Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Military historian Frank (Downfall) taps a massive, multicontinent array of sources to deliver the definitive account of the first phase of WWII in the Pacific. Frank begins more than four years before the bombing of Pearl Harbor, with the July 1937 skirmish between Japanese and Chinese Nationalist forces that sparked full-scale combat in the region. He documents the Battle of Shanghai, where fierce Chinese resistance enraged Japanese attackers, leading to the Imperial Army's "carnival of violation" at Nanking, and reveals that Chiang Kai-shek's attempt to save the wartime capital of Wuhan by breaching dykes along the Yellow River cost roughly half a million civilian lives. Frank traces the intricacies of Japanese, British, and American war plans as the theater of combat expanded to Hong Kong, the Malaya Peninsula, the Dutch East Indies, Burma, and the Philippines, and details intelligence and communication failures that led the U.S. Pacific Fleet to be caught by surprise at Pearl Harbor. Interweaving high-level strategic analysis with vivid eyewitness reports, Frank documents the chaotic fall of Singapore, when Japanese soldiers "wreaked slaughter" on thousands fleeing the city-state in "every imaginable craft... with the faintest prospect of seaworthiness." Concluding with a brief but gruesome account of the Bataan Death March and noting that the capture of Corregidor "marked the moment when the Imperial Japanese Empire reached its zenith," Frank masterfully sets the stage for the next installment in a planned trilogy. With copious maps and 160 pages of endnotes, this epic yet accessible account sets a new gold standard for histories of the conflict. (Mar.)
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
In this first of a projected three-volume set, historian Frank (Guadalcanal) focuses solely on the totality of the Asia-Pacific Region during World War II. To those familiar with Dan Carlin's Hardcore History podcast, Frank wastes little time jumping right into the military and political action, beginning in 1937. His descriptions of battles and strategy are skillful, putting readers in the front row to historical scenes such as Japan's invasion of China, the United States' reluctant Russian alliance and, ultimately, the attack on Pearl Harbor. Frank also discusses nations often forgotten during World War II: China, the Philippines, and Burma. He conveys that World War II was a defining moment for the Asia-Pacific region, and its effects drastically altered the fates of countries who went from colonialism to basic sovereignty in a matter of a decade. Notes and a bibliography are included, along with maps and photographs. VERDICT Frank succeeds in his goal to alter our view of World War II as mostly a European clash in this informative book meant for all serious world history readers, even those who presume to know all there is to know about World War II. [See Prepub Alert, 10/7/19.]--Keith Klang, Port Washington P.L., NY
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The first of a three-volume definitive history of the Asia-Pacific War.As distinguished World War II scholar Frank (MacArthur, 2007, etc.), who served as a platoon leader in the Vietnam War, writes, after Japan conquered nearby Manchuria in 1931, local Japanese forces invaded China proper in 1937. "This volume," writes the author, "attempts to restore the notion of a Heroic China' carrying on in the face of Japanese aggression, with horrific levels of death and destruction and with very sparse international support.The possibility that China could hold out in a conflict with Japan for more than weeks, or at most months, was wholly discounted throughout the world in 1937." In the first half of this monumentally researched narrative, Frank recounts the war in China, where more fighting and deaths occurred than on all other fronts combined. Readers may be startled to learn that historical opinion of China's leader Chiang Kai-shek has vastly improved. Frank agrees, maintaining that Chiang's stubbornness and acumen converted the Japanese invasion into a quagmire, "a struggle that would prove ultimately fatal to Imperial Japan." In 1941, galvanized by Hitler's invasion of Russia and embargoed by America, Japan's army leaders yearned to invade Siberia, and the navy leadership sought to conquer resource-rich Southeast Asia, which risked war with the U.S. The morass in China probably tipped the balance. After an absorbing account of the planning and maddening negotiation that preceded the attack on Pearl Harbor, Frank enters familiar territory with gripping descriptions of the attack followed by Japan's dazzling conquests from the South Pacific through the Philippines, East Indies, Singapore, and Burma. Readers may be surprised by the fact that Japanese troops were usually outnumbered (more than 2-to-1 in the Philippines) but better led. Frank's sharp portraits of the Allied generals include the usual incompetent suspects (e.g., Arthur Percival in Singapore) but also two who emerged as heroes (Douglas MacArthur and Joseph Stilwell).A painful yet riveting history, especially valuable for historians and military buffs. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
