Dimitri’s Reviews > The Two-Ocean War > Status Update

(p. 359) "it has been very tempting to British writers to pin the failure of operation SHINGLE (Anzio) on their allies. General Lucas, it is argued, should on D Day itself have ordered 1 column into the Alban hills & another into Rome itself, which would have fallen like a ripe plum. Patton would have done just that. "
Food for thought...after at least two more books.

"shipping was the bottleneck for everything and Admiral Dönitz was doing very well in his efforts to squeeze that neck"

That is why a worldwide shortage of landing craft occurred in 1944. Destroyers, escort carriers and antisub aircraft had been given "triple A" construction priority. If the defeat of the U boat failed, everything would fail.

Savo Island opened a bloody and desperate campaign for control of an island that neither side really wanted but which neither side could afford to abandon to the enemy.

By good luck, the Lexington and Yorktown fliers encountered light carrier Shoho, piled in on her and put her under in a matter of ten minutes, a record for the entire war. SCRATCH ONE FLATTOP! Signaled Lexington's dive bomber commander.

"the entire experience of the war demonstrated that the heavily escorted merchant convoy, supplemented by an escort carrier group on its flank, was by far the best way to get U-boats because the merchantmen acted as bait. The convoy was not a defensive weapon, as no often charged by ignorant or prejudiced people, but the best sort of offensive , besides being the only way to insure safe transportation."

"the United States, in contrast, was like a city police force equipped only with high-powered rifles, but with no weapons to meet thugs jumping patrolmen at night with automatic pistols and blackjacks"

"If England slept, America not only slept but snored."

A simple, witty phrase. Yet underneath there is a sense of post facto bitterness towards tandem isolationism & neglect of military readiness, common among historians of WWII who lived through the conflict, which their modern counterparts cannot match from a distance of almost a century.