Customer Reviews

Rickover: Controversy and Genius - A Biography

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Excellent! "Controversial" only begins to describe the intense but very mixed feelings that Navy nucs have toward The Admiral. This book gets under the surface, and shows the man with all his foibles as well as his strengths and achievements. He was a brilliant engineer and leader, but Niccolo Machiavelli could also have learned a great deal from studying his political methods.

The book might have been more appropriately titled, "A careless criticism of Hyman Rickover". For a careless criticism it is. The authors, unfairly in my view, portray Rickover as a man with great power and a narrow view. But worse, the theme that runs through the book is an implicit accusation that Rickover has long exploited other people and the "other Navy" to further his personal goals. The theme is supported with innuendo, but not facts.
Why the authors wanted to do this is not hinted at, except, perhaps, an admission that while Rickover granted other authors rights to his autobiography, he would not even discuss it with the authors of this book. Rickover simply told them, " I don't want a book written about me".

Having worked for Admiral Rickover for 30 years, I know much about his policies. And I understand why his policies were what they were. Rickover's whole thrust was to insure safety on nuclear submarines. The authors failed to understand this, perhaps because neither of them has experience in the Navy nuclear power division, and from a reading of the book, neither appears to have technical training.

The US Congress and the "other Navy" understood very well how important a contribution Rickover was making to America's strategic weapons arsenal. Both understood very well that an immaculate safety record on US nuclear submarines was the primary reason the public supported ship born nuclear power. But the authors did not grasp this.

It is important to note that, while Rickover had a lock on all aspects of nuclear power use on US Navy ships, and hundreds of reactors were used, the first land based reactor not under Rickover's control (Three Mile Island) had a melt down, and killed land based nuclear power generation in the minds of the public. Had Three Mile Island been Rickover's responsibility, we might to this day be getting significant electric power from nuclear reactors.

An example of the blatantly false claims made by the authors in an apparent effort to discredit Rickover, they claimed that the submarine Thresher sank because the reactor scrammed. The Congressional Investigating Committee and the Navy found that the probable cause was a failed pipe joint in a system subject to submergence pressure. That the Committee and the Navy thought the root cause lie outside the nuclear power plant is best seen by looking at the corrective action taken. The corrective action was to establish what came to be known as the Subsafe Program. The Subsafe Program changed the way all parts of the submarine that affect safety, starting the pressure hull itself, were manufactured, inspected, certified, and maintained. Notably, the nuclear power plant procedures were not changed because Rickover's policies were considered sufficient. The authors do not mention the Subsafe Program in this book.

The authors even attacked the personal life of Rickover's wife after she passed on.

The book is also poorly written. The two authors appear to have written different chapters without comparing notes, because much of the chapters rehash the same material. Many of Rickover's quotes are stated two times. This makes for tiresome reading.

As a biography, this book covers everything that anyone would want to know about ADM Rickover, and then some. Anyone wondering how someone who despised (and was despised by) his own service could still flourish in it should read this book. It provides a readable description of how Rickover picked his friends and enemies wisely through much of his career. If there is one chapter that is a MUST read, it's "A Fascinating Experience," which describes the infamous Rickover interview process that reduced many a young navy officer to a quivering bag of nerves.

Less would have probably been better for this book, however, as the last 200 pages seem to drag with an increasingly vindictive assessment of Rickover's impact through the 1970s. Not that Rickover didn't turn from "yesterday's visionary" to "today's conservative," and eventually "tomorrow's reactionary." He did. It's just that the point is hammered home relentlessly.

Many have said that Rickover advanced the Navy by 20 years, while others claim he set it back 20 years. You'll see why by reading this book.

If you don't want to spend a lot of money and time to delve into Rickover's massive biographies, this small but excellent volume is the best you can find in order to have a complete picture of that important and much maligned personality of the 20th century. The authors cover every important detail of Rickover's life from his early years in Poland to the Annapolis Naval Academy, to World War II service and finally to the atomic branch of the legendary BuShips. Rickover's role in the development of the nuclear powered US Navy is fully precented, as well as his part in the civilian atomic industry and his machinations with the Congress. One of the most interesting chapters in my opinion was the one labelled "The Man" where Rickover's routine, habits and eccentricities make a really enoying read. The book contains some black and white photographs and also a reference to the more important dates of Rickover's life in chronological order.

I found this book to be very readable and informative in many ways. But the authors' bias against Admiral Rickover stands out at several points and is, stated simply, extreme. Nevertheless, I found it a worthwhile, quick read and recommend it to any reader interested in learning more about naval nuclear propulsion. If you're interested in naval history, particularly 20th century naval history, it's a good read.

As with many things in life, there's a backstory to this book. In the book "Rickover: The Struggle for Excellence," which was published in 2001, historian Francis Duncan described how his biography came to be written. Rickover himself, at the end of his life, cited two motivating reasons for another biography, the first of which was "the appearance of a volume that showed little understanding or interest in the nuclear technology that [Rickover] had done so much to develop and that had revolutionized naval operations." The "volume" in question is "Rickover: Controversy and Genius," which was also written by Norman Polmar and Thomas B. Allen, the two authors of this book. While Rickover had been dead for over a decade when Duncan's book was eventually published, it's clear that the gloves were - and are - off.

Here's a specific example of bias. The authors properly assert that Hyman Rickover's influence on the Polaris program - the urgent national effort to develop a submarine launched ballistic missile - was limited by the fact that an existing reactor plant, the S5W, was installed in the early ballistic missile submarines. (Rickover was able to exert much greater control over design and construction decisions when a new reactor plant was installed, such as the S8G in the USS Ohio.) But the authors use the term "thoroughly dishonest" (quoting the Navy's Chief of the Bureau of Ships) to describe Rickover's assertion that his design control over the USS Thresher (lost at sea in 1963) was limited. In fact it was limited, for precisely the same reason that his control was limited in the Polaris program: the use of an existing reactor plant, the S5W. In contrast, the authors' assertion that Rickover significantly held up the adoption of gas turbine technology in the Navy's cruisers is much more plausible.

Another line from a chapter describing Rickover's relationships with members of Congress: "Wherever the Navy was on any issue, Rickover was almost inevitably 180 degrees away." I can only respond by writing that I hope that wasn't the case. Because during the period in question, Rickover was taking a leadership role in pressuring both government and private shipyards to use standards as they were intended to be used, not as guidelines that may or may not be met. In many cases - standards compliance, an appreciation of the complexities of technology, establishing effective training programs - Rickover and the Navy had the same interests. There were differences between the Navy's leadership and Rickover on the value of rotation during an officer's career, on academic programs at the Naval Academy, and on propulsion systems as the gas turbine example illustrates. But in most ways, Rickover's and the Navy's interests were aligned.

Likewise, the authors' analysis of the CV-67 decision (making the John F. Kennedy a conventional carrier) is superficial. It was ultimately Secretary McNamara's and President Kennedy's decision, but it was a horrible one, and Rickover was less of an outlier in recognizing this fact than Polmar and Allen depict. Delivering an oil-fired carrier to the Navy in the late 1960s simply wasn't in the best interests of the United States and the mistake of building a conventional aircraft carrier hasn't been repeated since.

I feel like Polmar and Allen did a good job in describing the end of Rickover's career, and the circumstances of his departure are a good lesson to all readers.

Personally, I think Rickover was off the mark in asserting that Polmar and Allen's earlier biography didn't describe naval nuclear propulsion and technology in a sound and interesting way. It's been well over a decade since I read "Rickover: Controversy and Genius," but by my recollection, it's more balanced that this more recent, shorter biography.

If you accept the fact that this is an abbreviated biography, the quality is excellent. The more expansive biographies are worth exploring if you have the interest - and Rickover is definitely interesting. However, this is one of the finest short bios I have read. Before beginning this little jewel I had just finished reading Richard Rhodes, "The Making of the Atomic Bomb," which overlaps the beginning of the Rickover era. What a combo. Now off to "RICKOVER" by Duncan.