seen on TV with their experience. These participants are seldom good sources, unless an author is aware of this and can adapt.
This author uses one submarine sailor as a theme and then recounts the Pacific War with the personal experience of this sailor. Right. The Pacific War in 300 pages. Maybe one shouldn't be surprised at his results. Before I quit reading, I found that there were only one attack wave by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor--the second was cancelled. There were six battles where the opposing fleets didn't sight each other. He's counting Pearl Harbor. If that counts, then all the carrier raids during the War count too. Then during Coral Sea, Tagaki attacked the two US carrier groups sinking an oiler and destroyer. It was a submarine that first detected the Japanese invasion force 350 miles from Midway on 4 June during that battle. That's when I pitched the book.