d-day, june 6, 1944: the climactic battle of world war iiby stephen e. ambrose
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D-Day, June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II by Stephen E. AmbroseReview by: Fritz SternForeign Affairs, Vol. 73, No. 4 (Jul. - Aug., 1994), p. 172Published by: Council on Foreign RelationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20046786 .
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Recent Books
continued abm program. A note of tri
umphalism over "self-styled progressive
scholars [and] leftist intelligentsia" marks the book, leading in one instance to dis
torting the views of a leading European liberal. Or take this example of in-depth
analysis: "Most professors dislike military
spending, not merely because they prefer
peace to war, and spending on welfare to
arms, but because professors compete with the military for public acclaim and
public funds." These gratuitous remarks
aside, there is much useful material here,
especially on the economic underpinning
of political developments.
D-Day,June 6,1944: The Climactic Battle
of World WarII by Stephen e.
Ambrose. NewYork: Simon &
Schuster, 1994, 655 pp. $30.00. A publisher's dream: on the 50th anniver
sary of one of the most dramatic military events in history, a commemorative vol
ume, distinguished by the voices of the men who were there. Stephen Ambrose, historian of the Second World War and
biographer of his idol, Dwight D. Eisen
hower, bases the best part of the book on
the large files of interviews at the Eisen
hower Center. He records the planning and the necessarily divergent expecta tions of D-Day, the bravery and the bar
barism of the day itself. In the book? unlike in the anniversary itself?the Ger
man side is fully present, its mistakes far
greater than our own. The contextual
history is primitive, the narrative a
compelling, readable reconstruction of
a day without parallel.
Western Hemisphere KENNETH MAXWELL
The Massacre at El Mozo te: A Parable of the Cold War. by mark danner. New
York: Vintage Books, 1994,304 pp. $12.00 (paper).
Mark Danner subtides his chilling account
of the massacre of hundreds of men,
women and children by the Salvadoran
army's American-trained Adacad Battal
ion in December 1981 "A Parable of the
Cold War." To a degree it is, in the sense
that the ideological fervor of the early 1980s provided
a rationale for the tangled web of half-truths, obfuscations and moral
spinelessness that still clings to many of the
individuals who became involved in this
sorry affair. But the truly disturbing ele
ment of the story, at least in its American
dimension, is that the individuals involved are not marginal characters but include
many of the best and brightest of their gen eration: Thomas Enders, Elliott Abrams
and A. M. Rosenthal, among others. Few
reputations survive Danner's relendess
investigation. It is worth noting the wall
James Baker, then President Reagan's chief
of staff, had carefully built between the White House and the professional diplo
mats and political appointees on the front
lines. "It's a dirty litde war and they don't
want to touch it," is how Enders explained the lack of support from the "upper ranks"
when Abrams questioned him. The mem
ory of El Mozote remains inconvenient and
this book is a courageous indictment in the
classical tradition of American journalism. Danner has provided
a striking memorial to
the victims of the tragedy who?because of
his effort?will not be soon forgotten.
[172] FOREIGN AFFAIRS Volume73No.4
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