U.S. Marine Corps World War II Order of Battle: Ground and Air Units in the Pacific War, 1939-1945
Product Description
Including extensive information only found in scattered sources or official documents and archives, this book provides detailed coverage of all organizational aspects of the Marine Corps units in World War II's Pacific Theater. It gives in-depth background information on the units' functions, evolution, designation practices, tactical organization of combat units, and extensive statistical and technical data including 21 maps. It covers atypical subjects such as Marines in China, and female and African American marines. Extensive additional data on weapons, U.S. Navy and Army backgrounds, Japanese Army and Navy backgrounds, code names, and comparative ranks of U.S. forces appear in the appendices. The book is a valuable one-stop resource for researchers, historians, military history enthusiasts, and war gamers.
As a complete reference source on the Marine Corps, the book provides an evolutionary study of the Marine Corps' wartime expansion and organization. It closely examines the prewar and wartime growth of the Marine Corps as well as its postwar reduction while providing complete background information on all ground and air units in the Pacific and their evolution. Information on each Marine Corps unit includes: dates in combat, location and code name of landing beaches, time of landing, island operation code names, date the island was declared secure, task organization for combat order of battle of the opposing Japanese units and their casualties, attached U.S. Army and U.S. Navy units, and much more. The book is the definitive source of organizational information.
</p>U.S. Marine Corps World War II Order of Battle: Ground and Air Units in the Pacific War, 1939-1945 Review
This book is everything the previous reviewers have said it is, a unique and indispensable resource on the World War II Marine Corps. It is not cheap, of course, but it saved me many hours of digging through archives, not to mention the time spent getting to them.The main chapters cover: 1. USMC organizational profile; 2. USMC shore establishment; 3. Fleet Marine Force (FMF); 4. Amphibious corps and forces -- Marine divisions, brigades, and tactical groups (including a summary of the history and actions of each); 5. FMF ground units (including a brief summary of the history and actions of each regiment and significant independent unit); 6. FMF ground unit operations (brief description of each major action, with order of battle on both sides and summary of results, including one or more maps for most); 7. USMC aviation profile; 8. USMC aviation units (to squadron and detachment level, with brief summary entry for each); 9. FMF aviation unit campaign participation.
There are useful appendixes covering the characteristics and utilization of weapons, aircraft, and landing ships and craft, as well as: a recap of USMC casualties; unit citations and commendations (as well as a statistical summary of individual awards); succinct but useful summary information on the U.S. Navy, U.S. Army, and Japanese forces; a listing of code names; and a comprehensive table of comparative rates and ranks.
As noted by another reviewer, the tables of organization are not always so detailed or complete as might be wished. Those who have been directly involved in military operations, however, will know that such tables always represent objectives rather than reality and that the actual organization is constantly in flux -- particularly so in war. One can get a detailed look at unit personnel strength (in most cases) by consulting the muster rolls (available on microfilm), but it is not practical to try to include all this information in a book even of this size.
With its oversized (7" � 10") page format and 600 text pages one would expect this book to pack a lot of information. The author manages to provide more even than might be expected by organizing the material well, which also makes it easy to find what you are looking for in this sea of data. Despite its "just the facts" orientation, readers will find many fascinating tid-bits. It is inevitable that in a book with this much information some bits will not be quite correct, but errors are few and inconsequential.
Most people probably neither need nor can afford this book for themselves, and the publisher has wisely positioned it as a library title. If you have any need or desire to study the Pacific War in depth, however, you will definitely want to urge your library to acquire it. This book is naturally complemented by Rottman's _World War II Pacific Island Guide : A Geo-Military Study_ (ISBN 0313313954), which provides details of the places where the Marines fought.
Will O'Neil
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