Reading Up on the Subject

[KevinRohrer]

For those who have an interest in reading about the combat that took place in this AO, the best book I have so far found is Fire in the Sky by Eric M. Bergerud, published in 2000 by Westview Press.
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This 680-page tome goes into great detail about the area, strategic importance of air bases, the aircraft and men, air tactics and strategies, and the history involved. Highly recommended for those wanting info on the air battle portion of the war in the South Pacific.

[AlvinS]

Thanks. I'll add that one to my list.

At the moment I am reading "The Solomons Campaigns 1942-1943 From Guadalcanal to Bouganville Pacific War Turning Point" By William L. McGee. (ISBN 0-9701678-7-3)

It goes into great detail about all of the battles fought during this campaign. It gives OOB data for both sides, and discusses lessons learned.

Sounds like "Fire In the Sky" will be a good compliment to this book.

[brisd]

I have been reading Fire In the Sky during my breaks from UV and find it the best history of this theater of war so far in my many years of military history readings. The description of the battlefield conditions including weather and almost total lack of infrastructure indicate that the designers of UV got it right!

[AlvinS]

The Matrix team did a great Job. "The Solomons Campaigns 1942-1943 From Guadalcanal to Bouganville Pacific War Turning Point" Conforms that Matrix did their homework. After reading this book I don't feel so bad when my Allied TF's take a pounding or Lunga is bombarded into dust.

I will be ordering Fire In the Sky from Amazon soon.

[seeker124]

I haven't seen any discussion about John B. Lundstrom's books on Naval Fighter Combat: "The First Team" and "The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign".

I haven't read the first book, but the second book is the most detailed look at the Naval Fighter force, along with plenty of first person information from both American and Japanese sources, that I have ever read. Given the subject matter, I highly, highly recommend them.

[Raverdave]

Eric Bergerud also wrote another book "Touched with Fire" The Land War in the South Pacific. I would rate it as a "MUST" read.

[jive1]

For something a little different I recommend
Black Cat Raiders of WWII by Richard Knott and Alone on Guadalcanal by Martin Clemens a Coastwatcher on the island.
Both may offer you a fresh view of the campaign, AoG being quite an adventure story about a brave and largely unsung group
of men.

[strollen]

Richard Frank's Guadacanal. Is probably the definitive account of what happened in and around the Island. I recently read it could for settling bets as to how many planes and how many hits etc :-)I also highly recommend both of Eric's books.

Frank's book will tell you WHAT happened. Eric's books will tell you WHY it happened

[XPav]

Eric Hammel wrote some books on Guadalcanal. The ones I read ten years or so ago (and harder to find nowadays) was a three-set of related books covering the land battle on Guadalcanal, the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, and Eastern Solomons/Santa Cruz.

[Drongo]

For those who like small, concise books (probably no one here), I found Adrian Stewart's 1985 "Guadalcanal : World War II's fiercest Naval Campaign" (ISBN 0-7183-0569-8) an excellent read. It wont tell you anything in its 190 pages that's not contained in the larger volumes but it gives a nice analysis of all the major land/air/sea clashes at Guadalcanal in '42. A good overview of what happened and why to both sides.

[Drongo]

Am I a trooper now?

[Drongo]

Yes!!!!!!!:) Sorry guys, just got excited.

[Tuomas Seijavuori]

For those who have an interest in reading about the combat that took place in this AO, the best book I have so far found is Fire in the Sky by Eric M. Bergerud

Thank you for the hint! I ordered the book from Amazon ($14.90US or so, $12 for the S&H) just because you recommended it and I'm now half-way through the book. It is interesting and makes playing UV twice as fun! As for the merits of the book itself: Bergerud is very thorough when it comes to the American side of the operations, but on many occasions I can't help thinking whether the Japanese historians would agree. Bergerud also constantly reminds the reader of his point of view with phrases like "we decided" and "we fought" as if the reader was his countryman. It actually bothered me first, because it seemed unprofessional for a historian. Strange that his publisher (editor) didn't catch that one. Even stranger if it is intentional.

[strollen]

The two downside Bergerud's books are that he holds the Japanese military leadership in undisguised in contempt, and that his books would have benefited from a much better editing to eliminate some of the redunancy and stream of consiousness writing.

On the positive side, he spends a lot of talking about all the little things (better engineers, better medical system, rotation policy, pilot search and rescue etc) that are generally overlooked by most militarian historian, and practically all wargames. (The collected works of Gary Grisby being a notable exception.) The cumulative impact of these little things were extraordinarily important.

Obviously lots of Americans want to be great general, cause by and large we do a great job with logistics!

[John Carney]

Although these books do not limit themselves to the Solomons Campaign or get to the nity grity they are great reading for Commanders and Operations that occured with the why and how.

For an American look John Costello "The Pacific War 1941-1945"
A pretty standard American view, but very well written.

For a more European view, with both theaters Robert Leckie "Delivered from Evil". A good look at the inner department and Country rivalries that effect the war conduct and production.

A good British view point James Dunnigan and Albert Nofi "Victory at Sea" (WWII in the Pacific).

And if you are really ventures the Soviets have released their intelligence reports on World War Two to their archieves. They are in Russian and it requires a formal request and cash. Some stuff will begin to appear on the internet translated I am sure.

Great thing about long deterent patroles is time to read. For those bubble heads "War Beneth the Sea" by Peter Padfield is great reading.

[brisd]

Two books published within the past decade are good overviews of the Pacific War, "The Pacific Campaign" by Dan van der Vat and "The War in the Pacific" by Harry A. Gailey which I am currently reading. For a retrospective of the origins of that conflict with a more modern view of why Japan felt compelled to attack the USA, I just picked up "Empires on the Pacific" by Robert Smith Thompson. The book starts with 1793 and the first foreign mission from Britain to Imperial China and advances to post-WW2. Sometimes the charge that the allies were just defending themselves has to be looked at in a long view of tens if not hundreds of years. Europe's imperial actions and the USA's the past century can help us understand Japan's politics and actions. There are many good books on various campaigns and aspects of the war but I find the general histories the most satisifying because I have always enjoyed the strategic elements more than the operational or tactical.

[Spooky]

Hi guys

I have added some of theses books to the UV Fansite along with some of your comments. If you want to have your comments removed, please send me an e-mail or a private message

Thanks

Spooky

PS : BTW, if you want to add any comment/review, you are of course welcome