VTG GoodBye, Darkness A Memoir Of The Pacific War 1980 William Manchester 1st Ed

Description: VTG GoodBye, Darkness A Memoir Of The Pacific War 1980 William Manchester 1st Ed. HC DJ Used. Condition Is “Very Good”. Dust Jacket Has Some Tears And Curls On Top Border. Spine Has Fading Or Wear On Top And Bottom. Remaining Components Of Book ie. Pages, Spine, Etc. Are in Near New Condition. Shipped Via USPS Media Mail. 762 “Goodbye, Darkness is a memoir of a Marine's journey through the Pacific, once during World War II and again in the late 1970's as a journalist and historian. It is a wonderfully-written book which shows the madness of war, the ineptitude of mid-level military leadership, and the bond that men in combat forge” “What a book! I came to this work thinking that it was the recollections of Manchester's time in the Marines during the War: it is that, but so much more besides. It is a potted history of the island-hopping campaign run by Nimitz, along with a current-day (1980) view of some of the most infamous and bloody battles in history. Manchester, a veteran of the Battle of Okinawa - where he was seriously wounded - decided in his middle-age to revisit the Pacific, to try and make sense of his time there, to make sense of the War in the Pacific, and work through his ideas of what the United States had fought for, and whether it was worthwhile. This is, mostly, a recollection of futility and waste: that is, a book about war. Manchester revisits Guadalcanal, the first test of the Marines in the War, where both the Allies and the Japanese fought the climate, disease and lack of food as much as they fought each other. Not for the last time, the Americans greatly underestimated how much effort it would take to successfully complete such invasions. For months, the fate of the Allies' war, and perhaps even Australia, balanced on who would prevail in the Solomons: at that time Guadalcanal was one of the most important places on the globe. When Manchester visits in the late 1970s Guadalcanal has returned to being the sleepy backwater it was before the War. He spends a night on Bloody Ridge, and is haunted by old memories and fears. He then visits Tarawa; he wasn't there during the War, and there isn't much there now. The island of Betio which held the airstrip and which therefore was the prize, is small - "No part of it is more than three hundred yards from the water." There were nearly five thousand Japanese on the island, and about the same number of Marines landed to face them. In 76 hours the battle was over, at the cost of 3,381 Marine casualties (over 900 deaths): of the Japanese garrison, 17 were taken prisoner. Such brutality was commonplace in the Pacific, where the Marines often took 60-70% casualty rates in their units and were still fighting. The Japanese typically fought to the last man ...”

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Location: Dublin, Ohio

End Time: 2025-01-11T19:06:52.000Z

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