Not sure if this has been done before, if so, could someone point me to it, if not, who do you think was the best commander of the war and why?
It has been done before. However, for my money it was Slim.
Each commander had his own problems and his own way of dealing with them. In war, no two operations are identical and so it is difficult to say how - say, for instance - Slim would have reacted to Rommel in the Western Desert or against Zhukov on the Eastern Front. What we can do is study their successes and failures, their strengths and weaknesses and make an estimation of how each would have acted or responded to given circumstances.
Then, of course, there are also their political masters to consider and the priorites of those masters when equipping the commanders with men and materiel they required.
So, on balance, I vote for Slim. Not only because of what he achieved, but because of the road he had to negotiate in order to achieve it.
Put me in for Monty. His overwhelming force attacks balance out the reluctance to move and his slow, methodic, rolling movement when he did get his butt moving.
Think both Slim and Monty would rate highly on most peoples list, including mine.
By all accounts Slim’s “Defeat Into Victory” is one of the Pacific War’s best books. probably the best senior officer memoir of World War II. and Robert Lyman who produced a history of Slim’s victory in Burma, calls him the true ‘Master of War’
He worked his way up through the ranks of the British Army from platoon leader to Field Marshal and was a truly outstanding commander in a theater of war that got precious little support yet fought major Japanese forces.
And he was a very popular GG down under to boot.
How would MacArthur stack up against the likes of Bradley, Hodges or Patton among American commanders?
Interesting question.
I’ll preface my comments by saying I’m not a cheerleader in the Doug Fan Club, but equally I think he’s been dealt with very unfairly in some popular histories and in popular memory, especially in Australia where popular ignorance of his military achievements is overwhelmed by popular knowledge of his bastardry towards Australian troops. He’s also been dealt with rather too fairly in some laudatory distortions of history by his admirers, rather like JFK and his supposed heroism on PT 109 that might still be afloat if he’d followed orders and kept his engines running ready for action.
I don’t know enough about Hodges to comment on him.
Mac was at least as good as Patton for courage and general 'give ‘em hell’ atttitude and action in the island advance but better than Patton for planning.
Unfortunately Mac earned the quite unfair nickname of Dugout Doug. Although he carefully managed his press coverage to massage his image and achievements (even when he didn’t achieve them, such as Buna), he exposed himself to front line fire several times during the island advance in circumstances which should have been seen as inspirational and which were most unusual for a theatre commander. He deserves to be remembered for that rather more than for his commonly disparaged stage managed recreation of returning to the Philippines which, after all, was no worse than the second flag raising on Iwo Jima.
Unlike Bradley and the other European commanders, Mac had experience of a bitter defeat (partly aided by his own incompetence) at the hands of the enemy he subsequently vanquished.
Unlike European commanders, he was faced with a relentlessly advancing enemy he had to stop with limited resources. Contrast that with the build up for the invasions of Italy and Normandy.
Mac was desperately manipulative early in 1942 after being put in charge of the SWPA where his fears of being sidelined to the USN or another army commander caused him to run the Papuan campaign fairly badly, ably assisted by the Australian commander Gen Thomas Blamey who was equally concerned to avoid bearing the professional consequences of failure for which Mac was strenuously setting him up while Blamey, realising what was going on, was strenuously setting up his own Australian commanders to take the blame.
Compared with Bradley and Patton, Mac had more control of strategy and was a better strategist. Bradley might have had some of those skills, but Patton was more of a bull in a china shop.
Mac also fought a much longer war, being from the start to the finish of the Pacific War, while the American land involvement in Europe was much shorter. Mac commanded in harder terrain with greater logistical problems and against a more ferocious enemy over greater distances with all the problems of repeated seaborne landings and LOC over water and jungle in co-operation with the USN and its own problems over much vaster distances than European commanders had to face.
Mac was a prize turd in some respects and he seems unfairly to be remembered in popular memory for those aspects, but he was a bloody good commander and I think he’d run rings around Bradley and Patton who never had to deal with anything like he did.
Moreover, for all its faults, his management of the occupation of Japan was masterful in the circumstances. Patton or Bradley couldn’t have done it in a fit nor, probably, could anyone else without Mac’s rare understanding of the Orient combined with his political instincts and skills.
The things that made Mac a turd by the standards of ordinary people also made him a great theatre commander and a great commander of the occupation of Japan.
Monty’s overwhelming force attacks were based on the knowledge that his troops were not of the calibre of the opposition. Particularly the British armoured units. The fact that he recognised the weaknesses within his Army and planned and developed around them makes him a top geezer.
When one also considers that Rommel had failed against first Auchinlek and then Monty at El Alamein, it underlines Monty’s success in the same arena.
That is true. If only he had more ANZAC quality soldiers…
When he made his first public appearance in Melbourne, it was said that it was like the coming of the Lord, Mac was in control, and everything would be right with the world.
He had a presence like no other.
Bloody good post by the way.
Hey Bravo, you weren’t the originator of the following were you?
‘‘Someone wrote that Monty was a good Commander, essentially because he understood what his men were capable of, took care of them, wrote plans that took full use of all allied advantages and negated as many German ones as they could, and got through his campaigns without major reverses. If he wasn’t a Rommel, that’s because he didn’t need to be to win, and Clark showed that having good cards in your hand didn’t prevent horrendous mistakes.’’
Found that surfing some time back, and thought it sums it up in a nut shell.
Yes, and it beats me why Australians were so delighted to get a man who at that stage was an incompetent commander who was being flogged in the Philippines after being paralysed by inaction for most of the first day he was under attack by the Japanese so that he didn’t carry out his orders in the event of an attack and lost half his precious bomber fleet on the ground after convincing Washington he could hold the Philippines if given the newest bombers etc (although that dovetailed with a reappraisal in Washington of the previous war plans which conceded the Philippines to Japan with the forces originally there pre-1939). Not that any of that was being publicised at the time.
I think Mac’s reception in Melbourne reflects more about relief that the Yanks weren’t going to abandon us than any commitment to Mac per se. It probably also reflects a certain aspect of Australian attitude that we were at the bottom of a hostile land chain and lacked the means to defend ourselves, which continues to today. The reality is that in 1942 we could have defeated the Japanese by ourselves if they’d been stupid enough to invade the mainland with the best force they could manage and supply and if we’d held our nerve.
Mac radiated confidence publicly when he arrived in Melbourne (and that was no mean feat for a man of his age after a gruelling time in the Philippines and a gruelling escape and trip to Australia), but William Manchester in American Caesar recounts how on the train bringing Mac to Melbourne he was beset with anxiety and doubt about the prospects of stopping the Japanese. Nonetheless he gave a bravura performance in Melbourne the following morning of boundless confidence, which was part of his quality and skill as a leader.
I still think he was a prick in many respects.
And I’d add to my earlier post comparing him with Patton etc that, despite the Dugout Doug tag which his American troops unfairly bestowed upon him, anyone who reads a bit on Mac has to conclude that he had a genuine regard and concern for his troops to an extent that I think Patton lacked in his more gung ho approach, although both were uncompromising in their attitude to troops they thought fell below their standards (and Mac had plenty of them in the early days in Papua, right up to generals).
Moreover, while Mac was a posturing media slut relentlessly projecting his own carefully controlled public image, Patton in comparison strikes me more as a posturing poseur with less substance as an all round commander with strategic as well as battlefield skills. I think the symbolism of the modest and homely pipe and battered cap versus the Wild West twin revolvers and glittering helmet sums up the difference between them and their conceptions of themselves (although Mac’s pipe was an accidental affectation following PR advice from someone, but I’ve forgotten the details).
He had a number of good infantry units from all over the Empire, including India, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Rommel thought the New Zealanders were the best, but that didn’t eman the others weren’t good. Most were citizen soldiers and had the war thrust upon them.
He also had some particularly good Free French troops that fought exceptionally well at Gazala.
Just a little example of Monty’s consideration regarding quality of troops. He would have preferred the Armoured units to lead the break-out through the minefields at El Alamein, but he didn’t feel they had the tactical expertise to deliver (obviously, there were good individual units, but generally speaking), most were newly deployed and inexperienced units, that was why he sent the infantry ahead.
Oh goodness! I am actually a little surprised at this largely positive portrait of Gen. MacArthur from you RS*!
This is an interesting comparison. I take issue with the comments on Kennedy (I’ve read half of his biography, and for some reason, stopped at the point that he becomes President. I’ll pick it back up this weekend when I’m done with Beevor’s Stalingrad). There is an interesting scene that I’ve read about previously from other sources on the web. That is that Doug and JFK both met, possibly more than once and seemed to have an affinity for one another. Both men had had problems with Truman in the past, Doug’s obvious and Kennedy’s not so much, and both seemed to share a concern with what Eisenhower called “the Military Industrial Complex” in the US, and their penchant for exaggerating Soviet military strength in order to continue massive defense spending. I’ve even read that Mac told Kennedy to stay out of Vietnam and counseled him that he was receiving bad information from his Pentagon advisers…
In any case, while JFK is not blameless the PT-109 debacle, he hardly created the conditions for it. I’ll post in more detail, but he had been taking part in one of the largest PT attacks of the War when it happened, and he (lacking radar, along with about half the 30 boats that took part) was actually listening for targets in the pitch-black night when he got rammed. And the 15 or so radar equipped boats simply launched torpedoes at the radar images and fled leaving the PT-Boats with none to flounder in the darkness…
Kennedy’s biggest mistake was being suckered into the “elite” image of the PT-Boat program --one that was largely ineffective at its stated goal of launching (unreliable) torpedoes to take out larger shipping and naval targets. However, as barge busters, they were quite good. And in fact, yes, JFK contributed to coming up with tactics for attacking Japanese supply barges and fought several months in that campaign…
I don’t know enough about Hodges to comment on him.
Mac was at least as good as Patton for courage and general 'give ‘em hell’ atttitude and action in the island advance but better than Patton for planning.
Unfortunately Mac earned the quite unfair nickname of Dugout Doug. Although he carefully managed his press coverage to massage his image and achievements (even when he didn’t achieve them, such as Buna), he exposed himself to front line fire several times during the island advance in circumstances which should have been seen as inspirational and which were most unusual for a theatre commander. He deserves to be remembered for that rather more than for his commonly disparaged stage managed recreation of returning to the Philippines which, after all, was no worse than the second flag raising on Iwo Jima.
Unlike Bradley and the other European commanders, Mac had experience of a bitter defeat (partly aided by his own incompetence) at the hands of the enemy he subsequently vanquished.
Unlike European commanders, he was faced with a relentlessly advancing enemy he had to stop with limited resources. Contrast that with the build up for the invasions of Italy and Normandy.
Mac was desperately manipulative early in 1942 after being put in charge of the SWPA where his fears of being sidelined to the USN or another army commander caused him to run the Papuan campaign fairly badly, ably assisted by the Australian commander Gen Thomas Blamey who was equally concerned to avoid bearing the professional consequences of failure for which Mac was strenuously setting him up while Blamey, realising what was going on, was strenuously setting up his own Australian commanders to take the blame.
Compared with Bradley and Patton, Mac had more control of strategy and was a better strategist. Bradley might have had some of those skills, but Patton was more of a bull in a china shop.
Mac also fought a much longer war, being from the start to the finish of the Pacific War, while the American land involvement in Europe was much shorter. Mac commanded in harder terrain with greater logistical problems and against a more ferocious enemy over greater distances with all the problems of repeated seaborne landings and LOC over water and jungle in co-operation with the USN and its own problems over much vaster distances than European commanders had to face.
Mac was a prize turd in some respects and he seems unfairly to be remembered in popular memory for those aspects, but he was a bloody good commander and I think he’d run rings around Bradley and Patton who never had to deal with anything like he did.
Moreover, for all its faults, his management of the occupation of Japan was masterful in the circumstances. Patton or Bradley couldn’t have done it in a fit nor, probably, could anyone else without Mac’s rare understanding of the Orient combined with his political instincts and skills.
The things that made Mac a turd by the standards of ordinary people also made him a great theatre commander and a great commander of the occupation of Japan.
One question I have is: What about Mac’s penchant for using a small stable of generals to do his planning/battle management, then taking credit for their work? I have not read as much on MacArthur as I should, but it seems that he used “firemen” like Lt. General Eichelberger. He was an exceedingly competent commander that did nothing but win battles and was a man who was beloved as much by the Aussies as he was by those in his direct command. I think he may be America’s counterpart to Slim, as the underrated and unheralded figure (in the popular culture). I’ve always thought that Macs strength lay in his ability as almost a “general manager” or coach type figure that was capable of building a very good team, but one that relied on others to do much of the planning and actual fighting. He seemed to have a glorius, if slightly brilliant strategic vision (the Inchon Landings, the SW Pacific campaign, and the occupation of Japan), but this often seemed undercut by his hubris and sometimes even what can be characterized as laxity.
Some examples of Mac’s weaknesses are that his troops in Japan were wholly unready for any sort of combat in Korea --though to be fair-- the entire US Army had floundered after the War because of budgetary restrictions and lack of a strategic focus largely due to the emphasis on nuclear deterrence. But, the problem is that the US Army seemed to lack training and esprit de’corp for the entire time it was under Mac’s command (save for the drive North after Inchon cut of the NKPA), but when General Matthew Ridgeway took over (one of the best US generals of the 20th century IMO), he empahsized greater training and more realistic expectations of US ground forces in Korea --the US Army seemed to magnify its tactical combat effectiveness by mid-1951 under his direct command and the US was able to maintain a very effective conscript army until it was ruined in Vietnam.
Anyways, here is an interesting article from TIME on LT. General (Uncle Bob) Eichelberger:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,798928,00.html?promoid=googlep
Naaah, it was probably Monty.
There’s a lot about Mac I don’t like and a lot of credit he gets without it being balanced by deserved debits, but there’s a lot about him that deserves more credit than it gets nowadays. Hardly anyone at that level is Mr Nice Guy, and he was a politician as much as a commander, to the extent that he was thinking about running for President in the ?1944 election but shot himself in the foot politcally and stuck to soldiering.
One question I have is: What about Mac’s penchant for using a small stable of generals to do his planning/battle management, then taking credit for their work?
All commanders rely on staff officers to do their planning. The commanders usually get the glory, although Mac could be relied upon to make sure nobody else got it, as he could be relied upon to make sure somebody else was the fall guy if things went wrong.
His treatment of Gen Brereton, who commanded the USAF in the Philippines and couldn’t get orders from Mac on day one of the war despite making a number of attempts, was very shabby. He ditched Brereton after he got to Australia. I’ve always suspected he didn’t want him around to remind Mac of how he failed at the start of the war.
I have not read as much on MacArthur as I should, but it seems that he used “firemen” like Lt. General Eichelberger. He was an exceedingly competent commander that did nothing but win battles and was a man who was beloved as much by the Aussies as he was by those in his direct command. I think he may be America’s counterpart to Slim, as the underrated and unheralded figure (in the popular culture).
Can’t open the Time article for some reason. I’ll try later.
Read Eichelberger’s book Our Jungle Road to Tokyo for his account. He recounts how Mac told him he’d get publicity if he won at Buna, which was important to Mac and which meant nothing to Eichelberger. Mac’s instructions to Eichelberger when sending him to Buna, where the Americans had stalled (which is a polite term for a division pretty much breaking down in the field) was to win or not come back alive. Then Mac pointed to Eichelberger’s chief of staff and said something to the effect ‘And that goes for your chief of staff too.’
I forget the composition, but to lead by example where the troops were refusing to advance Eichelberger led a patrol against the Japanese which might have been the highest ranking infantry patrol in history. Can’t remember the composition, but I think apart from Gen Eichelberger it had something like a colonel or two, maybe even a brigadier or equivalent, and a few majors etc. I think there was a sergeant there for the officers to order around.
I’ve always thought that Eichelberger’s achievement in taking a division which was not trained or acclimatised for jungle warfare, ill supplied, half starved, often sick, badly led at all levels, and virtually mutinous and turning it into a reasonably effective fighting force and doing it in the field in a few weeks was brilliant. Most commanders couldn’t manage it in barracks in that time.
I’ve always thought that Macs strength lay in his ability as almost a “general manager” or coach type figure that was capable of building a very good team, but one that relied on others to do much of the planning and actual fighting. He seemed to have a glorius, if slightly brilliant strategic vision (the Inchon Landings, the SW Pacific campaign, and the occupation of Japan), but this often seemed undercut by his hubris and sometimes even what can be characterized as laxity.
True, but isn’t it usually the case that the boss of anything relies upon his main managers to run the show? And that a good boss surrounds himself with good people?
Although in Mac’s case it’s debatable whether he surrounded himself with yes men who happened to be competent rather than the other way around.
That’s not to disparage the good people he had, notably Gen Kenny who ran his air force and was very much a ‘can do’ operator.
His chief of staff, Sutherland, was the gateway to Mac and was a nasty piece of work but he got his comeuppance in ?New Hollandia when he brought a woman up from Australia for a bit of tropical comfort. When he finally found out, Mac wouldn’t tolerate it and, I think, sent him back to Australia for a while. Clipped his wings a bit.
I don’t know that his island hopping stategic vision was all that unique, although it was clever. IIRC somebody else (USN admiral I think but I can’t pin it down) put forward a similar strategy independently of Mac.
The above is all from memory, so E&OE.
The TIME Magazine article, submitted for your approval:
Monday, Aug. 16, 1948
Uncle Bob
Almost all of the occupation forces’ top brass were at the dockside in Yokohama one day last week as Lieut. General Robert Lawrence Eichelberger walked slowly up the gangplank of an Army transport. There were few dry eyes among the generals and colonels. Many an Eighth Army G.I. was in the dumps. Said one hard-faced sergeant: “There goes the best goddam man the Army ever raised.” At 62, Bob Eichelberger was going into retirement.
Absent from the leave-taking was his commander, General Douglas MacArthur; they had said their farewells in private two days before. That was in keeping with their relationship during the last six years; it had always been on the basis of commander and subordinate, each with enormous respect for the other as a soldier.
In war, General MacArthur had used rough and leathery General Eichelberger as his forward-passer and end-runner; from Buna through the Philippines, West Pointer Eichelberger had made more than 55 invasion landings. Few field generals had been as daring, successful or relentless against the Japs: none had commanded so many amphibious assaults on the enemy.
Affectionate Tone. But General Eichelberger’s real triumph lay in his dealings with the Japanese people as boss of the occupation forces. At first the Japanese had feared him as a tough soldier who would probably be a hard-heeled conqueror. He showed that he could be firm; he also showed them that he was going to be fair.
The friendly side of Bob Eichelberger soon won the Japanese. He picked up hitchhikers in his car, swapped gifts with peddlers on the streets. His office door was always open to a Japanese. Unlike MacArthur, he got around, made friends with hundreds of big and little Japanese. To the Japanese, aloof, impersonal Douglas MacArthur had supplanted their Emperor as the personification of supreme authority. Eichelberger became a symbol of U.S. democracy and fairness. Many Japanese said “Aikerubaga” in the same affectionate tone used by many of his soldiers in calling him “Uncle Bob.”
“Kind Bust” v. “Mean Bust.” Before he left, the Japanese poured out their appreciation of General Eichelberger. The Emperor invited him to lunch—a rare courtesy. Prince Takamatsu, the Emperor’s brother, came to tea with the general and his wife Emma (who through the war, and after, got a letter a day from her husband until she joined him in Yokohama). The governor of Tokyo and the governor of Yokohama got into a squabble over which would commission a sculptor to do a “kind bust” of the general—to supplant a stern-faced “mean bust” made of him when he first arrived in Japan.
To the general’s office came dozens of Japanese with gifts and good-luck keepsakes. Most of them ended their hesitant speeches on the same note: “General, it is a tragedy for Japan that you are leaving us.” Many were weeping on the dock when the general joined “Miss Em” on the transport and sailed for a hero’s welcome this week in Manila, for an old soldier’s quiet life in the States as soon as the Army marks “Retired” on Uncle Bob’s service record of more than 43 years.
Agreed. Interesting about Brereton. The thing about Mac is that overall he does well and is associated with victory and all that. But at the same time, his career is punctuated by almost unforgivable errors such as his inability to realize the political dimensions to the War in Korea that effectively limited the military objectives. His failure to account for increasing Chinese PLA activity prior to what was essentially an ambush along the Yalu is also a key note failure along with his doddling on the first days of War with Japan…
Can’t open the Time article for some reason. I’ll try later.
Read Eichelberger’s book Our Jungle Road to Tokyo for his account. He recounts how Mac told him he’d get publicity if he won at Buna, which was important to Mac and which meant nothing to Eichelberger. Mac’s instructions to Eichelberger when sending him to Buna, where the Americans had stalled (which is a polite term for a division pretty much breaking down in the field) was to win or not come back alive. Then Mac pointed to Eichelberger’s chief of staff and said something to the effect ‘And that goes for your chief of staff too.’
Did you get the impression that Eichelberger didn’t like Mac all that much?
I forget the composition, but to lead by example where the troops were refusing to advance Eichelberger led a patrol against the Japanese which might have been the highest ranking infantry patrol in history. Can’t remember the composition, but I think apart from Gen Eichelberger it had something like a colonel or two, maybe even a brigadier or equivalent, and a few majors etc. I think there was a sergeant there for the officers to order around.
If you read Atkinson’s “An Army at Dawn,” there is a recounting of Patton essentially ordering a subordinate General, Orlando Pace, to essentially act as an infantry lieutenant in order to dislodge Germans from mountains in North Africa after the attack lost all momentum and the Germans showed themselves to be intractable in defense…
When Patton hung up the phone, I think it was said that he almost cried, and regretted what was essentially sending Pace to his death after humiliating him on the phone and essentially transferring his own failures in planning to Pace. Pace picked up a carbine, and acted as essentially a platoon leader until he was hit in the shoulder and face with shrapnel and bullets. He survived, but was severally wounded and would later be relieved after losing a blood feud with a rival --only to fight again in Germany, leading his troops ultimately to the occupation of Berlin at the end of the War as one of America’s few scapegoated generals to be redeemed…
I’ve always thought that Eichelberger’s achievement in taking a division which was not trained or acclimatised for jungle warfare, ill supplied, half starved, often sick, badly led at all levels, and virtually mutinous and turning it into a reasonably effective fighting force and doing it in the field in a few weeks was brilliant. Most commanders couldn’t manage it in barracks in that time.
True, but isn’t it usually the case that the boss of anything relies upon his main managers to run the show? And that a good boss surrounds himself with good people?
Although in Mac’s case it’s debatable whether he surrounded himself with yes men who happened to be competent rather than the other way around.
True enough…
That’s not to disparage the good people he had, notably Gen Kenny who ran his air force and was very much a ‘can do’ operator.
His chief of staff, Sutherland, was the gateway to Mac and was a nasty piece of work but he got his comeuppance in ?New Hollandia when he brought a woman up from Australia for a bit of tropical comfort. When he finally found out, Mac wouldn’t tolerate it and, I think, sent him back to Australia for a while. Clipped his wings a bit.
I don’t know that his island hopping stategic vision was all that unique, although it was clever. IIRC somebody else (USN admiral I think but I can’t pin it down) put forward a similar strategy independently of Mac.
The above is all from memory, so E&OE.
Good memory though. I guess your brain cells are impervious to lager.
As for the island hopping strategy, it was actually the brainchild of an ingenious, but alcoholic savant, US Marine LT Colonel Ellis. He died while on a secret mission in the 1920s, probably of alcohol poisoning…
Its a shame… But what happened, happened…
Allowing that it’s quite some time since I read Eichelberger’s book, my impression was that he respected Mac but had a realistic assessment of his foibles and vanities so that he wasn’t part of Mac’s yes men group.
MacArthur on the island hopping strategy…
‘‘My strategic conception for the Pacific Theater, which I outlined after the Papuan Campaign and have since consistently advocated, contemplates massive strokes against only main strategic objectives, utilizing surprise and air-ground striking power supported and assisted by the fleet. This is the very opposite of what is termed ‘island hopping’ which is the gradual pushing back of the enemy by direct frontal pressure with the consequent heavy casualties which will certainly be involved. Key points must of course be taken but a wise choice of such will obviate the need for storming the mass of islands now in enemy possession. ‘Island hopping’ with extravagant losses and slow progress…is not my idea of how to end the war as soon and as cheaply as possible. New conditions require for solution and new weapons require for maximum application new and imaginative methods. Wars are never won in the past.’’
Good stuff on here…
http://www.history.army.mil/books/wwii/macarthur%20reports/macarthur%20v1/ch05.htm
By advancing in leaps always within the range of his fighter-bombers (typically P-38 Lightnings), he could maintain air superiority over his land operations. This provided critical close air support and also denied the enemy sea and airborne resupply, effectively cutting the Japanese forces off as they were under attack. MacArthur’s strategy of maneuver, offensive air-strikes, and force avoidance would eventually pay off - unlike the ground forces in the Central Pacific theater, infantry troops in operations under MacArthur’s command consistently suffered fewer casualties.
Tojo, when interrogated after the war, said those type of tactics drove the Japanese to despair.
Anyway RS and Nick, who would your number one man be in WW2?