The Best War Ever

The second edition of a work first published in 1994, this study by historian Michael C. C. Adams argues that America's popular memory of World War II as a "Good War" and golden age distorts a complex historical reality. Adams, a Regents Professor of History at Northern Kentucky University, contends that while the Allied victory was a genuine and necessary achievement for democracy, the conflict has been mythologized into a simplified narrative in which everyone was united, families were well adjusted, and veterans returned home unscathed. The book's stated goal is to subject the war's major aspects to careful analysis, presenting a picture that neither demeans America's real accomplishments nor diminishes the stress, suffering, and failures that accompanied them.

Adams begins by challenging the folklore version of the war's origins, in which dictators openly collaborated to destroy democracy while spineless democratic leaders failed to stand up to them. He traces the conflict's roots to the late 18th century, identifying competing philosophies of governance, the connection between citizenship and military service forged in the French and American revolutions, and the influence of Social Darwinism, a philosophy holding that nations must conquer or die. Western imperial competition for resources led to domination of much of the globe, with Japan emerging as the one independent Asian nation and the United States expanding into the Pacific. World War I's aftermath destabilized Europe: the collapse of four imperial dynasties created fragile new states, Bolshevism in Russia deepened East-West hostility, and Germany's economic recovery depended on American loans. When the 1929 stock market crash triggered a global depression, these arrangements crumbled, and Adolf Hitler rose to power in January 1933. Adams portrays Hitler not as a madman but as a nationalist and political showman who used spectacle, terror, and propaganda to consolidate power. Western democracies tolerated him longer than hindsight suggests because anti-Semitism was widespread, Nazi persecution had not yet escalated to genocide, many conservatives saw Germany as a bulwark against Soviet expansion, and Nazism appeared to deliver economic results. Adams emphasizes a critical point: While appeasement is blamed for causing war in Europe, the opposite policy of forceful deterrence was pursued against Japan in the Pacific, and it also failed, as the Pearl Harbor attacks demonstrated. There was no single formula for solving international crises.

Turning to the war's military operations, Adams argues that the conflict was far more multifaceted than American popular accounts suggest. Germany's blitzkrieg, or lightning attack using concentrated armor and air superiority, characterized only the war's opening phases. As the Allies retook territory, fighting devolved into brutal attritional ground combat. Adams identifies several watershed events: Britain's survival in the Battle of Britain, aided by radar and the cracking of the German Enigma code; Hitler's catastrophic June 1941 invasion of Russia, where 70 percent of German manpower remained as late as D-Day; and in the Pacific, the naval battles of Coral Sea and Midway in 1942, which ended Japanese expansion. The Allied strategic bombing offensive against Germany degraded enemy fuel production and won air superiority, though hopes for a clean, surgical air victory proved illusory. In the Pacific, Japan's early conquests were spectacular but unsustainable: the country fought for a compromise peace, underestimated Allied determination, and could not replenish resources. The fighting grew increasingly savage, with enormous casualties on both sides at places like Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Adams argues that in the emotional climate of 1945, it was politically impossible for President Harry Truman not to use the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing roughly 135,000 people.

Adams then examines the American war machine, acknowledging its colossal industrial output while challenging the myth of uniform superiority. Many American weapons were inferior to German counterparts: the Sherman tank's thin armor and underpowered gun encouraged reliance on blanket firepower that caused massive environmental destruction and civilian casualties. Drawing on military historian Martin Van Creveld's comparative study, Adams argues that the Wehrmacht actually encouraged more initiative at the lowest levels, while the American army was over-bureaucratized and demanded rigid obedience. He challenges the Rosie the Riveter myth, noting that most women remained housewives and only 16 percent of working women were in war industries. Adams documents pervasive tensions within the military: African Americans were segregated and largely denied combat roles; gay and lesbian service members faced systematic persecution; women were restricted to two percent of the military; and combat infantrymen bore a disproportionate share of fighting and dying. Research found that the factors holding men in the lines were coercion and loyalty to their comrades, not patriotism or ideological commitment.

The chapter on overseas experience presents a graphic account of combat's reality, largely hidden from the public by censorship. Adams describes the terror of amphibious landings and the constant dread of shells and mortar rounds, which caused approximately 85 percent of physical casualties. About 25 to 30 percent of casualties were psychological, rising to 70 or 80 percent under severe conditions. A soldier reaching peak competence after about 10 days of combat would be worn out after 60 and often need hospitalization after 70, yet the rigid classification system offered no rotation. Adams documents the physical misery of perpetual exhaustion, filth, tropical diseases, and decomposing corpses, as well as crimes committed by Allied soldiers, including the killing of prisoners and, in the Pacific, the mutilation of enemy dead, all symptoms of what Adams calls war psychosis produced by prolonged immersion in combat's horrors.

On the home front, Adams argues that the war ended the Great Depression through massive government spending, increasing gross national product by 60 percent, but prosperity came with wrenching social disruption. Over 15 million civilians migrated to war-industry cities, producing severe housing shortages. Racial discrimination remained fierce: race riots erupted in Detroit, leaving 34 dead; off-duty white servicemen assaulted Hispanic youths in the Los Angeles "zoot suit" riots; and 127,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly removed to detention centers. The emergence of teen culture, driven by unprecedented adolescent affluence, transformed high schools into social centers dominated by peer pressure and consumerism. Adams contends that business exploited the war to attack New Deal social welfare programs, stunting the development of Social Security and national health care.

The postwar world fell far short of wartime promises. Adams argues the Cold War was inevitable given fundamental disagreements between the Western democracies and the Soviet Union. While American generosity was genuine, including over $12 billion in Marshall Plan aid, superpower status forced compromises, from CIA-funded covert operations to coups in Iran and Guatemala. Women lost nearly two million jobs between 1945 and early 1947, and ethnic minorities found that fighting for democracy overseas did not translate into equality at home. Adams presents extensive evidence that many combat veterans had lasting psychological damage, using the case of Audie Murphy, America's most decorated soldier, who despite his heroic public image had nightmares, substance addiction, and financial ruin traceable to wartime concussions. The GI Bill aided many veterans and helped create a new middle class, but Adams notes concerns that it contributed to a materialistic suburban culture obsessed with conformity.

In a final chapter, Adams traces the rise and decline of the Good War myth, identifying 1998 as its peak, when Tom Brokaw's declaration that the World War II generation was "the greatest generation any society has produced" (130), Stephen Ambrose's selective veneration of American soldiers, and Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan converged with public disillusionment. Adams argues the myth had damaging policy consequences: The "Munich analogy" justified military action as the default response to every crisis, Pearl Harbor was falsely equated with the September 11 attacks, and the George W. Bush administration predicted Iraqis would welcome Americans as liberators based on distorted memories of 1944 France. The 2003 Iraq War and the Afghanistan conflict exposed the myth's inadequacy. Adams concludes that distorting the past robs it of usefulness as a guide, and that keeping faith with those who sacrificed requires preserving the complete reality of their experience so that succeeding generations may fully understand what they endured and appreciate what they achieved.