Hunt for the German

Raider Königsberg
When Things Fell
Apart in Yugoslavia
Thank the Swedes
for Combined Arms
Interview: American
Ace Bud Anderson
HISTORYNET.com

TEL O R S UP PL IES ,
ING ORD NA NCE , IN D
WHETHER DELIVERRT HAS SAV ED LIV E S O N TH E G RO U N
CLOSE AIR SUPPO
econnaissance
A pair of F- 6As (r
Mustang)
versions of the P-51 sion over
mis
fly an observation
t in 1944.
the Normandy coas

SPRING 2023
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 SPRING 2023 Letters 6 Dispatches 8

Features
34
Killing Königsberg
At the outset of World War I
the German light cruiser kept
one step ahead of the Royal
Navy, until a South African
big-game hunter took aim.
By Mark Carlson

24
The Breakup
of Yugoslavia
Never more than a wobbly
confederation of disparate
republics, it blew apart in
the post-communist era.
By Anthony Rogers

Departments
14
Valor
16
What We
‘Gatling Gun Learned From...
Parker’ The 1918–20
Polish-Soviet War

2 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 Reviews 72 War Games 78 Captured! 80

48
The Day Combined
Arms Prevailed
Amid the Thirty Years’ War
Gustavus II Adolphus of
Sweden transformed the
way armies fight battles.
By David T. Zabecki

64
Death Within
the Walls
In 429 BC the city-state of
Plataea came under siege
from the same Greek forces
that had once defended it.
By Justin D. Lyons

42
Close Calls
For more than a century
since its introduction into
military use the airplane
has come to the soldier’s
aid in multiple roles.
By Jon Guttman
56
Practically
Irreplaceable
During World War II British
Field Marshal Sir John Dill
proved an essential liaison
among Allied war planners.
By John D. Howard

18
Interview
22
Hardware
76
Hallowed
Bud Anderson PL-37 Light Ground
Centenarian Artillery Wagon Saragarhi,
Ace of Aces British India

On the cover: Two F-6As (reconnaissance versions of the P-51 Mustang) sweep the Normandy coastline in advance of the June
1944 invasion. Each was fitted with cameras in its rear fuselage for low-level photography. (William S. Phillips/U.S. National Guard)
3
VISIT HISTORYNET.COM
TRENDING NOW
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Photos of World War II
The American general left a legacy of
personal images, revealing his unique
perspective on the war as he fought it
from North Africa to Germany.
By Jerry Morelock
HistoryNet.com/patton-photographs
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 Letters
Armor vs. Grunts
When it comes to infantry
fighting against armor, we
foot soldiers are certainly
not “hapless,” as stated in the
deck of “Armor vs. Grunts,”
by Jon Guttman [Winter
2023]. It was Bill Mauldin’s
Willie who famously opined
to Joe as they watched a “hap-
less” Sherman rumble by,
“I’d ruther dig. A movin’ fox-
hole attracts th’ eye.”
In 1967 Cold War Germany
we mechanized infantry guys
were trained to view Soviet
tanks as just “targets.” In ad-
dition to our 90 and 106 mm
“reckless” [recoilless] rifles
[see photo], we also had M72
LAWs (light anti-armor weap-
ons). We practiced often how
to destroy those vulnerable
iron beasts. We even visited
our neighboring armor unit’s
M60 tank park to take rides
in and actually drive those
ungainly HEAT [high-explo-
sive anti-tank] round traps.
We learned firsthand how
“blind” the operators were
6 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
and how to approach the rat-
t l e trap tin can safely to toss
a Molotov cocktail into the
engine compartment or onto
the turret ring. Yes, we even
practiced making and throw-
ing those gasoline-filled wine
bottles at derelict M4 Sher-
mans on the anti-tank range at
“Graf ” [Grafenwoehr Train-
ing Area, Bavaria]. On a 1983
8th Infantry Division staff
ride overlooking the Fulda
Gap I heard General Carl
Vuono ask Brigade Com-
mander Johnnie Corns what
he would do if more T-62s
poured through the gap than
he had weapons to engage.
We staff pukes were awestruck
at Corns’ reply: “Sir, I’ve lived
my entire professional life for
that moment!”
Albert P. Burckard Jr.
U.S. Army (Ret.)
Carrollton, Va.
Imagine my surprise in find-
ing the cover of my first sub-
scription issue of Military
History asking, Are Tanks
Obsolete? Thirty-three
years ago as a Soviet threat
analyst I wrote an article in
the Journal of Defense &
Diplomacy titled “Is the Tank
Dead?” Without belaboring
the point, the conclusion then
was, and remains today, that
the tank is dead. Indeed, ma-
neuver warfare itself is in the
throes of redefinition in the
face of “smart weapons.” That
there are still tanks on the
battlefield is merely an arti-
fact of evolutionary inertia.
Perhaps you could get
Guttman to do a piece on
the evolution of maneu-
ver warfare, following its
ebb and flow from Heinz
Guderian to Georgy Zhukov
to George Patton, and par-
ticularly its expression from
World War I to Blitzkrieg
to the Russians’ evolving
concepts of the operational
maneuver group (OMG) and
today’s deeply flawed con-
cept of the battalion tactical
group (BTG).
Louis Lavoie
Plymouth, Minn.
I found the article on armor
vs. infantry in your winter
edition particularly interest-
ing. However, I think the vul-
nerability of armor was first
exploited by two tank busters
in World War II, the Russian
[Ilyushin Il-2] Sturmovik
[ground-attack aircraft] and
the British [Hawker] Ty-
phoon [fighter bomber], fol-
lowed later down the road
by America’s “Warthog” [Fair-
child Republic A-10 Thunder-
bolt II attack aircraft]. With
modern technology tanks can
only be effective with infan-
try and air support superior
to that of one’s enemies.
Michael Sawyer
West Jefferson, N.C.
Carthage
I enjoyed immensely the
article “Carthage Must Be
Destroyed” [Autumn 2022],
by Marc G. DeSantis. Let me
add two cents worth of what I
learned in Latin class 75 years
ago. The Senate decreed Car-
thagine delenda est (“Carthage
must be destroyed”).
1. All inhabitants were
to be put to the sword.
2. Buildings were to be
torn down.
3. Salt was to be spread
all over so that nothing
could grow.
We still see its effects today.
Gaetano V. Cavallaro
Ormond Beach, Fla.
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 Dispatches
By Dave Kindy

HONORS

In the Ski Tracks

of Telemark

E
ighty years ago, on the night of Feb. 27–28, 1943, a team of 10 Norwe- SOUND OFF
gian commandos trained by the British Special Operations Executive
achieved the seemingly impossible. Descending into a deep gorge in ‘Courage, above all things, is
below-freezing temperatures, they forded an ice-choked river, scaled the first quality of a warrior’
a 500-foot cliff, planted explosives at a German heavy water produc- —Carl von Clausewitz
tion facility within the hydroelectric plant at Vemork, Norway, and slipped
away undetected. The resulting explosions destroyed the entire inventory of
heavy water intended for use in the production of atomic weapons. Operation
Gunnerside was popularized by the 1965 war film
In 1943 commandos The Heroes of Telemark (after the subarctic region
targeted a German
TOP: NORIMAGES (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO); LEFT: AKG-IMAGES

the commandos traversed), starring Kirk Douglas

atomic research facility
and Richard Harris, and the 2016 book The Winter
within the hydroelectric
Fortress, by Neal Bascomb.
plant at Vemork, Norway
(above). A 2023 ski trek Flash forward to today. In late February and early
will retrace their steps. March 2023, to mark the anniversary of the historic
assault, S.O.E. Expeditions—an international team of
ex-special forces operators, explorers, historians and endurance athletes—
will lead guests on 10- and 15-day ski expeditions tracing the commandos’
attack and escape routes through Telemark, including stays at huts in which
they sheltered. For more information visit soeexpeditions.com.

8 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 WAR RECORD
SOLE SURVIVOR
Spring 431 BC
In the opening clash of the
431–404 BC Peloponnesian
War a Theban assault force fails
to take the Athenian-allied city-
state of Plataea. Spartan King
Archidamus II ultimately suc-
ceeds where the Thebans failed
with his follow-up 429–427 BC
siege of Plataea (P. 64).

The Sailor April 1, 1914

Fregattenkapitän Max Looff

Who Beat takes command of the German

light cruiser SMS Königs-
berg (P. 34). At the outset

the Odds of World War I Looff shelters

the cruiser up German East
Africa’s Rufiji River, eluding
British Royal Navy pursuers
for 10 months before being
forced to scuttle his damaged
ship on July 11, 1915.

Like any optimistic sailor, Seaman 2nd Class Harold Bray didn’t want to believe his warship
April 15, 1632
Amid the Thirty Years’ War
could sink, but it did—and fast. On July 30, 1945, the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis—having Swedish King Gustavus II Adol-
recently delivered components for the Little Boy atomic bomb to the Pacific island of Tinian phus leads his Protestant army
in the Northern Marianas—was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-58 and sank in just to victory at Rain, Bavaria, over
12 minutes. Of the crew of 1,195, Bray was one of just 316 men pulled alive from the Philippine a Catholic League force led by
Sea four days later. The Sept. 29, 2022, death of fellow sailor Cleatus Lebow makes Bray the Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly,
who is mortally wounded. At
sole survivor of the wartime disaster, remembered more for its aftermath than its connections
their first meeting on Sept. 17,
to the atomic bomb.
TOP: ZUMA PRESS INC (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO); BOTTOM: MATAILONG DU (NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN, SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION)

1631, Gustavus beat Tilly at

For various reasons distress signals the ship’s radiomen sent after the attack went disregarded. the Battle of Breitenfeld
While adrift and awaiting rescue, Bray and shipmates battled the elements, dehydration and (P. 48), the first major Protes-
aggressive sharks, the latter of which claimed as many as 150 men. Scores of others perished tant victory of the conflict.
from exposure and saltwater poisoning. The incident remains the greatest loss of life at sea
May 4, 1980
from a single ship in U.S. Navy history. The death of autocratic Yugo-
slav President Josip Broz Tito
tips the first domino leading to
MEMORIAL the breakup of Yugoslavia
(P. 24). Following the post-
Honoring the Original communist elections of 1990,
the fragile confederation of

American Warriors Slavic republics eventually

splits into six states of cultur-
ally, religiously and linguisti-
On Veterans Day 2022 representatives of the Smithsonian’s cally dissimilar factions.
National Museum of the American Indian, some 1,500
American Indian veterans, family members and onlookers May 26, 1940
gathered to dedicate the National Native American Veter- British General Sir John Dill
ans Memorial outside the museum on the National Mall in (P. 56) is appointed chief of
Washington, D.C. It is the first national landmark to com- the Imperial General Staff. Pro-
memorate the military service and sacrifice of American moted to field marshal in 1941,
Indians, Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiians, a legacy of Dill is appointed his nation’s
courage that extends through all American wars. Designed primary representative on the
by Oklahoma-born Cheyenne/Arapaho artist Harvey Pratt, wartime Combined Chiefs of
Warriors’ Circle of Honor incorporates benches and flowing Staff, serving as an invaluable
water for future ceremonies and is flanked by decorative liaison between British and
lances to which visitors can tie cloths for prayer and healing. American commanders.

9
 SHIPWRECK
The Äpplet of Gustavus’ Eye
Most shipwreck aficionados are familiar with Vasa, the notoriously top-heavy
Swedish warship ordered by King Gustavus II Adolphus (see P. 48) that sank
mere yards into its maiden voyage off Stockholm on Aug. 10, 1628. Salvaged
in 1961, its largely intact hull (above left) is the centerpiece of a popular name-
sake museum [vasamuseet.se/en] in the capital’s Royal National City Park.
Less well known is its sister ship Äpplet, whose sunken hull (above right)
maritime archaeologists from the Swedish Museum of Wrecks recently dis-
SOLD
Rough Rider
Roosevelt’s Revolver
At the outset of the Spanish-American War Lt. Col. Theodore
Roosevelt of the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry (aka “Rough Riders”)
ordered this Smith & Wesson New Model No. 3 single-action re-
volver, but he left for training camp in San Antonio, Texas, before
it arrived. The future president had his pistol chambered in .38
Long Colt, the Army’s standard pistol cartridge caliber at the time,
though rarely found in this model. Having served as a “nightstand
gun,” Roosevelt’s top-break six-shooter remains in pristine condi-
tion. It fetched $910,625 at a recent Rock Island Auction Co. sale.
10 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
covered off Vaxholm, an island near Stockholm.
After shipbuilder Hein Jacobsson widened its
beam to correct Vasa’s design flaw, Äpplet sur-
vived its launch and served in the Swedish navy
for some 30 years. Researchers will make a 3-D
image of the wreck but have no plans to recover
it, as it lies in a protected military area.
Douglas A-26 Invader
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: OHL, CC BY-SA 3.0; JIM HANSSON (VRAK - MUSEUM OF WRECKS); PLATINUM FIGHTER SALES; ROCK ISLAND AUCTIONS
WARBIRDS
A Wing, a Prayer…
and Rivets
World War II aircraft are increasingly rare, but
a few remain airworthy or are being restored.
Following are standouts in the news:
Want to own a World War II–era light bomber?
Platinum Fighter Sales is offering the above
restored U.S. Air Force Douglas A-26 Invader
for $495,000. The sleek aluminum aircraft saw
action during the Battle of the Bulge and later
served in the Korean War.
The Military Aviation Museum in Virginia Beach,
Va., has acquired a restored, airworthy Japanese
Mitsubishi A6M3 “Zero” fighter. Produced by
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in 1942, airframe
3148 saw combat in the Pacific. Legend Flyers
in Everett, Wash., spent 10 years rebuilding it.
 REEL WAR

Remakes
The 2022 version of the war film All Quiet on the
Western Front (see review, P. 75), based on the novel
by Erich Maria Remarque, got us thinking: What
other war films have been remade and to what success?

BEAU GESTE
The 1924 novel by P.C. Wren, about brothers who
run off to join the French Foreign Legion in the
wake of a family disgrace, has been filmed several
times (1926, 1939 and 1966) and adapted for TV.
The best version is arguably the 1939 film starring
Gary Cooper, the 1926 silent drama with Ronald
Colman coming in a close second.

SAHARA
The 1943 version of this film, based on the 1927
Philip MacDonald novel Patrol, stars Humphrey
Bogart as an American tank commander fighting
Germans at an oasis in North Africa. A 1953 re-
make—filmed as the Western Last of the Coman-
ches—remained faithful to the original script,
while a 1995 TV adaptation starring Jim Belushi
was only passable.

TORA! TORA! TORA! THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE

This 1970 epic about the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese surprise
attack at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, was based on histories
of the strike by Gordon Prange and Ladislas Farago.
Featuring an international cast and crew, it wowed
audiences. While not technically a remake, the 2001
film Pearl Harbor, starring Ben Affleck, bombed with
critics but did surprisingly well at the box office.
Two films have dramatized the 1959 Richard Condon novel
about a Korean War veteran brainwashed by Communist
Chinese captors to be a sleeper assassin. The 1962 version
—starring Laurence Harvey, Frank Sinatra and Angela
Lansbury—ranks among the all-time best political thrillers.
The 2004 remake, updated for the Gulf War and starring
Denzel Washington as the assassin, pales by comparison.

“Captured,” a special
TOP: HERITAGE AUCTIONS; BOTTOM: NAITONAL WWI MUSEUM AND MEMORIAL, KANSAS CITY

MUSEUMS exhibit at the National

WWI Museum and
Memorial [theworldwar.
org] in Kansas City, re-
lates the experiences of
POWs during World War I
with photographs, period
artifacts and artwork ren-
dered by prisoners.

The Smithsonian’s
National Air and
Space Museum [air-
andspace.si.edu] in
Washington, D.C., has
reopened following an
Austro-Hungarian POWs await the Armistice. extensive multiyear reno-
vation and rehabilitation.

11
 MONUMENT

The Mountain
Division’s Camp in
the Rockies

Impressed by the performance of skiborne Finnish soldiers against invad-
ing Soviet troops during the 1939–40 Winter War, the U.S. Army in 1940
authorized formation of a platoon-sized ski patrol. Not until July 10, 1943,
however, did it activate the 10th Light Division (Alpine), the first division
of mountain troops in U.S. military history. It was redesignated the 10th
Mountain Division a year later. By then Camp Hale, the unit’s training camp
at 9,200 feet in the Rocky Mountains west of Denver, was in full swing.
During World War II the 15,000 men housed at Camp Hale trained in
mountain climbing, cold-weather survival,
Alpine and Nordic skiing, as well as on various
ordnance and weapons. Some 240 members of
the Women’s Army Corps also trained there.
President Joe Biden recently designated the site
and nearly 54,000 acres of the surrounding
White River National Forest the Camp Hale–
Continental Divide National Monument.

TAP S
Johnny Johnson, 101, last of the legendary Royal Air Force “Dambusters”
of Operation Chastise, died in Bristol, England, on Dec. 7, 2022. On May 16–17,
1943, then Sergeant Johnson was an aimer on one of 19 Avro Lancasters that
breached Germany’s Möhne and Edersee dams using specially developed bombs
that bounced across the water, struck the dams and exploded underwater.
Raymond Earl Haddock, 86, the last U.S. military commander in West Berlin,
died in Spotsylvania, Va., on Oct. 3, 2022. The former Army major general over-
saw Pershing II missile stations in West Germany during the Cold War and West
TOP: DENVER PUBLIC LIBRARY; LEFT: LEON NEAL (GETTY IMAGES)

Berlin from 1988 to 1990. Ironically, his death came on the very anniversary of
German reunification.
Dean Caswell, 100, the last living U.S. Marine Corps flying ace of World War II,
died in Austin, Texas, on Sept. 21, 2002. In 1945, flying a Vought F4U-1D Corsair
with Marine squadron VMF-221 from the carrier USS Bunker Hill during the Battle
of Okinawa, he shot down seven enemy planes and a probable eighth. Caswell also
flew jets during the Korean War. His decorations included the Silver Star and two
Distinguished Service Crosses.
Hiroshi “Hershey” Miyamura, 97, one of the last two surviving Medal of
Honor recipients of the Korean War, died in Phoenix, Arizona, on Nov. 29, 2022. On
Johnson April 24–25, 1951, near Taejon-ni, then Corporal Miyamura, a machine-gun squad
leader, covered the retreat of his company, killing an estimated 50 Chinese soldiers.

12 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

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 Valor ‘Gatling Gun Parker’
By David T. Zabecki

Two months later the 26th Division

was committed as part of General Jean
Degoutte’s French Sixth Army during
the massive French counterattack into
the Marne salient. Near Trugny on July 21
Parker, who remained in command of
the 102nd Infantry, advanced on horse-
back through heavy enemy artillery and
machine-gun fire. Preceding the lead
elements of his own troops, he recon-
noitered the German positions and the
most advantageous avenues of approach
for his attacking force. He received his
second DSC for that action.
Four days later Parker earned his third
DSC while the division was advancing
along the road through La Fére Wood.
A battalion to his front was halted in the
road, awaiting orders, when caught by
Brig. Gen. John He was famed among his U.S. Army colleagues and in an enemy artillery barrage with no cover
Henry Parker the press as “Gatling Gun Parker.” John Henry Parker but the shallow roadside ditches. “Imme-
U.S. Army acquired that sobriquet during the Spanish-American diately appreciating the situation,” read
War, when as a young first lieutenant he commanded a Parker’s DSC citation, the colonel “twice
Four Distinguished
detachment of three Gatling guns that laid down wither- rode down the line and back again at a
Service Crosses ing fire support for the U.S. forces that stormed San Juan slow walk, stopping to talk with the men;
France Heights in Cuba. Firing 18,000 rounds in less than nine and thus by his fearless personal exposure
World War I minutes, Parker’s gunners killed many of the defenders to, and disregard of, danger, he promptly
and suppressed their fire. It marked the first instance steadied the troops and prevented prob-
in Army history in which machine guns supported infantry in the attack. For able disorder at an important juncture.”
his actions on July 1, 1898, Parker received the Silver Star. Then Colonel Theodore By the start of the Allies’ costly Meuse-
Roosevelt, who 103 years after the fact was awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor Argonne campaign on September 26
for having led his Rough Riders from horseback up Kettle Hill, noted, “Parker deserved Parker was in command of the 91st Di-
rather more credit than any other one man in the entire [Santiago] campaign.” vision’s 362nd Infantry Regiment. During

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; INSET: NATIONAL AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM, SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
By the time of the U.S. entry into World War I Lt. Col. Parker had become the the attack on the village of Gesnes three
Army’s acknowledged expert in the organization, training and tactics of dis- days later he again led from the front
mounted machine-gun detachments. He was a member of the staff of the Ameri- through heavy German machine-gun
can Expeditionary Forces that sailed for England with Maj. Gen. John J. Pershing and artillery fire, including gas, shrap-
aboard RMS Baltic in late May 1917. Sent ahead to the Army Machine Gun School in nel and high-explosive shells. Though
Langres, France, Parker trained young AEF soldiers on the still relatively new weapon. twice wounded, he remained in com-
Loath to sit out the war in the rear, 51-year-old Parker pushed successfully for mand another five hours. Hit a third
assignment to a frontline unit. On April 20, 1918, the colonel was commanding time, he tumbled into a crater full of
the 26th (Yankee) Division’s 102nd Infantry Regiment when the unit came under other wounded soldiers. The following
German attack at Seicheprey, a supposedly quiet section where green American morning the colonel crawled from the
units were sent to gain experience. In one of the AEF’s first major engagements crater and led his surviving men to the
of the war the Americans suffered some 650 casualties and more than 100 men rear. While the war was over for Parker,
captured. In the midst of the enemy barrage Parker coolly moved forward to the action at Gesnes brought him his
inspect his lines and command the defense. For his actions he was among the first fourth Distinguished Service Cross. He
members of the AEF to receive the Distinguished Service Cross—second only was the only foot soldier of World War I
to the Medal of Honor for heroism in combat. to earn four DSCs. MH

14 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

HOW DID
THE DUKE OF
WELLINGTON
REFER TO
HIS SOLDIERS
AFTER THE
BATTLE OF
VITORIA?
Pigeon-livered half-wits, a dirty
pack of dogs, a sickening disgrace,
or the scum of the earth?

For more, visit

HISTORYNET.COM/MAGAZINES/QUIZ

ANSWER: “WE HAVE IN THE SERVICE THE SCUM

OF THE EARTH AS COMMON SOLDIERS,” WROTE
AN EXASPERATED WELLINGTON IN AN 1813
DISPATCH TO HENRY, THIRD EARL BATHURST,
BRITAIN’S SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR.
TWO YEARS LATER, HE WOULD EXPRESS A
MUCH HIGHER OPINION OF HIS MEN AFTER
HIS VICTORY OVER NAPOLEON AT WATERLOO.
 What We Learned From...
The 1918–20 Polish-Soviet War
By William John Shepherd

the Battle of Warsaw (aka the “Miracle

on the Vistula”) brought an unexpected
and decisive Polish victory. The Russians
had advanced with several large, poorly
coordinated armies that the Poles—
advised by such able French officers as
General Maxime Weygand and young
Captain Charles de Gaulle—managed
to disperse in succession. In the wake
of an eastward Polish counterattack the
Russians sued for peace, and the war
ended with an October 18 cease-fire.
After more than a century of Signed on March 18, 1921, the Peace of
rule by Austria, Prussia and Riga demarcated the border Poland and
Russia, Polish troops fought to Soviet Russia would share through the
restore their nation’s borders. interwar period. Its terms split Ukraine
and Belarus between the two, Lenin’s ad-
ministration establishing the respective
he 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine not only shocked the world but also Soviets republics in its areas of control.
evoked historical echoes of another conflict waged across some of the Conducted chiefly by Pilsudski’s oppo-
same ground a century ago. Fought primarily between the fledgling nents and against his will, the peace ne-
Republic of Poland and the recently proclaimed Russian Soviet Federated gotiations ended with official recognition
Socialist Republic, the Polish-Soviet War of 1918–20 contested disputed of the two Soviet republics, which became
territories of the former empires of Austria-Hungary and czarist Russia. parties to the treaty. The disappoint-
The Nov. 11, 1918, signing of the armistice that formally ended World War I had ing outcome precluded formation of the
also annulled the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk foisted on Russia by the Central Powers Intermarium—a Polish-led federation
in March. Vladimir Lenin promptly ordered Red Army forces westward to recover of states Pilsudski had envisaged bridg-
the German-vacated lands ceded by Russia under the terms of Brest-Litovsk. ing the Baltic, Black and Adriatic seas.
Lenin viewed Poland, newly restored after more than a century of Austrian,
Prussian and Russian partition, as little more than a conduit through which the
Red Army might enter Western Europe and foment communist revolutions.
Lessons:
Meanwhile, Polish officials rushed to restore their nation’s pre-partition borders. The bigger stick doesn’t always bring
In 1919, while the Red Army was preoccupied with the Russian Civil War, Polish victory. A well-led and -supplied under-
Chief of State Józef Pilsudski sent troops eastward to seize most of Lithuania, Belarus dog, such as Poland in 1920 and Britain
and western Ukraine. Meanwhile, in eastern Ukraine advancing Red Army troops in 1940, can snatch victory from the
pushed out the forces of the Ukrainian People’s Republic, compelling the latter to seeming brink of defeat.
forge an alliance with Poland in April 1920. That month Pilsudski, resolving that mil- Never underestimate a good defense.
itary action was the best way to secure favorable borders, launched the Kiev Offensive, Patriots defending their home turf are
and on May 7 Polish and allied Ukrainian forces captured that vital namesake city. The difficult to defeat—witness the United
NARODOWE ARCHIWUM CYFROWE, WARSAW

Soviets responded with successful counterattacks that drove the Poles back to Warsaw. States in 1776 and Ukraine in 2022.
The relentless advance of Soviet troops finally motivated the Western powers, Might does not make right. A nation
which belatedly sent military aid, advisers and volunteers to Poland. Among the defending its autonomy against an auto-
latter were Polish-American pilots of the Kosciuszko Squadron (7th Air Escadrille), cratic aggressor often reaps a wealth of
comprising World War I veterans eager to repay their nation’s debt to namesake international support, from the moral
Continental Army Colonel Tadeusz Kosciuszko, the Polish military engineer and to the material, while delivering a whirl-
hero of the American Revolution. Poland’s defeat seemed certain, but in August wind of consequences to invaders. MH

16 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 CHOOSE FROM NINE AWA RD -W INNING T I T L E S
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THE AMERICAN FRONTIER

Harvey Logan, aka Kid Curry,

had a reputation as a killer.

Plus!
aos
Vicksburg Ch er
Former teach for
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tastes comba e
the first tim
orth
Elmer Ellsw k

PATTON’S EDGE
A fresh loo
ing
at his shock
death

The Wild Bunch’s

KID CURRY
Prelude to Gettysburg

Stalled at the THE MEN OF HIS 1ST RA

—U NT IL
NGER BATTALION Y
THEY SAVED THE DA
Susquehanna ENRAGED HIM HOW MANY MEN DID HE KILL?
BUTCHER OF BATAAN
+ JUDGMENT COMES FOR THE
HT A PROXY
Gen. John Brown Gordon’s + THE STAR BOXERS WHO FOUG
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Ending Slavery An Army Wiped Out

for Seafarers Bicycles at War
Pauli Murray’s Testing the A-Bomb
Remarkable Life
Final Photos of Soviet Female Ace
William McKinley Battle in Paradise
An Artist’s Take
THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL on Jim Crow Invasion Stripes
OF MILITARY HISTORY HISTORYNET.com

World War II’s

Can-Do City
Witness to the
No Mercy
Washington’s tough
White War call on convicted
spy John André

ARMS DOUBLE
RACE TROUBLE ARMY AND
GERMANY’S CO MPETED
In 1775 the WAFFEN-SS’S FAVOR
FOR HITLER
Continental Army “He was more unfortunate than criminal,”
George Washington wrote of Benedict
needed weapons— Arnold’s co-conspirator.

and fast

WINTER 2022
HISTORYNET.com JULY 2020
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HISTORYNET.com

First Woman to Die Tragic Death of CIA’s Barbara Robbins

JULY 3, 1863: FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT OF CONFEDERATE ASSAULT ON CULP’S HILL + BEHIND THE SCENES ON BILLY WILDER’S THE SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS

50 th A N N I V ER SA RY
HOMEFRONT
Zonk! The dawn of
the Super Bowl era
AVIATION H I S T O R Y

LINEBACKER II AMERICA’S LAST SHOT

AT THE ENEMY

TOP PLUS
THE ALLURE

LEE TAKES The Day the SECRET OF THE

LEARJET

COMMAND
War Was Lost
It might not be the
one you think
DOGFIGHT
WHY A NAVY PILOT IN KOREA HAD TO

16 CRUCIAL DECISIONS OF THE Security Breach KEEP SILENT ABOUT HIS VICTORIES
1862 SEVEN DAYS CAMPAIGN Intercepts of U.S.
radio chatter
75TH ANNIVERSARY HOWARD HUGHES
FLIES THE SPRUCE GOOSE (JUST ONCE)
+THE WAR’S LAST WIDOW TELLS HER STORY + threatened lives
April 2021 WINTER 2023 CRASH AFTER CRASH THE HARROWING WINTER 2023
In one week, Robert E. Lee, with James Longstreet and Stonewall
Jackson, drove the Army of the Potomac away from Richmond.
HISTORYNET.com HISTORYNET.com
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 Interview
Centenarian Ace of Aces
By Jon Guttman
Bud Anderson
The 357th Fighter Group was the first
in the U.S. Eighth Air Force to enter com- England’s RAF Leiston airfield
bat from the outset of World War II
equipped with the North American P-51
Mustang. Credited with 595½ aerial
victories—including a record 18½ Mes-
serschmitt Me 262 jets—and 106½
aircraft destroyed on the ground, the
group also produced a record 42 aces.
Of the 357th’s nine double and triple
aces, one remains. With 16¼ victo-
ries to his credit, Clarence Emil “Bud”
Anderson Jr., 100, is the highest-scoring
living American fighter ace. His many
activities in the postwar U.S. Air Force
included flying Republic F-105D Thun-
derchief fighter bombers over Vietnam
as commander of the 355th Tactical
Fighter Wing from June to December
1970, before retiring on Feb. 29, 1972.
On Dec. 2, 2022, the Air Force capped
off his career by promoting him to the
honorary rank of brigadier general.
18 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
As a boy growing up in Oakland,
Calif., how early did you set your
sights on aviation?
My brother and I both grew up fasci-
nated by aviation. There was a mail plane
flying by daily and at least one airport
within 30 miles of us. Douglas B-18s
were based at Moffett Field. Our parents
would take my best friend, Jack Stacker,
and me to the airport, dump us there
and pick us up.
Did you have any flight
background before enlisting
in the U.S. Army Air Corps
on Jan. 19, 1942?
I was already a private pilot—it helped
in my early military training. I flew a
45 hp Piper Cub, a really early model.
I flew tail wheel aircraft all the way up
to graduation.
What was the situation when the
357th Fighter Group arrived at
on Jan. 31, 1944?
There was a “Pioneer Mustang Group,”
the 354th of the Ninth Air Force, which
lent its P-51s to the Eighth Air Force.
We loaned some pilots to the 354th, and
they were so wildly successful that the
Eighth ordered P-51s and made us the
first P-51 unit in the Eighth. They also
fired all the generals in the Eighth and
replaced Maj. Gen. Ira Eaker with Jimmy
Doolittle. [Doolittle] took the calcu-
lated risk of changing the bomber escort
procedure, with us not just escorting
the bombers but eliminating the enemy
fighters. It was pursue and destroy.
What do you recall of your
first combat mission?
By February 5 the 357th’s complement
of P-51s had reached 74, nearly its quota.
Two nights later I flew down to the 354th
at [RAF] Boxted with a half dozen oth-
ers, assigned to make my debut the next
morning. We weren’t too concerned
until morning, when we learned the
lark over France was to be, instead, an
escort mission deep into Germany. The
target was Frankfurt, 360 miles from
our base in East Anglia. We were liable
to see German airplanes up close on
this kind of mission—Focke-Wulfs and
Messerschmitts, good planes manned
by experienced pilots. I had logged 893
flying hours already, but only 30 hours
and 45 minutes of that in Mustangs,
and what I was thinking about, before
prodding the Merlin to life, was of not
getting lost, not screwing up.
I was assigned to a veteran pilot, a
fellow with a couple of kills already. We
found the bombers in less than an hour.
They would fly at 20,000 to 25,000 feet,
and if the atmospheric conditions were
right, they would leave enormous, bil-
lowing, cottony contrails that widened
behind them for miles. We climbed to
30,000 feet or more and began flying
zigzags above them, which was how
the escorts (“little friends” to the bomb-
er crews) stayed close to the bombers
(“big friends” to us) and still kept up
their airspeed.
Then someone calls, “Bogeys!” and
I’m suddenly about as alert and fully
alive as I’ve ever been in my life. The first
thing I do is tuck in closer to my leader.
And then up goes his wing, and he’s slid-
ing away, and he’s yelling something.
I do what he does, all the time looking
around, looking down…and then here’s
a Focke-Wulf Fw 190, a half mile off,
maybe less. I’m almost upside down,
and I’m looking straight up/down at this
RANDY GLASS STUDIO
deadly and beautiful thing, robin’s egg
blue with big black crosses, and the man
I’m protecting is sliding in right behind
it. “Mustang! Mustang! There’s one on
 Major Bud Anderson poses in 1944 on
the wing of his P-51D Mustang Old Crow,
the victory markings beneath its canopy
reflecting his status as a triple ace.
your tail!” Huh? I look around. Nothing.
The Mustang in front is lining up on
the German now, and again through
the earphones: “Mustang! Mustang! He’s
still on your tail!” At maximum range he
triggers his guns, sending a long, futile
burst at the 190 with his four .50 calibers,
and then he slides that Mustang up into
the damnedest series of gyrations I ever
did see. Somehow, I stay with him. It
comes a third time: “Mustang! Mustang!
He’s still on your tail!” And then a light
winks on in my head. Maybe the Mus-
tang he’s warning is me! I throw my air-
plane about, plummet down, look around
…and see nothing. Now I’m feeling like
an idiot. And worse, I suddenly notice—
I’m alone over Germany. No. There’s
a plane in the distance. I slide closer,
warily. It’s clearly a Mustang, alone, like
me. Against all laws of probability the
plane is my leader’s.
Later, back at Boxted, sorting things
BUD ANDERSON (TO FLY AND FIGHT)
out, we wondered if maybe someone
might have mistaken me for a German
closing on my own leader’s tail…but no
one ever admitted to yelling the warn-
ing, which seemed a pretty good clue that
somebody blew it and knew it and was
embarrassed about it. Man, was my flight
leader pissed! He could have gotten that
Focke-Wulf, and he wanted the victory.
My first mission hadn’t been a confi-
dence builder, exactly. But I’d seen the bad
guys up close, and I was a little bit smarter
by evening than I’d been in the morning.
How about your first
confirmed victory?
Our first pilot to get a kill was not the
sharpest knife in the drawer. On Feb. 20,
1944, 1st Lt. Calvert L. Williams of the
362nd Fighter Squadron got lost on his
first mission. He came out of a cloud
and suddenly found this German fighter
alongside him, apparently just as lost.
He just slid back and blew it out of the
sky. So here I am, the hottest pilot in the
whole world, and so far…nothing.
On March 8, 1944, we were heading
home with 1st Lt. John B. England along
with us. We saw a Boeing B-17 [Flying
Fortress] below us, smoking, so we were
headed over there when three Me 109s
came up. We cut them off at the pass,
and I saw one and said, “This one’s mine.”
Our initial engagement was one of con-
centric circles, pulling a lot of g’s. I fired
blind, and black smoke was coming out
—I got him in the coolant system. He
bailed out. I was patting myself on the
back when there was a guy on my wing,
and it was England, mask down and
grinning. Then I thought, Wait, did
Johnny England shoot that down from
‘Everyone get hits?’ The
answers come back,
‘Rog....Rog....Rog.’ So
we shared the credit
under me? After we had a debrief, I went
straight to the officer’s club, and the first
guy I saw was Johnny. He came running
over, and I was thinking: What do I say?
What if he claims it? Should I argue or
what? Hell, I’m not sure myself ! But I
didn’t have to ask. “Goddamn, Andy,”
he gushed. “Best shooting I’ve ever seen
in my life! You hit that sonofabitch out
there at over 40 degrees!” I said: “Aw,
shucks, Johnny. Lucky shot. You know
how it is.” And the moment he turned,
19
 Above: Perched on his Mustang’s port wing, Anderson describes his ninth victory to ground
crewmen of the 357th Fighter Group in 1944. Above right: Test pilot Anderson poses in the
late 1950s in front of a Lockheed F-104 Starfighter at California’s Edwards Air Force Base.
I ran—literally—to get on the telephone
and claim my first victory. [Editor’s note:
England was also credited that day with
his first of an eventual 17½ victories,
placing him among the 357th’s leading
aces. An Air Force base in central Louisi-
ana is named for him.]
What were the circumstances
of your double claim on April 11,
1944, in which you were credited
with an Me 109G and a quarter
share of a Heinkel He 111K?
On April 11 the target was a Focke-Wulf
factory at Sorau [present-day Zary, Po-
land], deep inside Germany, and the
Germans came up in force. While drop-
ping my tanks and jamming the throttle
forward, I picked out three Messer-
schmitts. They brought down two bomb-
ers beneath us, rolled over, went down
and turned around, obviously trying to
re-form up ahead for another head-on
attack. I fell in with one. He breaks hard,
I wheel about, see a large moving shadow
on the ground, and I see my opponent
reversing his turn, trying to come at me
head-on. He doesn’t quite make it. The
propeller flies off. The engine cowling is
blown away. Then off comes the canopy,
and out comes the pilot.
20 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
Now…what the hell was that shadow?
The rest of my flight has caught up. “I
think I saw a multi-engined plane head-
ing west,” I tell them. We pick him out
right away, a Heinkel 111 twin-engined
bomber, scooting right along on the
deck. He is trying to use his camouflage
paint job to blend into the countryside.
But in the bright sunlight his shadow
betrays him. From slightly above and
off to the side we attack, rolling over
one at a time, making what we called
a “high-side pass.” I go in first, set an
engine to smoking. Eddie Simpson goes
for the smoking left engine and blows it
to hell. Bill Overstreet rakes the bomber
from as close as 100 yards. Henry Kay-
ser, a brand-new guy, hoses the cockpit
until he runs out of ammo and burns his
barrels out. I come around for a second
pass and hit him from tail to cockpit
until my ammo is gone too. Losing alti-
tude quickly, the Heinkel pilot tries set-
ting it down in a field, but there’s a pole
in his path, and it tears the left wing away.
The bomber slews around and explodes
into flame. We pass over the wreckage
and see two men jump out. One takes
off, the other just stands there, looking
up at us. I say, “Everyone get hits?” The
answers come back, “Rog.…Rog.…Rog.”
So we shared the credit, a quarter kill
on each of our records.
Any special memories of the
“double play” you scored near
Strasbourg on May 27 or the
“triple” southwest of Leipzig
on June 29?
On May 27, 1944, the Luftwaffe came up
in force, and I had my toughest fight
ever, the “straight up” encounter I will
always remember. We were high over a
bomber stream in our P-51B Mustangs,
escorting the heavies to the Ludwigs-
hafen-Mannheim area. For the past
several weeks the Eighth Air Force had
been targeting oil, and Ludwigshafen
was a center for synthetic fuels. We’d
picked up the bombers at 27,000 feet,
and almost immediately all hell began
breaking loose up ahead of us. This was
still over France, long before we’d ex-
pected the German fighters to come up
in force. They’d worked over the bomb-
ers up ahead, and now it was our turn.
I start to call out, “Four bogeys, 5 o’clock
IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUMS; RIGHT: U.S. AIR FORCE
high!” We turn hard to the right, pull-
ing up, spoiling their angle. The Me 109s
change course, and we begin turning
with them. The Mustang is a wonder-
ful airplane, just a little faster than the
smaller German fighters and also just
XXXXXXXXXXXX
a little more nimble. Suddenly the 109s,
sensing things are not going well, roll out
LEFT:
and run, turning east. Then one climbs
 The storied World War II triple ace proudly poses beside
a restored P-51C Mustang at the Imperial War Museums’
Duxford Air Show in Cambridgeshire, England, in 2013.
away from the rest. I send Simpson up
after him. My wingman, John Skara, and
I chase the other three. I close to within
250 yards of the nearest Messerschmitt—
dead astern, 6 o’clock, no maneuvering,
no nothing—and squeeze the trigger. He
slows, rolls over. I pour another burst
into him, and the 109 falls into a spin,
belching smoke. My sixth kill.
As we take up the chase again, two
against two now, the trailing 109 dives
for home, and the leader pulls up into
a sharp climbing turn to the left, pass-
ing in front of us at an impossible angle.
My wingman is vulnerable. I tell Skara,
“Break off!” and he peels away. The Ger-
man goes after him, and I go after the
German. He sees me coming, dives away,
RADBURN/PA WIRE (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
then makes a climbing left turn. I go
screaming by, pull up, and he’s revers-
ing his turn—man, he can fly!—and he
comes crawling right up behind me. He’s
bringing his nose up for a shot, and I
XXXXXXXXXXXX
haul back on the stick and climb even
harder. He stalls a second or two before
CHRIS
I stall. Good old Mustang. He is falling
away now, then he flattens out and starts
climbing again, as if to come at me head-
on. I decide to turn hard left inside him.
I pull back on the throttle slightly, put
down 10 degrees of flaps and haul back
on the stick just as hard as I can. This
time the Messerschmitt goes zooming
straight up. I follow him up, and the gap
narrows. He must know that I have him.
I bring my nose up, he comes into my
sights, and from less than 300 yards I
trigger a long, merciless burst. The bul-
lets chew at the wing root, the cockpit,
the engine. There is smoke in the cockpit
…and then he falls away, straight for
the deck. No spin, not even a wobble,
no parachute. At 25,000 feet I ease out of
the dive and watch him go down. Eddie
Simpson joins up with me. Both wing-
men, too. Simpson, my old wingman and
friend, had gotten the one who’d climbed
out. We’d bagged three of the four.
As for the three [Focke-Wulf] Fw 190s
I got on June 29, that just went bang,
bang, bang. The last guy, he was on my
tail once, and I had to shake him off,
and throughout those maneuvers he
was hard to get, but I finally got him.
Your last victory came on Dec. 5,
1944. What do you recall?
The quality of the Germans had gone
down by then. One Fw 190 dived under
the clouds; I just slid down and blew it
up. I got two kills in that last fight.
So you emerged from your Air
Force career without a scratch?
When it was done—the 480 hours of
combat flying in P-51s and another 25
or so missions in Vietnam, almost all of
those in F-105s—I never once suffered
a hit in air-to-air combat. The sum total
of the damage all my aircraft absorbed
amounted to one small-arms round that
found one of my wings during a strafing
run after D-Day.
By then, we presume, you’d made
up your mind about the P-51?
The P-51 was a great airplane. I think it
saved the world. MH
21
 Hardware
PL-37 Light Artillery Wagon
By Jon Guttman
Illustration by Tony Bryan

Specifications:
Manufacturer: Krasny 4
Profintern Plant, Bryansk 2 6
Length: 48 feet 2 inches 3
Width: 9 feet 9 inches
Height: 14 feet 5 inches 5
Chassis: 55-ton wagon on 1 7
Diamond two-axle trucks
Main armament: Two 7.62 mm
M1902/30 field guns
Secondary armament:
Six Maxim 7.62 mm water-
cooled machine guns
Ammunition: 560 76.2 mm
shells and 30,000
7.62 mm rounds
Armor: .78-inch sides,
.59-inch roof
Observation: Triplex glass
visors; one PTK panoramic
periscope for commander
Crew: 30

19 17
18

s trains and the rail networks they plied improved
and proliferated through the 19th century, their
initial role as wartime transports led inevitably
to their development as mobile weapons. The
first armored trains were Austrian improvisa-
tions fielded during the Hungarian Revolution
of 1848. The opposing sides in the American Civil War
also used armored, cannon-armed trains. Such rolling
batteries reached their peak use and development during
World War I, especially on the Eastern Front, where Austro-
Hungarian and Russian designs supported their respective
armies. Following the 1918 armistice they saw further use
by Red and White armies alike during the Russian Civil War,
as well as by the forces of a resurrected Poland.
The Western and Eastern fronts of World War II witnessed
the last widespread use of armored trains, with a renewed

22 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 1. 76.2 mm M1902/30 field gun (rear turret)
2. Rear turret gun elevation wheel
3. Rear turret commander’s cupola
4. Gun maintenance access hatch
5. Maxim 7.62 mm machine gun
6. Stowage for boxes of 7.62 mm machine gun rounds
7. Stowage bin for 76.2 mm field gun shells
8. Armored artillery car commander’s cupola hatch
9. PTK panoramic periscope for armored artillery
car commander
10. Armored roof ventilation hatch
8
9 11
10
15
16
(OSPREY PUBLISHING, BLOOMSBURY PRESS PUBLISHING)
FROM NVG 140, ARMORED TRAINS BY STEVEN J. ZALOGA
emphasis on anti-aircraft capability. The Soviet Union relied
on its proven designs, while Germany, which during World
War I had fielded largely improvised armored trains, intro-
duced and made widespread use of its own original designs.
Standing out among the Soviet armored railcars was the
PL-37 light artillery wagon, modified from earlier armored
train designs that incorporated PL-35 tanks placed atop flat-
cars and flanked by armored walls. Large though the PL-37
11. Cupola for gun commander of forward gun turret
12. 76.2 mm M1902/30 field gun (forward turret)
13. Armored sleeve and ball mount for forward turret’s
Maxim 7.62 mm machine gun
14. Armored sleeve and ball mount for hull-mounted
Maxim 7.62 mm machine gun
15. Stowage for 76.2 mm field gun shells
16. Main armored crew entrance door
17. Stowage for 76.2 mm field gun shells
18. Rear right side Maxim 7.62 mm machine gun
19. Rear Diamond two-axle railway trucks
12
13
14
appeared, its 30-man crew found the interior quite cramped
due to its generously stocked ammunition supply. Produced
between 1939 and ’41, some two dozen PL-37s saw use
during World War II. The example above, No. 2 Za Rodinu
(“For the Motherland”) was attached to the Twelfth Army,
on the Southern Front, in October 1941. There it participated
in the Russian offensive for control of Donbass in eastern
Ukraine, site of more recent struggles in the headlines. MH
23
 A sniper scans for a target on the
streets of embattled Sarajevo at
the outset of the 1992–95 Bosnian
War. The breakup of Yugoslavia was
accompanied by ethnic strife, urban
warfare and civilian displacement.

24 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

THE BREAKUP OF
pu blic , the un ion of
ingdo m or as a so cia list re riment
Whether as a k ed an im po ss ible e xpe
southe rn Slavs p ro v
By Anthony Rogers

25
 army lay low on a roof amid a Serbian sniper
attack in Bosnia-Herzegovina in April 1992.

n May 4, 1980, 87-year-old Josip Broz died in Ljubljana, Slovenia, after a remarkable six-decade career
as soldier, revolutionary and statesman. He also left behind a remarkable multicultural experiment
in national unity. Yugoslavia (Slavic for “Land of South Slavs”) was, as its name implies, conceived
as a Balkan state for the southern Slavs. In practice, however, it was an unsteady confederation of six
ethnically similar but culturally, religiously and linguistically different republics—Slovenia, Croatia,
Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Macedonia. Tito had just the right combination
of charisma and ruthlessness to force them to live together. His demise left a void no successor could
fulfill, condemning the southern Slavic confederation to its own slow death.

Josip Broz was born on May 7, 1892, in Kumrovec (in
present-day Croatia), the son of a Croat father and a Slo-
vene mother who raised him in the Roman Catholic tradi-
tion. Conscripted into the Austro-Hungarian army in 1913,
he entered World War I as a senior noncommissioned
Yugoslavia’s republics began
falling away one by one like
PREVIOUS SPREAD: ANTOINE GYORI/CORBIS (GETTY IMAGES); THIS PAGE: SASA KRALJ (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
goslavia and became increasingly activist, adopting the
pseudonym “Tito” in 1934 (“to reduce the chances of expo-
sure,” he later explained).
During World War II Tito commanded the multiethnic
Yugoslav Partisans against the German and Italian occu-
pation forces and their independent Croatian Ustase allies,
also fighting alongside and sometimes against the Serbian
royalist Chetnik resistance forces. In the fall of 1944 the
arrival of the Soviet Red Army hastened the ouster of Axis
forces from Yugoslavia. Following the liberation of Bel-

leaves from a rotting tree
officer and distinguished himself in combat before being
wounded and captured by the Russians in 1915. During
his time in Russia, or shortly after returning to his home-
land, he joined the outlawed Communist Party of Yu-
grade on October 20 Tito transformed the restored king-
dom into the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. His
was no Soviet puppet state, however, and in 1948 he broke
away from Joseph Stalin and the Warsaw Pact to pursue
an independent course.
Tito was the lynchpin that held together a diverse nation.
Following his death in 1980 Yugoslavia was overseen by a

26 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 Croatian militiamen occupy makeshift firing
positions outside Karlovac as the fighting
with federal forces spreads in the wake of the
June 25, 1991, declaration of independence.
collective presidency of the six republics, but Tito proved
an impossible act to follow, as each of his successors found
themselves threatened with civil unrest. The post-commu-
nist elections of 1990 heralded the rise of the Croatian Dem-
ocratic Union under President Franjo Tudman and Bosnia
and Herzegovina’s predominantly Muslim Party of Demo-
cratic Action under President Alija Izetbegovic. By year’s end
Serbia had adopted a new constitution and declared itself
a constituent republic of Yugoslavia with Slobodan Milosevic
as its president. From then on Yugoslavia’s republics began
falling away one by one like leaves from a rotting tree.
The first was Slovenia, which held a referendum in
December 1990 in which the vast majority of Slovenes
called for independence. On June 25, 1991, Slovenia for-
mally seceded. Two days later tanks and armored vehicles
of the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) deployed to the re-
gion. They were opposed by lightly armed but well orga-
nized and determined troops of the Slovenian Territorial
Defense. A series of clashes followed. The JNA, faced with
combating erstwhile citizens, put up only a token resis-
tance. Tanks and other military equipment soon fell into
the Slovenians’ hands. Slovene conscripts deserted from
the JNA, adding to a chaotic situation. It was all over within
10 days. Some 75 people had been killed, including a dozen
or so foreign nationals caught up in the fighting. Many
ANTOINE GYORI/CORBIS (GETTY IMAGES)
others had been wounded. Soon afterward, in accordance
with the Brioni Agreement negotiated by the European
Community (EC), which acknowledged Slovenia’s libera-
tion from the control of Belgrade, the JNA withdrew.
Factions throughout Yugoslavia had been closely watch-
ing events, which were soon repeated in Croatia, but on a
far greater scale than anybody could have imagined.
On July 25, 1990, the Serb Democratic Party issued a
declaration proclaiming the sovereignty of Serbs in Croatia.
This led to the creation of the Serbian Autonomous Oblast
of Krajina. On March 16, 1991, its National Council de-
clared Krajina’s independence from Croatia, raising politi-
cal tensions and prompting ever increasing internecine
incidents. In eastern Croatia’s disputed Slavonia region
events came to a head in May when a dozen Croatian
policemen were killed trying to rescue col-
leagues held by Serbs at Borovo Selo, on
the Danube River.
Croatia formally declared independence
on June 25, after which conditions in Slavo-
nia deteriorated into daily firefights between
Croats and Serbs, the latter supported by the
For the Slavs
predominantly Serb-led JNA. The newly Yugoslavia (literally “Land
of South Slavs”) traces its
formed Croatian National Guard (ZNG) laid
origins to the post–World
siege to federal barracks, initiating a series War I Kingdom of Serbs,
of clashes known as the Battle of the Bar- Croats and Slovenes. King
racks, which ended late that year with Croats Aleksandar I Karadordevic
in possession of vast quantities of military gave it its more familiar
hardware, including tanks and heavy weap- name in 1929. After World
War II Tito held it together
ons. Elsewhere, Serb militia, in conjunction as the Socialist Federal
with federal forces, engaged Croats in open Republic of Yugoslavia.
warfare marked by mortar and artillery bar-
rages, bombings, tank assaults and infantry attacks that dev-
astated towns and villages and left thousands homeless. By
autumn the front extended from Vukovar west to the Papuk
mountains and southwest to Novska. It continued along the
Sava River to Sisak and beyond and along the Kupa River
to Karlovac. There was further fighting along the Adriatic
coast, particularly around Zadar, Sibenik and Dubrovnik.
27

In Vukovar, in the disputed region
of eastern Slavonia, a number of vio-
lent incidents had preceded the outset
of the war. By July 1991 the situation
had deteriorated as Croats and Serbs
laid claim to surrounding districts. In
Tito August the federal army launched an
offensive, with Vukovar as its main
objective. For the Serbs, the city
was key to achieving and consoli-
dating their hold on eastern Sla-
vonia. In taking the territory west
of the Danube, the Serbs could
extend their own borders and con-
trol the Privlaka and Srijemske
Laze oil fields, south of Vukovar.
On August 24 the Serbs com-
Milosevic menced a heavy bombardment of
Croatian forces in and around Vu-
kovar. Artillery, mortars and tanks,
supported by the Serbian air force and gunboats on the
Danube, concentrated a tremendous amount of firepower
against the city. The strategy was simple: sever Vukovar’s
energy, water and food supplies, disrupt communications
and create a killing zone. In order to survive, the inhabitants,
among them Serbs, took to living in cellars. Those daring
to appear aboveground risked injury or death. Occasionally,
28 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
A convoy of Yugoslav
federal army T-55
and T-72 tanks forms
for action in Slovenia
in 1991. Traditional
tactics gave way to
guerrilla warfare as
the wars devolved.
the shelling would lessen as Serbian tanks and/or infantry
advanced ever closer.
For 87 days a vastly outnumbered and outgunned ZNG,
together with volunteers from other parts of Croatia, put up
a desperate defense. Ultimately, however, on the afternoon
of November 18 the last holdouts in central Vukovar sur-
rendered. The battle had cost both sides dearly and would
contribute to a temporary cease-fire some six weeks later.
On November 27 the United Nations Security Council
(UNSC) agreed to send a peacekeeping force to Yugoslavia,
subject to a prevailing cease-fire and on condition Croatian
forces discontinued their siege of military establishments,
thus enabling the JNA to withdraw. Two days later the
FROM TOP: LANGEVIN JACQUES, POPPERFOTO, ANTONIO RIBEIRO (GETTY IMAGES, 3)
federal army began to pull out of Zagreb. Elsewhere, the
war continued. Not until Feb. 21, 1992, did the UNSC
finally approve Resolution 743, authorizing deployment
of a United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR). Six
weeks later the first UNPROFOR units arrived in Croatia.
Although the situation was far from being under control,
events were soon overshadowed by the war’s spread to
Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Late in 1991 Serbs in Bosnia-Herzegovina had made clear
their support for a “Serbian Republic…within the frame-
work of Yugoslavia.” However, in late February 1992, within
weeks of EC recognition of Slovenia and Croatia, a refer-
endum in Bosnia-Herzegovina also resulted in a majority
vote in favor of autonomy. Bosnian Serbs, most of whom
 had boycotted the referendum, responded by erecting bar-
ricades in the capital, Sarajevo, ostensibly in protest against
an incident during a wedding procession outside Sarajevo’s
Serbian Orthodox church in which the groom’s father was
killed and the officiating priest was wounded. The situation
quickly deteriorated. In scenes reminiscent of those in Slo-
venia and Croatia, Sarajevo’s army barracks were besieged
and looted. The first of countless mortar attacks struck the
city on April 6. In May escalating hostilities prompted the
U.N. to withdraw its headquarters from the city.
Muslims, Croats and Serbs battled for control in and
around Sarajevo and throughout the region—at Bosanski
Brod and Brcko in the northeast, around Bihac in the north-
west, and at Bugojno, Mostar, Foca, Gorazde, Visegrad and
Bratunac. Initially, the superior firepower of the Serbs
enabled them to achieve significant gains, notwithstanding
a united Muslim-Croat effort. After the latter alliance col-
lapsed over territorial claims, the Bosnian Muslim army
had to contend with both Bosnian Serbs and Croats, each
reinforced by compatriots from the other side of the border.
With the onset of winter the situation in Sarajevo wors-
ened. Water and electricity services were disrupted, and there
was a shortage of food and medicine. From the high ground
around the city Serbian gunners maintained a constant bar-
rage. Snipers picked off whomever they saw on the city streets.
Elsewhere, all three sides fought to retain what each Deteriorating conditions on the ground, including food shortages and the
considered their rightful territory. In contested areas the disruption of energy and other services, prompted U.N. intervention, top.
inhabitants were killed or forced to flee, their property In 1993, as mortar and air attacks on Sarajevo took a civilian toll, NATO
looted and homes destroyed. The place then became a sort dispatched U.S. F-16s to enforce a no-fly zone over Bosnia-Herzegovina.
of no-man’s-land, with vigilant troops quick to shoot at
anyone who dared return. Hostilities continued through the summer and fall of
1993. Northeast of Sarajevo, Zuc was subjected to a dev-
During four and a half years of war in Croatia and astating artillery barrage. Southwest of the city Mus-
Bosnia-Herzegovina there was one broken cease-fire after lims and Serbs also battled for possession of
another amid a succession of internationally brokered Mounts Igman and Bjelasnica (from which
peace talks. In January 1993 fighting again erupted in Cro- the victorious Serbs would later be forced to
atia when Croats launched an offensive to recapture key withdraw in order to avoid the threat of North
positions around the coastal town of Zadar. In Bosnia- Atlantic Treaty Organization air strikes). Else-
Herzegovina Serbs took Kamenica in February and Cerska where, Muslims achieved considerable suc-
TOP: LANGEVIN JACQUES (GETTY IMAGES); ABOVE: VINCENZO PINTO/REUTERS (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO)

the following month. In April continuing actions in the

Drina valley resulted in the U.N. evacuating Muslim civil-
ians from Srebrenica—a controversial move that, ironically,
resulted in the U.N. being accused of so-called “ethnic
cleansing,” a process that had begun in Croatia and would
come to characterize the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Croats
and Muslims clashed at Kiseljakm that month and at Jab-
lanica and Konjic, on the route between Sarajevo and Mostar,
into May. Fighting intensified in and around Mostar in May.
Under continuing international pressure, and faced
with the worrying prospect of a military alliance between
Bosnian Serbs and Croats, President Izetbegovic condi-
tionally agreed on June 7 to establish six “safe areas” for
Muslims in Bosnia. Simultaneously, renewed fighting round
Travnik culminated in Croats fleeing their Muslim erstwhile
allies to seek refuge among the Serbs.
cess, seizing control of several important towns,
including Gornji Vakuf, Fojnica, Busovaca
Last One Out
and Vares. Serbia cofounded the
As Bosnia-Herzegovina entered its second precursor kingdom that
became Yugoslavia in
winter of the war, the fighting showed little 1929 and remained the
sign of abating. February 1994 brought fur- dominant member of the
ther international outrage when 68 people subsequent socialist re-
were killed and many more wounded appar- public. After the breakup
ently by a single mortar shell that detonated it and Montenegro formed
in a crowded marketplace in Sarajevo. No one a reduced federative state
until the latter declared
was able to ascertain who was responsible, but independence in 2006.
Serb forces were given 10 days to withdraw
heavy weapons from around the city or face the conse-
quences. Simultaneously, NATO called on Muslim forces
to place their own heavy weapons under U.N. control. In
another diplomatic move, presumably to dispel any accu-

29
 When All
Fell to Pieces
odern-era Yugoslavia might well have chosen
as its motto E Unum Pluribus (“Out of One,
Many”), for that is precisely what happened
to the culturally, religiously and linguistically
disparate nation in the wake of authoritarian
president Josip Broz Tito’s death on May 4, 1980.
Tribalism is hardly a new phenomenon in the region. After
the fall of the Roman empire the Balkans split between Western
(Roman Catholic) and Eastern (Orthodox) Christianity, then
further between Christian, Muslim and Bogomilist. People sub-
divided still further into insular communities of Serbs, Croats,
Bulgarians, Hungarians, Albanians, Macedonians, Montene-
grins and Slovenes. The miracle is Yugoslavia ever came to be,
for it was never more than an unstable confederation of a half
dozen republics held together only under Tito’s ruthless rule.
So when the dominos fell in post-communist Eastern Europe,
it is no wonder those republics, and communities of people
within them, acted on their desire for independence. The
first to break away, Slovenia, set the pattern for the rest—
a unilateral declaration of independence followed by a fed-
eral military response that devolved into urban street fighting
and guerrilla warfare. Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo,
Macedonia and Montenegro followed in turn with varying
degrees of bloodshed and/or diplomacy.
In the end the only remaining federal vestige was Serbia.
The nearly two-decade fight to keep the manufactured Slavic
republic intact had taken the lives of upward of 100,000 of its
people before fracturing along lines built over millennia. MH

June 25, 1991 Slovenia secedes; Croatia declares independence

Aug. 24, 1991 Serbs commence heavy bombing around Vukovar
April 1992 U.N. sends peacekeepers to Croatia
May 1992 U.N. withdraws from Sarajevo
Jan. 1993 Croats launch offensive to recapture key positions
April 1993 Operation Deny Flight enforces U.N. no-fly zone
May 1993 U.N. evacuates Muslims from Srebrenica
Feb. 28, 1994 NATO’s first offensive action
March 1994 Tentative peace between Bosnian Croats and Muslims
April 10, 1994 NATO bombs Serbs around Muslim “pocket”
June 8,1994 Cease-fire in Bosnia-Herzegovina
July 11, 1995 Serbs overrun Srebrenica
July 28, 1995 Croatian troops cross border to attack Serb positions
Aug. 4, 1995 Croats retake Krajina. Serbs flee
Aug. 29, 1995 NATO attacks Bosnian Serbs
Oct. 5, 1995 Warring factions agree to cease-fire
Dec. 14, 1995 Dayton Agreement ends war in Bosnia-Herzegovina
June 9, 1999 Serbia accepts peace plan, withdraws from Kosovo
Feb. 17, 2008 Kosovo declares independence

MAP BY JOE LEMONNIER

30 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
31
 The decline of the Roman empire left it divided
Balkans’ between Rome in the west and Byzantium in the
east, with a corresponding split in the Christian
Complex Church—Roman Catholicism in the west, Ortho-
dox Christianity in the east. In the Balkans the
History dividing line more or less followed the River Drina,
which today marks much of Serbia’s border with
Bosnia-Herzegovina and helps explain why the
religion is mainly Orthodox Christian east and south of the Drina and largely
Roman Catholic further north and along the coast. But how did Islam come
to be the majority religion in Bosnia-Herzegovina?
The centuries following the collapse of the Roman empire saw the emer-
gence of Balkan states from which would evolve Serbia, Croatia and Bulgaria.
The Slovenes, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Bosnians and people of Herze-
govina would develop their own regional and national identities. By the 13th
century Bosnia was populated by Roman Catholics, Orthodox Christians and
the persecuted dualist Bogomilist sect. It began to merge with the southern
region of Orthodox Christian Hum (later Herzegovina) in the early 14th century.
Muslim expansionism led to the crucial Battle
Police in Sarajevo arrest of Kosovo in 1389, when Ottoman Turks defeated
Bosnian Serb assassin the Serbs, eventually driving them north to the
Gavrilo Princip in 1914. Danube, while the Croats were pushed north
toward Zagreb, Croatia’s present-day capital.
It benefited the Bogomil heretics in Muslim-occupied regions to convert to
Islam. In the 17th century, as the Ottomans were gradually forced to cede terri-
tory, many Muslims sought refuge in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The region was
taken over by the Austro-Hungarian empire following the Russo-Turkish War of
1877–78, which also led to the independence of most of Bulgaria. An emergence
of nationalist fervor culminated in the early 20th century with Serbia, Montenegro,
Bulgaria and Greece uniting in a brief and successful war with Turkey. Another
conflict, between the victors this time, resulted in an expansion of Serbia’s bor-
ders. Relations between Serbia and the Austro-Hungarian government collapsed
when, on June 28, 1914, Hapsburg Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated
in Sarajevo by Bosnian Serb terrorist Gavrilo Princip, precipitating the outbreak
of World War I and the ultimate demise of the central and east European empires.
The postwar years saw the rise of the Serbian-dominated kingdom of the Serbs,
Croats and Slovenes. In 1929 Serbian King Aleksandar I Karadordevic declared
direct rule by decree in an attempt to curb continuing dissent among the mem-
ber states. Five years later Aleksandar was assassinated. Not until 1939 was
home rule bestowed on Croatia by his cousin and successor, Prince Regent Paul.
The German invasion in April 1941 led to further discord, with some in favor
of occupation and others opposed. Ustase (insurgents), composed of pro-fascist
Croats and Muslims, proceeded to eliminate Serbs, Jews, Gypsies and others.
The situation also gave rise to Dragoljub “Draza” Mihailovic and his Serbian
royalist Chetniks (from ceta, or “company”) and Tito’s communist Partisans.
In the civil strife that persisted after 1945, Tito prevailed, and Mihailovic was
executed by a communist firing squad, laying the groundwork for a Yugoslavian
federation. History, however, was far from through with the Balkans. —A.R.
32 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
sations of prejudice, not least from Moscow, U.S. President
Bill Clinton announced NATO would target anyone who
continued to shell Sarajevo. The Serbs, knowing full well
who would be held responsible for any such violation, pru-
dently complied with the ultimatum. By late February, after
having been under siege for 22 months, the Bosnian capital
was at last able to enjoy some semblance of normality.
In April 1993 NATO had launched Operation Deny Flight
to enforce a U.N. no-fly zone over Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Nearly a year later, on Feb. 28, 1994, NATO carried out the
first active combat action in its 45-year history when Amer-
ican F-16 fighters shot down four Serbian aircraft oper-
ating in defiance of the ban.
In March a tentative peace was negotiated between Bos-
nian Croats and Muslims subsequent to forging a joint
federation. On the 19th Bosnian Serbs besieging Maglaj
suddenly pulled back, a move that enabled the U.N. to
send its first aid convoy in five months. A respite from the
slaughter lasted until the end of the month, when “fierce
fighting” was reported between Muslim and Serbian forces
in central Bosnia. Farther east the so-called “safe area”
of Gorazde also continued to come under attack by Serbs.
On April 10 and 11 Serbian positions around the embattled
Muslim pocket were bombed by NATO aircraft in the first
of a number of ground attacks. Within days Serb fire brought
down a British Sea Harrier (the pilot ejected to safety), and
little more than week after that a British joint commission
observer (a Special Air Service noncommissioned officer)
was shot dead in Gorazde. The situation devolved further
PHOTO 12 (GETTY IMAGES); OPPOSITE, FROM TOP: ANTOINE GYORI/CORBIS, CHIP HIRES (GETTY IMAGES, 2); TRINITY MIRROR/MIRRORPIX (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO)
in late May when some 400 U.N. personnel were detained
in a retaliatory move by Serbs.
Talks aimed at securing a cease-fire throughout Bosnia-
Herzegovina commenced in Geneva on June 6, 1994. On the
8th the warring factions agreed to a one-month cease-fire.
Within days, however, there was fighting in the northwest
Bihac enclave and between Zenica and Tuzla, around Brcko
and in the area of Vozuca in the Ozren mountains region.
In late May 1995 Serb forces again humiliated the U.N.
by seizing personnel, this time for use as “human shields”
in an effort to deter NATO air strikes. All were released in
mid-June following the implementation of UNSC Reso-
lution 998—the establishment of a rapid-reaction force
within UNPROFOR.
The final battles played out during the summer and fall
of 1995. On July 11 Serb forces overran the “safe area” of
Srebrenica, then two weeks later that of Zepa. Later that
month the Croatians announced their intention to provide
military assistance to Bosnian government forces. A few
days later, on the 28th, thousands of Croatian troops crossed
the border and struck at Serb positions. On August 4 the
Croatians moved against Krajina, retaking the region within
days and precipitating a massive exodus of Serbian refugees,
who sought sanctuary in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Serbia.
On August 30—two days after another mortaring of
the marketplace in Sarajevo, in which more than 40 died—
 Top left: A gravedigger keeps busy outside Sarajevo. The Yugoslav War
tolled upward of 100,000 killed, scores more wounded and millions of
civilians displaced, including this file of Serbian refugees (middle left)
fleeing Kosovo in 1999. That summer the Albanian-backed Kosovo
Liberation Army (bottom left) declared victory, and Kosovo declared
its independence, though international recognition remains divided.

NATO aircraft launched a series of sustained attacks on

Bosnian Serb positions. It was a clear indication of NATO
support for the Bosnian government.
On September 8 U.S. diplomat Richard Holbrooke helped
broker an agreement to stop the fighting in Bosnia. On
October 5 the warring factions agreed to a cease-fire,
which went into effect a week later. On December 14 the
signing of the Dayton Agreement finally brought the war
in Bosnia-Herzegovina to a conclusion. But hostilities
continued unabated elsewhere in the Balkans.

In 1998 growing discontent among ethnic Albanians

in the autonomous region of Kosovo erupted into violence,
as the Albanian-backed Kosovo Liberation Army sought to
rid the country of Serbian rule. When the Serbs retaliated,
NATO intervened with a 78-day air campaign
targeting Serbs, first in Kosovo and then in what
remained of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
Yugoslav
About half of Kosovo’s minority ethnic Serbs Wars
ultimately fled in fear of reprisals. On June 9, Slovenian War of
1999, 11 weeks after the start of the air offen- Independence
sive, Serbian President Milosevic was forced JUNE 27–JULY 7, 1991
to accept NATO’s terms for a peace plan that Croatian War of
included the withdrawal from Kosovo of all Independence
Serbian armed forces, special police and para- MARCH 31, 1991–
NOV. 12, 1995
militaries. Kosovo unilaterally declared inde-
pendence from Serbia on Feb. 17, 2008, though Bosnian War
APRIL 6, 1992–DEC. 14, 1995
international recognition remains divided.
Of the remainder of the former Yugoslavia, Insurgency in
Macedonia had declared independence in fall Kosovo
MAY 27, 1995–FEB. 27, 1998
1991 and, apart from a short period of internal
strife in 2001, enjoyed a comparatively peace- FEB.Kosovo War
28, 1998–JUNE 11, 1999
ful transition. A declaration of independence
by the southern coastal region of Montenegro Insurgency in the
on June 3, 2006, was recognized by the Serbian JUNE Presevo Valley
12, 1999–JUNE 1, 2001
parliament soon after.
No reliable figures exist, but during the years Insurgency in
of conflict in the Balkans upward of 100,000 Macedonia
JAN. 22– NOV. 12, 2001
perished, countless people were injured, and
millions were displaced. Of the former Yugoslavia, Serbia
remains, together with the northern autonomous region
of Vojvodina. MH

Anthony Rogers was a freelance photojournalist during

the war in the former Yugoslavia. For further reading he
recommends Seasons in Hell: Understanding Bosnia’s
War, by Ed Vulliamy, and My War Gone By, I Miss It So,
by Anthony Loyd.

33
 Built in 1905–06 Königsberg was
designed to patrol German home
and colonial waters. Bristling with
10 4.1-inch guns and fitted with
a pair of torpedo tubes, it posed a
threat the British could not ignore.

34 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

At the outset of World War I Royal Navy ships off East Africa
spent months tracking the German light cruiser, but it took
a big-game hunter to finally bring down the elusive warship
By Mark Carlson

35
 Cut off from friendly sources of coal, Konigsberg’s captain,
Max Looff, took to raiding shipping lanes for coal-bearing
vessels. By September 1914, however, the cruiser’s engines
needed an overhaul, and Looff sought refuge up the Rufiji.

n the 1976 war film Shout at the Devil, based on the best-selling 1968 novel by Wilbur Smith and starring
Lee Marvin and Roger Moore, a pair of ivory poachers are induced to wage guerrilla warfare in German
East Africa during World War I. The climax of the film comes when Marvin and Moore board the German
cruiser Blücher—hidden far up the Rufiji River while its crew repairs battle damage—and place a time bomb
in the forward magazine, blowing up the ship.
The story is very loosely based on an actual incident involving the German light cruiser Königsberg, whose
captain did steam the cruiser up the Rufiji in 1914 to overhaul its engines. Unable to get its capital ships within
range to engage the cruiser, the Royal Navy enlisted the aid of noted hunter and scout Philip Jacobus Pretorius,
one of South Africa’s most legendary figures. Pretorius helped the British find and destroy Königsberg. While nearly for-
gotten in naval history, the action is mentioned in English author C.S. Forester’s classic 1935 novel The African Queen.

Seine Majestät Schiff (“His Majesty’s
Ship”) Königsberg was the lead ship of four
light cruisers built by the Imperial Ship-
yard Kiel in 1905–06 to serve as fleet scouts
in Germany’s home and colonial waters.
Commissioned into the Kaiserliche Marine
the cruiser a considerable punch. It was also
equipped with a pair of torpedo tubes below
its waterline. Fast at 24 knots, Königsberg
was able to chase down any merchantman
afloat. With two triple-expansion recipro-
cating engines driving twin propellers, the

in 1907, Königsberg was assigned that June
to escort Wilhelm II’s yacht Hohenzollern
on a cruise of the Baltic and North seas,
during which the kaiser met with cousin
Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. For most of
the next five years Königsberg served as an
escort or goodwill ship on visits to various European neigh-
bors. It also undertook a series of reconnaissance patrols in
the Mediterranean, thinly disguised attempts at spying on
the British bases at Gibraltar, Malta, Alexandria and Suez.
Placed out of service in Danzig for 19 months of modern-
ization work, Königsberg rejoined the fleet in January 1913.
With a displacement of 3,400 tons and a length of 378
feet, Königsberg drew just over 17 feet of water. The cruiser’s
crew of 14 officers and 308 enlisted men operated the ship
and its main armament of 10 4.1-inch guns on single ped-
estal mounts. Each gun had 150 shells at the ready, giving
PREVIOUS SPREAD: BUNDESARCHIV; THIS PAGE, TOP: IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUMS; LEFT: BUNDESARCHIV
cruiser boasted a range of nearly 6,000 nauti-
cal miles. Its only limitation was the frequent
Max need to coal.
Looff With war looming ever closer, the German
Imperial Admiralty sent Königsberg to Ger-
man East Africa. Taking command of the ship
on April 1, 1914, Fregattenkapitän Max Looff helmed the
cruiser into the Mediterranean and through the Suez Canal
to its new home port, the colonial capital of Dar es Salaam.
Looff ’s short-term orders were to patrol coastal East Africa.
When war broke out, he was to use his ship to attack and
disrupt British shipping around the approaches to the
Red Sea, the busiest sea-lane in the world and vital to
Britain’s survival.
In late July 1914 Looff returned to Dar es Salaam to coal
and reprovision. While in port he rigorously trained his
deck crew, engineering department and gunners. Looff

36 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 intended to be ready when war was declared. He didn’t
have long to wait.
With Europe on the brink of war, the Royal Navy or-
dered three light cruisers—Hyacinth, Pegasus and Astraea—
from the Cape of Good Hope Station in South Africa to
steam north and bottle up Königsberg in Dar es Salaam.
But on July 31 Looff slipped out of port just ahead of his
British pursuers and turned north toward the Red Sea.
On August 8, four days after the formal declaration of
war, the trio of British cruisers shelled the German wireless
station in Dar es Salaam, making communication with
Königsberg or the German Imperial Admiralty difficult. To
prevent the British ships from entering port, German East
Africa Governor Heinrich Schnee ordered a large floating
pier to be sunk at the harbor mouth. But that also cut off
Königsberg from its home port. The British cruisers had
already prevented its collier, Koenig, from leaving Dar es
Salaam and purchased all available coal in neighboring
Portuguese East Africa.
With few options, Looff resorted to raiding the ship-
ping lanes for coal-bearing ships. On August 6 Königsberg
stopped the British freighter City of Winchester, from which
Looff ’s crew transferred more than a thousand tons of coal
before scuttling the freighter. Meanwhile, the German
steamer Somali, which had managed to slip out of Dar es
Salaam on the night of August 3–4, was also steaming to
resupply Königsberg with coal. By the time the ships rendez-
voused 10 days later, Looff ’s cruiser was down to 15 tons of
coal. Somali loaded more than 900 tons aboard Königsberg,
enough for about four days of steaming. On August 23
Somali again supplied the cruiser with coal.
By early September Königsberg’s engines desperately
needed an overhaul. Cut off from friendly ports, Looff had
a refuge in mind. The largest river in German East Africa
was the Rufiji (in present-day Tanzania). Navigable for some
60 miles and flanked by the largest mangrove forest in East
Africa, the river offered many places for a ship to hide while
undergoing repairs. Its delta spans more than 100 miles of
coastline, while just offshore lies 170-square-mile Mafia
Island. Looff decided to move up the Rufiji’s north channel
to find a mooring. On September 3, led by one of its launches,
Königsberg moved slowly into the thickly wooded and
swampy delta. The late summer air was as hot and humid
MAP BY JON BOCK; RIGHT: NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM, GREENWICH
as a sauna. Looff stationed two of his three launches 6 miles
upriver at wedge-shaped Salale Island. There he mounted
two of his 4.1-inch guns, set up searchlights and ran tele-
graph lines from the island to Königsberg to give Looff ample
warning of any approaching enemy ships.
Somali’s captain had arranged for small coastal tugs to
resupply Königsberg and got word to Looff that HMS Pega-
sus, which had nearly caught the German cruiser at Dar es
Salaam, was patrolling the East African coast. Königsberg’s
captain realized the British light cruiser would have to coal
at least once a week, and German spotters soon reported
MILES
PEMBA
KAMERUN
AFRICA 0 50
ENLARGED
AREA
ZANZIBAR
GERMAN
EAST
AFRICA
DAR ES
SALAAM
GERMAN RUFIJI RIVER MAFIA
SOUTH
WEST
AFRICA
MADAGASCAR
KÖNIGSBERG
SCUTTLED
the presence of the British warship at Zanzibar, an island
some 100 miles up the coast. A onetime pirate haven, the
British protectorate was a busy port for Arab dhows and
small ships. Looff decided to take the chance to eliminate
one of his adversaries.
Pegasus was in the midst of coaling from a barge at Zan-
zibar early on Sunday morning, September 20, its engines
shut down, when Königsberg hove into view at the harbor
entrance. There was no time for the British crew to react. At
0525 hours Königsberg opened fire from 9,000
yards, its shells soon hitting home. The so-
called Battle of Zanzibar did not last long. At
0555 Looff and his officers watched as Pega-
sus, holed more than two dozen times, settled
by the bow. As its crew attempted to beach the
sinking warship, Pegasus finally capsized and Bottled Up
sank with 31 killed and 55 wounded. British By the outbreak of World
gunners hadn’t even managed to hit Königs- War I the Imperial German
Navy (Kaiserliche Marine)
berg, which remained out of range. After sink-
had become one of the
ing the picket ship Helmuth and dumping world’s most powerful
several barrels loaded with sand at the harbor maritime forces, second
entrance to fool the British into thinking they only to that of Britain. But
were mines, Königsberg turned about, leaving his majesty Wilhelm II’s
a curved ostrich feather of white foam. fleet largely remained in
port and, like Königsberg,
g
His greatest threat neutralized, Looff could was ultimately scuttled.
finally begin repairing his ship’s engines. As
Königsberg steamed back up Rufiji’s north channel to its
mooring off Salale, joined by the supply ship Somali, the
cruiser’s crew sowed real mines in the ships’ wake.
The Royal Navy, infuriated by Königsberg’s hit-and-run
attack on the helpless Pegasus, went all out in its efforts to
hunt down the German warship. Supplemented with escort
destroyers and, at intervals, the old pre-dreadnought battle-
ship HMS Goliath, the squadron was placed under the com-
mand of Rear Admiral Herbert King-Hall, commander of
the Cape of Good Hope Station. His first order of business
was to find Königsberg. The German light cruiser had last
been seen steaming from Zanzibar, but more than a month
passed before there were any leads. Then, on October 19, one
37
Philip
Jacobus
Pretorius
British Rear-Admiral Herbert King-Hall did his best to find Königsberg at sea, but it took a combination of
scouting by hunter Philip Jacobus Pretorius and seaplanes like the Short above to pinpoint the cruiser.
of King-Hall’s light cruisers, Chat-
ham, stopped the German steamer
Präsident. An examination of its
papers revealed Präsident had coaled
Königsberg in the Rufiji Delta in
recent weeks, though King-Hall rea-
soned his quarry may since have
Herbert steamed most anywhere.
King-Hall
As luck would have it, on Octo-
ber 30 Chatham observed smoke up
the Rufiji. That was enough for the
admiral. Königsberg and its supply ship Somali were some-
where upriver. But given the hundreds of square miles of
channels and mangrove-shrouded islands, King-Hall had no
illusions about finding them without an exhaustive search.
First, to ensure Königsberg did not escape,
KÖNIGSBERG
KÖNIGSBERG-CLASS
the admiral had Chatham and its sister light
LIGHT CRUISER cruisers Weymouth and Dartmouth blockade
the mouth of the delta. Fortunately for the
TONS
British, native informers warned them about
DISPLACEMENT
Looff ’s defensive positions, which made any
378 FEET closer approach hazardous.
LENGTH On November 3 the cruisers tried in vain
43 FEET to blindly shell Königsberg, though four days
BEAM later Chatham scored a lucky hit on Somali,
destroying it. On November 10 Chatham and
17.3 FEET four smaller ships managed under fire to scut-
DRAFT
tle the collier Newbridge in the main channel,
24 KNOTS hoping to prevent Königsberg’s escape. Later
SPEED
that month the newly arrived Goliath also
322 MEN sought to damage the German cruiser with
COMPLEMENT blind shelling. But the delta’s water proved
INCLUDING 14 OFFICERS
too shallow for the battleship to close within
range, even with its big 12-inch guns. The shelling only
convinced Looff to move Königsberg 5 miles farther up
the papyrus- and mangrove-choked river.
38 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
At that point King-Hall tried a different tack. That fall
he’d learned of a civilian pilot named Dennis Cutler, who
was ferrying passengers around the harbor of Durban,
South Africa, in a Curtiss floatplane. Recruiting Cutler
into the Royal Naval Air Service at the rank of sublieu-
tenant, King-Hall had pilot and seaplane brought north
on the converted armed merchant cruiser Kinfauns Castle
to search for Königsberg. Cutler’s first attempt, on Octo-
ber 19, ended with his forced landing after the plane ran
short of fuel. Three days later he spotted Königsberg, but
as he lacked a compass, he could give only an approximate
position. A third flight with an observer yielded better
information. Unfortunately, the plane went down in the
delta on Cutler’s fourth flight, and he fell into German
hands. Further searches by Sopwith and Short seaplanes
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: HOMER L. SHANTZ COLLECTION, UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA LIBRARIES; IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUMS (2)
fared no better.
A week before Christmas Looff moved Königsberg one
more time. Its final mooring was some 17 miles upriver.
There its launch nudged the warship up against the north
bank of a narrow channel winding through the thick man-
grove forests. Looff sent men ashore to cut branches for
camouflage. He then sent a runner north to Dar es Salaam
to inform Governor Schnee of his plans. Soon supply lines
of wagons pulled by native bearers began rolling down the
120-mile jungle track.
Looff ’s engineers dismantled the two reciprocating en-
gines. Floated ashore by barge, they were transported over-
land to Dar es Salaam for overhaul. Meanwhile, Looff
received orders from Lt. Col. Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck to
yield up some of his crew in support of the latter’s East
African campaign against the British. Looff was able to
retain only 220 men, which would leave his ship short-
handed in a battle at sea.
Meanwhile, Königsberg was short on coal and had used
up about a third of its main gun ammunition. Malaria, dys-
entery, malnutrition and heat prostration took their toll on
 the skeleton crew. Snakes and crocodiles were a constant
threat. Time was running out for the cruiser. Looff still
needed to install the engines and head downriver, ever
closer to the blockading British ships. Then would come
a battle with superior forces.

In early January 1915 a frustrated King-Hall resorted

to an unconventional means of finding Königsberg.
Enter one of the most colorful characters in South Africa.
Philip Jacobus Pretorius, a Boer born in the Transvaal re-
gion of South Africa in 1877, was the most famous hunter
and guide in sub-Saharan Africa. Although his father had
fought the British in the 1899–1902 Second Boer War, he
had good relations with the British and hated the Germans
almost as much. King-Hall personally invited him to help
the Royal Navy find Königsberg.
On receiving the message, Pretorius traveled to Durban,
where he was welcomed aboard Goliath, which alternated
with Hyacinth as King-Hall’s flagship. The next morning,
as the cruiser sailed for the Rufiji Delta, the admiral greeted
him cordially. “King-Hall was a charming man, slightly
under 6 feet in height, red-complexioned and possessing
the bushiest eyebrows I had ever seen,” wrote Pretorius in
his autobiography, Jungle Man.
King-Hall asked whether Pretorius, who was familiar
with the region from his hunting treks, would be able to
move up the Rufiji and pinpoint Königsberg. Pretorius, only
too glad to help rid Africa of the seagoing menace-in-being,
agreed to help. He would need eight days.
Landed with a radio operator on Mafia Island by a launch
from Goliath, Pretorius recruited a half dozen trusted na-
tives. Two days later Weymouth ferried the band to the Once Pretorius had fixed Konigsberg’s position, determined its range from
mainland with a small dugout canoe. After hiding the dug- the coast and the state of its guns, and identified a channel of approach
out, the men marched inland and waited along the broad and a point of fire, King-Hall sent the shallow-draft monitors Mersey (top)
track on which the Germans were moving equipment and and Severn (above) upriver to engage the cruiser with their big 6-inch guns.
provisions. Pretorius soon captured two native porters and
convinced them to show him where Königsberg was moored. 4.1-inch guns still in their mounts. But he could not deter-
They took him to a riverside hillock from which he scouted mine whether its torpedoes were still aboard. Making con-
the German cruiser, some 300 yards away. “She was well tact with the friendly chief of one of the villages from which
camouflaged,” Pretorius recalled, “smothered in trees on Looff had recruited laborers, Pretorius learned the chief ’s
her deck, and her sides painted so that she seemed part of son worked as a collier on Königsberg. The chief offered to
the surrounding jungle.” go to the tent camp set up beside the cruiser and press his
After making careful note of its position, the scout, his son for information. Only half trusting the chief’s intentions,
men and their prisoners returned east and paddled the Pretorius said he would join him. Deeply bronzed from
dugout back to Mafia, where he signaled, “Pretorius wishes decades of being in the sun, with black hair and dark eyes,
to see the admiral.” Exactly eight days after having left he decided to pass himself off as an Arab. Clad in suitable
Goliath, he handed his report to King-Hall. The admiral clothing and carrying a basket of chickens, Pretorius and the
was impressed, but he needed more intelligence. “The chief (posing as his servant) were stopped short by German
locating of the ship was but the preliminary part of my pickets. But Pretorius convinced the guards to allow his
job,” Pretorius recalled. King-Hall wanted to know Königs- “servant’s” son to leave the ship and speak briefly with his
IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUMS (2)

berg’s exact range from the coast and the state of its arma-
ment. Weeks of scouting lay ahead.
Once again Pretorius headed inland to the riverside
vantage point. This time using powerful field glasses, he was
able to clearly see Königsberg’s decks, counting eight of its
father. “Where are the long bullets that swim in the water?”
the chief asked the boy in his native tongue. The reply proved
vital, for the boy said the torpedoes had been transferred to
the two launches waiting in the delta. Any British warship
attempting to move upriver would be in for a hot reception.

39
 Severn and Mersey struck out on their first go at
Königsberg on July 6, 1915. But five days later the monitors
were back in action and hammered their German quarry for five hours.
Their 6-inch rounds knocked out its guns in turn, forcing Looff to scuttle. Before
marching off across land, Königsberg’s crew posed with their stricken ship (below right).
By the time Pretorius returned to Mafia from his
second scouting trip, King-Hall had transferred his flag to
Hyacinth. (Goliath was sent up to the Dardanelles, where
on May 13 it was sunk by a Turkish torpedo boat.) On
learning of Königsberg’s torpedo-armed launches, the
admiral ordered all ships to remain well out to sea. Mean-
while, at the direction of the British Admiralty, two shallow-
draft Humber-class monitors were being towed down from
the Mediterranean to join King-Hall’s squadron. Ordered
by the Brazilian navy in 1912, the Vickers-built gunboats
were purchased by the Royal Navy in August 1914 to add
nearshore firepower to the fleet. At just over 1,200 tons
displacement and 267 feet long, the monitors looked like
nothing else in the Royal Navy. Severn and Mersey boasted
a powerful main armament of two 6-inch guns and two
4.7-inch dual-purpose guns for high-angle fire. Drafting less
40 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
than 6 feet, the monitors would be able to move upriver
and shell Königsberg.
Once again sending Pretorius into the breach, King-Hall
asked the scout to find a viable channel of approach and a
suitable range point in the delta from which the monitors
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: MONDADORI PORTFOLIO (GETTY IMAGES);
could fire. By then knowing the delta as well as anyone,
Pretorius charted a channel 6 to 7 feet deep that extended
7 miles up the north channel. It ended at a reef within
6-inch gun range of Königsberg. It was an ideal spot, though
BUNDESARCHIV; IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUMS
like the British cruisers and Goliath before them, Severn
and Mersey would have to fire blind over hills and man-
grove forests to hit their distant target. Pretorius then spent
a tedious month tracking the tides.
Finally, on the morning of July 11—after an abortive
attempt five days earlier to engage Königsberg—the two
monitors, preceded by two minesweepers, moved ponder-
 ously up the middle channel of the Rufiji. Pretorius watched
the fruits of his long labors from the deck of Hyacinth. “I was
watching their slow progress toward that position I had
found for them,” he recalled, “[when] then the sea seemed
to burst, and a tremendous column of water shot up into
the air in front of the flagship, followed by a thunderous
roar that filled the world.”
Warned by its telegraph posts on the coast, Königsberg
had opened fire. More shells from the unseen German
cruiser exploded around the British squadron, followed by
several from the two shore-based guns. The British ships
answered, loosing salvos in the general direction where
Königsberg lay. The monitors held their fire until reaching
the range point marked by Pretorius.
Then began the blind duel. “The firing increased,” Pre-
torius recalled, “and now it burst out from a new quarter
in the very heart of the bush. The monitors were in action.
Two aeroplanes had appeared over the delta, and I was
informed signals were being received from them.” The air-
borne spotters soon got the British gunners on target.
As Severn and Mersey unleashed their heavy shells on
Königsberg, smoke roiled from out of sight upriver. Thanks
to Pretorius, the British gunners knew exactly how far away
and in what direction the German cruiser lay hidden. Looff
was at a serious disadvantage. Moored up against the bank
of the narrow channel, he could not maneuver, and his
shorthanded crew was unable to load and fire the guns as
fast as a full crew. Königsberg took several hits from the
heavy 6-inch incendiary rounds, which ignited raging fires
on the decks. The trees used for camouflage also caught
fire as sailors tried desperately to push them overboard.
For five hours shells rained down on the German cruiser,
BUNDESARCHIV
silencing its guns in turn. Eventually, all return fire ceased,
and dense smoke rose from Königsberg’s mooring. Just after
1400 hours King-Hall ordered his ships to cease fire.
After scuttling Königsberg, Looff had his crew salvage all 10 of its guns
for transport north to Dar es Salaam. The repaired guns and surviving
crew later served in East Africa under Lt. Col. Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck.
Six days later Pretorius and his band found what was left
of Königsberg. “One would scarcely have known what she
had been,” he recalled. “Beside the bush-crowded edge of
the small island against which she had been moored lay
little more than a vast disorder of tortured
steel, made the more unlovely by broken bodies Tactical
strewn at every angle.” SMS Königsberg’s reign
of destruction had ended. Nineteen of its skel-
Takeaways
eton crew had been killed, another 45 wounded, Four days before the
including Looff. After scuttling his ship in the formal declaration of
shallow river and burying his dead, the captain war Max Looff helmed
had the surviving crew salvage all 10 guns for Königsbergg out of Dar
transport to Dar es Salaam. The repaired guns es Salaam just ahead of
and the ship’s crew went on to serve in East pursuing British ships.
Be ready for anything.
Africa under Lettow-Vorbeck. The British light cruiser
With the threat removed, the British squad- Pegasus was caught at
ron resumed escorting convoys, while P.J. Pre- its mooring in Zanzibar,
torius went back to his scouting and intelligence its engines shut down,
work. Among the most colorful and storied when Königsberg came
adventurers in Africa, he died at age 68 on calling and sank its
enemy counterpart.
Nov. 24, 1945, weeks after having witnessed Don’t fence yourself in.
the end to yet another war. MH Looff sought a favorable
shelter when he sailed
A contributor to more than a dozen naval, up the Rufiji to overhaul
aviation and military history magazines, his engines, but in so
doing, he left himself
Mark Carlson is working on a book about
no avenue of escape.
the first six months of the Pacific War. For
further reading he recommends Castles of Steel: Britain,
Germany and the Winning of the Great War at Sea, by
Robert K. Massie, and Jungle Man: The Autobiography
of Major P.J. Pretorius.
41
 e n tur y aviato rs
o r m o re th a n ac
F r m ’s w a y in the
ha
have gone in ne troops
r vice of f r on tli
se
Jo n G u t tm a n
By

42 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

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43
 CLOSE CALLS

PREVIOUS SPREAD: CORPORAL ALEJANDRO PENA (U.S. MARINE CORPS); A, B, C, G: BRANGER/ROGER VIOLLET, FPG, PRINT COLLECTOR, CORBIS (GETTY IMAGES, 4);
C

D: BUNDESARCHIV; E: NATIONAL ARCHIVES; F: U.S. MARINE CORPS (ASSOCIATED PRESS); H: R.A. BAILEY (U.S. MARINE CORPS)

A A Farman III biplane performs scouting duties during a French artillery exercise near Châlons-
From Fabric sur-Marne (present-day Châlons-sur-Champagne) in 1910. A year later Italy would use warplanes
Wings to in earnest in Libya. B Bulgarian airmen in a Blériot XI-2 set out on a bombing mission against
Ottoman defenses in Adrianople (present-day Edirne, Turkey) in 1913 during the First Balkan War.
Fast-Attack C An S.E.5a (left) and a Sopwith Camel strafe German trenches as the prelude to a British ad-
vance in late 1917. Fighter pilots, who were fair game for every enemy holding a gun, considered
Formations it a “dirty job,” but it increasingly became a regular part of their duties. D Junkers Ju 87D Stukas
peel off to attack a Soviet road column in a classic use of the dive bomber as “flying artillery”—
provided there is no aerial opposition. E Carrier-based Grumman TBF-1 Avengers soften up Japa-
nese fortifications for advancing Marines on Namur, Kwajalein Atoll, on Feb. 1, 1944. F A Stinson L-5
Sentinel does artillery spotting for Marines on Okinawa on June 2, 1945. G The observer in a U.S. Navy
aircraft trains in aerial photography at Naval Air Station Norfolk, Va., in 1940. H An Eastern Aircraft
TBM-1 spearheads a Marine assault on a hidden Japanese strongpoint on Okinawa on April 1, 1945.

44 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

Wireless signaling
enabled the airplane
to provide troops
and artillerists what
they needed to know
in real time

E F

G
45
 The helicopter
became an
indispensable
supplement
to the airplane

J K
 CLOSE CALLS

M N
I, K: U.S. NAVY (2); J, M: U.S. MARINE CORPS (2); L: BETTMANN (GETTY IMAGES); N: ASSOCIATED PRESS

I Douglas AD-4 Skyraiders of attack squadron VA-75 from the carrier Bon Homme Richard (CV-31) hit
Aiming to communist positions in Korea in 1952. J Cooperating with radio-equipped forward combat controllers,
Deliver on a Vought F4U-4 Corsair bombs an enemy bunker in Korea on Aug. 19, 1952. K More typically used as
a night fighter, a U.S. Marine Grumman F7F Tigercat provides close air support for colleagues on the
Time and ground in Korea. L Bell UH-1 Iroquois “slicks” transport elements of the 173rd Airborne Brigade to
on Target their first operation 8 miles from Bien Hoa, Vietnam, while other Hueys, armed with machine guns
and rockets, plaster a suspected Viet Cong position on Sept. 18, 1965. M Responding to reports of
Viet Cong mortar attacks on two landing zones in 1966, a Vought F-8E Crusader of U.S. Marine fighter
(all-weather) squadron VMF (AW)-312 unloads on a target after its element leader dropped its bombs.
N On May 19, 1969, amid the grueling 10-day struggle for Ap Bia Mountain, aka “Hamburger Hill,” a
wounded trooper of the 101st Airborne Division is medevaced by Huey helicopter to the nearest facility.

47
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COMBINED ARMS
PREVAILED
Amid the Thirty Years’ War Protestant
commander Gustavus II Adolphus of
Sweden finally crossed swords with
Catholic commander Johann Tserclaes
in 1631 at Breitenfeld, Saxony
By David T. Zabecki

48 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

A contemporary painting by Flemish artist
Pieter Snayers (1592–1697) captures the
battlefield, thick with smoke from artillery,
as Swedish forces (at right) under Gustavus
fight imperial forces under Tserclaes (Tilly).

49
 Key to Gustavus’ combined arms success
were his highly mobile field guns, like this
example marked GARS (translated from
Latin to Gustavus Adolphus Rex of Sweden).

ought on Sept. 17, 1631, the Battle of Breitenfeld was the first major Protestant victory of the Thirty Years’ War.
The epic clash pitted the opposing factions’ most outstanding generals against one another. King Gustavus II
Adolphus of Sweden commanded both his own Swedish forces and those of the Protestant Electorate of
Saxony. Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly, commanded the combined forces of the Holy Roman empire and
the Catholic League. Sparked by the Reformation, the war was among the costliest conflicts in European
history, with combat, disease and famine claiming as many as 8 million soldiers and civilians. Neither
Gustavus nor Tilly would live to see its conclusion.

Born in 1559 to devoutly Roman Catholic parents in
Walloon Brabant (in present-day Belgium), Tilly fought Prot-
estant Dutch rebels during the Eighty Years’ War (c. 1566–
1648) and Ottoman Turks in Hungary and Transylvania in
1600. In 1610 Duke Maximilian I of Bavaria appointed the
veteran field marshal commander of the Catholic League
forces. From the outset of the Thirty Years’ War in 1618 Tilly’s
impressive string of victories included the Battle of White
Mountain (1620), the Battles of Wimpfen and Höchst (1622),
the Siege of Heidelberg (1622), the Capture
of Mannheim (1622), the Battle of Stadt-
lohn (1623), the Battle of Lutter (1626) and
said, the Catholic House of Hapsburg had held the imperial
throne since 1440 and fully intended to keep it. Whenever
an emperor died, seven prince electors (three spiritual and
four secular) determined who his successor would be. All
three spiritual electors—the archbishops of Mainz, Trier
and Cologne—were Catholics loyal to the Hapsburgs. Of
the four secular electors—the rulers of Bohemia, Branden-
burg, Saxony and the Palatinate—only the king of Bohemia
was Catholic, though his realm did have a large and grow-
ing Protestant minority. Thus, the Hapsburgs could count
on a 4-to-3 majority. The trouble started in 1618 when
Ferdinand II, Holy Roman emperor and king of Bohemia,

the nightmarish Sack of Magdeburg (1631).
Tilly’s cavalry commander at both Magde-
burg and Breitenfeld, four months later,
was the fearsome Gottfried Heinrich, Count
of Pappenheim. Together they formed one
of the most dominating command combi-
nations in the history of warfare.
Contrary to widespread belief, the Thirty
Years’ War was far more complex than a
strictly religious struggle between Catho-
lics and Protestants, though it more or less
started that way. With the signing of the
Peace of Augsburg in 1555 subjects of the
Holy Roman empire were required to fol-
low the religion of their local princes. Most
King’s Garb German princes around the turn of the
17th century were Protestant—either Lu-
Among the surviving relics
from Gustavus’ reign are theran or Calvinist—though the Duke of
the steel chest harness Bavaria was Catholic. Outside of Germany
at top and the liveries, proper, most other members of the loosely
or knee breeches, above. knit empire, including Bohemia, much of
The latter, worn as an northern Italy and Austria, were predomi-
outer layer, marked a
nantly Catholic. The Austrian capital of
person of distinction.
Both are in the collection Vienna was the seat of the empire.
of the Swedish History In theory the emperorship was an elec-
Museum in Stockholm. tive, rather than a hereditary, position. That
PREVIOUS SPREAD: HERITAGE IMAGES (GETTY IMAGES); THIS PAGE, FROM TOP: INTERFOTO (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO); STATENS HISTORISKA MUSEUM, STOCKHOLM
started cracking down on the rise of Protestantism in his
kingdom. As it wasn’t part of Germany proper, Bohemia did
not fall under the terms of the Peace of Augsburg, thus its
citizens were used to considerably more religious freedom.
That May a group of angry Bohemian Protestants stormed
into the royal palace in Prague and tossed two of the leading
Catholic regents and their secretary out of a third-floor win-
dow—an act remembered as the “Defenestration of Prague.”
Though the men survived their fall, the incident was
too much for Ferdinand. He sent military forces marching
toward Prague, and the Thirty Years’ War was on. Every-
thing exploded in August 1619 when Frederick V, the elec-
tor Palatine, accepted the throne of Bohemia from the
Protestant Bohemian electorate. Thus, Frederick held two
electoral seats, giving Protestants the 4-to-3 majority when
selecting a future new emperor. Ferdinand was determined
to make an example of the Protestant rebels.
On Nov. 8, 1620, Catholic League forces under Tilly
crushed the Protestants at the Battle of White Mountain
near Prague, and Frederick fled Bohemia. Given his short
reign, he’s been known to history ever since as the “Winter
King.” Ferdinand later stripped Frederick of his lands in
the Palatinate (roughly comprising the present-day German
state of Rhineland-Palatinate) and transferred them to Max-
imillian of Bavaria, along with the electorship. The emperor
also had his son, the future Emperor Ferdinand III, installed

50 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023


on the Bohemian throne, shifting the electoral advantage
5-to-2 in favor of the Catholics.
Although Catholic, the ruling Bourbons of France were
bitter enemies of the Hapsburgs, who also ruled Spain at
the time. Cardinal Armand-Jean du Plessis, Duke of Riche-
lieu, was the chief minister of King Louis XIII. Seeing a
chance to strike at the Austrian Hapsburgs while they were
tied down with the brewing war in Germany, Cardinal
Richelieu financed Protestant Swiss mercenaries to fight
the German Catholics. When the Spanish Hapsburgs started
putting pressure on France from the south, Richelieu made
a further alliance with Protestant King Christian IV of
Denmark to oppose the combined forces supporting the
emperor. Christian was also the Duke of Holstein and,
therefore, had a direct stake in any conflict in northern
Germany. England and the Dutch Republic also pledged
financial support for Denmark.
On the orders of Emperor Ferdinand, Tilly marched his
Catholic League army north and crushed the Danes at the
Battle of Lutter on Aug. 27, 1626. Meanwhile, Ferdinand’s
NATIONAL GALLERY OF VICTORIA, MELBOURNE
imperial army, under the command of Bohemian genera-
lissimo Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Wallenstein, started
marching to the east along the Baltic coast, threatening to
overrun the free port cities of the Hanseatic League. If impe-
rial forces managed to gain control of the south coast, that—
in tandem with extant Polish and Russian control of most
of the eastern Baltic—would effectively seal off Protestant
Sweden from the rest of the world. Of more immediate
The Thirty Years’ War turned violent with the 1618 Defenestration of
Prague, when Bohemian Protestants, weary of power plays by Catholic
regents, threw two of them out a third-floor window of the royal palace.
concern, the Baltic ports could be used by the Holy Roman
emperor as a base for an invasion of Sweden.
In mid-May 1628 Wallenstein launched a siege against
the strongly fortified Hanseatic port of Stralsund, Pomera-
nia. On concluding an alliance with Stralsund weeks later,
Sweden’s King Gustavus sent a small garrison to defend the
port. They were the first Swedish soldiers in history to set
foot on German soil. Wallenstein conducted a landward
siege only, as he lacked the necessary naval forces to blockade
the harbor. The local and Swedish forces, with considerable
Though the men survived their
fall, the incident was too much for
Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II
support from Scottish mercenaries and the Danish fleet, held
out until Wallenstein gave up and lifted the siege on Au-
gust 4. It marked Wallenstein’s first defeat in the Thirty Years’
War and contributed to his temporary dismissal from com-
mand in 1630. That in turn left Tilly as sole commander of
the combined Catholic League and imperial forces, which
numbered some 80,000 troops in Germany. The siege of Stral-
sund also brought Sweden into the war as a full participant.
Gustavus’ first order of business was to control the
southern Baltic and thus keep the Catholic powers from
51
 This painting of Gustavus at Breitenfeld
is notable for its background depiction
of his innovative deployment of forces
—in two lines, one reinforcing the other,
supported by his mobile field artillery.

This engraved wheellock pistol belonged to an officer of the Thirty Years’

War. Even these modern weapons proved no match for Gustavus’ field
guns, which boasted rates of fire half again faster than period muskets.

severing his lines of communication. A gifted military re-
former, he was the greatest commander of the Thirty Years’
War. Though only 35 years old in 1630, he had already been
king for 19 years. His well-equipped and -trained army had
been honed by decades of fighting in Denmark-Norway,
Poland and Russia, during which Gustavus perfected an
innovative system of tactics derived from his study of
ancient Greek and Roman warfare.
Gustavus reduced the size of the large and unwieldy
cavalry squadrons of the period, increasing their speed
and mobility, and he widened the intervals between his
infantry battalions. Rather than rely on the usual single
battle line, he deployed his forces in two echelons, the sec-
ond line held as a reinforcement for the first. He further
TOP: NPL - DEA PICTURE LIBRARY (BRIDGEMAN IMAGES); ABOVE: INTERFOTO (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO)
reinforced his cavalry by deploying supporting infantry
among the horse. In modern parlance his tactical system
is known as “combined arms.” Considered the father of
modern field artillery, Gustavus employed highly mobile
guns with high rates of fire. He excluded anything heavier
than a 12-pounder from his field batteries. His bronze
3-pounder regimental gun could be towed by a single
horse or three men and boasted a rate of fire half again
faster than muskets of the period.
Gustavus was a deeply religious Protestant whose troops
went into battle singing hymns. He forbade his troops from
pillaging, looting and mistreating civilians, unlike most
armies of the medieval period. He also required them to
pay for all supplies received from towns and villages along

52 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 their line of march. As a result, locals generally welcomed,
or at least tolerated, the Swedish army wherever it went. Gustavus
The Swedish king invaded Pomerania with an initial
POMERANIA
on the March
force of 13,000 troops, landing near Peenemünde on July 6,
July 6, 1630
1630. They were soon reinforced by a follow-on echelon of WERBEN FRANKFURT
Gustavus II Adolphus
AN DER ODER
5,300 troops from Sweden and Finland. That fall the Swed- lands in Pomerania at the
MAGDEBURG
ish king concluded an alliance with Bogislaw XIV, Duke of head of 13,000 troops,
BATTLE OF
Pomerania. Recruiting locally, Gustavus was able to assem- BREITENFELD committing Sweden to
LÜTZEN the Thirty Years’ War.
ble a force of 43,000. Seizing the opportunity to strike a LEIPZIG
further blow against the Hapsburgs, Cardinal Richelieu GERMANY SAXONY April 13, 1631
signed the Treaty of Bärwalde with Gustavus, providing ( PRESENT-DAY Gustavus besieges and
ALTE captures the town of
him with financial support of one million livres per year. BORDERS ) VESTE
PRAGUE Frankfurt an der Oder.
Richelieu even went so far as to encourage the Ottoman Aug. 7, 1631
Turks to increase their pressure on Austria from the east. RAIN Gustavus clinches
The imperial court at Vienna initially greatly underesti- MILES victory at Werben in the
mated the Swedish threat, dismissively calling Gustavus the MUNICH first major field battle
0 50

“Snow King”—held together by the cold of the north, but
who inevitably would melt and disappear the farther south
he went into Germany. Overconfident of his earlier successes
in Germany, Emperor Ferdinand in 1629 had sent a large
German army over the Alps to support the Spanish Haps-
burgs, who were fighting the French in northern Italy over the
succession of the Duchy of Mantua. Gustavus, meanwhile,
managed to drive all Catholic forces out of Pomerania,
forcing Ferdinand to refocus his attention on the main theater
of war, as the Swedish king pushed ever deeper into Germany.
The Saxon city of Magdeburg, on the left bank of the
Elbe River, was among the most important commercial cen-
ters in medieval Germany. It was also a Protestant strong-
hold. With a population of more than 35,000, Magdeburg
at the outbreak of the Thirty Years’ War sought to remain
neutral. As imperialist pressures on the town grew, however,
the city council entered into an alliance with Gustavus
in August 1630. That November, in anticipation of an im-
perial siege, the Swedish king sent Dietrich von Falkenberg,
an experienced Protestant German officer, to Magdeburg
to organize its defense and command the garrison, which
ultimately numbered 2,400 trained troops and perhaps an-
other 3,000 local militia. Gustavus, meanwhile, continued
his operations to clear the Baltic coast and establish a secure
base of operations. In April 1631 he captured the key Bran-
denburg town of Frankfurt an der Oder.
By March 1631, meanwhile, imperial forces under Tilly
and Pappenheim, numbering 24,000, had closed in on Mag-
deburg. When Tilly demanded its capitulation, Falkenberg
refused, believing the Swedes would soon come to his relief.
Gustavus, however, was well beyond striking distance. Tilly
put his artillery into battery and commenced a fierce bom-
bardment of the city, but Falkenberg still refused to surren-
der. Finally, on May 20 imperial forces assaulted the town,
penetrating its defenses in short order. Falkenberg was shot
MAP BY JON BOCK
between Swedish and
days. More than 20,000 defenders and inhabit- imperial forces.
ants were killed or died in the spreading fire. In Sept. 17, 1631
Gustavus decisively
the aftermath, imperial troops had to dump defeats Tilly’s imperial
more than 6,000 bodies into the Elbe to clear the forces at Breitenfeld,
streets. At least that many had been consumed despite the fact Swedish-
by the flames. (A census taken a year later tallied allied Saxons fled the field
only 449 residents in Magdeburg, and much of with the baggage train.
the city remained a rubble field into the 1700s.) April 15, 1632
A month later Pope Urban VIII sent Tilly a At Rain on the River Lech
the Swedish king again
congratulatory letter, writing, “You have washed defeats Tilly, who is
your victorious hands in the blood of sinners.” mortally wounded.
But the Sack of Magdeburg, the single worst May 17, 1632
atrocity of the Thirty Years’ War, became a cause The Bavarian capital of
célèbre for the Protestant princes of Germany, Munich yields to Gustavus.
stiffening their resolve to resist the Catholics. Sept. 3–4, 1632
Saxony and Brandenburg, whose rulers were Gustavus suffers his first
both electors, allied with Gustavus. It didn’t tactical defeat of the war
against Wallenstein while
hurt that Gustavus was married to the sister
attacking the imperial
of Georg Wilhelm, the elector of Brandenburg. stronghold at Alte Veste.
For the first time in the war the Protestants had Nov. 16, 1632
something close to a unified command, and theGustavus is killed in action
combined forces gave the Swedish king the nec- at Lützen, though the
essary strength to march south into Germany Swedes win the battle,
and seek decisive battle with Tilly. thanks to Bernhard
of Saxe-Weimar, who
assumes command and
After Johann Georg I, Elector of Saxony, for- defeats Wallenstein.
mally allied himself with Gustavus on Sept. 11,
1631, Tilly initiated a punitive campaign, setting out to
ravage Saxony with about 36,000 troops. On September 15
he captured Leipzig, which his men looted. But the impe-
rial commander neglected the opportunity to attack the
weak Saxon army of 16,000 troops before they managed to
link up with Gustavus’ 26,000 Swedes at Düben, some
40 miles north of Leipzig. On the urging of his cavalry
commander, Pappenheim, Tilly abandoned town and took

dead while trying to organize a counterattack. Emboldened up a position at Breitenfeld, 5 miles to the north.
imperial troops set fire to the town, and many attackers went The opposing forces sighted each other early on the
rogue, looting, raping and massacring civilians over several morning of September 17. Tilly deployed his single line of

53

infantry in the center with cavalry on the wings.
Battle of He commanded the center and right, Pappen-
Breitenfeld heim the left. The imperial artillery was massed
SEPT. 17, 1631
in the center and center right and emplaced on
42,000 high ground to the rear. Gustavus deployed his
troops in his signature two lines. Rather than
SWEDISH EMPIRE the traditional Spanish-designed tercio square
26,000 SWEDES, 16,000 SAXONS
formation of massed pikemen with musketeers
5,100 on its corners, the Swedish infantrymen were
grouped in smaller, more mobile formations,
KILLED with musketeers predominating and pikemen
2,100 SWEDES, 3,000 SAXONS
protecting. Throughout the forthcoming battle
36,000 Gustavus’ lighter and more mobile artillery
would exact a heavy toll on the densely packed
HOLY ROMAN imperial formations.
EMPIRE
Saxon infantry, cavalry and artillery under
7,000 Elector Johann Georg held the left of the Prot-
estant line, while Swedish and other German
KILLED infantry units occupied the center and right.
PLUS: 6,000 CAPTURED
Most of the Swedish cavalry deployed on the
right wing, opposite Pappenheim. Gustavus’ reserve cav-
alry was at the center, between the two echelons of infantry.
Finnish Field Marshal Count Gustav Horn commanded
the Swedish left (the overall Protestant center) directly
against Tilly, while the Swedish king positioned himself
on the far right, opposite Pappenheim.
Tilly made the opening move. Rather than launch an
immediate attack, he resolved to pound the enemy for as
54 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
Gustavus (at center) is shot from his horse at the
Nov. 16, 1632, Battle of Lützen. Despite his death,
the Swedes prevailed and managed to mortally
wound imperial cavalry commander Pappenheim.
long as possible with his heavier, longer-range guns. He
ordered the imperial artillery to open up as Gustavus’ force
was deploying. The firing continued until midday, prevail-
ing winds blowing the thick gun smoke and dust directly
into the faces of the Swedes and Saxons. When the firing
ceased, the impetuous Pappenheim, acting without orders,
led his cavalry in an attempt to turn the Swedish right flank.
In a brilliant move, Gustavus wheeled his reserve horse,
catching Pappenheim between his two cavalry forces. The
Swedish king also rapidly repositioned his light guns and
opened up with grapeshot against the imperial horse.
Gustavus’ guns and musketeers easily outranged the pistol
fire of the imperial cavalry. Pappenheim hit the Swedish
line seven times, and each time he was repulsed with greater
losses, finally forcing him to withdraw.
Only then did Tilly advance against the Saxons. The rapid,
accurate fire from the Swedish line drove his men increas-
ingly to the right, but ultimately the Saxons broke, Elector
Johann Georg himself falling back on Eilenberg, a dozen
miles to the east. Messengers prematurely set out toward
Munich and Vienna carrying news of the Catholic victory.
Meanwhile, Tilly turned against the exposed Swedish
left flank. Gustavus immediately redeployed three regi-
NATIONALMUSEUM, STOCKHOLM
ments from his right to shore up his left. While Horn’s in-
fantry held off Tilly’s attack, Gustavus routed the remainder
of the Catholic left wing. With his own right wing freed,
the king then advanced against the Catholic guns on the
high ground to Tilly’s rear, rolling up Tilly’s left flank in the
 process. On capturing the imperial guns, Gustavus’ gunners
turned them on their former owners from the rear.
After seven hours of fighting, Gustavus’ forces had
almost wholly enveloped Tilly’s troops. Protected by four
veteran regiments that had never fled from a fight, Tilly
fought his way out of the encirclement. Once free of the
Swedes, the disciplined imperials formed a defensive
perimeter and continued to resist until nightfall, at which
point the wounded Tilly had only 600 effectives under his
command. The surviving Catholic forces withdrew toward
Halle, some 17 miles to the west. On reaching safety, Tilly
and Pappenheim were able to muster only about 2,000 men
between them. The imperial forces had lost around 7,000
dead, 6,000 captured, 3,000 wounded and 3,400 missing.
The Swedes had lost some 2,100 killed, the Saxons 3,000.
Leaving Johann Georg and his Saxon troops to clear
Leipzig, Gustavus turned southwest and drove deeper into
Germany. After clearing the Palatinate of imperial forces,
he established winter quarters near the Rhine. Hoping for
a return to his throne, deposed Elector Frederick V met
Gustavus at Frankfurt in February 1632. The Swedish king,
however, said he would support Frederick only if the latter
would hold the Palatinate as a fief of the king of Sweden.
Gustavus also insisted that Frederick, a staunch Calvinist,
agree to grant equal rights to Lutherans in the Palatinate.
Frederick refused, the two parted, and the hapless elector
never regained his throne.
That March Gustavus turned west and invaded Bavaria.
On April 15 he again faced Tilly at the Battle of Rain, waged
over defensive works centered on that town along the
River Lech. Outnumbering the Bavarians roughly 37,500
to 22,000, the Swedish king won a decisive victory, thanks
largely to his superb artillery. Tilly took a bullet to his thigh
and died of infection 15 days later at age 73. On May 17
Gustavus made a triumphal entry into Munich. He then
quickly cleared most of Bohemia. On the verge of panic,
Emperor Ferdinand recalled Wallenstein from forced re-
tirement and again put him in command of all imperial
and Catholic forces.
Gustavus and Wallenstein clashed for the first time that
September 3 and 4 at the Battle of the Alte Veste, near
Nuremberg. In that largest battle of the war, which pitted
nearly 90,000 men against one another, the previously
invincible Gustavus suffered his first tactical defeat, though
the strategic results were indecisive. The two great com-
manders met once more, on November 16, at the Battle
of Lützen. While this time Wallenstein was soundly de-
LWL-MUSEUM FÜR KUNST UND KULTUR, MÜNSTER
feated, Gustavus was killed after becoming separated from
his troops while leading a cavalry charge on his flank.
About the time Gustavus fell, Pappenheim, the great im-
perial cavalry commander, was mortally wounded on
another part of the field.
The death of the Swedish king broke the Protestant
momentum, and the course of the war waffled back and
When a disillusioned Wallenstein sought a separate peace with Protestants,
Emperor Ferdinand had him assassinated in his field camp at Eger in 1634.
forth. Unfortunately for the people of central Europe, the
Thirty Years’ War ground on another horrific 16 years.
After losing to Gustavus, Wallenstein grew increasingly
disillusioned with Emperor Ferdinand and
opened secret peace negotiations variously Tactical
with France, Sweden, Saxony and Branden-
burg. When the Holy Roman emperor learned
Takeaways
of his field marshal’s covert dealings, he charged Peace out the window.
If diplomacy remains an
Wallenstein with treason and issued orders for alternative to warfare,
him to be brought to Vienna—dead or alive. it’s probably best not to
Wallenstein was at his headquarters in Eger storm the royal palace
(present-day Cheb, Czech Republic), on the and pitch officials from
Bohemian-Bavarian border, when a group of a third-story window.
his own Scottish and Irish mercenary officers Don’t follow the crowd.
Gustavus’ willingness
assassinated him on Feb. 25, 1634. to break with traditional
Thus, none of the war’s four greatest battle- tactics of the period and
field commanders lived to see its resolution. employ a combined arms
Sweden remained in the fight, mostly under approach won battles.
the command of Field Marshal Horn, and the Never give up.
When Gustavus was
Thirty Years’ War finally ended in 1648 with the shot from his horse at
Peace of Westphalia, which again allowed rulers Lützen, Bernhard of
of the imperial member states to choose their Saxe-Weimar took up
own religious affiliation. the banner, kept fighting
Gustavus’ remains were eventually repa- and secured victory for
triated and interred at Stockholm’s Riddar- Protestants and their
fallen commander.
holmen Church on June 22, 1634. His fellow
Swedes posthumously granted the warrior-king the title
den Store (“the Great”), making him the only Swedish
monarch so honored. MH
Retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. David T. Zabecki is History-
Net’s chief military historian. For further reading he rec-
ommends The Thirty Years’ War, by Geoffrey Parker; and
History of the Thirty Years’ War, by Friedrich Schiller.
55
 He may not have impressed Winston Churchill, but Field
Marshal Sir John Dill proved an essential liaison between
the American and British chiefs of staff during World War II
By John D. Howard

Then General Sir John Dill poses for a

contemplative portrait in January 1941.
In his wartime role as senior British
member of the Combined Chiefs of Staff
he provided back channel information
vital to a coordinated Allied war effort.

56 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

57
 On Nov. 1, 1950, President Harry Truman speaks to an
international gathering of notables at the unveiling of a
statue to Dill at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

ritish Field Marshal Sir John Greer Dill’s funeral on Nov. 8, 1944, prompted a flood of tributes, an un-
common outpouring in wartime Washington D.C. Orchestrated by U.S. Army Chief of Staff General
George C. Marshall, the observances included a memorial service in Washington National Cathedral,
a motorized cortege along a route flanked by thousands of soldiers and interment in Arlington National
Cemetery. The British field marshal’s devotion to the Allied cause was also recognized by a rare joint
resolution of Congress and posthumous award of the U.S. Army’s Distinguished Service Medal.
Six years later, on Nov. 1, 1950, high-ranking military and government officials again gathered at

PREVIOUS SPREAD: REUBEN SAIDMAN/POPPERFOTO (GETTY IMAGES); THIS PAGE: NATIONAL ARCHIVES
Arlington to honor Dill, and President Harry S. Truman and Secretary of Defense Marshall unveiled
a statue of Dill on horseback atop his grave—an honor accorded only one other soldier interred in the national
cemetery, namely Maj. Gen. Philip Kearny, hero of the Mexican War and American Civil War. General of the Army
Marshall was never one to lavish praise, but he offered this stirring eulogy:

Here before us in Arlington, among our hallowed dead, lies a great hero, Field Marshal Sir John Dill. He was my friend,
I am proud to say, and he was my intimate associate through most of the war years.…I have never known a man whose
high character showed so clearly in [the] honest directness of his every action. He was an inspiration to all of us.

From January 1942 until his death in November 1944 Field Marshal Dill headed the British Joint Staff Mission,
representatives of the British Chiefs of Staff permanently based in the U.S. capital. He was also the senior British
member of the Combined Chiefs of Staff, military leaders of both countries who developed strategy and allocated
resources for coalition warfare against Germany and Japan.
But Dill’s actual role went far beyond his charter. A trusted colleague of the U.S. service chiefs, particularly Mar-
shall, the field marshal was a valued facilitator, a conciliator and a keen interpreter of each country’s aspirations.
The sometimes strained alliance would have been far rockier had Dill not been able to furnish rationale for rival
points of view and assist in crafting much-needed compromises.

58 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 Dill’s journey to America was more happen-
stance than part of a grand plan. He had been
chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS),
with oversight of the British army, since May
1940, though he never gained the confidence
of Winston Churchill. The prime minister re-
ferred to the reserved general as “Dilly Dally,”
hardly a term of endearment, and when Dill
reached the official retirement age of 60, Chur-
chill wasted no time replacing him. In Novem-
ber 1941 the prime minister announced General
Sir Alan Brooke would be the new CIGS. He
had Dill promoted to field marshal and ap-
pointed him governor-designate of Bombay,
India, intending to put him “out to pasture.”
Within weeks the December 7 Japanese attack
on Pearl Harbor brought the United States into
World War II. On December 11 Germany de-
clared war on the United States, and the next
morning Churchill embarked for the United
States aboard the battleship HMS Duke of York for talks Dill (at center) adeptly interceded between such high-ranking officials
with Franklin D. Roosevelt. He wanted to ensure that as U.S. Army Chief of Staff George C. Marshall (at left) and Dill’s own
defeating Germany would be the top U.S. priority. Charles opinionated boss, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (at right).
Wilson, 1st Baron Moran, the prime minister’s acerbic
personal physician, candidly remarked, “Mr. Churchill Hastings quotes a cable from Churchill to Roosevelt, in
has been panting to meet the president.” which the prime minister states, “Arrangements are being
Churchill and his staff of 80 arrived on December 22. As made for a landing of six or eight divisions on the coast
General Brooke remained in London, the prime minister of northern France early in September.” The assertion was
drafted Dill to attend the conference, code-named Arcadia. a blatant fabrication.
Churchill took up residence in the White House, the confer- According to Hastings, Churchill was disingenuous
ence dragging on till Jan. 14, 1942. He was oblivious that his because he feared candor might prompt the United States
eccentric habits, including regular daytime naps and work- to shift the axis of its war effort to the Pacific, an option
ing into the early morning hours, inconvenienced his hosts. strongly advocated by U.S. Chief of Naval Operations
Arcadia set the initial tone of the bilateral relationship.
From the outset Churchill demonstrated a propensity to
talk more than listen and projected the aura it was he who Churchill referred to the
would lead his new ally to victory. At the same time his
military advisers’ overweening self-confidence, bordering reserved Dill as ‘Dilly Dally,’
on arrogance, offended their American counterparts. It
was not a good start. hardly a term of endearment
On the positive side, Churchill’s interaction with Roo-
sevelt did reaffirm the “Germany first” strategy. He also Admiral Ernest J. King. But such evasion on the part of
gained presidential approval to establish the office of the prime minister created lingering distrust among the
the Combined Chiefs of Staff in Washington, D.C., with American chiefs. For his part, Marshall, who would emerge
Dill as Britain’s primary military representative. as the primary architect of U.S. strategy, came to trust only
During Arcadia and in the weeks that followed, Ameri- one of his British counterparts—Dill.
cans pressed for an immediate “second front” in northern
Europe, to get into the fight against Germany and take The Marshall-Dill bond grew stronger as Anglo-Ameri-
pressure off ostensible ally the Soviet Union, whose sur- can debates became more acrimonious. Dill worked to
vival remained in question. To mount a cross-channel dampen inflammatory rhetoric and find common ground
invasion before the United States had fully mobilized was among the Allies. Confidence in the field marshal’s abilities
KEYSTONE (GETTY IMAGES)

unrealistic, yet the prime minister acted as though he also grew among senior civilians, including Harry Hopkins,
supported such a premature move. Roosevelt’s closest adviser.
British historian Max Hastings lent some context for With Marshall’s approval, Dill shared selected American
such duplicity in his 2009 biography Winston’s War. In it message traffic with the British Chiefs of Staff to provide

59

keener insight into U.S. concerns. General Brooke saw the
value of the back channel and furnished similar documents.
Brooke became a strong advocate of the field marshal and
touted his worth to a skeptical prime minister.
Shipping constraints, shortages in landing craft and
recognition of their lack of preparedness forced Ameri-
cans to postpone the second front and in-
stead strike the Germans in North Africa
with Operation Torch. Roosevelt, ever the
politician, wanted Torch to start before the
Nov. 3, 1942, midterm elections and was
disappointed when problems delayed the
landings until November 8.
Successes in North Africa generated a
series of conferences to determine “where
to go from here.” There were five meetings
in 1943—in Casablanca (January 14–24),
Rare Press Washington, D.C., (May 12–25), Quebec
Dill was the cover subject (August 17–24) and Cairo-Tehran (No-
of the June 8, 1940, issue vember 22–December 7). Joseph Stalin only
of the British magazine attended the Tehran Conference, the first
Picture Post. On joining face-to-face meeting of the “Big Three” Al-
the Combined Chiefs of
Staff, the field marshal
lied leaders of the United States, Britain and
worked largely behind the the Soviet Union.
scenes as a facilitator at Churchill loved “summits,” his word for
major Allied conferences, major conferences, for they gave him a stage
for which he received and a captive audience for his monologues
little popular acclaim. advancing the British agenda. He was irked
when Roosevelt rejected his recommendation to hold one
of the gatherings in London.
Casablanca proved a useful venue in which to plan the
next campaign and visit battlefield commanders. Churchill
basked in the recent British victory at El Alamein, Egypt,
and his status as the alliance’s senior partner. Although the
60 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
In the successful aftermath of Operation Torch, the
November 1942 Allied invasion of French North Africa,
Dill brokered compromises about where to strike next.
United States had 150,000 soldiers in the region, Britain
had three times as many men, four times as many warships
and an equal number of combat aircraft. Thus Churchill
had a big bargaining chip when it came time to determine
where to employ forces after Torch.
Roosevelt limited the size of the U.S. delegation, which
proved a self-inflicted wound. In contrast, the British
brought a full complement of planners and a communica-
tions ship to allow immediate contact with the remainder
of the staff back home. They were better prepared and able
to respond quickly to counterproposals. Fortunately for all
concerned, Marshall had the foresight to include Dill as
a guest in the U.S. contingent.
The British raised major concerns about the scale of the
U.S. buildup in the Pacific and postulated that a bombing
campaign against Germany might relegate the invasion
of France, in 1945 or later, to a mopping-up exercise.
Their suggestion to delay the cross-channel invasion was
anathema to Americans and put the Allied contingents
at loggerheads.
Dill brokered a compromise that endorsed a credible TOP: NATIONAL ARCHVIES; LEFT: JOHN FROST NEWSPAPERS (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO)
commitment in the Pacific, a combined bomber offensive
against Germany, an invasion of France in 1944 and a
landing on Sicily in the summer of 1943. He shrewdly
reminded Brooke that neither side wanted to hand un-
resolved issues to Churchill and Roosevelt, knowing “what
a mess they would make of it.”
Dill’s efforts proved so significant that Roosevelt per-
sonally thanked him. In an unprecedented gesture, Mar-
shall invited the field marshal to bring his wife to the United
States and offered him a house on “Generals’ Row” at Fort
Myer, Va. Lady Nancy Dill became very popular in Wash-
ington society and repeatedly popped up in news accounts
wearing her Red Cross uniform and doing volunteer work.
 Meanwhile, Dill sent home detailed reports about the
United States’ growing strength. In 1943 American forces
reached 10.5 million men under arms, with 4 million over-
seas and another 6.5 million in training and soon to deploy.
In comparison, by year’s end British manpower topped out
at 3.8-plus million. After that, the replacement of casualties
proved problematic, though Brooke and fellow chiefs went
to great lengths to minimize the degraded state of their
armed forces.
As the agreements at Casablanca failed to address actions
after Sicily, Churchill pressed for another conference to settle
that question. He already had the answer—Italy, what he
called “the soft underbelly of the Axis”—and was confident
his powers of persuasion would convince Roosevelt. Based
on intelligence intercepts, Churchill believed the Germans
would not defend the peninsula if Italy were knocked out
of the war. That turned out to be an incorrect assumption.

The American chiefs could not afford to have their

troops in North Africa and Sicily sit idle, thus a modest
commitment in Italy was a logical course of action. If
Adolf Hitler did resolve to staunchly defend Germany’s
ally in the Mediterranean, Marshall would limit the cam-
paign, as it would consume an inordinate amount of men
and equipment, delaying the cross-channel operation. He
suspected the latter outcome was the British game plan
all along. The chief of staff emphatically stressed Italy
would not be a decisive theater, and fighting on the periph-
ery of the Nazi regime would not bring victory.
Churchill always viewed his commitments as flexible,
particularly the 1944 date for Overlord, code name for the
cross-channel attack. He lobbied for delays and advocated
other ventures to weaken Germany. After the May 1943
conference in Washington, D.C., U.S. Secretary of War
Henry L. Stimson felt so strongly about British prevarica-
tion that he sent Roosevelt the following assessment:

[The] prime minister and his chief of imperial staff are

frankly at variance with such a proposal [Overlord].
The shadows of Passchendaele and Dunkerque [sic]
still hang too heavily over the imagination of these
leaders.…Though they have rendered lip service to
the operation, their hearts are not in it.
FROM TOP: KEYSTONE-FRANCE (GETTY IMAGES); ASSOCITADE PRESS (2)

Stimson and Marshall were ultimately able to convince
Roosevelt that Overlord, coupled with an invasion of south-
ern France (initially code-named Anvil, later Dragoon),
must be initiated as soon as possible.
Prior to the August conference in Quebec Dill warned
the British delegation the Roosevelt administration was
under increasing pressure from Congress, which ques-
tioned why the United States seemed to follow British
plans when the former was picking up most of the cost
of the war. The criticism came from members of both
parties and worried Roosevelt.
Top: Churchill relished being the center of attention, as at this 1943 Allied
planning meeting in North Africa attended by, among others, future Supreme
Commander Dwight Eisenhower, seated at right. Middle: Dill (pointing)
proved a master conciliator whenever the prime minister ruffled feathers
among his nation’s or American military commanders. Unlike her husband,
Lady Nancy Dill was a darling of the press, noted for her volunteer work.
Senator Arthur Vandenberg, a Michigan Republican,
for one suggested operations in the Mediterranean had
been initiated to maintain Britain’s lifeline to India, not
to defeat the Wehrmacht. Vandenberg was reflecting the
general opinion of the American public, which viewed

61

Churchill and Britain with growing disapproval. Even the
Soviet Union ranked higher in popular esteem. British stock
further eroded when it was publicized that 9,000 of its mili-
tary personnel and civil servants were serving in Washing-
ton, D.C. The days of admiration for the island nation
standing alone against the Nazi juggernaut were long past.
Even in the face of mounting U.S. disapproval, Chur-
chill was unable to contain his flights of strategic fantasy.
Throughout 1943 the prime minister requested addi-
tional resources for Italy, cited the benefits of opera-
tions in the Balkans, extolled the advantages of striking
toward Vienna through what he called the “Ljubljana
Gap” (an area between two mountain ranges in north-
ern Yugoslavia) and proposed amphibious assaults in
the eastern Mediterranean. Roosevelt found Churchill’s
hit-or-miss approach tiresome and showed little interest
in discussing the schemes. He sarcastically equated the
Ljubljana Gap fixation to Churchill’s earlier pronounce-
62 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
Tanks in Tunisia bound for the 1943 invasion of Sicily illustrate
the complexity facing Allied planners. Left: Dill was present that
December when the “Big Three”—Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin,
U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt and Churchill—met in Tehran.
ment that Italy was the soft underbelly of the Axis. It proved
far from soft.
When Roosevelt and Churchill arrived in Cairo as a
precursor to meeting Stalin, there was a noticeable change
in personal dynamics. Roosevelt, conscious of America’s
emergence as the stronger partner, was visibly distant
to the prime minister. The president insisted on inviting
Chiang Kai-shek, incensing Churchill, who saw China’s
participation in the war as inconsequential. Roosevelt
added another slight when he cancelled their final one-
on-one meeting before leaving for Tehran.
In order to revive his Mediterranean strategy, Churchill
tried to convince Marshall that an invasion of Rhodes, the
largest of the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea, would
aid the war effort and bring neutral Turkey into the con-
flict on the Allies’ side. Following the president’s guidance,
an irritated Marshall replied, “Not one American soldier
is going to die on [that] goddamned beach!” His brusque
response shocked Churchill and further emphasized the
United States’ emergence as primus inter pares (“first among
equals”). The prime minister blamed Dill for what he
considered American intransigence.
At the first session in Tehran Stalin waved aside Chur-
chill’s lengthy introductory remarks and bluntly asked to
TOP: U.S. ARMY; LEFT: POPPERFOTO (GETTY IMAGES)
get down to business. The Soviet generalissimo made it clear
Overlord and Anvil were the keys to victory over Germany.
He discounted fighting in Italy and forays into the eastern
Mediterranean as having little effect on the war’s outcome.
Roosevelt and Stalin called the shots and set the spring of
1944 as the date to launch both operations. The prime min-
ister’s attempts to delay the cross-channel attack and cancel
the assault on southern France seemed to be thwarted.
 Shortly after the Tehran Conference ad-
journed, the British renewed efforts to expand
operations in Italy, augmented by a tenuous
beachhead at Anzio. They sought to scrub
Anvil and break the stalemate on the Italian
peninsula by using shipping from the Pacific
to reinforce the lodgment. The American chiefs
acknowledged landings in southern France
had to be delayed until August 1944, but they
refused to move landing craft from the Pacific
unless earmarked for Anvil. Tempers on both
sides of the table reached new heights.
Dill was again thrown into the breach as
an honest broker. He explained to the British
chiefs Roosevelt was facing domestic criti-
cism for his perceived neglect of the Pacific.
Slowing operations there by withdrawing
vital landing craft for employment in a sec-
ondary theater was unpalatable, especially
in a presidential election year.
Dill’s labors earned him additional enmity from the
prime minister, who continued to decry Anvil and bom-
bard American officials with telegrams requesting more
resources for Italy. In a fit of irrationality, he even accused
the field marshal of having been “Americanized.”
Increasingly concerned Churchill might recall his British
colleague, Marshall set about building a “backfire” that
included arranging to have Dill awarded Yale University’s
prestigious Howland Memorial Prize for his invaluable
contributions to international relations. Honorary degrees
from Columbia and Princeton followed. The accolades
garnered extensive press coverage, possibly staying Chur-
chill’s hand from recalling or censuring his representative.
The Anvil dispute was the last contentious issue Dill
was able to mediate. In the summer of 1943 he was diag-
nosed with aplastic anemia, a rare disorder in which the
body fails to produce blood cells in sufficient numbers.
For a year doctors kept him alive with blood transfusions,
TOP: NATIONAL ARCHIVES; RIGHT: NATIONAL AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM, SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
but in June 1944 Dill collapsed just prior to accompanying
the U.S. chiefs on a visit to Normandy. He endured an ex-
tended hospitalization and a long convalescence but never
fully recovered. Dill died at Walter Reed General Hospital
in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 4, 1944.
The response in London to the field marshal’s passing
was muted, Churchill neglecting to mention it either in
Parliament or on the radio. In a note to the prime minister,
Marshall chided his indifference. “Few will ever realize the
debt our countries owe [Dill] for his unique and profound
influence toward the cooperation of our forces,” he wrote.
“To be very frank and personal, I doubt if you or your
cabinet associates fully realize the loss you have suffered.”
Belated recognition came from Brooke in his wartime
diaries. In its pages the British chief readily skewered such
senior officials as Churchill, Roosevelt, Marshall and King,
Among other dignitaries present at the 1950 unveiling of Dill’s statue
at Arlington are Truman and British Ambassador Sir Oliver Franks (to
Truman’s left) and Secretary of Defense Marshall (second row, right).
but the words he reserved for Dill were glowing. His was
a lone voice throughout the British empire.
In his multivolume biography of Marshall author Forrest
C. Pogue succinctly captured the value of
Dill’s contribution to the war effort:
In an amazing balancing act, Dill was able
to represent British wishes to the Americans
without antagonizing them and to warn
London of the limits of American forbear-
ance without arousing suspicion on the
part of his own chiefs that he had become
a captive of his hosts.
General Sir Henry Maitland Wilson, su-
preme Allied commander in the Mediterra-
Dill’s DSM
nean, was promoted to field marshal and
appointed to replace Dill. Known as “Jumbo” In 1944 the United States
due to his girth and affability, Wilson made recognized Dill’s wartime
service with a posthumous
every effort to fill the shoes of his late colleague Distinguished Service
but never achieved Dill’s deft touch or sense of Medal. Supporting paper-
timing. Fortunately for the Allied effort, after work noted his “enduring
November 1944 they had settled their major contribution toward the
strategic differences, and operational issues victorious conclusion of
the war and also to that
were not as divisive as they had been when Sir
harmony of purpose ...
John Dill proved practically irreplaceable. MH essential to our security.”
John Howard served in the U.S. Army for 28 years, retiring
as a brigadier general. He was a combat infantryman in
Vietnam. For further reading he recommends Very Special
Relationship: Field Marshall Sir John Dill and the Anglo-
American Alliance, 1941–44, by Alex Danchev.
63
 At the outset of the Peloponnesian War the Athenian-allied
city-state of Plataea came under siege from the same Greek
forces that a half century earlier had driven off Persian invaders
By Justin D. Lyons

64 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

Though anachronistic in style, this 1755 engraving
reasonably depicts the walls of circumvallation
built by the Spartans during their 429–427 BC siege.

65
 This bronze sword dates from the time
of the initial 431 BC Theban assault of
Plataea. The 300 attackers stood little
chance against the fury of its citizens.

he operation had not gone as planned. A strike force of some 300 Thebans had gained entrance to
the walled city of Plataea under cover of darkness. The gates lay open, no guards had challenged them,
and they soon occupied a strong position in the agora. They held the advantage of complete surprise.
But soon they were desperately trying to find their way out again, for the Plataeans had blocked the
narrow lanes with wagons and barricaded the gates. Hampered by rain and darkness and lost in a maze
of unfamiliar streets, the Thebans came under attack from all sides and were pelted from above with
stones and roof tiles. They fled as they could, with pursuers at their heels. Those who reached the outer
wall hurled themselves over to break or die on the ground below. Others fought desperately in corners
and alleyways. By the time dawn broke, all who remained inside had been slain or taken captive.
Decades before the 431 bc attack on Plataea a once united Greece had divided into hostile camps, and war had
broken out. Ironically, Plataea had been the site of a decisive victory of allied Panhellenic forces over invading Persians
in 479 bc. But in the half century since much had changed. The cobbled unity occasioned by the Greco-Persian War
had eroded as the growing hegemony of Athens, founder and dominant member of the Delian League of city-states,
created unease and mistrust among members of the Peloponnesian League, dominated by Sparta. During the result-
ing 460–45 bc war the rivals circled each other like boxers, engaging in proxy fights through allies as they measured
one another’s strength. Signed in 446–45 bc, the Thirty Years’ Peace eased tensions for a time, but the root causes of
conflict remained, and the treaty lasted less than half as long as its name had promised.

While Sparta’s citizens’ assembly formally broke
the peace in 432 bc, the first assault of the Peloponnesian
War didn’t come until the following spring—launched not
by Sparta but by Thebes. The Thebans shared a long border
with the Athenians, who had defeated and dominated them
in the past. With war again brewing, Theban commanders
turned their gaze on Plataea, a longtime
Athenian ally holding a strategic position
that flanked the approaches from Thebes
to Athens and the Peloponnesus. Thebes
in their beds, but the Thebans refused. The coin of surprise
can be spent in different ways. The Thebans instead chose to
wake the citizens and cow them into voluntary submission.
Initially, neither side resorted to violence. But during nego-
tiations the Plataeans discovered just how few Thebans
were present in their city and resolved to overpower them.
Unobserved, they dug through the interior mud brick walls
of their houses to join forces and coordinate. When all was
prepared, they attacked while darkness still gave them
an advantage. Defeated and demoralized, the Thebans who

could not resist an opportunity to absorb
Plataea into its own Boeotian Confederacy
while Athens was distracted by wrangling
with the Peloponnesians.
Thebes’ ability to sneak a small advance
guard into Plataea reveals much about
the nature of the civil war. Greece was not
Sacred City only split between the leagues allied with
Sparta or Athens, but also fragmented
For its efforts toward the
Greek victory over Persia into oligarchic and democratic regimes
in 479 BC Plataea was within each city-state. The Thebans had
gifted funds for a temple no need to storm Plataea’s formidable
to Athena, goddess of walls. Confederates within, who had hoped
wisdom and warfare through alliance with Thebes to eliminate
(above), and proclaimed
their political rivals and gain ascendancy,
sacred and inviolate. Its
citizens tried trading on had left open the city gates.
that status when Sparta These Plataean turncoats had urged the
threatened in 429 BC. slaughter of their democratic opponents
PREVIOUS SPREAD: CHRONICLE (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO); THIS PAGE, TOP: BRITISH MUSEUM; LEFT: BIBI SAINT-POL
survived surrendered unconditionally.
The march of the Theban army that was to have
cemented the occupation of Plataea had been delayed by
the rain-swollen Asopus, thus it had arrived too late, and the
gambit had failed. Determined to salvage what they could
from the operation, the Thebans resolved to take hostages
from the surrounding countryside and exchange them for
their captive countrymen. Anticipating such a move, the
Plataeans dispatched a herald to the Thebans, reproaching
them for the sneak attack and warning that any harm to
citizens outside their walls would be repaid in the blood
of the captives they held. Though the Thebans withdrew,
the Plataeans, their indignation fueled by long-standing
antipathy, executed the 180 prisoners anyway.
Meanwhile, Sparta and its allies were mobilizing for an
invasion of Attica. Though Plataea was not at the center of
the action, the Athenians evacuated its noncombatants and

66 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 established a small garrison in the city to prepare for fur-
ther attacks. But Plataea remained an isolated outpost in
the larger conflict. Not until 429 bc, the third year of the
war, did the Spartans march to the aid of their Theban
allies. Frustrated by Athens’ insuperable walls and the Peri-
clean strategy of refusing open field combat, Spartan King
Archidamus II eyed its more vulnerable Boeotian ally.
Despite Plataea’s strong walls and the shortcomings
of Spartan siege craft, Archidamus had reason for confi-
TOP: CHRONICLE (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO); ABOVE: METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
dence. He commanded an army of 30,000 combatants plus
auxiliaries, a force greater than the population almost any
city-state in Boeotia. He counted on making an impression
of the consequences should negotiations with the Plataeans
break down.
But he also had reason for chagrin. In both diplomatic
and ethical terms, the entire situation was delicate. The
Thebans had attacked Plataea in peacetime, an overt breach
of the treaty. Any hostilities against Plataea would also
belie Sparta’s oft-proclaimed resolve to defend Greek free-
dom against Athens’ imperial ambitions. Plataea itself
stood as a symbol of Greek unity in defense of freedom.
Adding to the awkwardness, Thebes had been on the wrong
Above: The butt end of a circa 500 BC Greek bronze spear. Top: Greek
spears all point outward in 479 BC as Spartans, at left, fight alongside
Plataeans against Persian invaders. A half century later, however, as
Athens and Sparta wrangled for supremacy, Greek allies became foes.
side in the late war with Persia, having betrayed its country-
men by allying with Xerxes I.
For their contribution toward the Greek victory in 479 bc
the Plataeans had been granted the huge sum of 80 talents
to build a temple to Athena, goddess of wisdom and war-
With war again brewing, Theban
commanders turned their gaze on
Plataea, a longtime Athenian ally
fare. In addition, Plataea was to be the annual meeting place
of a joint Greek assessment of ships and men for the war
against the barbarian, and every four years the city would
host the Eleutheria, a festival to celebrate the triumph.
67
 The Spartan hoplite (above) was well equipped for open warfare, but a
siege called for wholly different tactics. Walls of circumvallation (above
right) were designed to keep a besieged enemy in and potential relief
forces out. Despite such measures, Plataeans managed to slip the noose.
Plataea was also given the privilege of offering sacrifices
to the gods for the whole of Greece and continuing the
rites of sepulture for those slain and buried on its soil.
The city and its territory were proclaimed sacred and invio-
late. As these measures had been sworn to by Spartan King
Pausanius, Archidamus was bound by ancestral oath—
a fact of which the Plataeans did not fail to remind him.
If Plataea would not fall
to the swift stroke, it could
still be strangled to death
But Archidamus conceived a path around these diffi-
culties. First, he required of the Plataeans only neutrality in
the war, with reciprocal guarantees of their independence
and property. Second, he turned the obligations of the oath
back on them. The promises to Plataea had been made in
the context of the struggle for Greek freedom. The struggle
remained, he argued, but the present threat was Athens.
68 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
Thebes was on the right side of that struggle. Were the
Plataeans to remain allied with Athens, they would be
aiding the oppressor.
After consideration, the Plataeans decided they could not
agree to the proposal without informing the Athenians.
They asked for a temporary truce, which Archidamus
granted. When the envoys returned with a pledge of support
from Athens, the Plataeans rejected the Spartan proposal.
Proclaiming the Plataeans oath breakers, and being thus
vindicated before gods and men, Archidamus hemmed in
the city with a palisade of fruit trees cut from the surround-
ing countryside. The Plataeans were isolated and alone. They
had been promised shelter beneath the Athenian shield,
but their enemies were close and their friends far away.
It was only a matter of time before the trapped garrison
of 480 combatants and 100 some workwomen faced starva-
tion. But Archidamus had time pressures as well. For one,
THIS PAGE AND OPPOSITE: PETER CONNOLLY (AKG-IMAGES, 3)
his large army would rapidly consume its own provisions,
increasing the commitments of foraging and supply. For
another, much of his army comprised farmers who would
need to return home for the summer harvest. Finally, given
Sparta’s existing reputation for incompetence in taking
fortified positions, a prolonged siege could weaken its
influence over city-states in the Peloponnese.
Rather than build permanent walls of encirclement, the
Peloponnesians began raising a siege ramp to overtop the
walls of Plataea. For 70 days they carried and stacked timber,
 Earlier in the siege the Spartans raised a siege
ramp, intended to overtop the city’s defensive
walls. Plataeans first raised their own walls and
then undercut the ramp by tunneling beneath it.

stones and earth. But the Plataeans matched them in energy The walls of circumvallation reflected a
and ingenuity. First, with timber and brick salvaged from great commitment on the part of the besiegers. Tactical
their own homes, they raised the wall against which the No such project had been attempted in Greek Takeaways
siege ramp lay. Next, after mining beneath the ramp, they siege craft. Two parallel walls 16 feet apart— Strike while the iron...
carried earth inside the city, eroding any progress made one to keep the Plataeans in, the other to At the outset of their
by the besiegers. When the Spartans brought up keep any Athenian relief force out— 431 BC assault the
timber battering rams, the Plataeans em- were roofed over, guarded by Thebans squandered
their advantage of
ployed iron chains and heavy suspended towers and battlements, and
surprise. When alerted
beams to lift, drop and shatter the rams. GREECE flanked by trenches. Interior citizens learned how few
(PRESENT-DAY
As a final stopgap they constructed a BORDERS) quarters for the garrison pro- Thebans there were, the
THEBES
semicircular inner defensive wall that vided shelter from the ele- latter’s fate was sealed.
PLATAEA
would present the attackers with the ments during what could be Ingenuity buys time.
same labor all over again. ATHENS
a long wait. Indeed, 18 months Plataean defenders
undercut the Spartans’
Thus thwarted, the Spartans turned to later the besiegers remained siege ramp and lassoed
fire. After piling pitch- and sulfur-soaked in place, but the walls had done their battering rams,
brush against the makeshift wooden barrier their work. Provisions within the stymieing the assault.
atop the wall and hurling more brush over the ram- city were failing, and Athens, immersed Expect no quarter.
parts, the besiegers set it ablaze. A raging conflagration in troubles of its own, had sent no further aid. Plataeans managed to
arose, but instead of the winds Archidamus hoped would In the winter of 428 bc, nearly four years after stall the Spartan siege
for several years. When
spread the inferno throughout the city, a heavy rain began the initial Theban assault, 220 of the remain- the city fell, they tried
to fall, extinguishing the flames. The grinding of the Spartan ing defenders resolved to escape. to negotiate surrender—
king’s teeth must have contested with the taunts and jeers Counting bricks by way of measurement, little surprise to no avail.
that no doubt rang from the battlements. the Plataeans built ladders to match the height
Months of effort had yielded no results. Archidamus of the inner enemy wall. Lightly equipped for speed and
could neither take nor afford to abandon the city. Accept- stealth, and concealed by the inky black of a stormy night
ing the reality of an extended siege, he dismissed much with no moon, they reached the wall without being discov-
of his force. Those who remained began raising perma- ered. The first scaling party, armed with daggers, ascended
MAP BY JON BOCK

nent and elaborate walls of circumvallation. If the city the ladders. No alarm was raised. A second group, armed
would not fall to the swift stroke, it could still be strangled with spears and shields, followed. Still, all was quiet. Many
to death. had gathered atop the wall when one of the Plataeans, grasp-

69
 Though the Thebans and Spartans had allied at Plataea in 429–427 BC,
they battled one another at Mantinea, above, in 362 BC, one in a series
of clashes amid the continually shifting alliances of Greek city-states.
ing for the battlements, knocked loose a roof tile. The clatter
roused the garrison, and the alarm was given.
But the Plataeans had planned well for the possibility
of discovery. Their senses impaired by the storm and dark-
The defenders were slain to a
man, workwomen were sold into
slavery and the city was razed
ness, the Peloponnesians had trouble discerning where the
danger lay. To maximize their confusion and divert their
attention, the Plataeans who remained within the city
launched a sortie against the enemy wall. When the be-
70 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
siegers lit fires in the direction of Thebes to signal for help,
the Plataeans also kindled fires atop the city walls, render-
ing the enemy signals unintelligible. Meanwhile, the scaling
parties had seized adjacent towers, slain the defenders
and lowered their ladders from the outside of the double
wall. Well-aimed arrows kept the besiegers’ heads down
while they descended. The archers in the towers were the
last to escape. As the Plataeans struggled over the outer
ditch filled with icy water, they were met by a unit of 300
torch-bearing Peloponnesians set aside for just such emer-
gencies. The latter made perfect targets for the night-
shrouded, bow-wielding Plataeans.
Having slipped the enemy noose, the Plataeans started
down the road to Thebes, reasoning correctly that would
CHRONICLE (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO)
be the last direction the Peloponnesians would look. After
a time they turned into the hills and eventually made their
way to Athens. Though all but a handful of them got away,
their comrades in the city had no way of knowing. The next
morning, however, negotiations for a truce to recover the
dead revealed the heartening truth.
 By the following summer it was clear the Plataeans
could hold out no longer, but the Spartan commander did
not wish to take the city by storm. This had less to do with
mercy than a calculation of interest. His instructions from
Sparta were to win over the Plataeans voluntarily if possi-
ble. In the event a future peace treaty with Athens should
stipulate those cities taken by force be returned, Plataea
could be withheld from the list. In pursuit of these orders,
he sent a herald to ask the besieged to surrender to the Spar-
tans and accept them as their judges, on the understand-
ing any punishment would follow the form of law. Starving
and weak, the Plataeans were in no position to refuse.
The justice of subsequent events is questionable. Some
days later five judges from Sparta arrived and put to the
survivors a remarkable question: What had they done to
help the Spartans and their allies in the current war? Aside
TOP: VIOLETA MELETIS (ALAMY STOCK PHOTO); RIGHT: ROYAL ONTARIO MUSEUM, TORONTO
from the practical consideration there is nothing they could
have done while trapped within their city for four years,
the Plataeans reasonably thought the question failed to take
in the nuances of the situation and asked leave to speak.
Thucydides’ account provides a poignant, if apocryphal,
speech from the Plataeans that evokes the hopes and fears of
any people facing such a predicament. A retelling of Plataea’s
role in defense of Greek freedom against the Persians and its
inviolate status are meant to appeal to the protections of both
gratitude and justice. Perhaps aware such appeals would not
be wholly convincing amid the passions and calculations of
war, the Plataeans connected them to the question of repu-
tation. Here they hit closer to the mark, warning the Spartans
that the infamy of Plataea’s ruin would haunt them, under-
mine relations with allies and hamper their war effort.
The successful Plataean defense held the allied Spartans and Thebans
at bay for years, for which the vengeful Spartans exacted their pound of
flesh, killing all defenders and leveling the city. Only its imprint remains.
Realizing the Spartans were acting in part to please their
Theban allies, the Plataeans offered them a rhetorical escape
hatch, emphasizing the wickedness of the traitorous and
fickle Thebans as the real agents of their destruction. They
were to blame. Sparta could earn glory, grat-
itude and advantage by repudiating their
ally’s dishonorable behavior.
The appeals fell on deaf ears, for the Spar-
tans had their own calculations of reputation
and advantage. They had poured too much
time and effort into taking the city to re-
lent. Bringing the Plataean defenders before
them one by one, the judges again asked each
whether he had done Sparta or its allies any
service in the war. Each said he had not, and
they were slain to a man. The workwomen
were sold into slavery. The city was given to
the Thebans, who ultimately razed it. Such
Storyteller
Thucydides’ contemporary
was the long, sad, slow death of Plataea. MH History of the Peloponne-
sian War,r as most ancient
Justin D. Lyons is an associate professor of accounts of war, should
history and government at Ohio’s Cedarville be taken with a grain of
University. For further reading he recom- salt. While the Athenian
mends History of the Peloponnesian War, general doubtless wrote
about war with authority,
by Thucydides; A War Like No Other, by he also exploited for
Victor Davis Hanson; and The Pelopon- effect the war’s symbolic
nesian War, by Donald Kagan. and emotional impact.
71
 Reviews
Things Fell Apart
The 1991–99 violent dismemberment of the
Yugoslavian state (see related story, P. 24) took
most of the world by surprise. The seemingly
peaceful and prosperous nation degenerated
into the bloodiest conflict on the European
continent since World War II. The tensions that
erupted to the surface in 1991, however, were
as long-standing as they were complex.
The Collapse of When the pope and the patriarch divided
Yugoslavia, 1991–99, Europe between Catholic and Orthodox Chris-
by Alastair Finlan, tianity in the Great Schism of 1054, the bound-
Osprey Publishing/ ary passed right through the middle of what
Bloomsbury Publishing, would later become Yugoslavia. The Slovenes
Oxford, U.K., and and Croats north of the boundary embraced Ca-
New York, 2022, $20
tholicism, while the Serbs to the south accepted
the Orthodox religion. In the late 14th century
the Ottomans conquered the region, occupying
it for the next 500 years and establishing a sub-
stantial Muslim minority, particularly in Bosnia.
However, as Alastair Finlan explains in The
Collapse of Yugoslavia, it was during World
72 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
“Victory,” in any traditional
sense of the word, proved
elusive for the various ethnic
factions of the Yugoslav Wars.
War II the real damage was done. During that
conflict Yugoslavs fought two simultaneous
wars, one against the German invaders and
the other between various domestic factions,
including Croatian nationalists, Bosnian Mus-
lims, Serbian royalists and communist partisans.
In the end the pro-Allied communist partisans
under Yosip Broz (aka Marshal Tito) emerged
as the rulers of post–World War II Yugoslavia.
Factional nationalism began to re-emerge
as communist rule eroded after Tito’s death
in 1980. Croats and Serbs accused each other
of attempting to take control of the country,
and old religious and ethnic bigotries resur-
ANTOINE GYORI/CORBIS (GETTY IMAGES)
faced. As the author notes, while most wars
have two sides, “in the Balkans at least 13 play-
ers…can be clearly identified,” not counting
the numerous unofficial groups comprising
mercenaries, bandits and criminal gangs.
Balkan politics have always been synony-
mous with hopeless complexity. This book, an
update of a work originally
published in 2003, helps to
sort out an extremely con-
voluted story.
—Robert Guttman
The East Africa Campaign,
1914–18: Von Lettow-
Vorbeck’s Masterpiece,
by David Smith, Osprey
Publishing/Bloomsbury
Publishing, Oxford, U.K.,
and New York, 2022, $24
The latest addition to the
serried ranks of Osprey’s
lavishly illustrated Cam-
paign series, this volume
deals with Germany’s epic
but often overlooked World
War I guerrilla war in East
Africa against the Allies—
a fight ably led by Paul Emil
von Lettow-Vorbeck, who
only surrendered after the
war had ended. David Smith
has authored several pre-
vious contributions to the
series, with topics ranging
from the American Revo-
lutionary War and Civil War
to British imperial history,
while illustrator Graham
Turner has produced stun-
ning art for subjects rang-
ing from the Middle Ages
to the world wars, includ-
ing several on World War II
aviation history.
Before World War I the
German colonial empire in
Africa was small and second-
rate compared to those of
Britain and France. Berlin
laid claim to what today are
Togo, Cameroon, Namibia
and Tanzania. Only the last
territory, then known as
German East Africa and not
including the island of Zan-
zibar, was viewed as being
of any real worth to poten-
tial Allied invaders. The wily
Lettow-Vorbeck was a vet-
eran of the 1899–1901 Boxer
Rebellion in China and the
1904 Herero revolt in Ger-
man South West Africa (Na-
mibia), having lost an eye
in the latter. For more than
four years, with never more
than 3,000 Germans and
11,000 Africans, and cut
off from supplies from Ger-
many, Lettow-Vorbeck tied
down more than 200,000
pursuing British, Indian,
South African, Belgian and
Portuguese troops.
This mostly obscure cam-
paign is nevertheless widely
considered one of the great-
est examples of guerrilla
warfare in military history,
with Lettow-Vorbeck fore-
shadowing Erwin Rommel
in World War II in that he,
too, was widely admired by
his enemies. Smith effec-
tively relates this story via
the standard Osprey for-
mat, studying the campaign’s
origins (with a useful chro-
nology) and opposing com-
manders, forces and plans
before moving on to actual
events, and ending with a
fine bibliographic essay.
Accompanying the narra-
tive are detailed maps and
Turner’s impressive art, with
two-page spreads colorfully
depicting the British attack
on the German light cruiser
Königsberg as it sheltered
in the Rufiji Delta in 1915
(see related story, P. 34), as
well as the costly assaults of
the South Africans at Salaita
Hill (Kenya) in 1916 and the
25th Fusiliers at Mahiwa
(Tanzania) in 1917.
—William John Shepherd
Battle: Understanding
Conflict From Hastings
to Helmand, by Graeme
Callister and Rachael
Whitbread, Pen and
Sword Military, Barnsley,
U.K., and Philadelphia,
2022, $42.95
In Battle two Ph.D.s from
the University of York dis-
sect field engagements from
medieval times through Af-
ghanistan in 2006, present-
ing through a succession of
historic examples the factors
that contribute to each one’s
outcome. Aside from the
more obvious factors, such
as leadership, logistics, cli-
mate, terrain, troop training
and morale, they examine
how noncombatant support
and the societies from which
the armies and their leaders
came affected their conduct
on the battlefields.
All this should make for
lively discussions among
readers, though its primary
fixation on the battles as
separate entities seems lim-
iting. Most recently, the vic-
tory of the Afghan Taliban
in 2021, after 20 years of oc-
cupation by Western forces
possessing overwhelming
firepower and despite heavy
casualties, brings to mind (as
the book itself briefly does)
Colonel Harry G. Summers
Jr.’s retrospective analysis
of the Vietnam War with a
North Vietnamese counter-
part in 1975, in which he de-
clared, “You know, you never
defeated us on the battle-
field,” to which the NVA col-
onel replied, “That may be
so, but it is also irrelevant.”
Some wars seem paradoxical
when excessively measured
by the tactical brilliance of
battles while the overall cam-
paigns are being pursued by
strategists and grand strate-
gists—as exemplified by
Hannibal Barca’s tactical
mastery being strategical-
ly undone by the Romans,
Britain’s battle-winning
armies being worn down in
the campaigns orchestrated
by George Washington and
Nathanael Greene, or Robert
E. Lee’s ultimate defeat at the
hands of Ulysses S. Grant.
There are dramatic battles
aplenty on which to chew
here. Perhaps a follow-up
might focus on the bigger
picture regarding the cam-
paigns and outright wars.
—Jon Guttman
The Chinese Civil War,
1945–49, by Michael
Lynch, Osprey Publishing/
Bloomsbury Publishing,
Oxford, U.K., and New
York, 2022, $20
“May you live in interesting
times,” an old Chinese curse
wishes, and The Chinese Civil
War, 1945–49 recounts some
of the more “interesting
times” in 20th century his-
tory. As author Michael
73

Recommended
The Jacobite
Rebellion, 1745–46
By Gregory Fremont-Barnes
This overview of the final,
failed attempt by the House
of Stuart to regain the British
throne, from the landing of
“Bonnie Prince Charlie” to
the Battle of Culloden, dispels
myths about the rising. Com-
plemented with color maps
and images, the narrative
examines the struggle of the
Houses of Stuart and Hanover
as well as battles, maneuvers
and the tragic consequences.
Hungarian Arms and
Armor of World War II
By Peter Mujzer
The Hungarian army went
from minimal involvement
in World War II to full-blown
conflict with the Allies. This
history includes 170 images
of its wartime armor, motor
vehicles, artillery pieces and
infantry weapons, including
equipment inherited from
Austria-Hungary, purchased
new and produced by Hun-
gary’s own arms industry.
74 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
Lynch explains, the post–
World War II Chinese Civil
War was far more than a mere
regional political conflict. In-
deed, the existence of an inde-
pendent Taiwan indicates the
conflict never really ended,
and it continues to influence
world affairs to this day.
The Chinese Civil War was
the continuation, and cul-
mination, of a conflict that
began after the fall of the Qing
Dynasty in 1911. The new
Republic of China proved
too weak to control the en-
tire country, large portions of
which fell under the domin-
ion of powerful local “war-
lords.” After the Nationalists
and Communists combined
forces to wrest control from
the warlords, the Nationalists
turned against the Commu-
nists, nearly wiping them out
and driving their remnants
into a remote region around
Yanan. That situation pre-
vailed throughout World
War II, during which the
rival forces turned their atten-
tions against a clearer, present
threat: the invading Japanese.
At war’s end the National-
ists, under Generalissimo
Chiang Kai-shek, dominated
most of China. Yet, within
four years that situation had
been completely reversed, and
the Nationalists fled mainland
China for the island of Tai-
wan. Lynch’s book explains
exactly how that dramatic re-
versal was achieved, as much
the result of Nationalists’ in-
competence as it was Com-
munist prowess. The Chinese
Civil War clears up many mis-
conceptions and presents a
complex subject in a concise
and lucid manner—quite an
achievement in itself for 144
generously illustrated pages.
—Robert Guttman
The Abyss: Nuclear
Crisis Cuba, 1962, by
Max Hastings, Harper,
New York, 2022, $35
Veteran military historian
Max Hastings seems to have
run out of wars and chosen
one that didn’t happen, but
few readers will complain.
He sets the scene with a mas-
terful 100-page history of the
Cold War, emphasizing the
three nations involved in the
crisis and their larger-than-
life but flawed leaders.
By the 1960s the Soviet
Union, still suffering the after-
effects of World War II and
hobbled by a dysfunctional
economy, possessed a huge
army and the atomic bomb,
but its greatest strength was
Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s
proclamation it possessed a
massive nuclear arsenal and
missile force, though it didn’t.
Vastly wealthier and better
armed but no more confi-
dent, the United States had no
doubt the Soviet Union in-
tended to conquer the world,
and President John Kenne-
dy’s 1960 election campaign
featured a promise to correct
a purely fictional “missile gap”
with its rival.
Fidel Castro’s arrival on the
scene did not improve mat-
ters. Cuba was a corrupt, mis-
governed client state of the
United States when his guer-
rillas seized power in early
1959. He was admired among
a subset of Americans for
several months until he na-
tionalized American busi-
nesses and began shooting
far more people than usual
in a Latin American coup.
On taking office in 1961,
Kennedy learned his prede-
cessor, Dwight Eisenhower,
had approved a CIA-orga-
nized invasion to overthrow
Castro. He decided that was a
good idea and didn’t change
his mind until too late, with-
holding further air support
from the floundering Bay of
Pigs invasion that April. A
leader’s traditional response
to a blunder is to blame un-
derlings. That Kennedy took
responsibility for the fiasco
was a mark of statesmanship,
but it convinced Khrushchev
he was a wimp.
Certain the United States
would try again, and with no
hope of defeating a proper
American invasion of Cuba,
Castro appealed successfully
to the Soviet Union for mili-
tary aid. There was no hiding
the shipments that followed,
but U.S. officials confined
themselves to complaining
until intelligence revealed
nuclear missile launch sites.
Readers know how matters
turned out, but they will love
Hastings’ expert account,
aided by verbatim transcripts
of the discussions from Ken-
nedy’s hidden tape recorder
in the White House con-
ference room. It’s no exag-
geration to claim, as Has-
tings does, that the president
saved the world from nu-
clear war by vetoing an in-
vasion (a decision for which
military advisers never for-
gave him) and instead or-
dering a naval blockade and
issuing overt threats that
persuaded Khrushchev to
withdraw the missiles.
—Mike Oppenheim
Crécy: Battle of the
Five Kings, by Michael
Livingston, Osprey
Publishing/Bloomsbury
Publishing, Oxford, U.K.,
and New York, 2022, $30
Award-winning military his-
torian Michael Livingston
provides an innovative re-
examination of one of the
best-known medieval battles.
Based on his comprehensive
Crécy: A Casebook (co-edited
with Kelly DeVries, 2016)
and similar to his Never
Greater Slaughter: Brunan-
burh (2021) and 1066: A
Guide to the Battles and the
Campaigns (2021), the pres-
ent work overturns accepted
historiography. Livingston
argues that historians have
been wrong on several im-
portant issues, particularly
English King Edward III’s
war planning, the location
and duration of the battle,
the truth behind the disaster
of the Genoese crossbow-
men, and the supposed he-
roics of young heir apparent
Edward, the “Black Prince.”
The five kings in the title
refer to Edward III versus
French King Philip VI, as
well as three allied mon-
archs—John the Blind of
Bohemia; his son, Charles,
king of the Romans and fu-
ture Holy Roman emperor;
and James III, recently de-
posed king of Majorca.
Livingston touts his Bat-
tle Reconstruction Toolkit,
which includes archaeology,
multisource authentica-
tion, technology and tactics
and four maxims—“Follow
the Roads,” “No Man Is a
Fool,” “A Battle Is Its Ground”
and “Men Flow Like Water.”
He argues that history is a
working hypothesis subject
to revision. Employing the
toolkit by drawing on such
nontraditional contem-
porary sources as a poem
written on-site by a French
herald, the “Kitchen Jour-
nal” of Edward’s camp cook
and German accounts, Liv-
ingston convincingly ar-
gues Edward did not have
a master plan, his actions
were contingency-based and
the major accomplishment
of the campaign, the cap-
ture of Calais, was opportun-
ism. Anglocentric accounts
of the battle, notably that
of Jean Froissart, exagger-
ate the English victory. The
Black Prince was in fact tem-
porarily captured and only
rescued by luck. Genoese
crossbowmen working for
On Film
All Quiet on the Western Front
Directed by Edward Berger, Netflix, 147 minutes, 2022
The new German remake of All Quiet on the Western Front is an excellent film. The
uniforms and equipment details are correct. The film accurately depicts the stark
and brutal realities of life and death in the trenches. But toward the end of the movie
are scenes depicting the German surrender negotiations of Nov. 8–11, 1918, in the
railway car at Compiègne. There is nothing like this in Erich Maria Remarque’s novel.
That whole sequence was inserted to set up the end of the film, which departs com-
pletely from the book and even further from history.
The film would have you believe that just hours before the Armistice went into
effect, at 1100 hours on November 11, a “General Friedrich” ordered a last-minute,
massive suicide attack to “save the honor of the German army.” Friedrich, a totally
invented character, is clearly patterned on General Erich Ludendorff. But Ludendorff
wasn’t there that day. The Kaiser fired him on October 26. By then Germany was
incapable of large-scale attacks. The bulk of its army was retreating eastward to
the line of the Meuse River. It was the Allies who kept attacking that day, particularly
the Americans. Pershing ordered the American Expeditionary Forces to keep attack-
ing hard right up until 1059 hours. The Americans took some 3,000 casualties in the
last 11 hours of the war, for absolutely no additional military or political gain.
Another problem is how that last large-scale attack is portrayed as a mass,
linear frontal assault, with the NCOs and junior officers shouting for the troops to
maintain their alignments. World War I started out that way, but by 1918 offensive
tactics had become far more fluid and sophisticated. Standard German infiltration
tactics—sometimes called “storm troop tactics”—emphasized bypassing and iso-
lating enemy strongpoints to overrun the defender’s artillery.
The main character, Landser Paul Bäumer, of course, is killed in the film’s last
great suicide attack. The book, however, does not give specific details on how he
died. All it says is, “He fell in October 1918, on a day that was so quiet and still on the
whole front that the army report confined itself to the single sentence: ‘Im Westen
Nicht Neues’ [‘In the West, nothing new’].”
It is difficult to understand why the German producers of this new film version
altered both the original story and history itself to make the Germans look like
suicidal automatons at the end. —David T. Zabecki
the French were not cowards, dieval battles, were likely
but they were used improp- 13,000 English and 26,000
erly and, thus, decimated French, with losses of the for-
by English longbows. mer negligible and the latter
Livingston also notes perhaps as many as 16,000.
sources that record the battle This significant addition
as having been fought in the to the Crécy story includes
forest surrounding Crécy, a beautiful mix of 33 con-
not in the town itself. Sur- temporar y illustrations
rounding marshlands con- and modern photographs
fined armies to area roads, as well as an impressive
with a portion of the French glossary of sources, biblio-
arriving a day late. Lastly, graphic essay, endnotes and
numbers engaged, always a thorough index.
a thorny question with me- —William John Shepherd
75
 Hallowed Ground
Saragarhi, British India
By Dana Benner
rom the dawn of human warfare to the present few
areas of the world have been as highly contested as the
mountainous region straddling the border of present-
day India and Pakistan. In 1897 the region was known
as the North-West Frontier Province of British India.
On September 12 of that year, in what became known
as the Battle of Saragarhi, 21 soldiers of the 36th (Sikh) Regi-
ment of Bengal Infantry of the British Indian army fought a
last stand against thousands of besieging Pashtun tribesmen.
Theirs is a story of bravery in the face of overwhelming odds.
That year, in an effort to exert control over the traditionally
volatile North-West Frontier, the British garrisoned a line of
For nearly seven hours the 21
Sikhs, equipped only with small
arms, repulsed incessant attacks
existing Sikh “forts”—really little more than makeshift mud-
and-stone shelters. Among them were Fort Lockhart, atop
the Samana Ridge, and Fort Gulistan, a few miles west in the
Sulaiman Mountains. The two were not visible to one another.
Midway between them was Saragarhi, a signal
outpost that linked the forts using helio-
graphs, tripod-mounted mirrors that
AFGHANISTAN directed reflected sunlight to com-
municate Morse code. The 36th
PESHAWAR Sikhs, which traced its origins to
1858, had been reformed at Jalan-
SARAGARHI
dhar, Punjab, in 1887. In December
PA K I S TA N 1896 the regiment was sent to the
North-West Frontier, dispersed among
the forts and tasked with quelling rebel-
lious local Pashtuns. In early September 1897 Orakzai and
Afridi tribesmen twice attacked Fort Gulistan. A relief column
from Fort Lockhart helped repel both assaults.
On their return to Fort Lockhart the men of the relief
column stopped at Saragarhi, raising the outpost’s strength
to 21—three NCOs and 18 enlisted sepoys. On September 12
76 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023
more than 10,000 tribal insurgents besieged Saragarhi while
thousands more Pashtuns kept the forces at Forts Lockhart
and Gulistan pinned in place, threatening to outflank any
attempted sorties.
For nearly seven hours the 21 Sikhs at Saragarhi, equipped
only with small arms, repulsed incessant attacks. Recognizing
the futility of their defense, they resolved to fight to the death
and take as many of the enemy with them as they could. A
record exists of their actions, as throughout the fight Sikh
signaler Gurmukh Singh kept Lt. Col. John Haughton, the
regimental commander at Fort Lockhart, apprised of what
was happening via heliograph. Despite the peril, the sepoy
kept on task, relating a blow-by-blow account of the battle
while his fellow soldiers dropped in turn about him. At last
came his final message: “They are getting in now. Shall I
take a rifle, or shall I go on signaling?” Haughton granted
Gurmukh Singh permission to defend himself. After care-
fully dismantling his signaling gear and packing it in its
leather case, the sepoy picked up his rifle and alone con-
tinued the fight. Determined to flush the lone holdout, the
Pashtuns set fire to the post. Gurmukh Singh is believed to
have killed 20 of the enemy before succumbing to the flames.
Two days later a relief column arrived at Saragarhi to find
the bodies of the 21 fallen Sikhs. Scattered around them were
upward of 400 enemy corpses.
When news of the battle reached London, members of Par-
MAP BY JON BOCK; OPPOSITE, FROM TOP: AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL; RAMESH SHARMA, CC BY-SA 2.0
liament gave a standing ovation to the fallen. All 21 Sikhs were
posthumously awarded the Indian Order of Merit (equivalent
to the Victoria Cross), the highest award of gallantry available
to Indian soldiers at the time.
To honor those who fell at Saragarhi, the administrators
of British India ultimately built two memorial gurdwaras—
Sikh places of assembly and worship—in Punjab. To this day
every September 12, on what has been designated Regimental
Battle Honours Day, the Sikh Regiment of the Indian army
honors the fallen 21 with ceremonies at the Saragarhi Memo-
rial Gurdwara in Amritsar and the Gurdwara Saragarhi in
Firozpur Cantonment, from which most of the regiment’s
members hailed. While the territory remains hotly contested
ground, the courage and sacrifice of the Saragarhi defenders
has not been forgotten. MH
Above, Sikh soldiers of the British Indian
army pose amid the charred ruins of the
Saragarhi heliograph station. The 1904
memorial gurdwara in Amritsar honors the
21 men who fought and died at Saragarhi.
 War Games

Emden

1
2

4
Hunter Turned Hunted

LEFT: BUNDESARCHIV; 1-3, 5, 9, 10: NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, LONDON (6); 4: MUSÉE COGNACQ-JAY; 6: ROYAL COLLECTION TRUST; 7: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; 8: NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
Can you match each of the following
German commerce raiders with the
agency of its ultimate destruction?
1. Komet, 1942
2. Cap Trafalgar, 1914 7
3. Atlantis, 1941 6
4. Karlsruhe, 1914
5. Admiral Scheer, 1945 5
6. Emden, 1914
7. Michel, 1943
8. Stier, 1942
9. Dresden, 1915
10. Pinguin, 1941
___ A. HMS Cornwall
___ B. SS Stephen Hopkins
___ C. HMS Carmania 8 9 10
___ D. MTB 236
___ E. Spontaneous internal explosion Veterans and Then Some
Identify these British commanders with three or more wars under their belts.
___ F. British bombers
___ G. HMS Glasgow, Kent ___ A. Sir Henry Evelyn Wood ___ F. Charles Cornwallis
and Orama ___ B. Robert Cornelis Napier ___ G. Sir Charles James Napier
___ H. USS Tarpon ___ C. Sir William Sidney Smith ___ H. Frederick Sleigh Roberts
___ I. HMAS Sydney ___ D. Jan Christian Smuts ___ I. Sir Garnet Joseph Wolseley
___ J. HMS Devonshire ___ E. Hugh Gough ___ J. Sir William Howe
Answers: A10, B8, C2, D1, E4, F5, G9, H7, I6, J3 Answers: A9, B2, C4, D7, E6, F1, G5, H3, I10, J8

78 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

 Taking on the Odds
Saragarhi was but one of many
battles involving a major imbalance
of numbers. Consider the following:

Rorke’s Drift

1. Which contingent was with

the Spartans at Thermopylae @The HistoryThingsPodcast
in 480 BC?
A. Boeotians B. Corinthians
C. Thespians D. Athenians
2. In which 1503 battle did
Pierre Terrail, Chevalier
de Bayard, defend a bridge
alone against a Spanish army? A conversational approach to
A. Canossa B. Garigliano interpreting history!
C. Padua D. Ravenna
3. Which Confederate casemate Listen as hosts Patrick and Matt
ram engaged a Union fleet
single-handed off Vicksburg,
connect you with your favorite stories
Miss., in July 1862? from the past—as well as ones you
A. Arkansas B. Chicora may have never heard!
C. Albemarle D. Tennessee
4. How many Victoria Crosses
were awarded for the British Download or listen for FREE
defense of Rorke’s Drift, in
South Africa’s Natal Province,
against the thousands-strong
Zulu Undi Corps in 1879?
A. Five B. Seven
C. Nine D. 11
5. How much Finnish airspace
did Swedish volunteer wing
F 19 defend with 16 biplanes
in 1940 at the close of the

HISTORYNET
ART GALLERY OF NEW SOUTH WALES, SYDNEY

Soviet-Finnish Winter War?

A. Half the Karelian Isthmus
B. All of Lapland above the
Arctic Circle
C. Viipuri
D. Territory east of Helsinki
Sign up for our free weekly E-NEWSLETTER at
Answers: 1C, 2B, 3A, 4D, 5B
historynet.com/newsletters
 Captured!

Here Be Dragon
Among the scores of dilapidated, tide-washed relics of the Atlantic Wall
CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP (GETTY IMAGES)

dotting coastal France is this blockhouse on the beach in Reville, France.

Rather than watch it continue to degrade or become a canvas for less inspiring
graffiti, French street artists Baby K and Blesea spent long hours battling the
surf from atop ladders to transform the ruin into a vivid depiction of a dragon
from a popular Japanese anime series. May it never again breathe fire.

80 MILITARY HISTORY SPRING 2023

STUNNING COLLECTION OF HISTORIC WWII MONEY & STAMPS!

U.S. and Foreign Coins

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Great Britain 1939-45 Half Penny SAVE $15
Canada 1944-45 “V” Five Cents or more!
Italy 1939-43 Lira
Historic Japanese Guerilla and Invasion Notes
Philippines 1943 1 Peso Japanese Invasion Note
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Philippines 1942-44 25 Centavos Guerilla Note
Burma 1942 1 Rupee Japanese Invasion Note
Burma 1942 5 Rupees Japanese Invasion Note
Burma 1942-44 10 Rupees Japanese Invasion Note
Burma 1944 100 Rupees Japanese Invasion Note
This Historic World War II Coin, Note and Stamp 3DWULRWLFDQG6LJQLÀFDQW86DQG)RUHLJQ6WDPSV
U.S. 1940 2¢ National Defense Stamp
Collection Can Be Yours! U.S. 1943 2¢ Allied Nations Stamp
This is an extensive 23-Pc. Collection of superb World War II memorabilia, U.S. 1942 3¢ Win the War Stamp
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ever that we’ve seen them assembled in one great set. This collection includes: Germany 1941-44 12 Pfenning Hitler Head Stamp
Germany 1941-44 25 Pfenning Hitler Head Stamp
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uncommon metals to help with the war effort, including a silver U.S. War Philippines 1942-44 5 Centavos Japanese Occupation Stamp
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as of the date of publication but may change significantly over time. All purchases are expressly conditioned upon your acceptance of GovMint.com’s Terms and Conditions (www. ®

govmint.com/terms-conditions or call 1-800-721-0320); to decline, return your purchase pursuant to GovMint.com’s Return Policy. © 2022 GovMint.com. All rights reserved.
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