New Books in Military History

Christopher Mauriello’s groundbreaking book Forced Confrontations: The Politics of Dead Bodies in Germany at the End of World War II(Lexington Books, 2017) focuses on American soldiers reactions to the victims of the Holocaust.  Using photographs, memoirs, and letters from US soldiers, Mauriello attempts to recreate the emotional and traumatic reactions these men had when confronted with the worst of Nazi Germany.  And, as a result, they made German civilians confront these horrors as an unofficial policy of the Military Government.  Mauriell’s methodology converges historical analysis with the latest in analytical theory to explain these reactions and humanize the end of World War II. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

In his splendid military history of Britain's pacification of the Arab revolt in Palestine, Britain's Pacification of Palestine: The British Army, the Colonial State, and the Arab Revolt, 1936-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2019), Professor Matthew Hughes of Brunel University shows how the British Army was so devastatingly effective against colonial rebellion in the mid to late 1930s by the Palestinian Arabs. The Army had a long tradition of pacification to draw upon to support operations, underpinned by the creation of an emergency Mandate / colonial state in Palestine. After conquering Palestine in 1917, the British established a civil Government that ruled by proclamation and, without any local legislature, the colonial authorities codified in law norms of collective punishment that the Army used in 1936. The Army used 'lawfare', emergency legislation enabled by the colonial state, to grind out the rebellion. Soldiers with support from the RAF launched kinetic operations to search and destroy rebel bands, alongside which the villagers on whom the rebels depended were subjected to curfews, fines, detention, punitive searches, demolitions and reprisals. Rebels were disorganised and unable to withstand the power of such pacification measures. Professor Hughes opus is the definitive account of the British military suppression of the Arab Revolt. Based upon voluminous archival research, It is difficult to imagine that it will be superseded anytime soon. According to Chatham Houses’ International Affairs, Britain’s Pacification of Palestine is “one of the most important and comprehensive accounts”, of this historical episode.Charles Coutinho has a doctorate in history from New York University. Where he studied with Tony Judt, Stewart Stehlin and McGeorge Bundy. His Ph. D. dissertation was on Anglo-American relations in the run-up to the Suez Crisis of 1956. His area of specialization is 19th and 20th-century European, American diplomatic and political history. He has written recently for the Journal of Intelligence History and Chatham House’s International Affairs. It you have a recent title to suggest for a podcast, please send an e-mail to Charlescoutinho@aol.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Alex Kay’s The Making of an SS Killer: the Life of Colonel Alfred Filbert, 1905-1990 (Cambridge University Press, 2016) is a must read for those interested in the Third Reich, the Holocaust, and World War II.  Focusing on the actions and consequences of a “front-line Holocaust perpetrator”, Kay’s biographies diverges drastically with the traditional bios of other more well-known Nazis.  Kay argues that Filbert chose to become an exceptional Nazi Party member and his career as well as his life hinged upon what seems to be an unquestionable dedication to the cause.  This book is not only well-researched, but intellectually tantalizing and addictive.  Kay’s narrative hooks you from his introduction and by the time the reader has finished, it is hard to believe that this is based on the facts of Filbert’s life and career.  Instead, it seems almost Hollywood-like in its tensions and its twist of an ending. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Amanda L. Tyler is the author of Habeas Corpus in Wartime: From the Tower of London to Guantanamo Bay, published by Oxford University Press in 2017. Habeas Corpus in Wartime is a comprehensive history of the writ of habeas corpus in Anglo-America. From its early beginnings, to the English Habeas Corpus Act of 1679, to its suspension during the American Civil War, to WWII internment camps, to the War on Terror, Tyler provides a compelling look at how important the writ has been during wartime.Amanda L. Tyler is the Shannon Cecil Turner Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. Her areas of research include the federal judiciary, separation of powers, habeas corpus, civil procedures, and the emergency Constitution.Derek Litvak is a Ph.D. student in the department of history at the University of Maryland. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Christine M. DeLucia is the author of Memory Lands: King Philip’s War and the Place of Violence in the Northeast, published by Yale University Press in 2018. Memory Lands provides a much needed new account of King Philip’s War which centers the Natives of the Northeast, instead of the English colonizers. Weaving together the history of King Philip’s War and the history of Northeast Native people to the modern day, DeLucia illustrates the many, complex, ways in which history and historical violence are intimately connected to the present day, and rarely ever just part of the past.Christine M. DeLucia is an Assistant Professor of History at Williams College. Her areas of research include Early American history, Native American and Indigenous Studies, material culture, cross-cultural communications, and violence.Derek Litvak is a Ph.D. student in the department of history at the University of Maryland. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Kevin M. Levin is the author of Searching for Black Confederates: The Civil War’s Most Persistent Myth, published by the University of North Carolina Press in 2019. Searching for Black Confederates investigates the claims that numerous African Americans willingly fought for the Confederacy. Investigating the Confederate Army at the time of the Civil War, Levin illustrates that such a claim would have surprised those actually present in the army. Moving forward, Levin recounts how this myth came to be, and its persistence into our own day. All the while, he makes sure to pay attention to the actions of African Americans during the Civil War and after its conclusion.Kevin Levin is an award-winning educator and historian, who studies the American Civil War.Derek Litvak is a Ph.D. student in the department of history at the University of Maryland. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

I spoke with Dr Adem Yavuz Elveren about his book on the economics of military spending; this is a very original theoretical and empirical contributionAdem Yavuz Elveren is Associate Professor at Fitchburg State University, U.S.A. His research focuses on gender and social security and the effect of military spending on the economy. The Economics of Military Spending offers a comprehensive analysis of the effect of military expenditures on the economy. It is the first book to provide both a theoretical and an empirical investigation of how military spending affects the profit rate, a key indicator of the health of a capitalist economy.We discussed the origin of the book and its main contribution. I asked the author to define what is the economic effect of military spending and how does it compare today with the past? We then reviewed what economic theory says about military spending. We then focused on military Keynesianism. I asked the author to explain the notion of military-industrial complex; what economists and politicians think about it. We then moved to what does a Marxist perspective add to the study of military spending. We concluded our conversation focusing on the empirical analysis on the nexus of military spending and profit rate.The book presents a general discussion on the economic models of the nexus of military spending and economic growth, as well as military Keynesianism and the military-industrial complex. Including an account of the Marxist crisis theories, it focuses on military spending as a counteracting factor to the tendency of rate of profit to fall. Using a range of econometric methods and adopting a Marxist perspective, this book provides comprehensive evidence on the effects of military spending on the rate of profit for more than thirty countries. The findings of the book shed light on the complex linkages between military spending and the profit rate by considering the role of countries in the arms trade.Andrea Bernardi is Senior Lecturer in Employment and Organization Studies at Oxford Brookes University in the UK. He holds a doctorate in Organization Theory from the University of Milan, Bicocca. He has held teaching and research positions in Italy, China and the UK. Among his research interests are the use of history in management studies, the co-operative sector, and Chinese co-operatives. His latest project is looking at health care in rural China. He is the co-convener of the EAEPE’s permanent track on Critical Management Studies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

In her new book, Social Aspects of Memory: Stories of Victims and Perpetrators from Bosnia-Herzegovina (Routledge, 2019). Alma Jeftić presents the compelling results of an empirical psychological study on how ordinary people remember war, drawing on narratives from two generations of people in Sarajevo and neighboring East Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina. This book sheds light on how collective memories are cultivated in the aftermath of violence, and how commemorative practices can be employed for either destructive or reconstructive ends.Jelena Golubović is a PhD candidate in anthropology at Simon Fraser University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

In his new book, Plots Against Hitler (Eamon Dolan/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016), Danny Orbach, Senior Lecturer at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem offers a profound and complete examination of the plots to assassinate Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler. A riveting narrative of the organization, conspiracy, and sacrifices made by those who led the resistance against Hitler. Orbach deftly analyzes the mixed motives, moral ambiguities and organizational vulnerability that marked their work, while reminding us forcefully of their essential bravery and rightness. And he challenges us to ask whether we would have summoned the same courage.Craig Sorvillo is a PhD candidate in modern European history at the University of Florida. He specializes in Nazi Germany, and the Holocaust. He can be reached at craig.sorvillo@gmail.comor on twitter @craig_sorvillo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Using a mixture of genres, Kent Gramm captures the voices of those past and present in his book, Gettysburg: The Living and the Dead(Southern Illinois University Press, 2019) Alongside stunning photographs by Chris Heisey, Gramm shares the experiences of the people at Gettysburg—both those historical figures who took part in the battle in some meaningful way and those of us today who return to the battlefield to try and make sense of such a tragic and mournful part of our history. Gramm’s writing style is eloquent and thought-provoking. By listening to the people who were at Gettysburg, he brings them back to life in a way that reveals the truth of the human experience and elicits empathy from his readers. Gettysburg: The Living and the Dead is emotionally stirring and absolutely essential toward helping us understand and heal from this tragic, watershed event in American history.Kent Gramm is an adjunct professor of English and Civil War Era Studies at Gettysburg College in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. A Wisconsin native, Gramm has also taught at colleges in Germany, Illinois, and Indiana. He holds a PhD in Creative Writing and American Literature from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, and studied theology at Princeton Theological Seminary at the University of Tuebingen, Germany. He has written books, plays, novels, and poetry about Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg, and the American Civil War. His book, November: Lincoln's Elegy at Gettysburg, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, and the graduate writing program at LSU awards an annual Kent Gramm Prize in Creative Nonfiction. Finally, he is a lifelong student of the Civil War.Colin Mustful is the author of four historical novels about Minnesota’s settlement and Native history. He holds an MA in history and a MFA in creative writing. He is the founder and editor of a small independent press called History Through Fiction. You can learn more about Colin and his work at colinmustful.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history