Category: All General History

My posts about books that look across multiple periods of military history

Geoffrey Plank interview about his 15th to 19th centuries military history book “Atlantic Wars” (Oxford University Press, 2020)

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Geoffrey Plan military historyGeoffrey Plank interview about his 15th to 19th centuries military history book “Atlantic Wars”

Check out this book here   https://amzn.to/3j22eMb

Interview Summary

Geoffrey Plank has been a historian for many years focusing on Nova Scotia, Quakers, and now military history. He’s written an expansive review of warfare across the Atlantic from the 15th to 19th centuries. We talked about this period, the book, and the immense impact the slave trade had on the formation of the nations along the Atlantic seaboard and on warfare.

(THE AUDIO PLAYER IS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE POST.)

0:40 – Geoffrey explains how he ended up writing an expansive book on Atlantic Wars.

2:02 – Geoffrey explains how he organized the book since it covers so much time and countries.

3:16 – Geoffrey talks about warfare at sea.

5:24 – Geoffrey addresses the idea of democracy and piracy.

7:14 – Geoffrey explains why he started the book in the 15th century.

8:53 – Geoffrey explains why he ended the book at the Age of Revolution.

11:37 – Geoffrey addresses the North Africans raiding Europe.

13:17 – Geoffrey talks about the shift to larger sailing vessels.

16:18 – Geoffrey talks about indigenous populations involvement in the Atlantic war at sea.

18:32 – Geoffrey talks about the war on land around the Atlantic basin and the involvement of indigenous populations.

21:27 – Geoffrey talks about the West African coast.

23:11 – Geoffrey talks about military forces in West Africa.

24:11 – Geoffrey talks about the North and South Atlantic.

26:09 – Geoffrey talks about the development of racism in this period.

30:24 – Geoffrey talks about how often whole colonies were evacuated from the New World to the Old. He also addresses the connection between the slave trade and military operations.

34:40 – Geoffrey talks about the meeting between African slaves and indigenous Americans.

36:38 – Geoffrey talks about a millenarian religious movement.

38:40 – Geoffrey talks about how he did his research.

43:09 – Geoffrey talks about including all of North America within the Atlantic World.

45:20 – Geoffrey talks about the importance of military history in the Atlantic World.

47:46 – Geoffrey talks about galleys being used to block forts in the Caribbean.

50:17 – Geoffrey talks about how rough the lives of sailors were in this period.

54:40 – Geoffrey talks about the role of Central and Eastern Europe in the Atlantic World.

Links of interest

https://amzn.to/3j22eMb

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/atlantic-wars-9780190860455?cc=us&lang=en&

Contact Information

For more “Military History Inside Out” please follow me at www.warscholar.org, on Facebook at warscholar, on twitter at Warscholar, on youtube at warscholar and on Instagram @crisalvarezwarscholar. Or subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Stitcher | Spotify Please see historyrabbithole.com for a list of my dozen or so blogs and podcasts. You’re sure to find something you like.

Guests: Geoffrey Plank

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: Books, audio interviews, author, academic, podcast, Oxford University Press, age of sail, American history,  General military history, 19th century war, 18th century war, Renaissance warfare, Naval Warfare, Slavery history, native american, indigenous peoples,

Check out this book here   https://amzn.to/3j22eMb

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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Global military history book – “The 100 Worst Military Disasters in History” (ABC-CLIO, 2020) – John Kuehn interview

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Check the book out here https://amzn.to/38GWtih

Dr. John Kuehn is a former US Naval officer and currently studies, teaches, and writes history at the United States Command and General Staff College. We spoke about his latest co-authored book on some of the world’s worst military disasters.

1:48 – John talks about how he developed the book on military disasters.

3:17 – John talks about the chronological format of the book.

4:48 – John talks about how they focused on both campaigns and wars.

10:11 – John talks about civil wars and revolution.

12:52 – John talks about technological impact on military campaigns.

15:39 – John talks about the impact of logistics on military disasters.

17:06 – John talks about pre-war preparation and its effects on wars.

22:36 – John talks about naval campaigns and disasters.

27:09 – John talks about the Russo-Japanese War and the Mexican-American War.

28:50 – John talks about the global, naval and air power focuses in the book. He also addresses contingencies in war.

33:03 – John talks about the vast amount of resources they had to study these wars and campaigns.

35:48 – John talks about the difficulty in determining casualties in war.

40:30 – John talks about the difficulty into coming to conclusions with some of the campaigns in the book.

47:45 – John discusses the end of the Pacific War.

50:10 – John expands on the Taping Rebellion.

1:03:14 – John can be found on twitter @jkuehn50 and by searching for “Hand Grenade of the Month” and H-war on google.

Links of interest

https://amzn.to/38GWtih

https://www.abc-clio.com/ABC-CLIOCorporate/product.aspx?pc=A5703C

https://twitter.com/jkuehn50

For more “Military History Inside Out” please follow me at www.warscholar.org, on Facebook at warscholar, on twitter at Warscholar, on youtube at warscholar1945 and on Instagram @crisalvarezswarscholar. Or subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Spotify

Guests: Dr. John Kuehn

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: military, history, military history, conflict, war, interview, non-fiction book, military history, fort leavenworth, command general staff college, ancient, medieval, global war on terror, iraqi freedom, Swedish Army, Mosul, American Revolution, French Revolution, English Civil War, Thirty Years’ War, Vietnam War, France, WWI, Germany, Russia, USMC, Japan, Pacific War, China, Salamis, iran-iraq war, Lepanto, Midway, athens, Texas Revolution, Taiping Rebellion, Meggido, Trafalgar, Tudor, York, washington naval conference

Check the book out here https://amzn.to/38GWtih

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Early 20th Century naval history – Learning War – Trent Hone interview

Trent Hone was written frequently on US Naval history. I interviewed him about his upcoming book Learning War: The Evolution of Fighting Doctrine in the US Navy, 1898-1945 to be published by the Naval Institute Press.

1:45 – Mr. Hone discusses some of his earlier naval doctrine writing. He’s written about night combat in the US Navy in early WWII. He also wrote on how naval doctrine changed over WII. He’s collaborated on different navy history projects. He helped with the WWI navy book To Crown the Waves.

4:45 – Mr. Hone discusses his current book. From the 1890s to the 1940s, the Navy became a learning organization.

8:28 – The Spanish American war is where the US Navy realizes it needs a new institutional structure. This leads to the creation of the General Board in the Navy. Also, there’s a conflict between engineering officers versus line officers. Line officers were then required to be engineering officers and the Naval Academy changed its focus to engineering too.

10:59 – After the Spanish-American war, the US becomes a global empire. The new territories are across the oceans. The General Board thinks seriously about what the Navy should look like with these new overseas commitments.

13:40 – The board is made up of navigation, intelligence, the head of the Navy, and the others. Some leaders in the Navy didn’t trust the Board since it put civilian control over the Navy. The board leads the creation of the Chief of Naval Operations.

16:42 – Surface tactics change before WWI. The Atlantic Fleet was established and the Navy learns how to fight as a fleet rather than as squadrons. They also learn how to use torpedoes in combat. New communications are developed for tactical exercises and new ideas created for independent action.

20:30 – The US Navy went into WWI ready for a big fleet action. But Germany instead uses U-boats to win the war. The US Navy then rushed to built ships good for fighting U-boats.

22:45 – In 1916, the Navy starts to realize that there are many different ways wars can be fought. The Navy begins to grapple with how aviation can be used in the fleet. Submarines are also an uncertainty as far as what their role will be in war.

25:42 – The idea that the Navy was focused on battleships for the next war is a pervasive belief. This idea is tied with the Gun Club, which were admirals focused on big gun battles. There was more diversity in thinking about how the next war would be fought.

29:00 – WWII leaders were adept at using all their available technologies. The Navy generally did promote the best rather than those who were connected politically. Performance mattered. The Navy also created good ways to exchange feedback about important issues. There was also a great deal of creativity during tactical exercises.

32:52 – Mr. Hone looked at exercise reports and doctrinal manuals. But they lacked context about how these ideas were created. He looked at various primary and secondary sources in the National Archives and the Navy War College archives.

37:21 – PBYs were used at night during WWII. There was a large pre-WWII effort to get patrol planes and ships to work together at night. The Navy was also working on destroyer night combat before WWI.

42:00 – Mr. Hone was surprised at how far back some Navy innovations went. He would like to do more research on how the large the spheres of influence of some officers were.

44:22 – Mr. Hone focused on one action on November 13, 1942 at Guadalcanal. History has said that Officer Callahan was confused and overwhelmed at Iron Bottom. However, Navy documents suggest that he used his force the way they were expected to be used against a Japanese battleship.

48:06 – The US Navy learned quicker than the Japanese Navy in WWII and this came from the organizational structure.

53:00 – Guadalcanal has many wrecks that provide information on how the Naval campaign was waged.

53:47 – The book will be on USNI.org and Amazon. His personal website is trenthone.com.

55:00 – The Navy planned for a campaign against the Japan in WWII but they didn’t have an idea of how they would end the campaign. The Japanese focus was on one big battle and they pursued that idea throughout. Pearl Harbor, Midway, and Leyte Gulf were Japanese big battle concepts.

Links

https://www.usni.org/store/books/ebook-editions/crown-waves

https://www.usni.org/

https://trenthone.com/

For more “Military History Inside Out” please follow me on Facebook at warscholar, on twitter at Warscholar, on youtube at warscholar1945 and on Instagram @crisalvarezswarscholar

Guests: Trent Hone

Host: Cris Alvarez