The Pacific [antikvár]

Introduction Hundreds of great books have been written about the Pacific War. The majority of these volumes fall into one of three categories: a book about the war in general; a book that illuminates every detail of a single battle or important aspect; or a book by a veteran about his experiences. While all of these have their place in the historiography of such an important event, there is room for one more. The goal of The Pacific is to take the reader through the Pacific War, from first to last, through the eyes of a select few of the men who fought it. In this way, the reader enjoys the immediacy of the individual narrative, but sees the war as a whole. To achieve this goal, the five stories included here were chosen because they are representative of the experience. Between these men, they fought many of the great battles of the Pacific War. The coincidences and relationships that connect the five men allow their experiences to arrive in the context within which they occurred. The historical perspective emerges in a variety of ways. After carefully choosing the right stories, and developing them to their fullest, the author has chosen to provide only a thin skein of omniscience. Given its goal, this work is self-evidently not a definitive history of the entire war or even of the battles that it covers. Attempting to tell the story of individuals is fraught with perils. Sources contradict one another. The fog of war leaves mistaken impressions. The fog of time increases these misapprehensions. The documents are incomplete, somedmes inaccurate, and always more revealing of the aggregate experience than that of the individual. Relying on the letters, reports, and journals written during the war, though, solves most of these problems.