Patton's style has always seemed terribly inspiring in a thoroughly American way, as iconic as any choice celluloid moment of John Wayne or Clint Eastwood, with of course the notable exception that the explosives were authentic and no stunt men were used.
The muchness made of the slapping incidents by the shrieking fairies of the limp-wristed fifth-column press--not to mention by the anglophile Eisenhower--mark a downturn in American exceptionalism, into the Value Jet swamp of Eurination.
Today we have every imaginable "psychological" defense of the worst murders--bathtub drownings of children, Los Hermanos Melendez, et al.
There is of course a cure for this, to get us straight: first, admit the problem. Second, when Ted Kennedy compares abu Ghraib to Saddam Hussein, buckle him in a 70 Olds and deep six him in the Chappaquiddick.
When Ward Churchill calls the 3,000 innocents immolated and crushed in the World Trade Center "little Eichmanns", put him on trial for Holocaust denial, convict him, and lock him away for several decades.
As e.e. cummings said, "there is some shit i will not eat"
It is worth reviewing the personality of another famous commander, General Omar N. Bradley. Six years after the war he wrote a careful “official history” book entitled, “A Soldier’s Story.” He attacks Montgomery and his plans viciously, yet defends Eisenhower’s actions – sometimes even when these actions were to support Montgomery. However at occasions there is a break in the “official history” where we get a real glimpse of his thoughts. Unfortunately for us, Bradley did not keep a diary. If he had, we would have seen his day to day thoughts and what he was really thinking. Instead, we know only that both Eisenhower and Montgomery published their “Histories of the War” first, and that it some cases Bradley scrupulously “corrected history” and corroborated Eisenhower’s version. Patton is the only clear voice that remains from WWII without need of deciphering. We are extremely lucky that Patton followed General Pershing’s advice and kept a diary. Without Patton’s diary, we would not have clear proof of his incredible “sixth sense:” his accurate guesses as to the intention of the enemy. It is easy for a commander to say, years after the war, that he “knew all along” the enemy was about to attack. That commander must be able to prove that he knew – and the best proof is a day-to-day account in a war diary.
In “A Soldier’s Story,” Bradley praises Patton with what would seem mollified respect. But in 1983 Bradley wrote another vicious book that fiercely attacks Patton called, “A General’s Life.” The tone used in describing Patton, while in the first book admiring, has changed to bitter hatred. In his second book, Bradley attacks Patton where in the first book he seemed to approve. Read these two passages describing the same event.
“Patton telephoned me that evening from Lucky Forward near Laval. ‘We’ve got elements in Argentan,’ he reported. ‘Let me go on to Falaise and we’ll drive the British back into the sea for another Dunkirk.’‘Nothing doing,’ I told him, for I was fearful of colliding with Montgomery’s forces. ‘You’re not to go beyond Argentan. Just stop where you are and build up that shoulder. Sibert tells me the German is beginning to pull out. You’d better button up and get ready for him.’” “A Soldier’s Story,” by General Omar N. Bradley
“I had a sharp telephone exchange with Patton that morning. He further infuriated me with his boastful, supercilious attitude. ‘Let me go on to Falaise and we’ll drive the British back into the sea for another Dunkirk.’ I replied coldly and firmly, ‘Nothing doing. You’re not to go beyond Argentan. Just stop where you are and build up that shoulder.’” “A General’s Life,” by General Omar N. Bradley
And while in the first account Bradley seems happy that Patton recalled Haislip “without a word,” in the second account, Bradley is “furious” that Patton did not ask to advance Haislip in the first place. There is a very clear difference in Bradley’s attitude towards Patton in both books. Why?
It first must be realized that Bradley lived into the 1980s – long enough to see the collapse of the post-war reputations. Bradley had lived a long and prosperous life. He had commanded in Korea and had been promoted to five-star general. Bradley knew that he had risen higher than Patton would ever have been allowed to go. Yet Bradley must also have known that he was eclipsed by the genius of the man whom he had commanded. Bradley must have read many of the books by historians who had begun to realize that Patton had been unjustly cheated of many opportunities – like Falaise – for winning the war.
Bradley lived to read books by historians who had uncovered evidence that Eisenhower and Montgomery were bad commanders who had purposely “lost” files pertaining to their disasters. “Patton’s Gap,” with its evidence that Bradley had changed his version of events to match Eisenhower’s, had been published as well. There were some cloudy circumstances around his own Hurtgen Forest and Battle of the Bulge, too.
Patton had emerged the true hero of WWII – Bradley was only a five star general who had survived the war. Historians already knew that one of the reasons Bradley was promoted was because he was so weak-kneed. Did Bradley read the books that proved Patton was denied gas for his attacks? Or the books that showed he had ignored Patton’s timely advice predicting the Battle of the Bulge? It would have been difficult for Bradley to ignore the evidence that Eisenhower’s, Montgomery’s, and his own reputation were not going to last beyond his lifetime.
It seems to me that “A General’s Life” was Bradley’s last, desperate “vindication” of the men whose reputations were falling apart around him. Bradley would have went down with far more grace if he had let history uncover itself; but instead in his 2nd book, like his first, Bradley tries to obscure the gradually emerging truth by defending Eisenhower tooth and nail.
Bradley had another unique experience – reading Patton’s diary. Since Patton’s diary was a record of his intensely personal and often critical thoughts and comments, it was not published until after Eisenhower’s death. Patton had often criticized Bradley’s timidity and mediocrity in his diary. Bradley writes of reading Patton’s diaries and letters,
“He wrote obsessively candid self-congratulatory (or self-abnegating) letters and diaries, which have recently been edited and published in two volumes. Reading these volumes was one of the most astonishing literary experiences of my life. It would seem that no thought George ever had in his life – however trivial or magnificent – went unrecorded, that his sense of greatness and destiny demanded a full accounting to the public.”
Bradley does not seem to realize that Patton wrote his diary with no intention of ever releasing it to the public. The thoughts and impressions recorded there were his real opinions – he was not trying to show-off to the “public.”
There was much in Patton’s diary that, while interesting from a historical perspective, was hardly flattering. For instance, Patton wrote about Bradley,
“His success is due to his lack of backbone and subservience to those above him. I will manage without him. In fact, I always have; even in Sicily he had to be carried.” Patton’s Diary
True, but undoubtedly infuriating to its subject.
It seems that after Bradley read Patton’s diary, he bitterly hated Patton and wished to criticize Patton “for the record” in his new book. One particularly jarring account is coupled with the announcement of Patton’s death – a death that does not seem to have upset him at all. He writes that,
“It may be a harsh thing to say, but I believe it was better for George Patton and his professional reputation that he died when he did. The war was won; there were no more wars left for him to fight. He was not a good peacetime soldier; he would not have found a happy place in the postwar Army. He would have gone hungering for the old limelight, beyond doubt indiscreetly sounding off on any subject any time, any place. In time he would have become a boring parody of himself – a decrepit, bitter, pitiful figure, unwittingly debasing the legend.” “A General’s Life,” by General Omar N. Bradley, page 464
While obviously Bradley’s opinion of Patton had soured with age, Bradley never truly appreciated Patton’s worth. In Sicily, Patton had been in command of Bradley. Patton forced Bradley to employ daring end-run tactics which eventually led to the capture of Palermo and Messina. Nevertheless, Bradley resented Patton’s “meddling” in his command. Bradley was the military adviser for the Patton movie. As Carlo d’Este pointed out, Bradley seems the hero, always advising Patton not to be foolhardy – “Those out-spoken comments will eventually catch up with you!” “George, you’re going to get yourself relieved if you don’t shut up!”
Interestingly, one of the most inaccurate scenes of the movie Patton was protested against by the actor who plays Patton, George C. Scott. The scene occurs in Sicily, where Patton tells Truscott that if his conscience will not let him conduct the risky end-run operation, “I will relieve you and have someone else do it.” Patton says that he doesn’t care how many men die, because he must take Messina before the British. Scott believed the scene did not properly represent Patton’s character and that it suggested Patton was indifferent to his men’s welfare. Even though Scott protested the scene, the studio owners wouldn’t change it. It strikes me that the military adviser for the movie, General Bradley, who was there in Sicily in 1943 and knew the scene to be false, did not protest it as well.
Bradley did not see fit to protest the many inaccuracies of the movie even when George C. Scott did, and so the studio owners kept the inaccurate Sicily scene. Scott, however, did not give up easily. He decided to purposely play the scene reclining on the couch, hoping that people would realize the scene’s falsity. When I first watched the movie, the fact that Patton was saying things he never said while lying down particularly galled me. I did not know this interesting side of the story.
Obviously, Bradley must have had some reason that made his hatred blind; what it is, we shall never know. It may have been jealousy at Patton’s fame, anger at Patton’s descriptions and predictions in his diary, loyalty to President Eisenhower, or all three. Bradley says in his book, “A General’s Life,”
“Patton and I were closely associated at Fort Benning for a period of almost a year. It was during this time that I first got to know him well. Thereafter our professional lives would become interwoven in war. He would be my boss; then in a kind of Greek drama, I his. As a result I probably knew Patton as well as any man.”
True, but Bradley did not see fit to defend him even when Scott, who did not know Patton, did.
Here is Bradley’s description of Patton. Historically it is not worth much, but it may be helpful in understanding the man who wrote it.
“As a soldier, a professional officer, Patton was the most fiercely ambitious man and the strangest duck I have ever known. He appeared to be motivated by some deep, inexplicable martial spirit. He devoured military history and poetry and imagined – in the spirit of reincarnation – that he had fought with Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Caesar, [sic] Napoleon. He dressed as though he had just stepped out of a custom military tailor shop and had his own private bootblack. He was unmercifully hard on his men, demanding the utmost in military efficiency and bearing. Most of them respected but despised him. Although he could be the epitome of grace and charm at social or official functions, he was at the same time the most earthily profane man I ever knew. I sometimes wondered if this macho profanity was unconscious overcompensation for his most serious personal flaw: a voice that was almost comically squeaky and high-pitched, altogether lacking in command authority. Like Douglas Mac Arthur, Patton was a born publicity hound, a glory seeker.” “A General’s Life,” by General Omar N. Bradley, page 98.
I cannot help but wonder if Bradley here disguised his own thoughts about Patton as Patton’s men’s; it seems it was really Bradley who “respected but despised” Patton.
