In a revision of his 1990 doctoral dissertation, Cameron
(History/Old Dominion Univ.) attempts to anatomize the esprit of
the 1st Division of the US Marine Corps on the basis of its
performance during WW II and after. In aid of his implicitly
pejorative inquiry, the author addresses ways in which
"historically invisible" cultural beliefs, perceptions, traditions,
and other band-of-brothers bonds related to the actual conduct of
battle. After sketching in the limited pre-Pearl Harbor role played
by the publicity-mined USMC in the American military, Cameron
critiques its training regimens, frequently comparing them to those
employed by the Waffen SS or other killer elites. Getting down to
cases, the author offers anecdotal accounts (drawn largely from
contemporary sources) of how shared ideology, myths, and
self-images affected the 1st Division's campaigns against Japanese
troops in the Pacific theater (Guadalcanal, Peleliu, Okinawa) and
their subsequent clashes with other Asiatic adversaries in China
and Korea. Among other things, cameron concludes that Marines not
only demonized but denigrated their foes, frequently on racial
grounds; and that they were encouraged further to consider
themselves far superior to their counterparts in other branches of
the armed services. Exactly what point the author's arguable
findings have, though, is unclear. To illustrate, he implies
without stating that the USMC's methods of preparing for and
engaging in warfare were deplorable and need to be understood if
they are to be set right (albeit in undisclosed fashion). The
actual result if our armed forces were to modify the ways they
ready themselves to fight remains another story - one Cameron
avoids altogether. In brief, then, an academic's examination of a
presumptive pathology, which will strike many readers as rotten to
the Corps. (Kirkus Reviews)
Events on the battlefields of the Pacific War were not only outgrowths of technology and tactics, but also products of cultural myth and imagination. American Samurai offers a bold and innovative approach to military history by linking combat activity to cultural images. Marines projected ideas and assumptions about themselves and their enemy onto people and events throughout the war--giving life to formerly abstract myths and ideas and molding their behavior to expectations. This fascinating book concludes by considering what happened to the myths and images and how they have been preserved in American society to the present.
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