BOOK REVIEWS

David Baird. Northern Lights: Lighthouses of aboard the vessels were saved. [228-229] Canada. Toronto: Lynx Images, 1999.245 pp., Through Baird's photographs, the reader is photographs (black and white, colour), maps, introduced to seldom-seen, isolated references, selected readings, index. CDN lightstations like Bellie Isle, Newfoundland [ $29.95, paper; ISBN 1-894073-09-6. 39-40] and Flat Island, Québec. [161] Images of crumbling lights at Southwest Point, Québec Canada's coasts are dotted with a huge variety [132] and Mohawk Island, Ontario [174] show of lighthouses. From Newfoundland's iron- how destaffing and abandonment has left many clad lights, to the squat wooden harbour bea- lighthouses to deteriorate. cons of the Maritimes and the slender concrete Baird notes that during the past twenty- towers in British Columbia, more than 600 five years "Canada's lighthouses have been structures remain active aids to navigation. changed forever by automation." He acknowl- Although satellite technology and automation edges that the architectural and technical char- have made them less important to mariners, acteristics of lighthouses are "liable to frequent Canada's remaining lighthouses are an impor- change" due to shifts in navigational require- tant element of the nations's maritime history. ments. Although Baird claims that his text David Baird's Northern Lights: Light- describes the current state of lighthouses in houses of Canada is the first book to look at Canada, there are a number of persistent factual navigation beacons across the country. The errors in the book. For example, he consistently author professes a lifelong interest in lights, and incorrectly identifies fog detectors (the beginning with a childhood friendship with the devices used to turn fog horns off and on son of the Partridge Island, NB, lightkeeper. automatically) as "radar-activated sensors" or Later, as a ship's deckboy off the coast of "radar detectors." There is a recurring confu- Australia, Baird says he became "hooked" on sion about Barbier, Rénard et Turenne through- lighthouses. out the book. At least two dozen factual errors In Northern Lights, Baird presents photos detract from the book's usefulness as a refer- and information about more than 200 lights ence tool – construction dates of towers (the across the country, gathered during fifty years venerable Peggy's Cove light in Nova Scotia of research trips. He begins with a brief histori- was not replaced by the current tower in 1979; cal and technical introduction to Canadian it was built in 1915), and sizes of lenses are lighthouses, including types of construction, sometimes incorrect. For instance, the photo of light and foghorn technology and general the Inch Arran light [131] shows a small lens information about keepers and automation. The that could not be of the "2nd Order," as stated remainder of the book is divided into seven in the text. chapters dealing with lights in each province Aside from a need for more careful re- with lighthouses (excepting Manitoba, which search, the author has done a commendable job has one major site). Baird devotes a page or in showing a varied selection of the country's two to each, with photos and general informa- lighthouses. Northern Lights provides a sense tion about the history and characteristics of of the importance of lights in Canada's mari- each lightstation. time history, and Baird's photos are important Baird writes of the hardships of early in preserving the memory of many which are keepers and their families. In 1906, Minnie now gone. Patterson, wife of the Cape Beale, BC keeper, made a gruelling four-hour trek to Bamfield to Chris Mills alert the government ship that a barque was Ketch Harbour, Nova Scotia coming ashore at the lighthouse. All the men

81 82 The Northern Mariner

Courtney Thompson. Lighthouses of Atlantic get a more detailed narrative, thanks in part to Canada: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince preservationists, such as the Nova Scotia Edward Island, Newfoundland and Lighthouse Preservation Society, which Labrador, A Pictorial Guide. St. John, NB: provided research in exchange for promoting Quebecor Atlantic, 2000. 128 pp photographs, their work. But Thompson's research misses maps, index, CDN $40, cloth; ISBN 0- the dates of most late twentieth-century lights 9651786-8-4; CDN $30, paper; ISBN 0- and makes errors in sites which hosted several 9651786-7-6. generations of lighthouses, such as the mistaken claim the original 1851 Medway Although thinly populated, Atlantic Canada Head lighthouse survives near the present has some of the richest density of lighthouses tower. The sketch maps are useful for tourists, in North America with over 360 surviving although one would lead a traveller on a long towers, including the continent's oldest drive in the wrong direction, locating the surviving lighthouse on Sambro Island Partridge Island Light on the wrong side of outside Halifax. The stated goal of Courtney Saint John harbour. It remains for someone to Thompson's book is to offer a produce an authoritative history or at least a comprehensive pictorial guide to reliable historical reference for Canadian lighthouses in Atlantic Canada's four lighthouses, which unlike American provinces. Thompson, an American, follows a lighthouses have never been given a historic formula developed with previous pictorial inventory, such as the comprehensive study guides to American lighthouses. After a short carried out by the US National Parks Service. historical introduction she provides colour While the history is sketchy, the book's photographs, snapshot histories, directions and strength is the quality and scope of its photo- location sketch maps for lights, grouped by graphs of lighthouse buildings — a huge num- province. She does not intend to include every ber of sharp, high-quality colour photographs lighthouse, but the 145 lights featured are of almost all the major surviving lighthouses in representative, including almost all the large Atlantic Canada. The photographs, taken by towers and many of the small harbour and the author, along with former lightkeeper Chris range lights. Mills and Newfoundland preservationist Thompson joins several other authors who Wanda Barrett, make the book a fine visual have attempted to combine some history, reference and outshine the photography in coffee-table quality pictures and travel infor- David Baird's volume. Seen collectively, it is mation for lighthouse tourists. Her book suc- clear that Atlantic Canada has a distinct light- ceeds as a fine visual reference, although its house tradition. Unlike the round stonework text falls short of historical standards. Typical lighthouses overwhelmingly found in the of recent pictorial guides, the historical intro- United States and Europe, Atlantic Canadians duction is rudimentary, certainly weaker than chose square and octagonal wooden towers, David Baird's 1999 book on Canadian light- later evolving into octagonal concrete towers. houses, Northern Lights. The text relies on Well suited to the resources and skills of the uncited secondary sources and makes a few region, the elegant simplicity of these towers is blunders, such as confusing the limestone " a rugged triumph of form and function. But Imperial Lights" of the Great Lakes with readers will get few clues as to the past look of lighthouse construction in Atlantic Canada. these stations, since the book makes almost no The historical sketches of individual use of historical images, concentrating instead lighthouses are somewhat better, certainly an on lighthouses which survive today. Those improvement on the many inaccurate profiles seeking beautiful scenery will be also be disap- in another similar book, David Stephens's 1998 pointed, as the focus of this book is the build- Discover Nova Scotia Lighthouses. Although ings themselves rather than their relation to the there is little or no discussion of technology, landscape. Harry Thurston and Wayne builders or architecture, Thompson provides Barrett's 1993 book Against Darkness and the construction date, automation date and Storm still wins out in this respect. navigational role of each light. Certain lights Book Reviews 83

Thompson has digitally altered a fair Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, appear to number of photographs, and readers may have acquired historical lives of their own. The notice the same suspiciously familiar puffy most bizarre example of this phenomenon is white clouds in different images. This fabrica- the way Steven Maffeo actually quotes pas- tion, albeit trivial, unfortunately undermines sages from the novels as "evidence" in his the veracity of already fine photographs and recent book on naval intelligence, Most Secret leads one to wonder if the lighthouses them- and Confidential (London, 2000). selves have been modified. Why has O'Brian managed so far to out- These are interesting times for publishing strip his rivals in the field of naval fiction? a visual record of so many lighthouses. The These two books offer some interesting an- Canadian Coast Guard has neglected many swers. In his short but insightful introduction to historic lights and is seeking to dispose of Persons, Animals, Ships and Cannon, Gary many more, a move opposed by community Brown writes that "O'Brian is also that rare groups seeking to keep lighthouses intact and thing, a genuine polymath (and that even rarer public. One wonders how many lighthouses thing, a polymath with both an angelic pen and will survive for future editions of books such a sense of fun)." O'Brian possessed an encyc- as this. lopaedic knowledge of all aspects life in the Napoleonic era, and it is this breadth and depth Dan Conlin of knowledge that makes his fictional world Halifax, Nova Scotia both believable and endlessly fascinating. It is so fascinating, indeed, that his readers always want to know more. It is to satisfy this Anthony Gary Brown. Persons, Animals, Ships quest that Gary Brown has created his dictio- and Cannon in the Aubrey-Maturin Sea Novels nary – an ambitious listing, with accompanying of Patrick O'Brian. Jefferson, NC and London: notes, of all the characters and ships mentioned McFarland and Company, 1999 [Box 611, in the novels. He brings to the task an erudition Jefferson, NC 28640, USA]. vii + 342 pp., that is a worthy match for O'Brian's; as a bibliography. US $35, paper; ISBN 0-7864- result, his book is one of those reference works 0684-4. that is genuinely difficult to put down, with one entry cross-referencing to another in an en- A.E. Cunningham (ed.). Patrick O'Brian: thralling intellectual trail. Perhaps most Critical Appreciations and a Bibliography. interesting, Brown places fact alongside fic- Rev. ed.; Boston Spa, West Yorkshire: British tion, showing how O'Brian often intermingled Library, 1994, 1995. 175 pp., photo plates. the two – as seen, for example, in the entry on £15, cloth; ISBN 0-7123-1070-3. Captain Aubrey's favourite ship, the frigate HMS Surprise, which Brown shows in fact is More than a year after his death, Patrick an amalgam of two historical ships. O'Brian still shows no signs of losing his So, whether used as a companion to the position as the best loved writer of naval fic- novels or as a work of reference in its own tion. The "Gunroom," a web discussion group right, this book is a most useful and enjoyable devoted to his works (www.hmssurprise.org), tool. Unpretentious and workmanlike in ap- often clocks up more than 100 messages a day; pearance, it has a clear, sharp typeface, paper the Smithsonian recently held a conference on covers and no illustrations. It also includes a his works that attracted over 150 delegates; and useful annotated bibliography and a guide to the Royal Naval Museum, in Portsmouth, the complex internal chronology of the novels. England, has just announced it will be holding a Yet however distinguished his knowledge "Patrick O'Brian Weekend" in the autumn, may have been of the wider aspects of late with a series of formal lectures and a dinner on eighteenth-century life, it was for his knowl- board HMS Victory. Like Conan Doyle's edge of Nelson's Royal Navy that O'Brian was Sherlock Holmes, O'Brian's heroes, Captain most admired. And that admiration came not 84 The Northern Maríner just from his readers but from the leading Pat Wastell Norris. High Seas, High Risk: The historians in his field, as A.E. Cunningham's Story of the Sudburys. Madeira Park, BC: Critical Appreciations demonstrates. Here are Harbour Publishing, 1999. 245 pp., photo- assembled some of the key names in modern graphs, illustrations, index. CDN $28.95, cloth; naval scholarship, united in their admiration ISBN 1-55017-208-5. for a novelist. Nicholas Rodger contributes a chapter on "The Naval World ofJack Aubrey," From 1955 to 1965, the heyday of deep-sea Brian Lavery writes on "Jack Aubrey's Ships" salvage on the Canadian west coast, the tugs and Richard Ollard offers a fascinating "Edi- Sudbury and Sudbury Il and Island Tug and tor's Report" that analyses why the novels are Barge were virtually household words. Their so successful. The book also includes two short exploits in a number of dramatic long-distance stories by O'Brian himself, "Samphire" (writ- towing and salvage jobs, combined with some ten in 1955) and "Simon" (1994); together very good press coverage, ensured they were with a terse, and rather grudging, essay on the also well known to the world shipping commu- writing of the novels (O'Brian was notoriously, nity. Thirty years later they and their owner and often ungraciously, protective of his pri- have been forgotten by all but a few old timers vacy). Additionally, there are gushing tributes and enthusiasts. from two of his more famous admirers, Wil- This book is a largely chronological ac- liam Waldegrave and Charlton Heston. More count of the two ships and their major salvage usefully, there is a comprehensive O'Brian and towing projects. Intertwined is a biography bibliography and a collection of press notices of their owner, Harold Elworthy, a larger-than- that tellingly demonstrate how critics only life figure, without whom there would have appreciated very gradually what O'Brian was been no story, and the succession of companies seeking to achieve. The book is handsomely which lea up to (and followed) Island Tug. Pat produced, with a superb dust-jacket featuring Wastell Norris weaves first-hand accounts of one of the vivid Geoff Hunt paintings which participants and useful explanations of materi- have done so much to promote the novels in als and methods into a readable, often dra- the bookshops. matic, tale. Despite these riches, the book does not The author, who grew up on her father's really hang together. Part "companion," part towboat but is not a career seafarer, admits to bibliography, part tribute, in the end it suc- having learned a lot from her sources, and the ceeds in being none of these. A useful compan- book is relatively free of "clangers." Her ac- ion would need maps, more illustrations to knowledgments include a full two dozen for- support the historical essays and, above all, a mer masters and mates, cooks and engineers, glossary of nautical terms – a tool for which O' deckhands and dispatchers, who are quoted Brian's non-maritime readers continually extensively. No published sources are ac- plead. To be a comprehensive bibliography, it knowledged, and original company files appar- really needs a list of key naval books, such as ently no longer exist. that supplied by Gary Brown. And as a tribute By 1954 the numbers of surplus war-built it fails because it is unfocussed – a quality ships going to Japan for scrap, combined with quite alien to O'Brian. It is in any case out of ill-found ships dropping their propellers and date, since even this revised edition was pub- rudders in the Pacific, led Elworthy and his lished in 1995, when O'Brian had four full- sons to make the leap from coastal towing to length novels still to write. ocean towing and salvage, long the domain of the Dutch. They purchased the former corvette Colin White Sudbury, refitted it as a fully-equipped salvage Portsmouth, UK vessel, and put it to work on long-distance towing. Sudbury's first salvage job came in 1955, with the Greek Makedonia, 3000 miles out in Book Revíews 85 the Pacific with a loose propellor. The success- Greg Dombowsky. Diver s Guide: Vancouver ful salvage of this Liberty ship in hideous Island South. Surrey, BC: Heritage House, conditions was a gamble which paid off. The 1999. 144 pp., photographs, maps, figures author explains the significance of the Lloyds CDN $14.95, paper; ISBN 1-895811-88-0. Open Form, "No Cure, No Pay" contract, under which the salvor receives no compensa- This is the first in a planned series of practical tion unless the salvage is completed success- regional guides to the premiere dive sites in fully. Long-distance tows are usually con- British Columbia. This guide covers fifty-three tracted by lump sum or daily rates. Salvaging sites in the southern Vancouver Island area, ships at sea, usually in dangerous conditions, is from the Race Rocks past Victoria and along a high-risk, win-or-lose business. The evolu- the Saanich Peninsula to Maple Bay. Most tion of that business to today's tendency to diving areas have few detailed dive guides place the environment ahead of ship or cargo is covering where to dive, what to see, and how nicely contrasted. The men who ran the tug, to get there. The internet is filling this informa- and its fleet mate Sudbury II, a purpose-built tion gap, but guidebooks remain the key source salvage vessel, used ingenuity, native wit and of information for the local or tourist diver. pure determination to learn the salvage and Greg Dombowsky's is only the fourth guide towing business. The author's admiration for covering BC dive sites. More are needed, and these men and their exploits is well placed, and Dombowsky hopes to fill this gap over the next she generally leaves it to them to describe their few years. experiences without unnecessary embroidery. The Guide is broken down into five sec- Some quotations and some incidents do not tions, with dives listed under "Shore Dives," " ring completely true, but as with good wine, Boat Dives" and "Other Sites" covering the oft-told tales are known to improve with age. fifty-three dive sites. Each is described by While not a technical volume it does attractions, land directions, diving instructions provide good descriptions of the equipment and currents, and is accompanied by a very and methods used, as well as conditions aboard useful hand-drawn map showing depths, site ship in hurricanes and other trying occasions. features, and hazards. Most guides lack this The ups and downs of the business side, and feature and rely on coast guard maps that do the evolution of the west coast towing industry, not have sufficient underwater detail for divers. also form a background to this story. These The introduction describes the key marine exploits are well and clearly told. life of interest to divers in plain language and While for some there may be insufficient hand-drawn silhouettes. BC's marine life, detail of the history of specific ships, this is especially the invertebrates and large mam- compensated for by the richness of descrip- mals, are world renowned. Future guides in this tions by those on the scene. A few errors are series would benefit from a more complete inescapable: Smit and Wijsmuller did not marine life review, including a crisper intro- amalgamate in the 1970s (they formed a joint duction, better images, and a short list of ma- venture in the 1990s to operate some tugs); the rine life at each site. statement that "an abandoned ship is available The author does not label sites by diffi- to all" should have been clarified; and the bay culty on the basis that "any site can become in Venezuela is Amuay, not Amway. more than a beginner diver can handle." This is H.B. Elworthy's chief skill was as a leader a unique approach. Most dive guides rate sites and inspirer of men. It is really hearing these and then describe the specific safety issues men telling their stories with precision, and which can change the rating. The introduction often modesty, that is the real reward of this covers the key safety issues such as currents, book. kelp and visibility, providing helpful hints for beginning and advanced divers. A major safety M.B. MacKay omission is the lack of information on emer- Halifax, Nova Scotia gency contacts, such as the Coast Guard and 86 The Northern Mariner

RCMP. Also lacking is information on hyper- lights the "importance of the Washington Navy baric facilities and site-specific data, such as Yard and its employees to the nation, the Navy the nearest phone. and the District of Columbia." [xi] Using The book lists boat launches and dive mainly published sources, Edward J. Marolda, stores in the region, but directs readers to the the senior historian of the Naval Historical author's website rather than listing diving Center, presents the major activities of the groups (clubs or societies) and other services ( yard, some of its workers and its important charters, certification agencies and equipment visitors. Interspersed with the main narrative manufacturers). A website is ideal to provide are two-page essays by other historians associ- up-to-date contact information on the ated with the Center on special aspects of the regularly-changing landscape of diving groups story. Such topics as the oldest buildings, John and services. Most divers currently rely on A. Dahlgren, black workers, the early days of books and not websites in the field, and tourists naval aviation, presidential yachts, the Navy will rarely have access to websites. Hence, it is Museum, and the yard's historic ordnance strongly recommended that future guides in collection provide additional information on this series carry contact information (address, subjects related to the main story. A well- phone, fax and e-mail) for at least the key chosen selection of photographs enhance the groups, such as the Underwater Council of BC, value of the work. Underwater Archaeological Society of BC, the Artificial Reef Society of BC, and the charters While the book is not intended to replace and certification agencies in each study area. Taylor Peck's sesquicentennial volume, Round Shot to Rockets (Annapolis, 1949) in its cover- The author favours eco-friendly dive age of the earlier decades of the yard, Marolda practices, spear-fishing restraint and no artifact has brought together some interesting material removal — all of which are in vogue with most on events of the last fifty years. A little-known divers. He errs, though, in stating that "any fact is that for a number of years the gun fac- wreck sunk for over three years in British tory at the yard maintained the subway system Columbia waters is protected by law." Wrecks of the US Senate, for which it built cars in which have been sunk for two years or more 1912. When the production of ordnance ended are now automatically protected. Nothing can in 1961, half the buildings and land that made be removed without a provincial permit. up the yard were transferred to the federal This guide is a welcome informational government's General Services Administra- source on diving in BC waters. I look forward tion. That same year the Chief of Naval Opera- to the next volumes in the series, especially if tions, Admiral Arleigh Burke, used the old they are enhanced with the recommended breech mechanism shop to start what later additional information. became known as the Navy Museum. Subse- quently, the Combat Art Gallery (now the Tom Beasley Navy Art Gallery) was established. The Naval Vancouver, BC History Division was moved to the yard in 1971 and renamed the Naval Historical Center. Two years later the Joint Committees on Land- Edward J. Marolda. The Washington Navy marks of the US Congress designated the yard Yard: An Illustrated History. Washington, DC: as a Historic District. In 1978, the yard's his- Naval Historical Center, 1999. xiv + 112 pp., toric Tingey House became the official resi- illustrations and photographs (black and white, dence of the Chief of Naval Operations. As the colour), notes, bibliography, index. US $17.00, twentieth century drew to a close, and real paper; ISBN 0-945274-41-6. Order by GPO estate became increasingly expensive, the Navy Stock Number 008-046-00191-0. Department began consolidating its Washington-area commands and activities at To commemorate the bicentennial of the instal- the Washington Navy Yard. Old buildings lation, the author has written a book that high- were reconditioned for new occupants, and the

Book Reviews 87 tempo of daily activities increased. The future fortunately, he was killed in a motorbike acci- looked bright for this old historic site. dent two years later at the age of twenty-four. The author has achieved his goal of pro- Both these articles paint a poignant, but viding a brief and introductory account of the definitely unromantic, picture of life on board history of the Washington Navy Yard and its the old full-riggers during the middle years of influence on the nation, the navy and the city. the last century and are keeping with the stimu- lating writing the reader has come to expect Harold D. Langley from this publication. Arlington, Virginia Peter von Busch Karlskrona, Sweden Börje Karlsson, et al. (eds.). Sjöhistorisk Årsskrift För Aland. Vol. 11: 1998-99. Mariehamn: Ålands Sjöfarsmuseum, 1999. 173 Joseph D. Parker. On the Waterfront. Bishop pp., photographs, illustrations, maps, English Auckland, Durham: Pentland Press, 2000. xiv summaries. FIM 100 (plus FIM 40, postage + 272 pp., photographs. £15.75, paper; ISBN and handling; payment by cheque preferred), 1-85821-737-7. paper; ISSN 0788-799X, ISBN 952-91-1483- 4. Today is Easter Sunday, a day which seemed appropriate to write a review of this interesting The Sjöhistorisk Årsskrift for Aland has a if idiosyncratic book by a pious man who has deserved reputation for its knowledgeable and devoted a significant portion of his adult life to well-researched essays covering a wide range working for the Missions to Seamen. Not quite of topics in the field of maritime history. This autobiographical, this is an episodic, anecdotal number is no exception, and I feel that two of and discursive volume that in the end tells us a the contributions should be of particular inter- good deal about a decent man but perhaps not est to both the specialist and the general reader. as much as we would like about the work in Viking was a four-masted barque launched which he was engaged. in 1906 and, although originally built as a Joe Parker has certainly had an interesting training ship for the Danish Merchant Marine, life. Born in Ireland in 1928 and brought up as would in fact spend its entire working life an Anglican, he pursued a career in business trading between far-flung ports with a variety before deciding to become first a lay worker of cargoes. The author, a former master mari- and then a fully-ordained priest with the Mis- ner, had himself sailed on the vessel in 1946; sions to Seamen. After his ordination, he in this article he gives an account of its for- became Senior Chaplain to the Mission in tunes. Viking sailed throughout the Great War Belfast. But on 21 July 1972 his entire world of 1914-1918 and at various periods during the was thrown into chaos when his fourteen-year- 1920s before being sold to the celebrated old son, Stephen, tragically lost his life to a car Gustaf Ericksson of Mariehamn, after which it bomb planted by the Irish Republican Army. was employed in the grain trade until the This crushing reminder that the "troubles" in outbreak of war in 1939. After the war it was Northern Ireland spared no man finally led him eventually sold and converted into a seaman's after eleven years to request a transfer. He was school, but it is now an hotel and restaurant in soon sent to Vancouver, and for the final Gothenburg, Sweden. eighteen years of his active career he served The second article is a selection of corre- seamen in British Columbia, which is the spondence between a young seaman, Sigvard setting for the second half of his book. Enros, and his sister during the 1920s. In 1925 Through the good times and the bad, Joe he signed on as a carpenter on Gustav Parker comes across as a human being on a Erickson's barque Hougomont, but two years mission. The pun is deliberate. For Parker later decided to try his luck in Australia. Un- serving seamen was not merely the experience 88 The Northern Maríner of bringing practical services to a class of David Phillipson. Roll on the Rodney! Life on people too often ignored by society but a the Lower Deck of Royal Navy Warships After calling in the trust sense of the word. Working the Second World War. Stroud, with seamen was not simply what he wanted to Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing, 1999. 160 do but rather was something he had to do. It is pp., illustrations, glossary, notes, bibliography, also abundantly clear from this book that he index. £16.99, cloth; ISBN 0-7509-1968-X. was very good at helping his clientele. He treated seamen as genuine people with their The sub-title immediately establishes the own sets of ideas and religious beliefs, and unique territory surveyed by this slim but managed to avoid the sanctimony too often substantial volume. Good quality memoirs of associated with this type of work. life in the Silent Service are few enough, and But if Parker comes across as the type of those tend to focus upon wartime experiences, person with whom you would be privileged to invariably from the "officer" perspective of the spend some time, this does not mean that he wardroom. Here finally is a thoughtful ap- has produced an exceptional book. Indeed, the praisal from the lower deck (that is, the non- volume is flawed in some fundamental ways. commissioned ranks) that begins with the end The anecdotal approach leads him to skip from of the Second World War. topic to topic with little apparent reason. Ser- The author speaks with some authority, mons and letters are interspersed throughout, having been conscripted into the Royal Navy often to the detriment of any narrative develop- for his national service. He subsequently re- ment. And since he seldom grounds events in enlisted, serving eleven years before transfer- time, this is especially frustrating for an histo- ring to the Customs and Excise service, from rian. Moreover, there is little context, and the which he retired in 1987. Although it is never little bit of "history" that he includes does little clearly stated, it appears that the author's tour to rectify this problem. in the RN spanned the years 1946-1957. In- Still, if the reader is prepared to work at it deed, this is not memoir in the purest sense, for and to provide many of the connections that Phillipson's reminiscences are interspersed the author ignores, a picture of life in the with anecdotes canvassed from others, al- Missions does come through, as do the charac- though these are organized and informed by his ters of at least a few of the thousands of sea- own experience. In another departure from the men to whom the Reverend Parker ministered conventional memoir, the discussion is the- over the years. If read as a companion to Roald matic rather than chronological. Kverrndal's encyclopedic Seamen 's Missions: The focus primarily is on life in "big" Their Origin and Early Growth, A Contribu- ships (aircraft carriers, battleships and cruis- tion to the History of the Church Maritime ( ers), but a conscious effort has been made to Pasadena, CA, 1986), the book has its uses, include destroyers, frigates and shore establish- especially for the contemporary period. While ments. As such, this book has something for I would have been happier if the book had everyone, with a number of chapters dedicated been as good as Michael Hadley's minor to the physical living conditions of broadside classic, God's Little Ships: A History of the messdecks with slung hammocks and canteen Columbia Coast Mission (Madeira Park, BC, messing (that is, self-cooked meals), the rou- 1995), On the Waterfront makes a contribution tines of cleaning ship and liberty (shore leave), to our understanding of the important work of and discipline and training. A less satisfying the Missions to Seamen in the modern age. chapter looks at relations with officers. There is also a too-brief survey of peacetime opera- Lewis R. Fischer tions, including the China and Haifa patrols. A St. John's, Newfoundland glossary of lower-deck terms and expressions is not only instructive but entertaining. Overall, it is a comprehensive and educational introduc- tion to peacetime naval life. And the close links Book Reviews 89 maintained throughout this period between the about force eight on the Beaufort scale. And its Royal Navy and its Commonwealth partners ( striking form means that it takes time to read especially Canada and Australia) make it the sober and salutary stories in between the broadly representative of them as well. deceptively naive and jolly lines. Such effort is Still, the juxtaposition of the various richly rewarded. anecdotes is not always smooth. Moreover, the There have been disproportionately few final image remains almost a cliché: a numbing naval autobiographies by women from World existence of hopeless overcrowding, disease War 11, although their oral testimony is starting and senseless discipline through which irre- to emerge on the US Navy website. And unlike pressible "Jolly Jack Tar" keeps his sense of veteran WRENS, WAVES have many websites humour. The author makes much of the RN's and social groupings where life stories are told recruiting and retention problems, but evi- by veterans in brief anecdotal form. This dently he and the many others who re-enlisted autobiography, therefore, is an important could not have been all that dissatisfied. Was publication by the Naval Institute Press, the feeling of camaraderie in itself enough to which also (and impressively) published that relieve the other ills? This reviewer, admittedly seminal text on women at sea, Suzanne J. from the biassed perspective of a serving Stark's Female Tars: Women aboard Ship in officer in a Commonwealth navy, and from a the Age of Sail (Annapolis, 1996). later generation, finds the pat excuses of ward- Josette Dermody Wingo (born 1924) room indifference and Admiralty conservatism a joined the US Navy Women's little too easy. Could it be that many of the Reserve (WAVES) in 1944, did basic problems were reflections of postwar British ( training at Hunter College and gunnery school and Canadian and Australian) society in at Great Lakes, before finally becoming a general, and that naval service still was better gunnery instructor at Treasury Island, than the alternative of factory life? California. After the war she took degrees in One is left, then, with the question, just philosophy and education, became a mother how representative is this book? This is not and teacher and now works with homeless meant as criticism of the book Phillipson has families in Santa Monica. written but rather points to the one he did not This jaunty book shows us just two very write. This reviewer is inclined to take Roll on important years in her life yet provides a group the Rodney! at face value and to accept that the portrait of the WAVES, for it details context author has exercised balance in selecting and and climate remarkably effectively. It does not presenting his evidence. But until a rigorous interrogate the gendered situations the women scholarly analysis setting naval life in a wider faced but rather evokes them so that today's context is undertaken, we will not know. And readers can see how (oddly) natural it then felt that will require more works such as this to not to be in combat, to routinely accept the point the way. Keep them coming! order to pose glamorously in a Mainbocher designer uniform on a slippy torpedo in a Richard H. Gimblett parade, and so on. That is, the book illustrates Blackburn Hamlet, Ontario lived behaviour rather than exploring the hegemonic constructions of naval life at that time. It is evidence from the field that can Josette Dermody Wingo. Mother Was a Gun- allow for subsequent theoretical investigation. ner's Mate: World War Two in the Waves. The author is (and was) astute about the Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2000. viii + gender issues that structured that world. For 234 pp., photographs. US $15.95, paper; ISBN example, Joe, one of her gunnery instructors, 1-55750-960-3. yelled at her classmates: "'Crazy Broads any- way. No man for a job, teaching dumb stupid This autobiography probably fits the term "tour broads. Nothing but bitches and lezzies."' de force." In gusto and vivid language it is Rather than responding defensively, Dermody's friend Tolliver simply acknowl-

90 The Northern Mariner edged his underlying problem when she a range of defensive strategies. Interestingly, murmured astutely, "Can we help it if you none of Dermody's gang ended up with naval can't get sea duty?" [61] And, of course, that is husbands, but five of six did marry. None had one of the roots of the tension: many men like seafaring careers after the war. Joe felt demasculinized by being confined to land, to non-combatant status and to working Jo Stanley with women. There is a simple fundamental Gauxholme, UK binary equation: masculine/sea versus femi- nine/land. Women in the navy had to conform to Mervyn Spencer Doe. A Rough Passage. particular behavioural norms – no sex, no Bishop Auckland, Durham: Pentland Press, swearing, etc. Referring to the 1942 decision to 1999. 199 pp., illustrations, £16.00, cloth; allow US women to serve in the navy, ISBN 1-85821-728-8. Dermody says the admirals acceded to this initiative by Eleanor Roosevelt but "exacted This unusual book is the autobiography of a the proviso that all Navy women would be former Royal Navy seaman cook and subse- ladies. Naturally, what did they expect." [97] quent Fleet Air Arm air mechanic written after It is at moments like this that more penetrating his recovery from a stroke at the age of sixty- analysis and less easy anecdote would have eight. The first half is taken up with the ac- been welcome. What was meant by "lady" and count of the author's unhappy childhood in a why did this need exist, given that there was no British orphan's home. Most of the remainder parallel interest in recruiting "gentlemen?" covers his time as a regular in the Royal Navy How did women handle these constraints? between 1937 and 1946. His life after his The author illuminates many instances of demobilisation is covered in a few pages as a tension around that complex and enduring conclusion. issue of women's allotted place at sea. For Read strictly as the account of a life this is a example, she quickly learned that "every sailor lightweight work. There is little of literary we know has a buddy who has been laid up merit, and the material touching on the bulk of next to a Russian ship that's been held up for Doe's service in the Royal Navy is by no the captain's lying in. It's one of those stories means unique. But read as a social commentary like Lorelei and mermaids that [male] sailors on England between the wars, and the straits tell over and over. Always it's the buddy.... faced by those who had suffered loss and never the guy who's telling the story." [103] dislocation, this is a more poignant tale. It is And Dermody highlighted the changing complete with candid admissions of the behav- gendered expectations about sexual activity on iour to which "respectable" people resorted and maritime borders when she reported a telling the limited horizons available to those who song the new WAVES sang during basic came of age in poorer families during the training. "Don't make my girl a sailor, the 1930s. In fact, some of its revelations about the weeping mother said...She's always been a way in which homes for orphaned or aban- home girl, she's never been to sea. A man in doned children were administered are mirrored every port is not the life she learned from me." in the same kind of admissions with which we [27] in Canada have become all too familiar in recent years. But what these women learned – from each other and the situation, not from weeping The treatment of the training of new re- mums – was that their war contribution was cruits by a Royal Navy gearing up for war is not easily made but fraught with gendered also noteworthy, especially seen from the notions that were sometimes hostile and un- bottom up, as Doe did. His full year of training welcoming. They developed ways to handle a is well covered, as is description of life as a situation in which women were structurally cook on board his first ship, HMS Cumber- unequal by maintaining pride and by invoking land. Book Reviews 91

The primary historical value of the book is May 1942 he graduated with a BA and signed reflected in Doe's first-hand accounts of the on as a seaman in Angelus, an old square- role of HMS Cumberland in the pursuit of Graf rigged barquentine out of Louisbourg bound Spee in December 1939 in the South Atlantic for Barbados with a cargo of lumber. Just and the ship's subsequent participation in the before Angelus got underway, a USN vessel ill-fated incursion at Dakar in September 1940, bound for St. John's became top heavy with ice when Cumberland was hit by gunfire from the and stranded on a reef off the harbour. With no French battleship Richelieu. His subsequent heat or hot food, and in the freezing cold, aid service was impacted by an attack of meningi- was required. Volunteers from Angelus tis, which ultimately enabled him to take ad- manned two dories and began the rescue. vantage of the need for ratings in the Fleet Air Assisted by local fishermen, twenty-six crew- Arm. He was slated to go to East Asia on HMS men were rescued. As this review is being Colossus when the Pacific War ended. He written, the United States Coast Guard cor- obtained his release shortly thereafter. rected a fifty-eight-year-old oversight and Though not to belittle the effort of some- awarded a Silver Lifesaving Medal to the only one recovering from the debilitating effects of surviving member of the rescue team. a stroke, this book likely has more value in the Angelus sailed for Barbados and arrived therapeutic benefits it provided its author and without incident, discharged its cargo and his family than for either the professional or loaded barrels of rum and molasses for Canada. amateur student of naval history. It is hard to North of Bermuda, it encountered a German recommend it at its full price, though it would submarine, U-415. Angelus hove to and low- be worth acquiring for its glimpse into the ered its lifeboat. The captain of the submarine Royal Navy of the late 1930s if a copy were gave their latitude and longitude and ordered found on a remainder table. them clear of their ship, which was then sunk by gunfire. Ten men in a small boat were left to Christopher Terry the merciless North Atlantic in early May. Ottawa, Ontario Steering west for four days they encountered a storm with snow squalls and then drifted hope- lessly for days. The men were freezing and R.L. Boudreau. The Man Who Loved Schoo- dying one by one. Finally, an American de- ners. Halifax, NS: Nimbus Publishing Ltd., stroyer escort rescued the only two left alive 2000 v + 170 pp., photographs. CDN $17.95, and landed them in Portland, Maine. Almost paper; ISBN 1-55109-319-7. unbelievably, in 1967 in Morehead City, North Carolina, Captain Boudreau met the German A biography written as an autobiography is submarine captain, who had been sailing alone unusual. Captain Robert Lewis Boudreau has in a forty-foot sloop flying the German flag. chronicled, in a most convincing manner, The Records indicate that U-415 was sunk on 14 Man Who Loved Schooners as if it were the July 1944. work of his later father, Captain Walter In 1943, after recuperating from this Boudreau. The result is an exciting account of ghastly ordeal, Walter Boudreau undaunted a life at sea with lifesaving, shipwrecks, sink- again went to Louisbourg, where he signed-on ing by a U-boat and even an encounter with to the three-masted schooner City of New York drug pirates. The pleasures and difficulties of with a cargo of nails and lumber bound again schooner chartering are described factually for Barbados. When it returned to Canada with with humour and excellent photographs. a cargo of salt from the Bahamas, his intention Captain Walter was born in 1916 from a was confirmed to follow a life afloat. With a long line of sea captains. As a youth he sailed loan from his father, Walter bought his own and maintained the family sloop in demanding schooner. Since he did not have his command Nova Scotian waters. When the Second World qualification, he hired a captain and served as War broke out he was attending university. In mate. They carried general cargoes (plus some 92 The Northern Mariner rum) to Cape Breton, Prince Edward Island, St. naval historian and gifted writer, two traits that Pierre, Newfoundland, Labrador, Yarmouth, combine seamlessly in his latest book, a little Boston and New York. On their last passage to primer on Naval Battles of the Twentieth Labrador, in a heavy gale their vessel ran Century. In just under 300 narrow pages (with aground and became a total loss. This was generous type and wide margins) Hough re- another epic, and the desperate crew finally counts the major details of thirteen naval bat- was rescued by another schooner. tles between Tsushima in 1905 and the Philip- The war ended and Walter's next venture pines Sea in 1944. The pace is fast, the writing was in an old minesweeper employed in trad- smooth and the final result is (even for some- ing fish between Yarmouth and Boston. This one knowledgeable in the field) an entertaining proved unprofitable, so it was decided to take and informative evening's read. For the general up sealing using a spotter aircraft. The aircraft public, which is clearly the target readership, crashed on the ice and sank – another total Naval Battles provides a fine introduction to loss. Boudreau sold his share in this enterprise. the nature and course of major actions by the In 1949 he passed his Master's exam, went last great battle fleets of the industrial age. to Camden, Maine and bought a Yankee pilot That said, it is clear from the misleading schooner. Sixteen passengers could be accom- title, selection of battles, illustrations chosen modated for charter cruises on the Bras d'Or and lack of references that this book was writ- lakes. At this point he met and married his ten quickly and designed to sell. It plays to wife, his partner for fifty years. As the charter Hough's strengths as an historian: all but four season in Bras d'Or was too short, it was of the thirteen battles are British, or largely so, decided to move the business to the Caribbean. and the descriptions are built on the author's In 1952 Captain Boudreau moved south earlier research. Fair enough. The Pacific War and advertised winter cruises in the Caribbean. from 1941 to 1945 is given much less cover- With the charter-cruising business established, age, although the balance between carrier the Boudreau family settled in St. Lucia, where battles and surface actions in the war against they also built a hotel. From then on a steady Japan is about right. Understandably, given succession of charter schooners followed, Hough's interests (major battles between interspersed with all the wrecks, disasters and capital ships) the book ends in 1944 with the successes that can be imagined. The most vivid Battle of the Philippines Sea. This leaves the experience came off the Bahamas when drug last fifty-five years of the twentieth century un- pirates tried to capture his vessel and to murder touched. In fairness, there were not many naval him and the crew. The vivid descriptions of battles – narrowly defined – in the last half of hurricanes, rogue waves, the Gulf Stream, the twentieth century. But warships were sunk people and places, bring all the triumphs and in battle with other ships between 1944 and disasters to life. Captain Robert Boudreau is to 1999, some of them British, although admit- be congratulated on this appreciation of the life tedly they were sent to the bottom increasingly and times of a remarkable gentleman, his by torpedoes and missiles, not Hough's forte, father, Captain Walter Boudreau. by his own admission. All of this is by way of saying that the title promises more than the Latham B. Jenson book delivers. One suspects that the publisher Queensland, Nova Scotia is at fault here for mis-titling the book, which could be properly described as "Naval Battles of the Early 20th Century." Richard Hough. Naval Battles of the Twentieth Naval Battles is also largely bereft of " Century. London: Constable, 1999. xiii + 253 academic encumbrances" such as references pp., photo plates, maps select bibliography, to quotes or facts, and Hough makes no pre- index, £18.99, cloth; ISBN 0-09-479910-5. tense at having mastered modern scholarship on the subject. Each chapter has its own very Richard Hough is known to many readers as a dated list of secondary sources, buttressed by Book Reviews 93 the stalwart Oxford Companion to the Second A few charts and maps are interspersed World War (1995) and references to conversa- throughout the text, and there is a small section tions Hough has had with officers and histori- of glossy photographic illustrations. As might ans over the years. The book has thirteen be expected, most of these photographs deal photos, but they do not attempt to cover the with subjects pertinent to the 1914-1918 and thirteen battles of the book. Rather, it is an odd 1939-1945 wars. It seems a pity that there are collection of illustrations, chosen (one suspects not more sketches and photographic represen- given the current practice of British publishers) tations of earlier periods, but the background because they could be printed without paying for the book is so well covered that one must for publication rights. assume there were none available. But it is churlish for a reviewer to nitpick The massive bibliography is organized not at a mass-market book on a popular subject only by books and articles but also by the like "battles" by an historian with a facility at above-mentioned "primary sources," which writing and a publisher intent on sales. Naval comprise correspondence, diaries, private Battles of the Twentieth Century is an unpre- papers and other ephemera. Beyond the two tentious and well-written primer on some of and one-half pages of primary sources, the the major battles of the last industrial age seven and one-half pages of books, and the fleets. Novices could do much worse. four and one-half pages of articles, there are unpublished works and personal interviews. Marc Milner Another appendix lists illustration credits, and Fredericton, New Brunswick there is an index, although it is not entirely effective for locating specific data. As an example, I attempted to re-check on the code Brian Tennyson and Roger Sarty. Guardian of letters used to identify convoys between Syd- the Gulf Sydney, Cape Breton and the Atlantic ney and the iron-mining town of Wabana on Wars. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, Bell Island, Newfoundland. The codes, without 2000. x + 495 pp., maps, notes, photographs, identification, were listed under "convoys," bibliography, index. CDN $45.00, £25.00, and "Wabana" and "Bell Island" were listed cloth; ISBN 0-8020-4492-1. separately. There was no cross-referencing system within the index. In the end, I located the code in question by going through first the The authors have undertaken a monumental, "Wabana" and then the "Bell Island" and successful, task in the research on which references one by one and, finally, leafing this volume is based. The first of the thirteen through the pages between them when I got to numbered chapters treats Sydney's role as an the appropriate time period. "Outpost of Empire" from the close of the seventeenth century to the beginning of the There seems as well to be some discrep- nineteenth. The un-paginated epilogue deals ancy in deciding toward what readership the with the closing of the last military facilities book should be aimed. In the earlier sections, there in 1991. Of the balance of the book, three there are quotes from historical documents chapters cover the remainder of the 1800s, three framed in archaic, but perfectly acceptable, take in World War I, one concerns the period English. These are interspersed throughout between the two World Wars, and the conclud- with what seemed to me totally unnecessary ing six encompass the period from 1939 to explanatory addenda in square brackets. If one 1945. The archival investigation for such a expects academics and historians to read this study was of necessity extensive, and the text book, such additions are not required; the is supported by copious endnotes. Primary occasional [sic] is sufficient. If, on the other sources for official records and ephemera hand, the book is aimed at a more popular range from the Beaton Institute at the Univer- audience, this practice can be confusing and a sity College of Cape Breton to national reposi- simple paraphrase might have been preferable. tories in both Ottawa and Washington. In short, I did not find the book easy to read 94 The Northern Maríner from either aspect. after its publication in Germany during the The hardback volume is well and sturdily First World War, was initially serialized in the constructed. Despite its length (over 350 pages US Naval Institute Proceedings in 1916 and without the appendices) it is firmly, but flexi- 1917. This edition, with a well-written and bly bound, and the paper jacket is attractively informative introduction by Terrell D. designed, bearing reproductions of paintings Gottschall, brings this epic tale back into public front and rear, as well as a convoy assembly view with all the exciting detail that made it a photograph in black and white. hit in the first place. Kapitanleutnant (Lieuten- As a reference volume, especially for data ant Commander) Hellmuth von Mücke's story regarding North Atlantic convoy escorts during of his ten-month adventure in the South Seas, both world wars, this work is an essential first aboard the German raider Emden and then supplement to the library of any interested on the captured three-masted schooner Ayesha, maritime scholar. Certain events of particularly is reminiscent of the epic voyages of Odysseus local significance, such as the sinking of the or Bligh. The challenges were in many ways Newfoundland ferry Caribou and the escort comparable, as was the compelling desire by HMCS Shawinigan, are treated in depth with von Mücke and his crew to return home safely meticulous detail. There is, however, a great after a long and dangerous journey. lack of ease in the overall presentation. It is a Von Mücke's account is set against the straightforward chronological progression of backdrop of German naval action in the South facts and little else. On only two occasions did Seas during the early months of the First World any lightness enter the text. The first instance War. Emden, on which Mücke served as Exec- involves a quotes from a Cape Breton newspa- utive Officer, separated from Vice Admiral per describing attendance at a post-victory Maximilian Graf von Spee's East Asia Squad- celebration at the end of World War I: "every- ron on the outbreak of war and operated inde- body and his wife and a lot of others with other pendently with great success against Allied people's wives." The second, the opening shipping in the waters of the Pacific and Indian quote of chapter thirteen, appears mildly amus- oceans until sunk by an Australian ship in ing until further reading discloses that local November 1914. At the time von Mücke was in victory celebrations after World War II sadly charge of a small landing party that had seized culminated in riots, vandalism, and looting. and destroyed a British radio and cable station In short, while I was impressed with the on a remote island in the Indian Ocean. To research that produced this volume, and al- avoid capture von Mücke put his men on board though I will find it an invaluable reference the leaky weather-beaten Aleysha and set sail resource, I regret that this is not a book that I across the western Pacific for Turkish-con- will wish to re-read on a regular basis, as are trolled Arabia. It was a daunting undertaking some others on parallel topics. that included battling storms in the Indian Ocean, narrow scrapes with Allied blockaders Morgiana P. Halley and hostile dealings with the Bedouins of Suffolk, Virginia Arabia. That von Mücke succeeded in reaching Constantinople after seven gruelling months is testimony to the man's remarkable capabilities Hellmuth von Mücke. (J.H. Klein, Jr. trans.). as a commander and of the tenacity of his fifty- The Emden-Ayesha Adventure: German Raid- man crew. ers in the South Seas and Beyond, 1914. Over half the book deals with the adven- Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2000. xxviii tures of Emden in its lengthy trek across the + 189 pp., maps, photographs, tables, US waters of Southeast Asia in search of enemy $34.95, cloth; ISBN 1-55750-873-9. targets and wartime prizes. The war at sea, at least in the beginning, was governed by civi- This "Classics of Naval Literature" edition, lized rules of behaviour. Commander Karl von translated by an American naval officer shortly Muller, commanding officer of Emden, devel- Book Revíews 95 oped a remarkable reputation for fairness and Gallipoli memorial chapel was established in civility in all his dealings with captured ships 1917 and where an annual memorial service and their crews. The latter were usually permit- was held every year until 1984. The lectures ted to seek refuge in friendly or neutral ports. formed part of the continued memorialization Loss of life was therefore minimal. This gen- of the campaign. tler kind of warfare stands out in sharp contrast As such, several lecturers took the oppor- to the latter phases, when desperation drove tunity to use their talk as a peg upon which to both sides to abandon any pretense of gentle- hang their own contemporary concerns. Dis- manly behaviour. missing Gallipoli in his opening paragraphs, The Naval Institute Press has made a wise Edward Heath used the occasion to argue that choice in deciding to publish this new edition European integration was the best way to of a classic work. It will be welcomed not only secure future peace in Europe. John Grigg by the general reader but also by those with a preferred to ponder which of the two particular interest in the war at sea. Von world wars was fought by the British in a Mücke's compelling account brings alive an more idealistic spirit. On a more mundane important chapter in the naval history of the level, several lecturers concluded that soldiers war and will not disappoint. It will also com- who fought as junior officers at Gallipoli and plement much recent work on individual expe- subsequently rose to high command after riences in the war, either memoirs or diaries, 1939 had learned some painful lessons from which has developed into an important field the misconduct of their erstwhile superiors. within World War I history. Von Mücke's That the higher direction of the campaign account is an important addition to that genre. suffered from divided council and the lack of a single directing body is well-known and is David R. Facey-Crowther repeated at some length by a number of St. John's, Newfoundland lecturers. But Hugh Beach, speaking in the aftermath of the Falklands' campaign, wondered if even in the 1980s the British had Sir Martin Gilbert (intro.). The Straits of War: really mastered the command-andcontrol Gallipoli Remembered. The Gallipoli Memo- problems of amphibious operations. rial Lectures, 1985-2000. Stroud, The greatest disappointment in reading Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing, 2000. xxiv these lectures is the willingness of most of the + 224 pp., maps, plates, index. £20.00, cloth; speakers to repeat uncritically the conventional ISBN 0-7509-2408-X. wisdom. Archbishop Runcie asserted that had the fleet broken through to Constantinople, The sixteen lectures brought together here by where much of the Turkish armament Martin Gilbert are by very diverse hands. A industry was situated, Turkey would have chapter by Archbishop Robert Runcie, for surrendered, and Germany would have been example, rubs shoulders with others by a dealt a decisive blow. But what would have former Master General of the Ordnance (Hugh been the nature of this blow? Germany's Beach), a former Chief of Naval Staff and First drang nach dem osten through the Ottoman Sea Lord (Julian Oswald), a British Prime Empire would have been blocked, but it is Minister (Ted Heath), two holders of the doubtful if that by itself would have Chichele Chair of the History of War at Oxford persuaded them to stop fighting and University (Robert O'Neill and Michael negotiate a peace acceptable to the Entente Howard) and a former Turkish Minister of powers. Germany still possessed some power- Foreign Affairs (Osman Olcay). The lectures ful bargaining chips in the shape of Belgium were inaugurated in 1985, the seventieth anni- and northern France which it was unwilling to versary of the campaign, and continued annu- surrender. How much did Churchill really learn ally until 2000. They were given at Holy Trin- from Gallipoli about the need for the utmost ity Church, Eltham, in south London, where a care in preparing for coming operations? Rob- ert O'Neill suggests that he learned a lot, as shown by the establishment of the Combined 96 The Northern Mariner

Operations Directorate in 1940. But it is also prosecution of the war, particularly for the fair to point out that Gallipoli did not prevent allies. Even so, the attention granted to the full him from rushing into the Norwegian fiasco in range of activities of Royal Flying Corps ( 1940 or the equally ill-considered campaign in RFC) and its naval equivalent, the Royal the Dodecanese in 1943. Only occasionally Naval Air Service (RNAS), has been generally were lecturers willing to take a more critical slight. The RNAS in particular has received stance. In the penultimate lecture, delivered in little attention from historians, and its work has 1999, Julian Oswald challenged the oft-re- been largely forgotten. Peter Cooksley's book peated assertion that had the allies broken is therefore a most welcome addition to the through, Britain would have been able to pour literature on British air services before 1918. supplies into Russia and thereby save the Matters do not begin entirely promisingly, Tsarist empire from the military catastrophes it though, as the introduction claims that the RFC suffered in 1915-1916 and the revolution that ceased to exist "over ninety years" ago, when engulfed it in 1917. But in 1915 the British it was only formed in 1912, and the odd irritat- could not even supply their own armies, never ing factual error or inconsistency appears every mind provide for the needs of the Russians. now and then. Some better proofreading would As Martin Gilbert admits in the introduc- have helped, since this ought to have elimi- tion to this book, the Gallipoli campaign is one nated some of the more obvious mistakes. For of the most intensively studied episodes of the instance, the reader is informed that the 56th First World War. Distinguished as many of the Squadron flew SE-5s, yet only four lines later individual lecturers were, this collection adds we are told that its "Camels" were unsuited for little to what we already know about the con- night-fighting. [ 128] Even relatively uniformed duct of the campaign or its wider significance. readers will be aware that the SE-5 and the " Camel" were two completely different air- David French craft. Since Cooksley is a highly regarded London, UK expert on military aviation, it is a fair assump- tion that he knows this too. His proofreaders clearly did not. Peter G. Cooksley. The RFC/RNAS Handbook, There is also the matter of the size of the 1914-1918. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton chapters. Since the work in intended as a gen- Publishing, 2000. viii + 208 pp., photographs ( eral handbook, the author has been forced to 200 black and white), diagrams, bibliography, produce a whirlwind account of the significant index, tables. £19.99, hardback; ISBN 0-7509- actions of the RFC and RNAS. Considering the 2169-2. vast range of operations undertaken by the two air arms (even with the aircraft available be- Historical coverage of the First World War's tween 1914 and 1918), this simply does not aviation services has been patchy. For many work, and some important history – for in- years, popular perception of the air war be- stance the role of the RFC and RNAS against tween 1914 and 1918 held that it was domi- the German Spring offensives of 1918 – is nated by fighter-to-fighter combat, carried out omitted. Although the book's title suggests that on the British side by a mixture of dashing the RAF is not considered, Cooksley sensibly aristocrats, callow ex-public schoolboys and goes on to consider some of the work done by wild, undisciplined yet phenomenally talented the new force after the amalgamation of the and courageous "colonials," mainly from RFC and RNAS into a single service, discuss- Canada. While there is some degree of truth to ing the role of the nascent strategic bomber these assertions, more recent historical research force. While this is covered admirably, some has presented a far more complex picture, consideration of the Battle of Amiens in Au- suggesting that the role of army co-operation, gust 1918, where tactical air power arguably even when carried out in comparatively primi- came of age, really ought to have appeared to tive aircraft, was of vital importance to the show just how far the air services had come. Book Reviews 97

As Cooksley rightly emphasizes, the oft-for- history have footnotes!). It is indeed a good gotten point that the air services supported the book by someone who knows how to write. work of the ground forces and the fleet, rather The specialist may find it lacking, but it is for than engaging in independent operations. It is the most part accurate and always a good read. a pity that the book's size prevents him from The first two-thirds of the volume cover expounding further on this issue. the story of the RN's Q-ships. Bridgland pro- Even taking account of these failings, vides a very brief sketch of the early anti- there are far more good things about this book submarine effort and takes the reader quickly than bad. Cooksley writes well and knows his through the first attacks by armed trawlers in subject. He covers the use of airships and June 1915. This brings us to what is perhaps balloons; the role of women; and uniforms and the only serious flaw in the book: the author insignia with great authority, and the relevant depends heavily on Robert Grant's U-boats chapters are of huge value both to the general Destroyed, published in 1964, for information reader and those who already familiar with the on German submarine losses. Some new infor- subject. Above all, he makes clear that the air mation has appeared during the past thirty-five services were a vital auxiliary to the war on the years, and it is disappointing that more recent ground and at sea. Perhaps the book's greatest works, such as Paul Kemp's 1997 inventory, strength is the manner in which it inspires the do not appear in the bibliography. This makes reader to find out more about the air services. Bridgland's account of the sinking of UB-4 by For the informed student of the First World Inverlyon [5] less than authoritative – he ques- War, it provides an informative and authorita- tions the identity of the U-boat and wonders if tive reference on the air services, while for the it was indeed sunk. There is little doubt about general reader it is a perceptive and interesting either today. introduction to the subject. In spite of the On the other hand, the author deserves full doubts noted above, Cooksley's book deserves marks for his discussion of the sinking of U-27 commendation and a place on the bookshelf. by HMS Baralong and the suspected massacre of the German survivors. Chapter four (some David Jordan thirty-five pages) is given over to Baralong and Watchfield, UK Lieutenant-Commander Herbert; the recount- ing of what happened is detailed and fair- minded to both sides. Bridgland points out that Tony Bridgland. Sea Killers in Disguise: The by now all eye-witnesses have "crossed the Story of the Q Ships and Decoy Ships in the bar," and thus "we can never know the truth. First World War. Annapolis: Naval Institute Not for sure." [43] Exactly. And the same Press and London: Leo Cooper, 1999. xiv + even-handed approach is used when recounting 274 pp., maps, photographs, music, bibliogra- the loss of the trawler Ethel & Millie – its crew phy, index. US $34.95, CDN $53.95, cloth; were taken prisoner by the submarine and ISBN I-55750-895-X. Canadian distributor, never seen again. But this may have been UC- Vanwell Publishing, St. Catharines, ON. 41, which blew up on its own mines five days later – and we now have no way of knowing The theme is "merchant ships in disguise," a for certain. thread which binds two normally separate Sadly, there are a few places where the sagas together: the British "Q-ships" and their author has gotten his facts wrong. Some are trapping of German submarines; and the trivial, such as calling HMS Dreadnought a Kaiser's surface raiders. The result is a single battle cruiser. [21] Others are liable to mislead volume which gives useful outlines of both. those readers unfamiliar with the naval side of The author truthfully tells us that he has writ- the Great War – in particular the retelling of ten a "good...historically true 'yarn"' [xi] the fable that it was Admiral Jellicoe who rather than a reference book, despite the claims prevented the introduction of convoys. [ 86-87] on the dust jacket (serious works of naval The section on British Q-ships ends with 98 The Northern Mariner a much too brief look at the Q-ship raids on ceivable detail pertaining to the design, German transport of Scandinavian iron ore, including fittings, machinery, and armament, and a paragraph that inconclusively sums up of all classes of warships from capital ships to their contribution to the war effort. Both could patrol vessels. Readers can learn exactly what have been greatly expanded to the betterment made these ships tick. of the book. It is also a pity that there is no Brown explores the many challenges table listing all RN Q-ships. confronting fleet designers faced with adapting Eight chapters provide an overview of the their trade to new technologies (e.g., wireless) German raiders. Like the first section, they are and practices (e.g., change from coal to fuel well written and a fine introduction to the oil). He lauds the innovative genius of Sir activities of Möwe, Wolf and Seeadler. Philip Watts, the Director of Naval Construc- In short, I can heartily recommend Sea tion (1902-1912), and his wartime successor, Killers to anyone looking for a good popular Sir Eustace Tennyson d'Eyncourt (1912-1923), history — it is an enjoyable and informative for their roles in implementing building pro- read. Serious researchers might be grams leading to the creation of the Grand disappointed, but that was not the goal of the Fleet. Theirs was a daunting task given the author. increasingly complex strategic situation and fluctuating naval estimates with which they William Schleihauf were forced to plan. Pierrefonds, Québec Among the most interesting topics Brown elaborates on are ships' trials, especially weapons' tests. Brown skilfully describes D.K. Brown. The Grand Fleet: Warship De- prewar trial data and expertly shows their sign and Development 1906-1922, London: influence on construction design. His chapter Chatham Publishing and Annapolis: Naval on "Action Damage and the Experience of Institute Press, 1999. 208 pp., photographs, War" is fascinating and instructive. Although illustrations, tables, appendices, select anno- few wartime lessons could be incorporated in tated bibliography, glossary and abbreviations, capital ships, many light cruisers and destroy- index. $59.95, cloth; ISBN 1-55750-315-X. ers completed during the conflict benefited Canadian distributor, Vanwell Publishing, St. from improved sea-keeping qualities and Catharines, ON. heavier armament. On the other hand, naval aviation developed very rapidly, as did subma- Noted British naval architect and prolific rine design. In an excellent, succinct discussion author D.K. Brown has published the second of the growth of embarked air power, Brown of a projected three (or more) books tracing the argues that the Admiralty robustly promoted history of British warship design in the first naval aviation at this time — notwithstanding half of the twentieth century. In The Grand the claims of other writers in the field. As Fleet, a companion volume to his earlier War- evidence, Brown cites the surprising fact that rior to Dreadnought, he describes in great the Grand Fleet's capital ships and cruisers detail the ships that served Britain during the alone carried 103 aircraft by war's end. He also First World War and its immediate aftermath. mildly defends the notorious and ill-fated K- Brown's aim is to "review the design and boats, although it is a hard sell to rehabilitate construction of British warships." Recognizing this particular class of submarine. Brown that some solid work in this field exists, he further offers a fine description of early Royal concentrates on lesser-known technological Navy minesweeping capability. features and warship classes. He spends con- Not surprisingly given his profession, and siderable time on the battleships and cruisers indicative of continuing intra-service rivalry, designed just prior to the war which served as the author clearly lays responsibility for certain tests for modifications to wartime construction. deficiencies in British capital ships (e.g., shells Nevertheless, he provides almost every con and propellants, upper-deck layout, and turret Book Reviews 99 armour) on the shoulders of the Director of committed to the concept of the western Naval Ordnance rather than the Department of democracies' obligation to promote and, if Naval Construction. The title of his last chapter necessary, impose some order on the more can serve as his conclusion and overarching unstable parts of the world, or at least those principle: "The Right Ships and the Right with a littoral accessible to naval forces. His Fleet." Brown's life-long passion for his topic main criticisms this year are directed at the shows clearly in his prose, and readers quickly European powers, which continue to reduce learn that a ship, while first and foremost a their armed forces while relying more and work of architecture and engineering, is also a more on the United States to provide the lead- form of art. ership and the bulk of the military contribution This book is an extremely valuable techni- to any joint enterprise. To make matters worse, cal reference full of basic information, statis- they are not updating their communication and tics, tables, charts, and drawings covering ship data-exchange systems to remain compatible construction, design evolution, trials, and after- with United States' forces. Whatever the limi- action summations. The Grand Fleet is also tations of the Canadian Forces, this is one area heavily illustrated with many excellent and rare where we have remained current: during the photographs from private collections. Brown last year a Canadian frigate was successfully expects much from his readers, and those who integrated into a US battle group in the Indian are technically proficient will benefit most Ocean. from his work. At times, the information is a The changes in the strengths of the world's bit overwhelming, with the result that the work fleets during the last year are not really signifi- frequently has the feel of an encyclopaedia or cant.. The United States Navy has now reduced reference manual. But that is hardly a criticism. to 355 ships and may start expanding again. It This is an important publication. remains incomparably stronger than the rest of the world combined. East Asian navies, nota- Serge Durflinger bly the Chinese, are being increased somewhat Gatineau, Québec while European fleets are being reduced. The Russian navy can only be described as being in hibernation but one day, when that country's Richard Shame (ed.). Jane's Fighting Ships chaotic finances are brought to some sem- 2000-2001. Coulsdon, Surrey and Alexandria, blance of order, it will awaken. VA: Jane's Information Group, 2001. [88] + In reviewing trends by type of warship: the 907 pp., tables, photographs, glossary, indexes. number of ballistic missile-firing submarines is US $435, cloth; ISBN 0-7106-1795-7. [All greatly reduced. This is in accordance with the information in Jane's publications is also START II agreement signed in 1993. (Actu- available on CD-ROM.] ally, it is re-entry warheads that are reduced, but this requires fewer platforms). The USN If the world's navies are, for the most part, has eighteen SSBNs and Russia about the same being reduced, why is Jane 's as voluminous as number, although many are probably not ever? The answer is more and better photo- operational. Britain and France have four each graphs, and this year practically all are in and China one. All British SSNs now can fire colour. (Last year only the principal naval Tomahawk missiles, and Canada is at last ships were illustrated by colour photos). One receiving the British-built Victoria (formerly result is that the Canadian Coast Guard pro- Upholder) class diesel boats. Apart from the vides quite a vivid splash of red in the early pa French Charles de Gaulle, only the USN rt of the book. continues to build large angled-deck carriers In the foreword the editor has as usual capable of operating high-performance aircraft. provided insightful comments on the world As each ship is completed it replaces an older naval situation. As is to be expected, he does vessel, maintaining a level of twelve Battle so from the point of view of a western navalist Groups. When Ronald Reagan is completed in 100 The Northern Mariner

2002, no more will enter service until 2008. In Woodman, who is a merchant mariner surface combatants, Britain has withdrawn with over thirty years experience that included from the tripartite (UK, France and Italy) command, clearly states in his acknowledge- Horizon air-defence ship project which has ments that "1 was not proposing to write a being going nowhere since it was initiated in purely naval history and that I would wish to 1994. A new purely British design will be emphasis the part played by the merchant ordered next year and the first ship will be service." [511] In this he has succeeded su- completed in 2007. As regards amphibious perbly. The great companies that provided the forces, the USN is building a new class of many cargo ships and crews are acknowledged, Dock Landing ships (LPD). Singapore is also as are the impressive accomplishments of the building an indigenous design of this type; men and ships. The balance between purely Canadians had an opportunity to see one when military events and the important contributions the first of class, Endurance, visited Halifax in of the merchant ships is finely struck. July 2000. It is known that the Canadian Navy A most interesting result of Woodman's wants to replace the support ships Protecteur aim is a very detailed look into the operational and Preserver with larger vessels that would level of warfare where logistics plays such an also have a sea-lift capability. As usual, Jane's enormous part. The author's deliberate focus Fighting Ships is an enormous and comprehen- on the role of the merchant ships causes the sive compilation of naval information. issues of logistical supply and distribution to be Since this review was written, Captain brought to the forefront. As a result of this Richard Sharpe has announced his retirement approach, Woodman has demonstrated a very as editor of Jane's Fighting Ships. Captain competent grasp of the plight of a theatre Sharpe took over as editor in 1987 and has commander cursed with a monumental task been responsible for raising the standard of and hampered by resources that are clearly accuracy and timeliness of the information in inadequate to the challenge presented. The the annual, while in the forewords to each issue greatest strength of this book rests in Wood- he has provided comprehensive analyses of the man's descriptions of the innovative and bold world naval situation. During his tenure colour operations conducted by Admirals Somerville has been introduced, first as an inserted section and Cunningham in the early years of the war. and eventually throughout the book. The new The strategic implications ofa failure to supply editor is Commodore Stephen Saunders, RN. Malta with vital war materials and desperately need domestic commodities is very clear from C. Douglas Maginley Woodman's presentation of the situation. Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia Although laid out in the format of a schol- arly work, the style of writing is very uneven and generally not up to the standard expected Richard Woodman. Malta Convoys, 1940- of modern treatments of such subjects. Wood- 1943. London: John Murray Publishers, 2000. man is highly biassed in his commentary on the xx + 532 pp., illustrations, maps, notes, bibli- events, and his rhetoric on several occasions is ography, index. £30.00, cloth; ISBN 0-7195- highly overblown. The use of derogatory and 5753-4. denigrating comments to describe Axis opera- tional procedures and tactics seriously under- Richard Woodman has followed his critically mines the value of the book. Such theatrical acclaimed Arctic Convoys (1994) with a com- devices used to enliven the text indicate unwill- panion work that closely matches its predeces- ingness or, worse, an inability to look past sor in subject and format. An impressively- wartime propaganda to conduct a thorough detailed work, Malta Convoys is handsomely analysis of events from the perspective of the laid out and well supported by maps, pictures, opponent. Only in the last section of the book, excellent chapter notes, a massive bibliography where Operation Pedestal becomes the focus, and a detailed index. does Woodman's writing come close to attain- Book Reviews 101 ing the same level of quality he achieved in carrier would alleviate the situation, is never Arctic Convoys. explained. A detailed knowledge of British Whereas Woodman's background as a naval ordnance is required to know that the merchant mariner is a definite strength in main armament of the Dido-class cruiser was certain areas, it is a positive liability in others. the 5.25-inch/50 high-angle anti-aircraft gun, During descriptions of naval and air actions and that the Illustrious-class aircraft carrier was Woodman generally leaves far too much to the armed with the 4.5-inch/45 high-angle gun. reader to sort out without the aid of maps. The The novice reader will be completely confused many complicated events of these battles by such unsupported and nonsensical declara- require some kind of graphic depiction. Al- tions, which are rife in the book. though I am a naval officer and very familiar Unfortunately, many such technical and with most of these engagements, I found it procedural errors can be found throughout. virtually impossible to keep a clear idea of how These sorts of oversights and inaccuracies the events were developing from Woodman's make Malta Convoys irritating for an expert description. A novice reader will be hopelessly and bewildering for a novice. The great lost. Likewise, a reader not thoroughly familiar strengths of this work are at the strategic and with the myriad of aircraft types employed by operational levels of historical analysis. At the the Italian and German air forces will have a tactical level this work is a confused and some- hard time sorting out the significance of certain what one-side depiction of events. A reader developments in air battles. Woodman makes who hopes to gain new insight into the German no attempt to introduce these aircraft and their and Italian views of the naval war in the Medi- weapons, nor is there an annex that deals with terranean will have to look elsewhere. Malta their capabilities. A standard reference will Convoys would not be a good place for a have to be kept close at hand during reading. student of history to begin research into this fascinating and exciting period of World War There are also many errors of technical II. detail that detract significantly from the au- thor's credibility. Not surprisingly, these errors involve the military aspects of the subject. Kenneth P. Hansen Woodman significantly confuses the issue of Toronto, Ontario aircraft identification by using various non- standard abbreviations and other inaccurate name references to the same type of aircraft. In Robert J. Mitchell, with Sewell T. Tyng and one case he makes an outright error when Nelson L. Drummond, Jr. (Gregory J.W. trying to describe the American-provided Unwin intro.). The Capture of Attu: A World Martlet carrier fighter as the Grumann [sic] War II Battle as Told by the Men Who Fought Hellcat. [25] The Martlet was the Grumman F- There. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 4F Wildcat, not the F-6F Hellcat. The same 2000. xxii + 144 pp., index, maps. US $12.00, kind of factual errors also arise in the descrip- paper; ISBN 0-8043-9557-X. tion of naval events. Woodman describes Admiral Cunningham's concern over a poten- On 11 May 1943 the first of approximately 17, tial two-month delay in the arrival of ammuni- 000 American soldiers splashed ashore on the tion thusly: "Bonaventure would not be able to gloomy black beaches of the Aleutian replenish her low-angle ammunition until Island of Attu. They had been told that the Formidable arrived with more in March." island, defended by a small Japanese garrison [130] Having already clearly established the since Japan had taken it in June 1942, would fact that Bonaventure was a Dido-class anti- require only two or three days of fighting to aircraft cruiser, the curious question of why a secure. But the Japanese garrison was some- senior commander would worry himself over what larger than anticipated, and American the lack of low-angle ammunition for an anti- planners had failed to account for the island's aircraft cruiser, or why the arrival of an aircraft mountainous terrain or harsh sub-Arctic cli- 102 The Northern Maríner mate. The invaders would need almost three so calmly about having committed war atroci- weeks to destroy the Japanese and would suffer ties. over 500 killed and 3200 other casualties, There are a few problems with the volume many from frostbite and exposure thanks to as well. Sewell Tyng's original introduction, clearly inadequate clothing and boots. Attu's which essentially summarizes the battle, mis- bill in per capita losses would be surpassed takenly claims that Japan had intended to use only by Iwo Jima's stupendous bloodletting in the Aleutians as stepping stones towards early 1945. Alaska and perhaps even the continental Robert Mitchell was a young army lieuten- United States. This is untrue. The Japanese ant wounded in the Attu fighting. Taking military initially had planned only to hold the advantage of his convalescence, he interviewed west Aleutians until the fall of 1942, but fear- other Attu veterans and with the cooperation of ing an American riposte in the north Pacific, the Infantry Journal in 1944 published their decided to retain their Aleutian gains. Never remembrances. The 2000 edition replicates the did Japan plan to invade the North American initial 1944 book, except for a new introduc- continent, nor did it have the resources to carry tion by Professor Gregory Unwin of the De- out that monumental task. Further, I found partment of History at Temple University. Professor Unwin's introduction short and Over seventy men, ranging from privates to disappointing. He focuses on Attu, with rather captains, spoke to Mitchell, providing him with little explanation of how Japanese and Amer- fascinating details that run the gamut of com- ican troops found themselves at each other's bat experience from front-line foxholes to aid throats in such an isolated and dismal place. stations and a supply dump. Soldier after This book does give the reader a good glimpse soldier use colourful 1940s vernacular (though into what it was like to go to war on Attu, but Mitchell edited their narratives) to describe the the roots and failed promise of the Aleutian terror of combat, relay the sheer difficulty of campaign still have not been adequately ex- fighting and living on Attu's snowy peaks, plored. and, often with reluctant modesty, speak of their own heroic acts. Indeed, despite the Galen Roger Perras horror that greeted them, including a terrifying Lennoxville, Québec banzai attack by the remnants of the tattered Japanese garrison on 29 May, many retained a sense of humour about their experiences. Latham B. Jenson. Tin Hats, Oilskins and Still, the hatred for the Asian foe comes Seaboots: A Naval Journey, 1938-1945. To- through clearly. Many American soldiers ronto: Robin Brass Studio, Inc., 2000. 302 pp., clearly relished being able to kill the enemy, over 170 line illustrations, maps, diagrams, and not all of them felt bound by the provi- photos, index. CDN $24.95, US $19.95, paper; sions of the Geneva Convention or their con- ISBN 1-896941-14-1. sciences. A number of troops state that they or other men in their units deliberately killed L.B. "Yogi" Jenson describes his experiences Japanese wounded on the battlefield. Indeed, in from 1938 to 1945 in this excellent addition to my 1995 doctoral dissertation on the Aleutian the literature of wartime memoirs. The first campaign, I cite an intercepted letter written by chapter also provides a short and crisp account an unidentified army lieutenant who bragged of his boyhood on the prairies in the 1920s and that while his men liked to bayonet injured 1930s, including a detailed discussion of his Japanese troops, as "a gent" he opted to use his family roots in Great Britain. This builds a pistol to dispose of enemy wounded. Such solid basis for his description of visits to vari- stories certainly are not new to anyone who has ous relatives in England before and during the read John Dower's chilling account of the war war, as well as for his blunt assessment of in the Pacific, but it is disturbing to hear men, wartime Halifax. The account of his prewar especially those who fought a "good war," talk and early wartime experiences flow crisply, Book Revíews 103 with candour and wry humour on every page. a Canadian tribal-class destroyer. While wait- Jenson brings to life the evolution of an ing for Algonquin to be readied, Jenson briefly enthusiastic young man, determined to make commanded a corvette in English waters, a the sea his career, and his world in a clear and good example of the diverse tasking that often straightforward manner. The Canada he de- fell to naval officers in the midst of the war. scribes is very different then the one we live in. Algonquin took an active part in many offen- The links to Britain in the interwar period were sive actions, supporting the Normandy inva- much stronger than today, reflecting the pre- sion, escorting convoys to Russia and carriers dominance of newly-arrived Britons in the to attack Tirpitz, and attacking German con- population as well as the pervasive influence of voys along the Norwegian coast. the Great War. Jensons's departure for England Jenson's wartime career was clearly ac- in 1938 (to train with the Royal Navy until tive. He recounts the actions in clear and inter- 1941) ensures that a distinctly British flavour esting prose, bringing to life a period half a coloured his early naval career. century past. What makes his book particularly Jenson's training with the Royal Navy was fascinating is how well he brings to life many typical for the period, but his personal schedule aspects of wartime life, ranging from the dif- resulted in a remarkably interesting number of ferent attitudes toward liquor in Britain and experiences at a young age. Finishing his wartime Halifax to his balanced comments on training ashore just as the war began, he ar- the many Reserve and Voluntary Reserve rived in HMS Renown in time to search for the officers and men in the Canadian Navy. There doomed Graf Spee in the fall of 1939 and to are many places where the chronology of engage Scharnhorst and Gneisnau off Norway events is little more than a vehicle for Jenson to in the spring of 1940. Jenson then spent the comment on related activities, but this is all to remainder of 1940 in the RN tribal-class de- the reader's benefit. The charm of the book is stroyer Matabele, leaving a few months before the way it brings a period to life through its it was sunk to join the battle cruiser HMS frequent observations on all and sundry. Hood. He left for his Sub-Lieutenant's course The best aspect of the book, however, is shortly before that ship sank during an engage- the many wonderful sketches Jenson drew. ment with Bismarck and Prinz Eugen. They bring the prose to life much better than After completing his course, Jenson joined photographs alone could ever do and make this his first Canadian ship of the war, HMCS book worth reading even for those only casu- Ottawa and would not leave until it was sunk ally interested in the subject. The variety of the on 18 September 1942, an event that clearly ( sketches is amazing: not just ships, but social and understandably) affected him deeply. cartoons and caricatures, cities and buildings, Ottawa's sinking marked not only a critical and more. The sketches alone are a worthy moment in Jenson's life but also a shift in the addition to anyone's library. book. From the beginning until that event the There are some minor technical errors in narrative flows smoothly and chronologically, the book, but general readers will likely not a match for any existing memoir. After this, notice, and specialists will usually find them Jenson introduces chapters discussing the corrected elsewhere in the book. There are no convoy system and the role of Canadians in the references, and a short bibliography probably Battle of the Atlantic. While interesting and would have been useful to guide general read- informative, especially for general readers, ers to other sources. But this is minor indeed. they break the flow of his memoir, which On the whole this is a very good little book, resumes with Jenson's position in the four- with a charm all its own. General readers will stacker HMCS Niagara as executive officer. find it fascinating, and specialists should make His time there passed in relative quiet, and for an effort to add it to their libraries. once the ship did not sink when he left. Jenson's final post was as First Lieutenant ( Doug McLean executive officer today) of HMCS Algonquin, Orleans, Ontario 104 The Northern Maríner

W.J.R. Gardner. Decoding History: The Battle ity of the U-boat force declined even as its of the Atlantic and Ultra. London: Macmillan operational strength increased. Productivity and Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1999. improved briefly at the beginning of 1943 ( xvii + 263 pp., diagrams and tables. £ 45, US $ when the number of merchant ships sunk per 34.95, cloth; ISBN 1-55570-158-0. convoy battle rose above three) but then dropped steeply. By mid-1943 the Allies, As its title suggests, this welcome study exam- through dogged effort, had developed effective ines the significance of Allied signals intelli- tactics and weapons and were able to employ gence in the way the Atlantic campaign was large numbers of aircraft and escorts, particu- fought. In fact, the simplicity of the title belies larly in critical areas. These developments gave the scope of what is a ground-breaking and the Allies the tactical edge, both when a sub- rigorous examination of the complex interplay marine attempted to close on a convoy and if it of the many factors that determined the out- tried to attack. come at sea. Gardner has examined all these Jock Gardner is an historian with a back- strands and succinctly dissects technological ground as a naval officer who specialised in developments from both German and Allied anti-submarine warfare. The author of a useful strategic perspectives. The author also dis- guide called Anti-Submarine Warfare (London, cusses what he calls "the economic context," 1996), he has an instinctive understanding of by which he means the shipping and other the tactical factors involved in anti-shipping maritime resources available to the Allies, and operations and those which determined weighs them against the ability of the Germans whether a convoy would be intercepted and to sink tonnage. attacked. His experience in anti-submarine Gardner examines two phases of the warfare and his "seaman's eye" give this book campaign (1941 and mid-1942 through mid- particular authority. The book is full of in- 1943) to assess the effectiveness of the U-boat sights, such as a clear discussion of why first offensive. He bases his analyses of these criti- locating a convoy and then successfully bring- cal periods on credible numerical examination ing submarines within striking range was such of trends. The author demonstrates that even a difficult tactical problem for the Germans. though the number of U-boats on operations Drawing on work by Douglas and Rohwer, the increased steadily during 1941, their "produc- author points out that the vast majority of tivity" in sinking tonnage declined. The under- convoys were never attacked at all. Indeed, U- lying reasons included the extension of the boats were able to attack less than half of the convoy system, covert assistance in the Atlan- convoys intercepted (only fourteen percent tic from the United States during the second were attacked between August and December part of the year, and the constraints imposed by 1942; the percentage increased to twenty-four the Germans on operations to avoid provoking between February and May 1943 but then the Americans. British successes in decrypting dropped for good). German signal traffic in near real time is Gardner points out that Ultra could have shown to be only one of several factors. been of tactical significance only during the During the second phase examined, the two periods when the Germans mounted group Allies were not reading German signals until attacks on convoys: 1941 and again between December 1942. The last half of 1942 was mid-1942 and May 1943. The author discusses marked by the resumption of group attacks on the roles of Ultra and signals intelligence in convoys (which generally lasted three or four general and concludes that they were only two days). Because the U-boat force was continu- of a number of strands contributing to eventual ing to grow, the number of submarines in- Allied mastery. volved in convoy battles rose to fifteen or This is an ambitious and sweeping study. more, and in 1943 to over twenty (in two The text is buttressed by twenty-nine pages of battles even to forty). But from July 1942 to authoritative notes, which reflect years of January 1943 the overall operational productiv careful study, and an extensive bibliography. Book Reviews 105

Still, one can quibble over details. It is argu- Denys Arthur Rayner; S.W. Roskill (ed.). Evan able that Gardner undervalues how access to Davies (intro. and appendix). Escort: The German signals enabled Allied intelligence Battle of the Atlantic. "Classics of Naval over time to build up a comprehensive picture Literature" edition. London, 1955; reprint, of German operations. There is a surprising Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1999. xxxvi generalisation that in the absence of effective + 258 pp., photographs, figures, appendix, convoys, U-boats "ran riot" off both Canada index. US $34.95, CDN $53.95, cloth; ISBN 1- and the United States in early 1942. [ 179] In 55750-696-5. Distributed in Canada by fact, Canadian coastal convoys were instituted Vanwell Publishing, St. Catharines, ON. immediately and suffered negligible losses. Ocean shipping was already being convoyed, Action at sea during the Second World War but when the U-boat campaign opened an can quite readily be divided into five easily unusual number of independents had been identified major segments: the Battle of the routed through the Canadian area. The sharp Atlantic, between the Kriegsmarine's U-boats disparity in shipping losses off Canada com- and the Allied convoys; the major ship actions pared with those off the United States under- throughout the huge Pacific area between USN lines tellingly the effectiveness of the convoy and Japanese heavy forces; athe USN's system. It is true that tonnage sunk off New- submarine campaign to throttle Japan; the foundland and Nova Scotia in the first two battle for supremacy in the Mediterranean from weeks of the campaign was indeed higher than 1940 to 1943; and "all others." The Battle of that off the United States (124,000 versus 99, the Atlantic lasted, with few and only relatively 000 tons), but these reflected a marked short respites, from early September 1939 to imbalance in German force concentrations. U- May 1945. If lost, it could not be re-fought, as Boat Command initially thought that only several of the Pacific battles were. The British long-range boats could reach American waters Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, who held at and sent fourteen submarines to operate off least an appreciation of sea power from his Newfoundland and Nova Scotia (two were earliest political days, commented that all soon shifted further south) and only three to depended on its outcome. US waters. Yet even during this opening phase, Denys Rayner's story of his almost contin- the much larger submarine force in the Cana- uous life in that battle is a good example of dian area sank only half as many ships per boat how it was fought, at both the broad and the as the boats operating off the United States. U- personal scale, by whom and by what ships. Boat Command then shifted the concentration Indeed, I would place it in the same category as of force to the target-rich American coastal Nicholas Monseratt's novel, The Cruel Sea. waters, where in subsequent months tonnage Rayner was unusual in that he was a prewar destroyed dwarfed losses off Canada (which RNVR (from 1925 in Liverpool), qualified were almost entirely unescorted independents). both in navigation and anti-submarine warfare. But this oversimplification about what The latter specialty was not at all popular in happened off North America does not detract regular naval circles: for example, Canada's from the value of the study. Overall, Decoding navy at the outbreak of the anti-submarine war History is a truly satisfying and important in 1939 had two A/S specialists. Rayner analysis. It tackles a subject of extraordinary correctly considered that if he was to gain a complexity and in a masterful fashion lays out ship command, highly unlikely for an RNVR, the factors which determined the outcome. it would be in as an A/S specialist, a trade This pithy and rigorous study should be essen- which the regular navy decried. tial reading for anyone wishing to understand As soon as war broke out Rayner was the Battle of the Atlantic. appointed to administer an anti-submarine trawler group. With the rank of LCdr., he was Jan Drent soon senior officer of a sub-group, travelling Victoria, BC amicably in Loch Tulla. A year later he was 106 The Northern Mariner commanding the new corvette HMS Verbena Arnold Hague. The Allied Convoy System, and enjoying many adventures. He moved on 1939-1945: Its Organization, Defence and in March 1943 to the elderly destroyer Shikari, Operation. St. Catharines, ON: Vanwell Pub- a rather unique appointment for an RNVR lishing Limited, 2000. xiii + 208 pp., glossary, officer. Six months later he was appointed to index, photographs, appendices. CDN $45.00; the escort destroyer Warwick, and then the cloth. ISBN 1- 55125-033-0. newer destroyer Highlander. Finally, for a short two-month period Rayner had the This is a "nuts and bolts" history about British- Castle-Class corvette Pevensey Castle, where organized convoys in World War II. It does not he was again group senior officer for four have any descriptions of convoy battles or Castles. It was only during this last accounts of high-level policy discussions of appointment that his ships actually sank a U- command and control. Rather, it examines in boat. But then the responsibility of the some detail the things that are ignored in most other escort groups of which he had been a accounts of the Battle of the Atlantic – the part had been "the safe and timely arrival" of idiosyncrasies of convoy designation, rescue the convoys. ships, replenishment at sea, and other such This book rightly belongs in the category topics. Arnold Hague, the author, is a retired of classics, as the description of events is Royal Navy officer who for a while worked typical of many hundreds that could have been with the Naval Historical Branch under David written. Rayner writes well and includes sev- Brown. The book began as an aide memoire eral passages on how convoys were protected, for those following Hague who would have to how A/S attacks were carried out, and the role answer telephone enquiries about convoys – of escort ships in general. This edition is hence the unapologetic volume of lists. For enhanced for the non-naval reader by a new those who need sailing or arrival dates of a introduction with many footnotes by Evan particular convoy, how many ships it Davies that explains the uniqueness of comprised and how many were lost, this may Rayner's positions, where the VRs fit in the be the book. In 208 pages, the appendices naval system, and thus why his appointments account for ninety-nine. If this might be too were typical and yet unique. much of "all you did not want to know about Rayner was obviously good at his job and convoys and were afraid to ask," you may want delighted at his various appointments to a wide to stop with appendix 1, "Alphabetical Convoy variety of escorts. His real love was High- List," which occupies six pages. Yet none lander, and he was most unhappy in the Castle cover the convoys in the St. Lawrence or other class, even though the ships were the latest North American coastal convoys, such as word in A/S warfare; they were under-powered Halifax-Boston, although some statistics are and a poor sea boats in his opinion. He ended provided on UK coastal convoys. the war from January 1945 on the staff at Port The text comprises seventeen chapters, smouth as an advisor on the new inshore anti- beginning with "Control of Shipping," which U-boat campaign that caused considerable offers a brief (five-page) description of how the worry in the last months. Naval Control of Shipping system worked. This is as good a tale of the Battle of the Many chapters have only two or three pages of Atlantic as one could find. If the reader does text. This meets the requirements of a crib not hold a copy of the 1955 original, it is worth sheet for telephone enquiries, and may also be obtaining. of use to the more serious researcher who needs a "nuts an bolts" question answered. F.M. McKee Beyond that, the text is of limited use. For Markdale, Ontario example, Hague asserts that "it was the Royal Navy's ability to interrupt and destroy the supply net work that limited the effectiveness of these otherwise formidable ships [Bismarck, Book Reviews 107 etc.] aided [my emphasis] by a reluctance with tended to a number of fine, older naval books. in the German political and naval hierarchy to Thanks to the US Naval Institute's Bluejacket hazard them, thereby greatly limiting engage- Books series, they have neither died nor faded ment of major warships." [46] Two observa- away. Instead, these durable but relatively tions may be made. First, the statement is inexpensive paperbacks have resurrected offered without any footnote. This is unfortu- classic titles and offered them to new readers. nate, particularly as Hague worked with the When Little Ship Big War first appeared in access of an official historian. Others might put 1984, it was apparent that Stafford, whose the emphasis elsewhere, for example on the previous book about the famous carrier USS German reluctance to use them or the difficulty Enterprise, Big E, was a bestseller, had ren- of evading the British blockade. The absence dered a special service. In Little Ship Big War of footnotes, coupled with the lack of either a Stafford recounted the story of his ship, USS proper bibliography or some sort of "sugges- Abercrombie (DE-343) and gave voice to the tions for further reading," makes it impossible experience not only of Abercrombie but of to pursue this or other comments that raise an many other often unheralded "little ships," the eyebrow. (The appendix on sources discusses destroyer escorts of World War II. convoy records only.) Second, the sentence Stafford joined Abercrombie as a plank clarity could have been improved with editing. owner in early 1944 when it was in the process The editorial deficiencies may be a problem of of being "born" in a shipyard in Orange, Texas. the publisher, Vanwell, rather than the author. Through completion, fitting out, At first glance it seems curious that commissioning, a shakedown cruise and finally Vanwell, in St. Catharines, Ontario, would service in the Pacific Theatre, Stafford relates publish such an overtly British book. But there the unvarnished story of a ship and his ship- is a rationale, and it is the book's second mates. His account, while personal, offers strength. A number of the photographs, a good insights and stories other than his own; if there many of which are new to me, were supplied is a central figure in this book, it is USS Aber- by Ken Macpherson, who is handsomely crombie. The duties of Abercrombie, and the acknowledged and credited with interesting experiences of its crew, are placed in context, Vanwell in the project. Apart from deftly and with skill, as Stafford relates the Macpherson's photos, many have come from stories of nearby ships, near-sisters and friends other private collections, including, for exam- aboard them as the little DE went about doing ple, one of an alongside RAS credited to James the "dirty work" of the navy in the Pacific. Plomer. All the photographs have been care- Stafford offers tales of escort duty, anti- fully researched and have detailed captions. submarine warfare, rescues of downed pilots, The extent and range of convoy statistics and inshore invasion support for landing craft " and the very good photographs make this a hitting the beaches" at Leyte and Okinawa. He useful reference book for specialists. also relates the drudgery and risks of ship-to- ship refuelling, target practice, drills, and the William Glover excitement and terror of combat—particularly Kingston, Ontario the dangerous kamikaze attacks on Abercrom- bie and its squadron mates. Though Abercrom- bie and the crew survived without damage, Edward P. Stafford. Little Ship Big War: The Stafford expands and adds to the value of his Saga of DE343. Annapolis: Naval Institute story by including the travails and losses of Press, 2000. 336 pp., photographs, biblio- nearby DEs. Hailed by veterans of the conflict graphic note, index. US $17.95, paper; ISBN and "tin can" sailors who served in the DEs, 1-55750-890-9. Little Ship Big War is a naval classic. The story that Stafford shares is honest, The adage that "old soldiers never die, they revealing and unromantic. The men who pass simply fade away" fortunately has not ex- through its pages are revealed as real people, 108 The Northern Mariner with flaws, faults, and mistakes along with firmed their intention to declare war on Japan virtues, heroism and humanity at its best. and agreed to American requests to build and Stafford offers an officer's perspective but also man meteorological facilities at Khabarovsk carries the reader into the crew's quarters. and Petropavlovsk on the Kamchatka Penin- Readers – even those of a younger generation sula. Yoder explains that the primary purpose who did not serve in the military or navy of these bases was to enhance the climatologi- during the war – are drawn completely into the cal data needed to support the planned invasion world of USS Abercrombie and come away of the Japanese home islands. Although the understanding how this ship represents one of Soviets were providing the United States with Stafford's early points in the book. "Every ship weather observations from a number of Sibe- has its individual personality" that "derives rian locations, the author notes that the validity both from the quality of her construction and of these data was suspect. Hence, the Ameri- equipment, and from the officers and men of cans wished to collect this information directly. her crew." [24] Thanks to Edward Stafford, The establishment of Khabarovsk soon this unique biography ofAbercrombie captures after the cease fire in mid-August 1945 re- that personality as well as illustrates the contri- flected the Allied belief that the Japanese butions of the destroyer escorts. military might revolt against their political Stafford carefully researched the book, leaders and oppose the occupation of Japan. In drawing not only from Abercrombie's deck the event of renewed military operations, logs, action reports, war diaries, and visual Siberian weather data had essential value. signal logs but also from letters, personal Yoder's major contribution is to depict the journals and questionnaires answered by experiences of the Americans who served at seventy-six former shipmates, thirty of whom Khabarovsk during its short four-month exis- also provided detailed interviews (another tence. A central strand in that history was the sixteen tape-recorded their reminiscences and tense relationship between American and sent them in). In short, Stafford did his home- Soviet authorities. From the outset the Russians work and assembled from that information a made it clear that US personnel were suspected book that remains a classic account of how to of being espionage agents. As a consequence, author a biography of a fighting ship. the Soviets demanded that all codes and ci- The Naval Institute Press, by reissuing this phers used at the American station be turned classic, returns to print a book long sought by over, a request firmly rebuffed by Washington. many readers. It is a worthy addition to any In the meantime Soviet intelligence agents World War II naval library or bookshelf. closely observed their visitors. Even the sim- plest American request for Russian assistance James P. Delgado often became the subject of complex negotia- Vancouver, BC tion and prolonged delay. Soviet suspicions, combined with the undoubted fact that hostili- ties with Japan were at an end, led to Mos- H.S. Yoder, Jr. Planned Invasion of Japan, cow's request in early December 1945 that 1945: The Siberian Weather Advantage. Phila- Khabarovsk and Petropavlovsk be closed. By delphia: American Philosophical Society, the end of that year the United States evacuated 1997. xvi + 161 pp., photographs, appendices, both facilities. tables, maps, bibliography. US $35.00, cloth; The author also offers many insights into ISBN 0-87169-223-6. the conditions of Soviet life in the Khabarovsk area at the end of World War II. He fully H.S. Yoder is a former naval officer who was confirms the West's image of an exceedingly assigned to the US Naval weather station primitive Siberian economy and a people established near Khabarovsk, Siberia in August subjected to harsh political oppression. Yoder, 1945. During the Potsdam Conference, held who is a professional earth scientist, also offers the previous month, Soviet authorities con- considerable information on the extreme Book Reviews 109 weather conditions in the area. Nevertheless, rais: Togo, Jellicoe, Halsey and Spruance, the he leavens his grim view of Siberia by express- last two being treated together in the same ing admiration for the perseverance of the chapter. The author's relaxed and friendly style ordinary men, women, and children who strug- makes for a very readable and undemanding gled to exist in a harsh social, political, and book, and the subject is what most people physical environment. would still think is the very stuff of naval Readers will enjoy and learn from Yoder's history – battles at sea and fleet personal account. But they should be aware command. Some of the major battles of the that the Siberian weather stations can be twentieth century are reviewed: Tsushima, viewed in a broader strategic perspective. Jutland and the main clashes of the last stages There is no doubt, as Yoder points out, that the of the Pacific campaign of 1942-1945. The planned Allied invasions of Kyushu and Hon- author makes no significant errors, and his shu stood to benefit from improved weather judgements, clearly based on assiduous forecasts based on meteorological observations reading of the latest literature, command in Siberia. But the author does not seem to be respect. His review of the Sumida/Lambert fully aware of other US activities, occurring revisionist thesis on Fisher and his north of Japan's home islands, that could have Dreadnought policy, for instance, is sensible been affected by the region's notoriously fickle and balanced. And yet this in the end is a weather. An example was an American aerial disappointing book that falls between three bombing campaign between 1943 and 1945 stools. It is not really a battle or campaign from bases in the western Aleutians that fea- history; it is not really a biography or series of tured more than 1500 attack sorties against biographies; and it is certainly not a substantial Japanese targets in the Kuriles. In addition, study of naval leadership. during 1944-1945 US submarines and surface As a series of battle or campaign histories, ships launched offensive operations in the the book puts each in its proper setting very Kuriles and Sea of Okhotsk. And in the latter well. Before the Battle of Tsushima, for part of World War II the US Navy established example, there was a debate about whether to a major base at Cold Bay, Alaska that trained rely on long-range gunfire from the main more than 12,000 Soviet officers and men in armament of the heavy ships on the one hand the operation of approximately 150 amphibi- or on the "hail of fire" that a fleet in close ous, minesweeping, and patrol ships being contact firing all its main and secondary transferred under the lend-lease program. armament could deliver. This is concisely Bearing the American North Pacific cam- and well discussed, and Togo's success with paign in mind, it seems to this reviewer that the the latter method is clearly illustrated. But American weather stations in Siberia may have because the author has quite properly decided had even greater military significance than Dr. to explain the context of each battle in this Yoder suggests in his interesting book. way (and he does so rather effectively) there is little room for depth in the discussion of the Dean C. Allard many battles covered. For this reason, many Arlington, Virginia readers will find little that is new in this book. Much the same can be said about it as a Ronald Andidora. Iron Admirals: Naval Lead- series of mini-biographies. The author bases ership in the Twentieth Century. Westport, CT: his work more or less exclusively on Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000. 181 pp., well-known secondary sources. The maps, photographs, notes, bibliography, index. result is a familiar review of some well- US $65.00, cloth; ISBN 0-313-31266-4. known admirals that are good summaries but little more. This book is a study of the careers and The most serious fault is that there is in achievements of four twentieth-century admi- fact little real discussion about the nature of leadership in twentieth-century naval warfare, despite the sub-title. There are some rather shallow comparisons with Nelson as the arche- HO The Northern Mariner typal naval leader, but this is not pushed very effective but spread too widely among too far. It may again be a consequence of the many targets. For this reason Ronald Andidora author's attempt to cover too much ground, but has lost the chance to turn a good introductory many opportunities for useful discussions are text into something much better. let slip. For instance, a review of the battle- command and leadership styles exemplified Geoffrey Till during the Russo-Japanese War cries out for an Devizes, UK exercise in contrast and comparison between Togo, Makarov and Rozhdestvensky, who were very different in so many ways. But apart from making this rather basic point, the book Aldo Chircop, Andre Gerolymatos and John O. shies away from the subject. latrides. The Aegean Sea After the Cold War: The Battle of Jutland, to give another Security and Law of the Sea Issues. example, would be a splendid case study of the Basingstoke, Hampshire: MacMillan, 2000. xiv importance of initiative in battle. The author's + 247 pp., maps, tables, figures, photographs, reference to the disastrous impetuosity of notes, index. £45.00, cloth; ISBN 0- Admiral Arbuthnot (whose desire to finish off 33371897-6. Wiesbaden led to his death and the loss of several armoured cruisers) [76] is followed The contents of this volume are based on a three pages later by a brief account of Admiral conference held in 1996 in Ottawa which was Leveson's deliberate decision not to leave the triggered by the Imia-Kardak Aegean crisis line in order to prevent the German fleet slip- between Greece and Turkey earlier that year. ping away for the last time that day into the The book consists of two parts, the first concealing dusk. But so much more could have covering the historical and security issues been made of this. Jellicoe quite properly relating to the Aegean dispute and the second comes out well from this review, but the con- addressing the law of the sea and governance trast between him as a leader keen not to leave issues raised. anything to chance and Nelson, that model of Edited volumes can easily suffer from naval command who thought successful com- incoherence. Editorial control can be too light, manders needed to do just that, is merely the contributors too independent, or the quality touched upon. of their contributions too variable. Conference In the discussion of Halsey and Spruance programmes can as easily reflect availability of there is an interesting reference to the require- participants as design. This volume exhibits ment of naval leaders to cater for the "whims some of these characteristics. It is not clear, for of popular opinion and ambitious politicians." example, why Nachmani's piece on Greek [133] And what a lot could have been said water problems is included at all, as it bears about that ! But sadly, in this book, little is little relationship to any of the dimensions of said. The concluding chapter does not quite the Greek-Turkish stand-off. Richard Clogg's pull the whole thing together because it focuses wise, insightful and typically entertaining on the achievements of each admiral (the contribution focusses heavily on Greek-Turk- outputs) rather than their qualities as leaders ( ish differences over Cyprus rather than the the inputs), and so another opportunity slips Aegean. On the other hand, the book might away. have benefited from an article specifically Significantly the chapter which concen- concerned with air space differences. Overall, trates on comparing the impetuous, audacious though, in terms of quality and focus this Halsey with the patient, balanced, steady volume hangs together reasonably well. Spruance is the book's best on naval leadership What does detract from its credibility, but its weakest as biography or campaign however, is its one-sidedness. Judging by history. As such, it rather exemplifies the surnames, around half of the contributors are book's main fault. The author's gunfire is ethnically Greek, none Turkish. To be fair, the introduction does express the laudable aspira- Book Reviews 111 tion that Turks should in future be included in the conclusion (and elsewhere in this volume): the dialogue, but this only serves to highlight that any resolution in the Aegean will require this volume's failure to incorporate a Turkish Greek and Turkish political will. And this in perspective. It might be argued that this should turn raises the question of the utility of a vol- not matter, but where Greek-Turkish relations ume consisting largely of Greek contributors are concerned, sadly it does. The mutual mis- presenting largely legalistic arguments, worthy trust and passion with which each side and readable though many of these articles may approaches the problem too frequently renders be. elusive either Greek or Turkish "objectivity." The "Greek" contributions to this volume Bill Park occasionally confirm this observation. It is not Oxford, UK only the language deployed that betrays Greek bias. One can also find here characteristic Moshe Tzalel. From Ice-Breaker to Missile Greek allegations of Turkish territorial revi- Boat: The Evolution of lsrael 's Naval Strategy. sionism and aggrandizement (Gerolymatos, for Westport, CT; Greenwood Publishing Group, example). Platias goes so far as to assert that 2000. xiii + 184 pp, tables, photographs, notes, Ankara "tried to raise the issue of the Turkish bibliography, index. US $59.95, cloth; ISBN minority in Western Thrace in order to lay 0-313-31360-1. claim to Western Thrace itself." [66] Strati's article is a good example, though From Ice-Breaker to Missile Boat is about the not the only one, of the legalistic determinism evolution of a small navy from nothing to a that can characterise the Greek position on the fighting force tailored to cope with Israel's Aegean, and it is worth citing for the ease with problems. It describes how fledgling students which it glides over its own finding that legal ofnaval warfare learned how to handle fighting judgment would award neither Greece nor ships while trying to decide whether they were Turkey everything it wants. Indeed, one of the necessary or not. It could have done with one more constructive sub-plots detectable within or more maps. this volume is the idea that the application of Those who built the Israeli navy were a law of the sea convention in the Aegean would mixed bag including ex-Royal Navy officers, probably take such factors into account as ex-merchant navy officers and Palyam, the sea uniqueness (VanderZwaag) and equity arm of Hagana, the clandestine pre-independ- (Chircop), that it might favour negotiated ence force. The first ship was the ice-breaker of dispute settlement rather than compulsory the title of the book, ex-USS Northland, the judicial decisions (McDorman), and that semi- first Eilat. Its only action was to be rammed by enclosed seas are susceptible to bilateral reso- a British destroyer, which suffered severe lution (according to Della Mea, an Italian structural damage. [153], but not according to Raftopoulos, a The navy was decreed into existence by Greek [146]) – all of which would tend to the Israeli Defence Force General Staff on 17 weaken the relevance of legalistic purity. March 1948 as "The Sea Service," assigned An associated theme that pops up is that "all the missions of defence at sea." This Greece and Turkey might try to put aside "vague prescription left the door maritime sovereignty arguments and focus open...between those who saw the...navy as a instead on resource management in the flanking support for the land army – and...a Aegean, in which they have a mutual interest, blue water navy, based on surface ships and/or as one frequently finds elsewhere in the Medi- submarines and independent of the army terranean (Chircop). In this case, such generals." endeavours might even serve as confidence- The book deals with the period between building measures upon which deeper coopera- 1948 and 2000. It is in three parts: "Building a tion might be built (Della Mea, Katsepontes). Navy" (thinking about the naval role); "Reality But this brings us to the argument stressed in Check, Naval Operations;" and "The Sea as a 1 12 The Northern Mariner

Gateway" (blockade and gunboat diplomacy). version (FAC [M]) using the Gabriel missile. Politically-isolated Israel is like an island. The opening night of that war Israel sank three Apart from hostile neighbours who can attack FACs and a minesweeper in its first naval overland, it can only be reached by sea. The missile battle in history and suffered no losses, Director of the Nautical College in Haifa, despite more than six Styx missiles being fired advising President David Ben Gurion on naval at its ships. matters, found no need for defence against Imaginative Israeli use of the FAC (M)s seaborne invasion, or any need to seek battle during the Yom Kippur War ensured naval with an enemy fleet, since no such fleets were expansion. Sa'ars were proposed as a system to around. Instead, he argued that the new nation exercise control over the eastern Mediterra- needed the ability to engage single enemy nean, but opinion that aircraft remain the most vessels with torpedo boats and to convert effective platforms for anti-ship missiles immigrant ships to "warships." This, appar- prevailed. In this strategy, the attacker remains ently misunderstood by IDF leaders, became " for only a short time near the target, thus The Big Flotilla" of escort vessels and subma- lessening the chance of mis-identification rines. because the pilot can see the target. Moreover, Palyam trained seamen and escorts for the aircraft can attack other targets if there is immigrant ships. It wanted forces to blockade no maritime threat. (In practice, pilots are as Arab nations, to protect Sea Lines of Commu- likely as sailors to attack the wrong ship). nication (SLOCs), to conduct commando A good read, but pricey. operations, to transport troops, and to man and defend naval bases. Dan Mainguy The profound effect of these two vastly Ottawa, Ontario different concepts of maritime operations is discussed in some detail. Readers are expected to know the various names of the wars: The Peter J. Woolley. Japan 's Navy: Politics and War of Independence, immediately after the Paradox, 1971-2000. Boulder, CO and Lon- proclamation of the State of Israel in 1948; the don: Lynne Reiner, 2000. xviii + 163 pp., Suez Crisis of 1956, when Egypt nationalized tables, maps, selected bibliography, index. US the Suez Canal; the Six-Day War of June 1967, $49.95, cloth; ISBN 1-55587-819-9. also called the June War; The War of Attrition, immediately after the Six-Day War; and The In 1973 James Auer wrote an important book Yom Kippur War of 1973, also known as The that gave an excellent account of what was in October War. effect Japanese naval policy from the putative Experience during the wars revealed that end of the Imperial Navy at the end of World small-boat operations were far more effective War Two to the beginning of the 1970s, by than the Big Flotilla. Battles from 1948 to 1967 which time the Japanese Maritime Self De- showed the general ineffectiveness of the Big fence Force (MSDF) was well established. Flotilla, but explosive boats sank the Egyptian Aptly, he introduces this new work in which flagship El Emir Farouk. Right after the cease Peter Woolley takes the story forward to the fire of the June War, both sides made raids. end of the twentieth century. As Auer puts it, in The successful Israeli amphibious "Operation his most generous foreword, Woolley provides Ravin" brought retaliation when the Israeli "a comprehensive, balanced and rational ac- flagship Eilat was sunk by Styx missiles. Two count of the cultural, legal and political hurdles months later, the submarine Dakar was lost encountered by the Japanese government in with all hands while being delivered to Israel ( growing the MSDF." The author examines the it was finally found in 1999). The Big Flotilla evolution of Japanese defence policy in the was sinking, and missiles increasingly were in. period since 1971 and the enlargement in the By the time of the Yom Kippur War, Israel had use made of the MSDF in that process. De- procured Sa'ar Fast Attack Craft, the missile fence policy in Japan is a subtle subject requir- Book Reviews 113 ing specialist cultural "feel" and understanding. completed. Nothing that has happened in recent This Woolley amply provides, giving his years undermines his analysis in any way. readers in his opening three chapters a primer The author has deliberately eschewed in Japanese policy and politics, the kata (style) operational matters, and there is therefore not of the MSDF and the constitutional debate on much on the size and shape of the MSDF or its the use of force by Japan. He then examines, in organization. There are useful points to be separate chapters, the debate over sea-lane made about the nature of the MSDF as a true defence out to 1000 miles, the despatch of the "self defence force" rather than a navy mine countermeasures flotilla to the Gulf in "proper" and its complementarity with Japan- 1991, and the cautious adoption of a more based units of the US Navy in what can be proactive peacekeeping role. The author sums regarded as an overall naval capability. This up in a final chapter entitled "Democracy, would have further strengthened Woolley's Strategy and Alliance" that argues for a close thesis about alliance. maritime alliance between he US and Japan. Nevertheless, this slim volume is a highly The work is very much the result of the significant contribution to the still limited author's year as an advanced research scholar literature on a navy of growing significance. Its at the Naval War College in the mid-1990s, gaps provide opportunities to other scholars, and his account is written from that point in especially Japanese, to provide more compre- time. It would have been better to have come hensive accounts of the continuing evolution of clean on this and changed the title to 1971- the MSDF. Auer and Woolley are, however, 1996, when the book effectively ends. Readers the essential starting points for any such study. will be disappointed that there is nothing about the latest controversial revision of Japan's Eric Grove Defence Guidelines, quite a serious gap in a Hull, UK book apparently culminating in 2000. Neither is there anything about the potential anti-ballis- tic missile task of the new Kongo class or Commander Duk-Ki Kim. Naval Strategy in about Aegis ships, something that promises to Northeast Asia: Geopolitical Goals, Policies have a considerable impact on the MSDF's and Prospects. London: Frank Cass organization and role. The structure of the Publishers, 2000. xxiv + 261 pp., maps, tables, book also suffers from much of it being effec- glossary, index, appendices, select tively revisions of articles the author has al- bibliography. US $57.50, £39.50, cloth; ISBN ready published. These chapters still retain 0-7146-4966-X. much of their character as self-contained pieces, and there is a goo deal of repetition. For rip-roaring yarns of the sea, Marryat and The book should really have been subject to Taffrail still reign supreme. For mastery more editing and up-dating, of naval strategy in Northeast Asia few can This said, however, the author has done an compare to Admiral Yi Sun-sin with his excellent job in analysing the evolution of what turtle ships. Nevertheless, Commander Kim might be called the higher aspects of naval of the Republic of Korea Navy has written an policy in Japan in the later Cold War years and informative book (no. 9 in the generally the immediate post-Cold War era. He explains excellent Cass series "Naval Policy and the difficulties caused by the all too successful History") with an impressive bibliography cultural pacification after the Second World of English-language sources. The purpose War, and the real problems faced by the policy of his study "is to design a co-operative makers of a sea-dependant economic super- maritime security structure for Northeast power constitutionally unable to deploy a Asia through the application of naval arms proper navy. He ably explains the reasons for control and disarmament measures (both stru the essential incrementalism of Japanese pol- ctural and operational); maritime confidence- icy, which has continued since his study was building measures and maritime co-operation measures."[ 12] What is most attractive about Naval Strategy in Northeast 114 The Northern Mariner

Asia, however, is not the security model it stem from the vacuum left by the reduction of envisages but rather the information it provides both countries' naval forces since the Cold War about maritime issues, tensions and disputes in ended. In order to help protect their security the waters that stretch from the Straits of interests, both nations emphasise the need for Malacca to the Sea of Okhotsk as seen from maritime co-operation. the differing approaches of the major naval Chapter six deals with Chinese maritime powers involved – the United States, Russia, strategy. Kim argues that China's approach to China and Japan. The book is intended for two co-operative maritime security is determined audiences: one comprised of professional by two conflicting factors: the effect of naval maritime analysts, naval officers, security arms control and the effect on China's standing analysts and defence planners, and the other in the world because China wants to be seen as consisting of academic students of East Asian a responsible major power. The expanding political, strategic and security matters. Given capabilities of the Chinese navy are seen by the number of abbreviations (four and one-half some countries, however, as a harbinger of its pages of them), cypher clerks and the boffins desire to establish hegemony over the South of Bletchley Park should also be added to the and East China Seas. Chapter seven looks at target audiences. Like all books that analyse Japanese maritime strategy, which seemingly current issues, this one runs the risk of quickly poses little threat and stresses co-operation. becoming dated because the geo-strategic Chapter eight is the conclusion and contains, maritime environment in Northeast Asia is among other things, commonsense recommen- subject to change. dations relating to information exchange and Naval Strategy is divided into eight chap- confidence-building measures that could en- ters. In chapter one Kim discusses the concept hance the prospects for the creation of a co- of co-operative maritime security. In chapter operative maritime security structure among two he argues that the regional naval arms the major maritime powers in northeast Asia. build-up during the 1990s, spearheaded by While this study looks at the major mari- China and Japan but also involving lesser naval time powers, a little more information concern- powers like South Korea and Taiwan, created ing the maritime strategy of lesser powers, a new geo-strategic environment that has led to such as the two Koreas, Taiwan and Vietnam, an increased risk of potential misunderstand- would have been helpful. Further, greater use ings and incidents at sea as well as disputes of Korean, Chinese and Japanese sources over marine resources. This has necessitated a would have aided in clearly demonstrating that greater need for co-operation between coun- the concern for co-operative maritime security tries in the protection of sea lines of communi- is deeply rooted in the professional writings of cations and in the solution of environmental the officer corps of those navies and not just problems like sea pollution. restricted to an English-reading elite. At the Chapter three is useful. In it Kim first end of the sixteenth century, Toyotomi investigates the basic concept and approaches Hideyoshi's forces were defeated because of taken by regional nations to territorial disputes. Korean maritime strategy. It would be well for He then analyses the Russian-Japanese dispute naval officers interested in things Pacific to over the so-called Northern Territories; the read Commander Kim's book to forestall Korean-Japanese dispute over the Tok Islands; conflict at the beginning of the twenty-first the Senkaku Islands and seabed disputes be- century. tween China, Taiwan and Japan; and the Parcel and Spratly islands disputes that involve China, A. Hamish Ion Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Kingston, Ontario Indonesia and Brunei. Chapters four and five are concerned with US and Russian maritime strategies, respectively, and point out that many of the current problems in the region Book Reviews 115

Charles T. Williamson. The U.S. Naval Mis- become deeply ambivalent about their role. sion to Haiti 1959-1963. Annapolis: Naval From the outset, he feared that his army offi- Institute Press, 1999. xix + 394 pp., map, cers were likely to plot against him. Thus, the photographs, appendix, notes, bibliography, more successful the US mission appeared to be index. US $33.95; CDN $57.50; ISBN 1- during the initial months in training the troops 55750-941-7. Canadian distributor, Vanwell of the Forces Armees d'Haiti, the more suspi- Publishing, St. Catherines, ON. cious he became of its efforts. During the first years of the Haitian train- This carefully-crafted book provides a sobering ing program, the Marines did their utmost to account of the establishment and rapid decline succeed despite the obvious lack of receptivity of the US Naval Mission to Haiti. From 1959 from the Presidential Palace. By 1962, how- through mid-1963 the primarily-US Marine- ever, it was becoming difficult to overcome the staffed mission had the unheralded and ulti- obstacles put in their path both by the evident mately unsuccessful task of training Haiti's indifference of the army leaders and the ram- armed forces (Forces Armees d'Haiti) – a pant paranoia of the Haitian dictator. predominantly ground force with limited coast The final months of the mission's life were guard and air corps augmentation – in small- marked by the Haitian government's gradual arms infantry tactics. curtailment of its training responsibilities and Colonel Charles Williamson is well-suited by a series of increasingly alarming harass- to have recorded these events, having served as ments by Haitian militia (Milice Civile) and a junior officer with the naval mission from its secret police forces directed against individual inception until almost its final days. In putting members of the mission staff and their families. together his detailed history, he relied not only When the last of the Marines left in July 1963, upon his own memories but also the official their mood was a mixture of frustration and records of the mission, now at the National disappointment that an effort that began with Archives and Records Administration facility such high hopes had ended so disastrously. at College Park, Maryland. In addition, he Williamson's book provides a fascinating conducted interviews with a number of his account of the difficulties that military forces fellow officers and with several expatriate, can face when carrying out quasi-political American-trained, Haitian officers who man- functions in developing countries. This book aged to escape Haiti during the turbulent pe- should be of particular value not only for riod recounted in the book. historians of the Cold War but for analysts As Williamson makes evident, daily life in interested in examining the peacetime roles of Haiti during the final years of the second military forces in the emerging century. Eisenhower Administration and the heady days of the Kennedy era had an Alice-in-Wonder- Jeffrey G. Barlow land quality that was not always understood by Manassas, Virginia American decision-makers. The nation was a dictatorship ruled by the deceptively soft- spoken François "Poppa Doc" Duvalier. It was Gordon Davis. The Maritime Helicopter Pro- a land where the secret police – gangs of armed ject: The Requirement for a Capable thugs known as the Tonton Macoutes – roamed Multi-Purpose, Sea King Replacement. Hali- freely to maintain the short-term stability of the fax: Centre for Foreign Policy Studies, Duvalier regime by terrorizing the local popu- Dalhousie University [www.da.ca/centre], lation with sudden punishments that were as 2000. Maritime Security Occasional Paper, No. brutal as they were arbitrary. 8. 69 pp., illustrations. CDN $10, US $8, Although in April 1958 Duvalier person- paper; ISBN 1-896440-26-6. ally had requested that the United States estab- lish a military mission in Haiti, by the time the Canada's need for a new shipboard aircraft is Marines arrived the following year he had undeniable. The Sea King fleet is well beyond 116 The Northern Mariner its lifespan, and it costs the taxpayer (those the incoming government in 1994. On the forgotten people to whom we are ultimately whole, the study suffers from a lack of docu- responsible) more scarce defence monies to mentation. Davis would have a stronger case maintain this capability. Gordon Davis' occa- had he provided evidence to support his opin- sional paper sets out to examine this long- ions, particularly with his brief mention of the standing requirement, with the stated aim of possibility of a "navalized" Griffin acquisition. informing the educated public why Canada In the end, it is unclear as to who actually desperately needs a new maritime helicopter. opposes a Sea King replacement and thus The work is divided into three sections, needs to be convinced. If persuasion is required which explore "the policy fundamentals that at the political level, experience demonstrates underpin [DND] capital acquisitions," review " that some domestic factor has to act as the the evolution in the roles and tasks demanded hook to get elected officials interested. That in of the Sea King" and provide "an experience- fluence will not be exerted by those of us who based list of capabilities." Simply put, Davis write occasional papers (this reviewer succeeds with the third and part of the second included). The vital point to be remembered is section, but fails with the first section. that it is really a matter of getting a platform The policy analysis in the work does not, in which will satisfy all of our requirements and, fact, provide us with even an accurate cursory if it has to be built in Québec, so be it. examination as to how and why the Sea King was acquired in the first place. If Davis had Sean M. Maloney researched the matter, he would have Kingston, Ontario found that the late 1950s Royal Canadian Navy ( supported by the government of the day) requirements for the machine which would Charles A. Meconis and Michael D. Wallace. become Sea King included the ability to re- East Asian Naval Weapons Acquisitions in the move the ASW gear and use it as a troop- 1990s: Causes, Consequences and Concerns. carrying aircraft from the projected general Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, purpose frigates or other joint platforms. In 2000. xix + 226 pp., tables, figures, maps, essence, the RCN anticipated the multi-purpose notes, selected bibliography, index. US $65.00, function that would be demanded by the new cloth; ISBN 0-275-96251-2. world order envisioned by the Brock Report and the 1964 White Paper. Dancing through The stated aim of this book is to document white paper after white paper and convoluted weapons acquisition in East Asia throughout Defence Planning Guidance verbiage obscures the 1990s and to analyse the implications of the these facts, which are really critical to the long- data collected through a thorough application standing and accepted arguments for a multi- of the latest developments in political science purpose helicopter. theory. The authors examine the relationship The study is laudable in its efforts to bring between weapons acquisition and armed con- out the operational employment history of the flict and apply their conclusions to contempo- Sea King and the specific equipment capabili- rary East Asia. As such, the book provides a ties necessary in a replacement. Discussions of summary of contemporary international rela- Operation CORDON in Somalia, and the more tions theory on issues such as arms races and critical COP COBRA planning in 1995, are the sources of armed conflict. In addition, it critical to any discussion of future require- examines naval capabilities and potential ments. But castigating various governments sources of conflict within the region. about the lack of progress of the NSA Having introduced contemporary theories programme needs more explanation and about competitive arms acquisitions and estab- substantiation, even for the informed reader. lished that arms races can contribute to the We really need to understand exactly how and outbreak of armed conflict, the authors seek to why the EH-101 programme was affected by discover whether a naval arms race is under- Book Revíews 117 way in East Asia. They establish that in mere player for the foreseeable future. The US Navy numerical terms the total number of warships is the only major outside actor in the region, in the region has actually declined in the past and they see it largely as a stabilising force. ten years. Yet there has been an increase in the The authors present the idea of "enduring total number and distribution of modern "de- rivalries," where a history of conflict between stabilising" systems such as submarines, air- particular states acts as a key variable in deter- craft carriers, amphibious vessels and long- mining conflict. They apply this theory to range, high-endurance surface ships with China-Taiwan, Japan-South Korea and, less comprehensive anti-ship, anti-air and land convincingly, Singapore-Malaysia. Their attack capabilities. The authors reject the idea conclusion that enduring rivalries can act that these vessels might bring stability through synergistically with the competitive arms deterrence, although this remains a debatable acquisition process to increase the potential for point. More significantly, land-based aircraft conflict is well founded although hardly sur- have not been included due to an apparent lack prising. of reliable data on numbers and capabilities. A key strength of this book is that it pro- This is a serious omission and undermines the vides an excellent introduction into the dis- value of the analysis. putes, rivalries and potential sources of naval The book is based upon a "scientific" conflict within East Asia. It also offers an analysis of data, and it is ably supported by the introduction into the capabilities of regional authors extensive research. The information navies and the performance ofparticular weap- gathered is relevant, comprehensive and fully ons systems that should prove of equal value to referenced. But if this book is to provide more the expert and novice alike. The authors should than a summary of the relevant pages of Jane 's be congratulated on the manner in which they Fighting Ships, the data must support the present both theory and fact in a fashion that theoretical assumptions upon which their should be accessible to all. Their conclusion, conclusions are based. In general they do, that there is not yet a formal naval arms race although the complexities of maritime capabili- throughout East Asia, but that one exists be- ties do not lend themselves to assimilation into tween China and Taiwan, is supported by mathematical formulae or scientific models. appropriate evidence and their assessment of The attempt to construct weapons-based quan- the possibility of both conflict and cooperation titative arms race indices simply by adding up in the future was clear, relevant and well the tonnages of particular types of ships and founded. Although the emphasis on "scientific" numbers of weapons is a gross oversimplifica- modes of analysis may not appeal to all read- tion of a complex subject. The tonnage of a ers, the book will be of value to anyone inter- particular ship is not a reliable indication of its ested in naval capabilities, rivalries and the capabilities and potential offensive uses. The potential for maritime conflict in East Asia. increase in the size of a frigate or destroyer is as likely to represent improvements in living Ian Speller conditions and catering facilities as it is to Swindon, UK signify an increase in offensive capability. The fact that the total tonnage of modern surface ships acquired in East Asia is increasing may Norman Friedman. Seapower and Space: From be significant, but equally it may not be. The the Dawn of the Missile Age to Net-Centric complexities of the issue are not adequately Warfare. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, investigated here. 2000. 384 pp., photographs, notes, bibliogra- The book does provide a very useful phy, index. US $42.50, cloth; ISBN 1-55750- overview of current naval capabilities in East 897-6. Asia and of the potential for maritime conflict in the region. The authors are surely correct to This book links one of the oldest forms of discount the Russian Pacific Fleet as a major conflict, war at sea, to one of the newest forms, 118 The Northern Mariner war in space. Friedman aims to explain how States will become involved in a protracted the relationship between these two very differ- war. Using sea and space systems, the US will ent environments emerged, how the interaction be able to decide when to engage and disen- changed naval warfare, and how it is likely to gage from a conflict. It is also assumed that bring about change in the near future. The bulk net-centric warfare will result in a battle of of the study concentrates on the Cold War: ten such a high tempo that it will overwhelm the of fourteen chapters are dedicated to examin- ability of an enemy force to resist. Friedman is ing the historical development of particular confident that the superiority of net-centric technologies. Each appraises the reasons these warfare will be reinforced by further improve- technologies were developed, how they ments in satellites and computers. The overall worked, and the problems encountered in effect will be to speed up the time taken to translating technical ideas into viable weapons. locate a target and launch an attack against it – Friedman explains in layman's terms how a capability that was obviously lacking in the these complex systems operated and how they hunt against mobile Scud launchers during the affected the conduct of war. It is also very Gulf War. interesting the way he demonstrates the dyna- This is an interesting book. When discuss- mism of the arms race at sea between the ing naval power in the post-Cold War world, United States and Soviet Union during the Friedman makes a number of very useful Cold War. Through a technological survey, he points. But it is unfortunate that he did not shows successfully that external strategic and focus more on the contemporary security operational challenges propelled and shaped situation and the potential effectiveness of technologies. He provides a superb insight into naval power. Significant questions arise over the dynamics of the action- reaction cycle and the vulnerability of surface vessels to new the causes of the qualitative arms race that was technological developments and the potential such a defining characteristic of the Cold War. of asymmetric threats. It is also unclear how According to Friedman, the end of the sea power can deal with terrorists like Osama Cold War has merely enhanced the utility of bin Laden or indeed enemy states that do not naval power in the "new world disorder." Sea possess highly-developed industrial or eco- power offers an ideal medium to protect the nomic infrastructures and therefore lack targets interests of the United States. He refers to the against which attacks might be launched. strategic mobility of the surface fleet, its inde- Friedman also fails to consider the ineffective- pendence from overseas bases, and the fact that ness of distant punishment delivered against it possesses its own intrinsic anti-ballistic Iraq over the last decade. The failure to address missile defence system. Most important, questions such as these weakens the persua- however, has been the integration of space- siveness of the argument. based communications and surveillance sys- Overall, this is an interesting and readable tems with the weapons and sensors of the work. But it is unfortunate that so much of the surface fleet through a digitised computer study focuses on developments during the Cold network. This has created an unprecedented War. Although this historical analysis was capability for naval units to see targets, both on informative, the really interesting issues are land and at sea, several hundred miles over the developed too late in the book to do them horizon, and to strike them with conventional, justice. The volume is thoroughly researched, long-range guided missiles in real time. Fried- and even the footnotes provide a wealth of man calls this "net-centric warfare." information. It is only regrettable that Fried- In Friedman's view, net-centric warfare man does not cite his sources more frequently. has given the US Navy a new lease on life. The ability to deliver distant punishment makes it Warren Chin impossible for the enemy to hit back and so Ashton Keynes, UK reduces the chance of casualties. Equally impo rtant, it minimises the risk that the United Book Reviews 119

Peter T. Haydon. Sea Power and Maritime extensions of their parent state." In addition, " Strategy in the 21st Century: A "Medium" the presence of a warship is a clear signal of Power Perspective. Halifax: Centre for Foreign the interest or concern of a state...about a Policy Studies, Dalhousie University [www.da. situation." [38; this catalogue of virtues in a ca/centre], 2000. Maritime Security Occasional naval force, clearly central to the author's Paper, No. 10. v + 139 pp., tables, notes, index, thesis, appears again, verbatim, on 63.]. A table CDN $10, US $8, paper; ISBN 1896440-32-0. entitled "Naval Crisis Management Tasks" [66] provides persuasive argument for "multi pur- This is a naval "appreciation of the situation." pose and combat capable naval forces rather Peter Haydon says what he is going to say, than those constrained to 'niche' capabilities." [ says it, and then tells us what it is that he has 69] Haydon has the grace to admit that "none said. In the process he exposes the reader to of this is really new." current political and strategic assessments of Another table entitled "Naval Capabilities" [ sea power. The footnotes alone are worth the 81] summarises the roles of major, medium price of admission, but what makes his brief and small coastal state navies. Medium powers especially worth reading is the largely success- generally play a limited part in sea control (the ful attempt to place current thinking in context protection of what strategic writers insist on for what he calls a "medium" power. calling sea-lines of communication, rather than We live in precarious times. By compari- ships) and power projection. Except for son, life was simple during the Cold War. A Canada, which played a major part in North statement of the obvious, this is nevertheless American strategic anti-submarine warfare the essential basis for discussion. Building on during the Cold War, they play no part in the work of James Cable, Colin Gray, Eric strategic deterrence and "compellence" (exert- Grove, Ken Booth and Rear Admiral J.R. Hill ing limited naval force to influence the actions among others, Haydon brings them down to of a state). They do, however, engage in diplo- earth with his comment that politicians (more macy, national security and constabulary tasks, in some countries than others, this reviewer and humanitarian assistance. The limitations would observe) have limited horizons. Naval noted in this table notwithstanding, Haydon staffs can neither predict the future nor "what points out that medium-power navies today are their political masters will ask them to do." also in a position to operate globally in coali- They must invariably explain requirements "in tions, something that was not the case before terms of 'what might happen if specific capa- the Second World War and the Cold War, and bilities did not exist."' [83] Moreover, they which meets the enormous need "to soften the usually have to engage in crisis management. It impact of pax Americana." [78] This gives might be suggested that this little study is medium powers considerable leverage. designed to expand the horizons of decision- War can be expected in the future, what- makers in the government to smooth the way ever its form (Haydon summarises quite neatly for Canadian naval planners. varying opinions on this, and "soft power" In the present strategic situation "there is receives short shrift: he cites in particular Dean good reason for navies to return to being multi- Oliver and Fen Osler Hampson on the subject), functional instruments of state authority over and it will be conducted under unprecedented the seas." [3] Naval forces will help protect the public scrutiny, thanks to modern media cover- interests of the state and preserve "a stable age. Information technology and the revolution environment in which to trade and prosper" [ in military affairs will separate the men from 30], often serving in a diplomatic role. War- the boys. States that can work together in crisis ships are particularly useful because they can management with technological compatibility, be deployed and if necessary withdrawn much and follow a well-defined political mandate, more simply than other armed forces, and they " will prosper. Inescapably, an ability to work have a symbolic value in that they are legal with the US Navy will be essential. Haydon refers frequently to "the lessons of 120 The Northern Mariner history," and calls upon such sages as Mahan ( the Mediterranean in 1967 was that Nasser, with favourable mention of Jon Sumida's even though the ships never got past Gibraltar, rehabilitation of that historian), Corbett and used that as a pretext for actions against Liddell Hart to give a respectable perspective UNEF. Was this a case of what Haydon calls to his argument. This is not, however, a work "getting it wrong"? Off El Salvador between based on more than cursory historical analysis. the wars and off Haiti after the Second World Vice Admiral Stansfield Turner, USN, is by War the navy's role was again a combination Haydon's admission a prime source for the of diplomacy and "compellence." And it is not argument he advances. There is nothing wrong clear why Haydon makes no reference to with this, because Stansfield Turner is a highly Canadian participation in the Persian Gulf credible authority whose vision, in the 1974 a War, which has been well documented in the rticle cited by Haydon, was prophetic. That monograph Operation Friction, by Richard being said, it is surprising that Haydon does Gimblett and Jean Morin. A possible reason is not pay more attention to Canadian experience the desire to make this study more than a since the Second World War, or even between comment on Canadian naval policy, but he has the wars. The RCN and RCAF during the Cold left a wide field for others to plough. War also had "multi-functional" roles because they supported at least two peacekeeping W.A.B. Douglas missions – Suez in 1958 and UNEF in 1967. Ottawa, Ontario Indeed, the down side of sending destroyers to