Podcast
The Danger Zone (DZ)
Hosted by Paul Fordyce · EN
Paul conducts the guided tour at the Australian Armour and Artillery Museum, Cairns every Saturday at 10:30 am. Paul’s tour’s like what Carlsberg says about their beer, probably the best tour of an armour and artillery museum in the world. The Trip Advisor reviews of his Tour speak for themselves. This Podcast is like the Tour – only infinitely better. It looks at military history, in incredible detail, the likes of which you’ve never heard before. Never rushed – the topic is exhaustively covered in as many parts as are needed to do the topic full justice.
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Episodes
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DZ Season 064 Part 39. End the War in 44 – Only Human – JCH Lee 3 – For the Overlord Supply Build Up Somervell Needed His Best Man.
1w ago00:26:29Tap to summarizeTo manage the buildup and subsequent supply of the American troops being shipped to Europe for the planned invasion of Hitler’s Festung Europa, Fortress Europe, Hank H Cox, in his biography of General JCH Lee, The General Who Wore Six Stars, wrote:The Allied governments had determined that Germany would be their top priority. After Germany was defeated, they would make Japan their primary focus. But conquering Germany meant it would be necessary to invade Europe, and that would require an amphibious assault across the English Channel. Thus a materiel buildup in Great Britain of vast proportions would be the first essential step to wresting the continent from Germany's grip.To manage a buildup and subsequent supply of that magnitude in Europe, Somervell needed his best man — someone with proven ability that he could trust. Somervell achieved big things because he selected men who knew what they were doing and were determined to get it done.He chose General JCH Lee – did he choose wisely? There were and are many who say that he didn’t. This all plays a big part in why the Allies didn’t win the war in Europe in 1944 – with huge consequences with the voracious Russian bear devouring everything in its path to come out of World War II as a super power that rivalled the United States.Tag words: Hitler; Festung Europa; Fortress Europe; Hank H Cox; General JCH Lee; The General Who Wore Six Stars; Brehon Somervell; General Marshall; Pearl Harbor; General Lesley McNair; John Kennedy Ohl; Supplying the Troops; BOLERO; OVERLORD; European Theater of Operations; ETO; Services of Supply; SOS; Secretary Stimson; Major General Mark Clark; General Eisenhower; GeneralBradley; General Patton; Bedell Smith; Martin Creveld; Supplying War; Logistics; Rommel; Moving Mountains; Lieutenant-General William G Pagonis; Operation Desert Storm; General Homer M Groninger; Colonel Thomas B. Larkin; General James G Harbord; General Pershing;
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DZ Season 064 Part 38. End the War in 44 – Only Human – JCH Lee 2 – The Biggest Jerk in the European Theater of Operations
2w ago00:33:54Tap to summarizeFor the most part the popular historians have been even harder on [General JCH Lee than the men who served with him]. Stephen E. Ambrose wrote in Citizen Soldiers that Lee was "the biggest jerk" in the European theater of operations.Hank H Cox, in his biography of Lee, The General Who Wore Six Stars, gave himself the task of answering this key question when he wrote Lee’s biography:The bigger question is whether Lee performed his job well, and that is a matter of some dispute. Indeed it is safe to say that Lee has come down in history to us as one of the most controversial personalities of the great conflict, or perhaps any American conflict.So I have to quote one final peer, a man of the highest rank and importance to the American war effort in Europe, who commented on Lee, in fairly glowing terms. But was he saying what he really thought?Tag words: General JCH Lee; Stephen E. Ambrose; Citizen Soldiers; Hank H Cox; The General Who Wore Six Stars; General Bradley; A Soldier’s Story; Com Z; Communications Zone; Eisenhower;General Marshall; General Brehon Somervell; G-4; G-3; G-2; Kennedy Ohl; Supplying the Troops; Joseph T McNarney; Goldthwaite Dorr; Colonel Henry S Aurand; World War I; Great War; Services of Supply; SOS; Army Service Forces; Lesley J McNair; Henry Arnold; Matthew 6:24; Patterson;
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DZ Season 064 Part 37. End the War in 44 – Only Human – JCH Lee 1 – Eisenhower Only Had 5 Stars – Who Had 6?
3w ago00:23:38Tap to summarizeOn December 16, 1944, there was a wedding at Eisenhower's headquarters in Paris for a young staff officer and a Red Cross nurse.….The day before the wedding President Roosevelt had nominated Eisenhower to the five-star rank of General of the Army, along with Marshall, Douglas MacArthur in the Pacific, and Hap Arnold of the air force. Also getting multistar treatment were Adm[iral]s. William Leahy, Ernest King, and Chester Nimitz, who were named to the equivalent five-star rank of Admiral of the Fleet.This was big stuff to the career military officers, as it represented the pinnacle of professional achievement. Ulysses S. Grant was the first general in American history to wear four stars. George Washington himself had only three as a lieutenant general, though in 1976, in honor of the bicentennial, Congress posthumously awarded him a fourth star, making him General of the Armies.So wrote Hank H Cox in his biography of General JCH Lee, with the telling title The General Who Wore Six Stars. Let me tell you about that, but just briefly, in passing it’s interesting to note the footnote that Carlo d’Este appended to his biography of General Patton, A Genius for War, in the light of the Congress making the posthumous promotion of George Washington (although admittedly to the rank of a four star general and not a five star general):Two resolutions were introduced into the 82d Congress in 1951 by Massachusetts representatives to posthumously promote Patton to the rank of five-star general, thus placing him alongside both Eisenhower and Bradley. Neither passed and both were opposed by the Pentagon on grounds that it was against policy ever again to promote officers to five-star rank.That Sicilian slapping incident still made Patton, even dead, too controversial a figure to honour in that way just after the war I reckon.Tag words: Eisenhower; President Roosevelt; General of the Army; Ulysses S. Grant; George Washington; Hank H Cox; The General Who Wore Six Stars; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; General JCH Lee; Bradley; Patton; Materialschlacht; Service of Supply; sos; Communications Zone; ComZ; Third Army; Court House; Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ Himself; Bedell Smith; Geoffrey Perret; There's a War to Be Won; Kay Summersby; He Was My Boss; Rick Atkinson; The Guns at Last Light; Jonathan W. Jordan;Brothers, Rivals, Victors; Antony Beevor; Captain Harry C. Butcher;
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DZ Season 064 Part 36. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 7 – Patton Hated Being on the Defensive at All.
Apr 2200:25:27Tap to summarizeThe reality is that Patton accepted the inevitability of death in combat but strove mightily to save the lives of his men.so wrote Carlo d’Este in his biography of Patton – A Genius for War.Patton’s preferred nickname for himself, “Blood and Guts”, would seem to bely this assessment. Carlo d’Este had this to say about Patton’s reputation:Eisenhower was well aware that Patton's detractors were snidely twisting his vainglorious nickname by referring to him as "Our Blood, his Guts," and apparently privately agreed with them to some extent. "Ike feels Patton is motivated by selfishness," wrote Butcher. "He thinks Patton would prefer the war to go on if it meant further aggrandizement for him. Neither does he mind sacrificing lives if by so doing he can gain greater fame." It was a reflection of Patton's obsession with carving his place in history that even his closest friend viewed him as intrinsically a glory hound. Or, as Eisenhower's biographer Piers Brendon has less charitably written: "Ike recognized that Patton's vicious and manic qualities were better calculated to win victories than the sober virtues of less inspired generals."So what’s the truth?Tag words: Patton; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; Blood and Guts; Eisenhower; Bradley; 17thAirborne Division; Ardennes offensive; Russell Weigley; Eisenhower’s Lieutenants; Nigel Hamilton; The Battles of Field Marshal Montgomery; SHAEF; Krauts; Field Marshal Brooke; War As I Knew It; Panthers; Third US Army; General Middleton; VIII US Corp; General Gay; Dominick Graham; Shelford Bidwell; Coalitions, Politicians and Generals; JCH Lee; Jesus Christ himself;
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DZ Season 064 Part 35. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 6 – Was Patton a Cowboy.
Apr 1500:24:48Tap to summarizeGrudging admiration of Patton was even expressed by Adolf Hitler, who referred to him as "that crazy cowboy general."wrote Carlo d’Este in his biography of Patton, A Genius for War.I don’t think it was grudging admiration from Adolf Hitler. I think it was a genuine compliment. Let me explain why.Tag words: Patton; Adolf Hitler; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; Karl May; Christa Schroeder; He Was My Chief; Albert Speer; Inside the Third Reich; Spandau – The Secret Diaries; Winnetou; Schlieffen Plan; Karl-Heinz Frieser; The Blitzkrieg Legend; David Irving; Hitler’s War; Rommel; General Enno von Rintelen; Field Marshal Milch; Jeb Stuart; Geoffrey Perret; Old Soldiers Never Die; Douglas MacArthur; Russell Weigley; Eisenhower’s Lieutenants; Third Army; General Gaffey; Brigadier General Hobart R. Gay; Colonel Halley G. Maddox; Dominick Graham; Shelford Bidwell; Coalitions, Politicians and Generals;
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DZ Season 064 Part 34. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 5 – Why Patton Was Right to Slap Those Two Soldiers.
Apr 800:27:36Tap to summarizeOne of the fellows under me was Orde Wingate!’ …. Rank-and-file British soldiers trained kibbutzniks in military tactics. The British militarised the Yishuv and the 'Jewish warrior — as a cultural and social model and as a fact of life — emerged during the Arab Rebellion.’ …. Wingate slapped and struck Jewish soldiers in his squads, who took this as a necessary part of their drill and called Wingate the 'insane one.’ British soldiers such as Corporal Howbrook serving with the S[pecial] N[ight] S[quad]s saw the eccentric Wingate treat the Jews 'almost like dirt ... the rank and file he could do anything with them. He could push them around and order them about. And they'd almost run like kittens, little puppies.’So wrote Matthew Hughes in Britain’s Pacification of Palestine. Was it really OK then for Patton to have slapped two of his soldiers?Tag words: Orde Wingate; Martin Creveld; Fighting Power; American Army; German Army; Psychiatric cases; mental health issues; Patton slapping; Post Traumatic Stress Disorder; PTSD; Ethan Watters; Crazy Like Us; American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, DSM; debility syndrome; Da Costa's syndrome; shell shock; trauma;
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DZ Season 064 Part 33. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 4 – Once a Powerful Friend Transformed into a Powerful Enemy.
Apr 100:20:23Tap to summarizeThe Times 6th December 1943 edition covered a piece written by The Quaker muckraker Drew Pearson, apparently tipped off by an OSS source, broadcast a garbled but uncensored version of the incidents during his weekly radio show as Rick Atkinson recounted in his book The Day of Battle. The Times piece read:On November 21 crusading Drew Pearson, once called a liar by the President, let his nationwide radio audience in on a secret that scores of U.S. correspondents had shared with thousands of U.S. soldiers since August. George S. Patton, the General who does not believe in nerve difficulties, had some himself … . For slapping a hospitalized soldier, … .Now Patton’s future was on the line. So, for that matter was Eisenhowers.Tag words: Times; Drew Pearson; Rick Atkinson; The Day of Battle; George S Patton; Eisenhower; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; Private Charles H Kuhl; Private Paul G Bennett; Ruth Ellen; Stimson; Bedell Smith; General Marshall; President Roosevelt; Omar Bradley; Overlord; 12th Army Group; General John J Pershing;
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DZ Season 064 Part 32. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 3 – Managing a Crisis.
Mar 2500:30:44Tap to summarizeCowards. Cowardice. Fear. An army has to have soldiers who are afraid. If it didn’t it would be a disastrous army. Just enough fear is what is wanted, but if there’s too much fear then that spells disaster. To understand what I’m talking about you really have to get your head around this.Tag words: Cowards; Cowardice; Nelson Mandela; Long Walk to Freedom; Jonathon Haidt; The Anxious Generation; fear; anxiety; Patton; Eisenhower; Rick Atkinson; Liberation Trilogy; The Day of Battle; Kay Summersby; Eisenhower Was My Boss; Past Forgetting; Harry Butcher; cowards and skulkers; Alexander; Eisenhower; Beetle Smith; Carlo d’Este; Blessé; Demaree Bess; A Genius for War; Major General John Porter Lucas; Marshall;
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DZ Season 064 Part 31. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 2 – The Slap That Killed Millions.
Mar 1800:22:06Tap to summarizeIn the space of a week, 3 and 10 August 1943, two incidents occurred that could have resulted in the sacking of Patton. He he’d slapped and otherwise abused two different men in Evacuation Hospitals calling them both cowards and apparently threatening to shoot one of them. The story had reached the ears of four reporters, attached to the Seventh Army, Demaree Bess of the Saturday Evening Post, Merrill Mueller of NBC, Al Newman of Newsweek, and John Charles Daly of CBS.Carlo d’Este, in his biography of Patton, A Genius for War, related what happened next:Bess, Mueller, and Quentin Reynolds of Collier's, flew to Algiers, and on August 19 a written summary prepared by Bess was presented to Bedell Smith. The Bess report noted that Patton had committed a court-martial offense by striking an enlisted man, and ended: "I am making this report to General Eisenhower in the hope of getting conditions corrected before more damage has been done."….The arrival of the three correspondents reinforced Eisenhower's awareness that he had a tiger by the tail. What they wanted was a deal: In return for killing the story they wanted Patton fired. Correspondent Reynolds summed up the strong anti-Patton bias within the press corps when he told Eisenhower that there were "at least 50,000 American soldiers on Sicily who would shoot Patton if they had the chance." John Charles Daly thought Patton had gone temporarily crazy.Eisenhower had no intention of submitting to an undisguised attempt to blackmail him into getting rid of Patton. Torn among loyalty to an old friend, the clear necessity that he must be disciplined, and the consequences of losing Patton altogether if the incidents became public, Eisenhower unhesitatingly decided that "Patton should be saved for service in the great battles still facing us in Europe, yet I had to devise ways and means to minimize the harm that would certainly come from his impulsive action and to assure myself that it was not repeated."Now let me ask a question that you will definitely find odd. Had Patton done the wrong thing? So you can consider your verdict, here’s what happened.Tag words: Patton; slapping incidents; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; General Eisenhower; Ike; Ernie Pyle; Rick Atkinson; The Day of Battle; Charles H Kuhl; Major General John Porter Lucas; Marshall;Private Paul G Bennett; Bradley; Brigadier General William B Kean; Brigadier General Frederick A Blessé; General Alexander;
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DZ Season 064 Part 30. End the War in 44 – Only Human – Patton 1 – Salute to a Rebel.
Mar 1100:26:42Tap to summarizePatton. I stand on shaky ground speaking about this American legend if I’m going to say anything negative about him. Luckily for me all of the men who served in his Third Army are now dead so I’m unlikely to get punched in the face for what I am going to say over the next few parts of this series about the man.Carlo d’Este, in his biography of Patton, A Genius for War thought that this remark by the Emperor of the French, Napoleon Bonaparte, captured the spirit of Patton:If the art of war consisted in not taking risks glory would be at the mercy of very mediocre talent.Patton was certainly a general who was willing to take risks. So let’s see how Patton stacks up when looking at the war in Europe in those crucial months between the end of July 1944 and January 1945.Tag words: Patton; Third Army; Carlo d’Este; A Genius for War; Napoleon Bonaparte; George C. Scott; World War II; Andy Rooney; General Omar N Bradley; A Soldier’s Story; Eisenhower; Adolf Hitler; Karl May; Westerns; Basil Liddell Hart; The Other Side of the Hill; Operation Cobra; Blumentritt; Pétain; Field-Marshal Rundstedt; God; Charles Codman; Compassionate; Ruth Ellen;
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