recommendation

[John Beaman]

For those interested in the “other war”, against Japan, I would HIGHLY recommend:December 8, 1941, MacArthur’s Pearl Harbor by William Bartsch, Texas A & M Press, ISBN 1-58544-246-1It covers the 18 months, plus or minus, leading up to the Japanese attack on the Philippines and the actual attack. Many of us have speculated over the years how MacArthur managed to lose 80% of his air force in an attack where he was forewarned, knew about Pearl Harbor, and the Japanese striking force was delayed a number of hours. This tells it all and is heavily documented.The author also wrote Doomed From The Start which is the detailed history of what happened to the USAAF fighter component during the Philippines campaign. A lot of the work was incorporated into Chris Shores’ volume 2 of Bloody Shambles, the first 6 months of the airwar in the Far East.