Customer Reviews

Eagle Against the Sun: The American War With Japan

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Good books devoting themselves to the overall scope and breadth of Pacific campaign against the Japanese during World War Two are hard to find, but this book solves the reader's problem nicely. It is a comprehensive, entertaining, and fair-minded book that careful details both Japanese and Allied perspectives before, during, and at the conclusion of the war. This book is truly a carefully constructed, exhaustively researched and quite well documented one-volume history that everyone should love. I first discovered it on the syllabus of a graduate-level Harvard history course, and have had it on my shelf ever since. Written in a very accessible style that allows the reader to stream through as though one is reading a novel, and it is filled with interesting anecdotes and new insights that keep the reader entertained and interested throughout the nearly 600 pages of the book. My own personal favorite was an actual complaint filed immediately after the attack at Pearl Harbor by a Hawaiian resident of a dog who was allegedly barking in Morse code to the Japanese ships offshore. It is also offers a number of new thought provoking and intriguing ideas about aspects of the war against Japan for the reader.

The author engages in an active reinterpretation of the war based on declassified intelligence files, archival material, Japanese documents and an impressive collection of interviews with principals involved in the almost five year struggle to defeat the Japanese after the events at Pearl Harbor. It is interesting to learn that the U.S. planned to wage a wide-ranging campaign of submarine attacks against enemy shipping even before the start of the war, and also indicates that MacArthur was lucky not to be unceremoniously dumped after his bad bungling of the defense of the Philippines and also because of his active disregard for a number of important intercepts of Japanese messages that could have saved literally thousands of American and other lives. Spector also reveals that U.S. decisions were often more influenced by the nature of our stormy relationship with our British allies and our own inter-service rivalries than by strategic concerns.

The author vividly conjures up accurate and spell-binding accounts of the major battles of the war, and provides a number of intriguing descriptions of lesser known aspects of the Pacific campaign, as well. He takes the reader on a fascinating whirlwind tour of the war, leaping from details of critical meetings between war planners in the Pentagon to social, economic, and political aspects of the engagement to excellent on-the-scene coverage of the battlegrounds. He shows us how the war against the Japanese was different from that being waged in Europe, and how this intensely naval type of conflict was in a number of ways much more risky and innovative on our part than its European counterpart. I was particularly fascinated by his interesting argument that the most critical Japanese mistake of the war was in allowing itself to be drawn into fighting the war of attrition we had always preferred to wage based on its defeat at Midway. This is an important, magisterial, and comprehensive book that is undoubtedly the single best one-volume treatment of the war against Japan and it belongs on every serious World War Two student's bookshelf. Enjoy!

As a history of the Pacific War, Eagle Against the Sun is rivalled only by Samuel Eliot Morison's 15 volume classic. Ironically, however, Spector packs far more detail into this classic one volume narrative than Morison managed to include in 15. Where Morison slighted organization, logistics, and sociological issues in favor of action, Spector gives such issues the attention they deserve. The Pacific War was a war of logistics--moving massive volumes of men and material across thousands of miles of ocean. The Pacific War was also a fascinating study in race and gender relations, with early and problematic evolution towards the modern integrated force. Spector addresses all these issues, while still telling an exciting story of action and heroism.

Spector is eminently well-qualified to write such a history. A Marine Corps veteran (Viet Nam), Spector is also a professional historian. He understands combat as few historians do. Spector is also a talented writer, whose prose flows quickly and powerfully.

Spector's careful analysis of the controversial decision to use atomic weapons against Japan is especially well-done. He acknowledges that there are legitimate arguments--both moral and military--against their use. He notes that critics of the decision included not only left-leaning academics, but also army and navy leaders resisting air force officers who believed that SAC rendered the other branches obsolete. Yet, he persuasively argues that tha atomic bombs, coupled with Russia's invasion of Manchuria, were the exogenous shocks that finally destabilized Japan's militarist regime.

In sum, very highly recommended.

Reading about the Pacific War in the new WWII novel, "The Triumph and the Glory", spurred me into exploring the topic further, so I picked up a copy of "Eagle Against the Sun" and was very impressed. It is solidly researched, very readable, all in all one of the better history volumes about the great struggle in the Pacific between the United States and Imperial Japan.

This is a very good one-volume history of World War II in the Pacific. It is fast-paced, easy reading, and balanced. The author covers all aspects of the war with roughly the emphasis they deserve, shifting back and forth from the high councils of strategy to homely events on the front lines of this brutal, bitter conflict.

"Eagle against the Sun" won't get my highest rating, however, because of its lack of maps. The inside cover has a general map of the Pacific -- and that's all folks. How can a publisher put out a book that contains hundreds of obscure place names and descriptions of complex military maneuvers without at least a dozen detailed maps to illustrate the text? The lack of maps diminishes what would otherwise be an outstanding book.

This is probably one of the BEST single volume works in the field. ANY student of the US Navy, or World war II who doesn't have this on their shelf isn't serious about the field. I CANNOT recommend it too highly, both for content and for readability. Buy it.... you WON'T regret it.

This is a superb analysis of the Pacific War between the USA and Japan. It is always very difficult for an author to strike a balance between sufficient detail on the one hand, and the risk of overwhelming the "big picture" with too much detail, on the other. Here, the author hits it just right. This is a detailed and thorough analysis of the Pacific War that focuses on the main trends of the war, while supplying sufficient detail to support the themes that the author presents to the reader.

Spector's basic thesis is not new, but this is the best presentation of it that I have encountered. Essentially, the author notes that superior American industrial capacity, organizational skills, and technology overwhelmed a highly trained, well-armed and competent Japanese foe. The Japanese training regime was brutal, featuring tough night training in the icy waters south of the Kurils--Japanese skill at night naval engagements were to give the US Navy ugly moments for years. On the other hand, the author speculates that the savage discipline of the Japanese service tended to "burn out" its officers, often causing them to avoid "thinking outside the box."

Both sides had problems with inter-service rivalries. The Americans fought the war with divided commands, whereby MacArthur advanced through the South Pacific with most of the Army, while Nimitz advanced through the Central Pacific with the bulk of the Navy and the Marines. The author argues that this was an inefficient, sub-optimal strategy. The Japanese Army and Navy were even more riven with rivalries, and the Japanese Navy on numerous occasions concealed from the Army the scope of its defeats at the hands of the US Navy. (It was a long time before the Japanese Army learned of the disasterous defeat of the Navy at Midway; the Army believed that Japan had won, not lost, the Battle of Leyte Gulf).

This is a fairly conventional analysis of the Pacific War, but the author sometimes does come to unorthodox conclusions that will challenge the reader's own opinions about command decisions made by the Pacific War's heavyweights. Frank Jack Fletcher merits heavy blame for lacking aggressiveness on several occasions, which is no surprise, but at times Admiral Spruance (a personal hero of mine) also comes in for criticisms that I did not expect. The author overall attempts to be fair, however, and generally does a pretty fair job of making his case.

Overall, this is perhaps the best single volume analysis of the Pacific War written for the general public that I have come across, and it is highly recommended.

If you've read some of the other reviews this will come as no surprise - - this is a terrific book, but one that is completely lacking in maps to explain the strategic and tactical elements of the various Pacific campaigns that are exhaustively and effectively summarized and described throughout the book. Putting together a narrative that describes and explains the entire Pacific war in about 600 pages is no small task, but this book does the trick. And it's an entertaining read as well. It is a terrific overview of the entire Pacific war that covers every major offensive with appropriate emphasis on the problems of logistics, in-fighting among the allies and among service branches and competition among the various theatres for precious supplies, equipment, arms and manpower. However, the lack of any campaign maps was frustrating and irritating. About halfway through the book, I happened to find the West Point Atlas for the Pacific War at Borders (an absolutely fantastic collection of campaign maps) and scooped it up specifically to use with this book. With the atlas at the ready, Eagle Against The Sun became a much better read. Even if you're fully familiar with the imense geography of the Pacific war, you'll be driven batty by the lack of maps in Eagle Against The Sun. However, the lack of maps is really the book's only material flaw and, in the end, it was easily fixed by pulling out the atlas.

If you're looking for a book about battles and fighting, this isn't the book for you. If you want a look at generals and statesmen struggling to find a way to victory, you'll enjoy this book. It tells the tale of how victory in the Pacific was found and fashioned. The disagreements between the services, the personal chemistry, the problems with logistics, the balancing of needs versus the fight with Germany, all these important issues are explicated in 'Eagle against the Sun'. It's not exhaustive in its treament of the war and not exhausting in the reading.

It's a very good book to start analyzing World War II in the Pacific theater.

A very readable, interesting history of the Pacific theater in World War II. Despite being a single volume Spector does a masterful job of covering all the key aspects of the Pacific war and does so in a very complete manner. The earlier reviewers comments about the lack of maps is true; you might want to have an atlas handy while reading this book. Definitely worth your investment several times over in both time and money.

This is a very well written and informative book, and it gives a good high level overview of the war in the Pacific. There is probably nothing new or particularly interesting in it for the expert, but for the interested layman it is a good read. There seem to be some inexplicable omissions here and there, such as the real risk of Halsey's sojourn at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. However, my biggest complaint is the lack of any maps in the book. There was a single, high-level map of the whole theater on the inside cover, and that was it!! How can you write a military history of WWII without a single map to depict the major battles?? This is a pet peeve of mine with many history books, but this book was especially egregious.