Posted on 06/25/2009 9:01:46 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
American Commando: Evans Carlson, His WWII Marine Raiders and America's First Special Forces Mission
By John Wukovits
Caliber, $25.95
Evans Carlson was not an ordinary U.S. Marine officer.
He was a maverick. He learned guerrilla warfare from Chinese communist forces in the 1930s. He believed in sharing hardships with enlisted men. He swapped letters with President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt's son, James, was his executive officer. Carlson led the Marines' first World War II special forces raids.
The 2nd Raider Battalion was created and trained by Carlson.
In August 1942, he led the first long-range strike against Japanese-held Makin Island. In 1942, Carlson led the unit's Long Patrol, spending 30 days behind Japanese lines on Guadalcanal, always moving, always killing and always disrupting.
John Wukovits, a premier historian of the Pacific war whose books include "One Square Mile of Hell: The Battle for Tarawa," brilliantly details Carlson's life and career. He draws on letters, diaries and official documents to portray the man and his troops and their accomplishments.
Wukovits contends, accurately, that the Raiders were the inspiration for the Green Berets, Navy SEALs and the Army Rangers. Carlson also created heavily armed fire teams, which the Marines use to this day.
The Raiders' attack on Makin was less than a total success.
Two companies of Carlson and his men were taken to the island on two submarines. They battled heavy surf to get ashore, then bogged down under sniper fire. Carlson, an advocate of movement, became surprisingly timid in a set-piece battle and briefly considered surrender. The Marines did kill Japanese and destroy equipment, but straggled back to the subs after an incomplete victory.
Guadalcanal was a different story. Marines were under siege and undersupplied around Henderson Field, the air base taken from the Japanese.
Carlson took six companies ashore at Aola Bay, 40 miles east of Henderson, on Nov. 4. For a month, the Raiders attacked, flanked, trapped and killed Japanese and destroyed supply dumps.
They captured and destroyed "Pistol Pete," an artillery piece that had shelled Henderson for months. The timid Carlson of Makin applied his own lessons.
In addition to the Japanese, the troops battled hunger, malaria, dysentery, jungle rot, snakes and insects. Disease took a higher toll than the enemy.
The Long Patrol changed the balance on Guadalcanal and helped lead to the U.S.' first Pacific ground victory.
Carlson and the Raiders had been hailed after the Makin raid, and the Long Patrol brought even more glory and medals. Hollywood made a movie about the raid. It was called "Gung Ho," after the Chinese slogan that Carlson used to create unity.
Such success did not go unpunished. Carlson was booted up to regiment and never commanded combat troops again. A line officer took over the battalion and eliminated the gung-ho spirit.
Carlson retired after the war in 1946 and died at 51 in May 1947. "American Commando" assures that his bravery and leadership will live on.
Good post.
parsy
I find Carlsons flirtation with the left fascinating and worthy of exploration. Evidently, he was remarkably successful in inculcating unit cohesion by copying the Communist Chinese methods which he described as, "gung ho."
For some time I have been suggesting that there is tremendous psychological power which comes to the individual when he surrenders his ego. Understanding the power of this phenomenon imparts understanding of the power of the left over the mind of those in the cult. This is part and parcel of the evangelical Christian experience, for example. The left induces the individual to surrender himself and his own identity and submerge it into the group instead of God. When the individual accomplishes this, he is rewarded with a wave of emotions and a feeling of well-being, integrity, identity, and belonging which replace an aching unease and sense of apartness which plague so many in this world. This phenomenon has been well recorded by psychologists.
I believe this has much to offer in explaining the power of the left and and why lefties are immune to logic, why their political alignment is a matter of emotion and not of logic and therefore immune to reason. One might say that the Marine Corps, for example, strips away the ego of the recruit in boot camp and replaces it with a group a identity. "Once a Marine, always a Marine." It seems that Carlson has taken this one step further. It is interesting that he insisted that his men be indoctrinated politically.
It also might explain why the Democrats are so invested in identity politics. Why they see the world as a collection of groups rather than as individuals. Why, for example, healthcare or college admissions should be doled out not to individuals but to group recipients.
Carlson was an extraordinary Marine and an extraordinary American. I do not know much about his politics, but I do not like what I see. However, it is important to see what he is doing in the context of 1920-1947 and not in the context of what we know today about how murderous the Chinese Communists really were from the perspective of the 21st century.
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