As defense secretary, Charles Hagel is likely to be particularly attuned to the needs of enlisted soldiers and skeptical of the demands of senior officers. That's my takeaway from reading the transcript of an oral history interview he gave to the Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress. Sure, he was in Vietnam 45 years ago -- but he made these statements in 2002.

"The people in Washington make the policy, but it's the little guys who come back in the body bags," he said near the end of the interview.

He also came away from Vietnam underwhelmed by his senior leaders. Here's an extended comment about that:

I was not much impressed with our -- our battalion leaders, our XOs. I don't -- I didn't ever get a sense that they came down in, enough into the platoon company level to really do what I thought officers should do. And the lieutenants and the captains carried the bulk, as they do in any war, essentially. But it was the sergeants. It was the senior enlisted that carried the weight. I mean really carried the weight. And it was obvious to everybody. And they -- the senior sergeants were the reassuring, calming guys. And in many cases, many cases, these were the guys that didn't fall apart. And some of the officers did. And some of the officers couldn't read maps very well. And I just -- I never had much confidence in -- in a lot of the officer corps. Now, there were exceptions to that. Some exceptional officers that I saw and I served with.

It is also striking how the Army he served in differs from today's. In 1968, Hagel had been in the Army less than two years, yet for a short time after the Tet Offensive, he served as "acting company sergeant." That's a green force.

Other stuff that struck me:

• He saw the system of individual rotation of soldiers causing a lot of problems.

• He spent a lot of time walking point.

• He saw PTSD in his own family. "I remember my father, when I was young -- he was in World War II overseas for almost three years. I remember him waking up in the middle of the night screaming....And it happens not just because of necessarily the blood and gore that you see in combat. It's the -- it's the pressure of the mental process that -- that makes you that way."

• General Westmoreland's brother-in-law, Lt. Col. Frederick Van Deusen, briefly was his battalion commander before being killed. (In one three month period, he comments, "we had three battalion commanders killed").

• He still has some shrapnel in his chest.

By Jeff Williams

Best Defense office of reviewing books about obscure weapons

"History does not repeat itself but it rhymes" - Mark Twain

As the centennial of the First World War is nearly upon us, it is rather ironic to note that Mark Twain's insight bears some relevance in today's world. A hundred years ago there was also an intense naval competition between two great powers. Today we find American naval supremacy being challenged by the up and coming Asian land power China. This is not so different from the early 20^th century when Great Britain's rule of the waves was challenged by the powerful European land power Germany.

Like contemporary America and China, Great Britain and Germany were very substantial trading partners, but also global strategic rivals. As that rivalry increased in tempo it drew British naval power away from her far-flung empire closer to home in the North Atlantic and North Sea. These two bodies of water in effect acted as a gate to the maritime ambitions of Germany.

This situation is not so different from China's strategic concern today about its own access to those sea areas that it considers of vital strategic interest. In light of this, both the United States and China find themselves in a competition to develop strategies and tactics for new technologies that in many ways resembles the century old contest between Great Britain and Germany.

To help us understand that naval rivalry between the British and Germans, comes the familiar figure of Norm Friedman, a highly regarded naval writer well known among those with an interest in naval warfare past and present. His previous works such as U.S. Aircraft Carriers and Naval Firepower are the gold standards for a more in-depth understanding of both naval aviation and surface gunnery in both World Wars. Friedman's new book Naval Weapons of World War One: Guns, Torpedoes, Mines and ASW Weapons of All Nations is an excellent addition to his library of naval writings.

The real impact of Friedman's book is the tracing of the development of weapon systems, how they were understood, and their influence upon tactics and strategy. For instance, the long-range torpedo had a significant impact upon the thinking of both British and German naval theoreticians. The 1914 British adage was that "gunnery fills a ship with air but the torpedo fills it with water." The Royal Navy's tactical response to this observation was to increase the range and rate of fire of their gunnery, in order to disable an enemy vessel, followed by the coup-de-grace of a destroyer-led torpedo attack.

However, there were unintended consequences to increases in the rates of fire of a battleship's main armament. Certain key safety precautions were informally set aside, such as keeping turret ammunition flash doors open rather than having them safely shut during action. Many naval historians like to point out that the deck armor of the ill-fated battlecruisers Indefatigable, Queen Mary, and Invincible was too thin. In actuality their tragic loss had much more to do with the "tactical factor" of dangerous ammunition handling techniques adopted to speed the rate of fire rather than the "design factor" of deck armor thickness. The original concept of the battlecruiser as a class was high speed for scouting ahead of the battlefleet. These ships likely could never have reached their designed speed if deck armor was made thick enough to protect against excellent German AP shells, thus defeating the rationale of their operational intent.

German ammunition handling procedures at Jutland were far safer, albeit slower, in that flash doors remained closed and ammunition was stored in brass cases rather than vulnerable silk bags. This did reduce their rate of fire but also considerably lessened the risk of a catastrophic explosion. Consequently, the hard school of battle forced the British to rethink ammunition handling and enforce safer procedures. Battle also instructed them on developing improved fire-control to overcome German maneuvering, designed to disrupt fire-control solutions.

Additionally, the British had studied and liked the idea of a massed torpedo attack at the culmination point of a battle and without further evidence made the assumption that the Germans did also. While the Germans might have liked to make massed torpedo attacks, they didn't. German doctrine considered torpedoes far too expensive and valuable to be squandered in such a fashion. The famous turn away of the German High Seas Fleet at Jutland, screened by only a few torpedoes, was far from being the massed attack that Admiral Jellicoe, the British Grand Fleet commander, anticipated.

One of the most surprising revelations Friedman makes concerns the fact that while it was long-standing Royal Navy practice to maintain a tactical fleet plot during an engagement, it was not German practice. According to Friedman, what happened at Jutland "was that the German commander Admiral von Scheer, discovered to his surprise that he had no idea whatever of what was happening -- he maintained no plot and the situation was far too complicated for anything less. In that sense he was profoundly defeated and the only important conclusion he drew was that he never wanted to fight the British fleet again." Von Sheer's self-induced confusion was largely responsible for allowing Jellicoe to place his fleet across the Germans not once, but three times. Additionally, it seems the primitiveness of German tactical doctrine was largely responsible for the failure of von Scheer's initial cruiser scouting plan. The botched job of scouting led directly to von Scheer's later surprise and confusion.

Freidman's book also discusses the use of mines as a highly potent weapon. Tactically laid minefields constrained the maneuvering of both fleets in the North Sea and had probably more direct implications on immediate naval operations than any other single factor, other than the submarine. The mine was the ultimate passive-aggressive weapon whose cost-benefit was highly efficient and remains so to this day. He also reviews the primitive beginnings of ASW and thoroughly discusses both its limitations and future promise to be fully revealed in the Second World War.

Norm Friedman's book is not a page-turner, but if you have an interest in naval history and the interplay of technology, tactics, and strategy, you might enjoy this new addition to his library of naval literature. In my view, just the coverage of the British and German experience at Jutland is worth the price of the book.

-Many thanks to ‘Tyrtaios' who contributed many important suggestions to the writing of this review.

Jeff Williams spent his working life at IBM and Merrill Lynch, but always sustained a deep curiosity about military and naval history. His paramount interest has always been the Royal Navy of the Georgian era but his fascination with the First World War has led him to extend that interest to the naval campaigns of that conflict.

Friends say Peter Linnerooth came home from Iraq with heavy PTSD. He had written about the burnout of military therapists.

By Emile Simpson

Best Defense guest columnist

Afghanistan 2013: time to evolve the strategic narrative

(By ‘strategic narrative' I mean the explanation of actions: the lens that we propose to people through which to view the conflict.)

a. We need to adjust the strategic narrative in relation to the 2014 transition deadline.

i. Since 2009, the coalition strategic narrative has successfully toned down expectations of the more idealistic aspects of the campaign, which means that audiences now gauge coalition ‘success' primarily in terms of the stability of the Afghan state, the credibility of Afghan security forces, and coalition casualty figures. The last one will fade as we pull back, placing increasing emphasis on the first two.

ii. Our current strategic narrative still presents the conflict effectively as a zero sum game: the Taliban will either come back or they won't. This is closely associated with the proposition, that we mistakenly encourage, that what we are engaged in is a ‘war,' in which one's aim is defined against an enemy. By conditioning audiences to expect success or failure to present itself in a binary manner, we hamper ourselves: first, the conflict is not likely to produce a binary outcome, which will make our job in terms of explaining the conflict over the next few years very hard, and we will lose credibility by our failure to match what is actually happening to what we said would happen.

iii. Why is the conflict not likely to produce a binary outcome? The ‘Taliban' is a franchise movement; most of its field commanders fight for their own self-interest, hence why many simultaneously have connections into the Afghan Government. The dynamics of the conflict are thus kaleidoscopic, with actors competing vis-à-vis one another, not polarised. The bulk of the coalition leaving will accelerate the kaleidoscopic dynamic, as we are the main object against which the Taliban ‘franchise' can define itself to maintain its cohesion (i.e. less cohesion means more self-interested dynamics). The Soviet experience of transition in 1988-90 supports this analysis.

The likelihood is the Afghan Government will maintain the cities and the roads only (they don't have the logistical capability or political will to hold more), but neither do the insurgents have the combat power, logistics, or command structure to mass, take over a whole city, and hold it. This will create (and is already creating) a ‘core' area held by the Afghan Government and a ‘peripheral' zone beyond. What will result is a patchwork of allegiances, with some villages, and even broad remote areas, controlled by power brokers linked to the insurgency, others to the Afghan Government, or more likely, linked to both. By maintaining a narrative that emphasises a binary outcome, we will be perceived as having failed, when in reality the Afghan Government controls the key areas, and over time, will make pragmatic arrangements with those who control the periphery to maintain relative stability in Afghanistan.

b. We should not invest any coalition credibility in holding the peripheral areas: Over the next three years, the Taliban flag may go up in some towns and villages. In our current narrative, that will be seen as a major victory for them. In reality, to control dusty villages on the periphery, and even remote district centres, means little. We need to adjust our narrative so people expect that, and when it happens, people believe us when, legitimately, we point out that this is insignificant. By so adjusting the narrative, we take pressure off the Afghans to hold the peripheral areas, which they do not want to, only being there because they perceive it as a condition for us giving them support. We also take the initiative away from insurgents by recognising that this is a war for political more than physical space: insurgents are attention seekers -- they want us to react to a provocative flag raising because by reacting we show the world that they matter -- should they raise a flag in a forlorn district centre and we appear neither to look nor care, they have a serious problem.

c. The narrative needs to allow for maintaining some (but significantly less than today) coalition combat power in Afghanistan beyond 2014: This is the insurance policy that ensures the Afghan Government does not lose the cities and roads. The model should be in extremis back up to the Afghan security forces (airpower based, with boots on the ground as a last resort). This is critical, as the perception (amongst the insurgency, the Afghan people, the Afghan Government itself, and international audiences) that the Afghan security forces will hold the core areas will create space for de facto political settlements on the ground.

d. ‘Moshtarak' is over -- the narrative now needs to emphasise Afghan sovereignty: Ultimately there will remain a real possibility of the Afghan state, which is incompetent and corrupt, collapsing in on itself with little action from the insurgency until it genuinely sees itself, and is seen by insurgents and Afghans, as sovereign. In 2009 ‘moshtarak' -- side by side -- was the visual metaphor chosen to characterise the strategic narrative; that made sense at the time. However, side by side means shared responsibility, and that is incompatible with genuine sovereignty. Time now for coalition press conferences to get very dull, as most answers should amount to: "ask the Afghan Government, they are in charge." The litmus test of Afghan sovereignty will be when people stop asking the coalition their questions.

Emile Simpson served in the British Army as an infantry officer in the Gurkhas from 2006 to 2012. He deployed to southern Afghanistan three times and is the author of War From the Ground Up: Twenty-First Century Combat as Politics (Columbia, 2012).

By Rebecca Frankel

Best Defense Chief Canine Correspondent

Two career MWDs, both at the ripe old age of eight, recently traded in their military leashes for the comforts of civilian life. Brit, a German shepherd, was formerly a "patrol narcotics detection dog for a military police unit at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington." Bubba (pictured), a chocolate lab with one tour in Iraq and one in Afghanistan behind him, was a bomb-sniffing dog for the Army.

Bubba's last tour in Afghanistan was apparently cut short when the 80-pound dog took a bad tumble, falling through a canvas roof. But his new owners, the Van Fleets, report that Bubba's wounded leg doesn't keep him from enjoying his new home or from taking measures to keep his new family safe. The couple, who lives in Trumansburg, NY, say that Bubba "will case the perimeter" of their home whenever he's outside and "insists on inspecting whatever object in one's hands."

Brit on the other hand, is continuing to offer his services to those in the military but in a rather different capacity. Along with his new owners, the Russells of Fayetteville, NC, Brit is making the rounds at the Womack Army Medical Center at Fort Bragg as a therapy dog, having taken therapy-training classes in order to assist wounded veterans. He's only made a handful of visits so far, but his presence already seems to be making an impact.

"The boy is a traffic stop," [his owner, Russell, who accompanies Brit on these visits] says. "Everyone stops to say hello or give him a hug."... On several occasions, those soldiers have broken down in tears while hugging Brit and have thanked him for the service of military working dogs overseas...."They tell me 'When the dogs come, it makes our day.'"

Canine news of interest: The practical use of the canine nose seems without limits. This week I came across three very interesting articles about sniffer dogs being used to detect some pretty unexpected...things. In Britain dogs are helping authorities uncover counterfeit condoms, and in California dogs are being employed to track down fox droppings in an effort to preserve the endangered San Joaquin kit fox. They're also using dogs to sniff out fox dens in Queensland, Australia, though in this case it's to cull the population, not save it. Who knew?

Rebecca Frankel, on leave from her FP desk, is currently writing a book about military working dogs, to be published by Atria Books in August 2013.

The NRA was in no position to oppose this change in the law. And some soldiers may live because of it. Good.

Emile Simpson doesn't think we can just walk away from COIN. As he writes in his book, "Counter-insurgency is likely to remain the more effective operational approach to deal with an enemy who wants to fight in an irregular manner," (p. 11).

"The control of political space is as important, if not more important, than controlling physical space," (p. 6). There is a good master's thesis to be written on just exploring that thought.

And don't think you can just ignore the politics. "One cannot refuse to engage in political activity: the empowerment or marginalising of individuals and groups will occur through coalition actions, whether deliberate or not," (p. 107).

He seems to reject the "hearts and minds" shorthand often used for COIN: "‘Classic' counterinsurgency...was far more about population control than about popular support," (p. 150).

Finally, he observes that classic Western military thought calls for concentration of force against the enemy's center of gravity, but warns that insurgencies generally avoid concentration.

His bottom line: "If in a given conflict the policy choice has been to commit military forces to achieve an outcome in a country in which the enemy refuses conventional battle and lives among the people, counterinsurgency, properly resourced, and in a realistic political context, can be highly effective," (p. 235).

The significance of the nomination of Chuck Hagel to be defense secretary is not that he is the first Vietnam vet to be tapped, but rather that he is the first combat-veteran enlisted man ever to be picked. (Like Forrest Gump, he served in the 9^th Infantry Division.)

I think that is nice. But I don't think it particularly will help him with the job. I worry more about the lack of diversity in the backgrounds of the members of the Obama cabinet. Too many former members of Congress, too few people who know much about the real world.

It also is kind of weird that the three of the last four SecDefs picked by a Democratic president have been Republicans, at least in name (Hagel, Robert Gates and William Cohen). Where's that Democratic bench?

I remain a fan of President Obama, but I think he and his team have a certain tone deafness on national security. The military may just look like a political problem to certain offices at the White House, but it really needs to be considered as something more than that.

By Lt. Col. "A.N. O'Nymous," U.S. Army

Best Defense guest columnist

When I was a junior military intelligence captain and S2 for a combat arms battalion, I was a "toxic leader." There were no good reasons for this, but the fact that my immediate boss was toxic, that I was having personal issues, and that I was leaning strongly toward leaving the military all had something to do with it. During this period, which lasted close to two years, selfishness guided my every action. I was not only selfish but lazy, desiring a sense of accomplishment without wanting to do the extra work it takes to build an effective, trained team. I cared neither about teaching nor mentoring my subordinates, and I did not listen to them. I also drove them hard. The result was an S2 Shop that seemed to check all the right boxes but was hardly a team.

My shop's apparent accomplishments were strong. We exceeded the standard in every security inspection conducted by higher-ups, not only passing but incurring zero reports of deficiencies. We were also highly successful during our two deployments to a maneuver training center. During our first deployment, my templates for enemy disposition and my descriptions of enemy action were so accurate that I was under suspicion for cheating for most of this exercise. (I didn't cheat; I had just done my homework well.) Near the end of this exercise, the brigade commander even sent the brigade S2 to me for training, which was no doubt a humiliating experience for that major. During my second deployment, my staff work helped my battalion defeat the Opposing Forces (OPFOR) in more battles than we lost -- the only time that year that a friendly unit accomplished this feat.

But, I was the guy in my shop doing all the briefings and drawing all the templates. My troops' jobs were to simply battletrack and take care of my logistical needs as our command post hopped from one place to another. Of course, they were unhappy doing such menial chores. My bright lieutenant, NCOs, and soldiers knew they should have been doing much more than this. All also knew that the way we were doing business was dysfunctional. What if, for example, something happened to me? In the long term, this would have been a good thing. In the short term, though, it would have been a mess.

Everyone was unhappy, and, unsurprisingly, a large rift developed between me and both my assistant S2 and senior intelligence sergeant. Eventually, this rift fueled further unprofessionalism from my assistant S2 and me. Things got personal.

Since my shop had met or exceeded every goal given us and I got along well with my battalion commander, I more than half-expected a top block rating for my final efficiency report. Our army being what it is, I probably would have received this rating in many units. Thankfully, I did not. My battalion commander, who was not himself a great leader, strangely exercised wisdom in my case. I'll never forget, for my final counseling, his sitting me down and telling me: "You have been responsible for much of my success. When I list my battalion's accomplishments for my boss, I do so knowing that you were instrumental in many of them. But, you didn't get along with my majors, you didn't get along with your soldiers, and I blame you for that. I'm going to give you a report card that is squarely center of mass, and that's the best that I can do."

This warning was indeed the best thing he could have done for me, because this warning -- along with an underlying sense of shame that I could not shake -- initiated some serious introspection on my part.

Compounding this good fortune, in my next two jobs (I became a staff officer and company commander in Iraq), I was blessed with the best set of leaders with whom I have had the pleasure of serving. Watching them in action made a hugely positive impression on me. Reading a book that my next commander gave me, Major General Perry Smith's Rules and Tools for Leaders, made a similar impression. Experiencing the positive climate change that took place in the Task Force 1^st Armored Division headquarters when Brigadier General Martin Dempsey replaced Major General Ricardo Sanchez (the epitome of a toxic leader) also made an impression. Things began to click and fall in place, and I returned to a better path, continually learning as I went.

The article "Narcissism and Toxic Leaders" in the current issue of Military Review sheds some light on my failings then. Narcissism, Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Joe Doty, Ph.D. and Master Sergeant Jeff Fenlason argue, is the essential condition for toxic leadership (though not all narcissists are toxic leaders). Narcissists have "an in?ated sense of self-importance and an extreme preoccupation with themselves." Toxic leaders, who are not necessarily screamers, are those narcissists whose selfish, destructive behaviors create unhealthy organizations and demoralized troops. The authors persuasively contend that our military should develop "methods to enhance its [narcissism's] positive attributes and raise awareness of its negative ones."

What I like best about this article is the authors' observation about self-deception, how toxic leaders (giddy with their seeming string of professional successes, I imagine) often do not even know that they are toxic. That was certainly true in my case. Toxic leaders' driving junior leaders from the military, their creating subordinates who are themselves toxic, their units' members failing to act ethically in the absence of immediate supervision, their units lapsing into utter ineffectiveness when they depart the unit and the motivation to work (fear) is removed -- all of these results have nothing to do with their leadership, these leaders tell themselves. They are great leaders, they think. After all, their report cards say so.

The authors conclude that our military needs to place "more emphasis on mentoring, self-awareness, self- regulation, and emotional intelligence." But, how do we do this, and is this enough?

Based on my experience, what our institution must do first to counter this persistent problem is to improve how we evaluate leaders. As a junior captain, I was lucky to get the report card I actually deserved. We need to take more of the luck out of this process. A good place to start would be with incorporating 360-degree feedback from leaders' subordinates, peers, and raters into their efficiency reports. It is also important for our military to figure out how to better assess a unit's health and to make this assessment a key element (if not THE key element) of efficiency reports. In other words, obvious indicators of mission accomplishment need to be better balanced with indicators of overall unit health and morale. These latter indicators might include, for example, command climate survey results, soldier retention rates, and the time the unit dedicates to the professional development of its officers and soldiers.

Getting leader efficiency reports right would require of our military a great deal of serious thought, study, and energy. However, the long-term results would be unquestionably worth it.

Just as important, though, is helping to prevent toxic leadership in the first place by improving education in our service schools. I should have been thinking about "organizational culture" and "organizational leadership" before I was a major at the Army's Command and General Staff College. True, I received my commission from Officer Candidate School, where there is probably time for only a day or two of such discussion. However, robust discussions, videos, and authoritative and compelling testimonies regarding "what right looks like" in healthy organizations and "what wrong looks like" in unhealthy organizations would probably have made a huge difference for me if I had received this instruction at basic course, advanced course, and the now-defunct Combined Arms and Services Staff School.

Similarly, teaching cadets who are attending military schools and ROTC programs to recognize the signs of healthy and unhealthy units might make a huge difference for these officers, and such classes should be consistently taught at NCO schools, too. Such a block of instruction -- regularly and consistently applied in service schools throughout a leader's career -- would at least get leaders thinking about putting their units' long-term health and their troops' professional development before short-term mission accomplishment. It is especially important that junior leaders receive this instruction while their character is still malleable. Our pushing junior leaders to units without this education, when they are prone to automatically emulate apparently successful leaders (who, in real terms, may not be successful at all), is harming these young leaders, their future units, and their future troops -- in a few cases, perhaps, irreparably.

The views offered here are the author's own and do not necessarily represent those of the U.S. military.

I've seen many positive reviews of my book, and a few negative ones. But I have not seen one so entirely ambivalent as the one by retired Army Brig. Gen. John Brown in ARMY magazine. On the one hand, the general thinks my new book is "engaging, well-written, sensibly documented, and interestingly organized." He adds: "People are going to read and enjoy this book."

On the other hand, there is actually quite a lot General Brown dislikes about my book. Most of all, he really, really hates my emphasis in the book that the Army should fire ineffective generals, and even announce such actions. "Much the same was said about public flogging in its day," he comments. I guess that makes George Marshall a public flogger.

At this point in the review, the GPA (the Generals' Protective Assocation) kicks in. "We need not apologize for being protective of our colleagues and their reputations," he admonishes. Hmm. I would say, Oh yes you do, if by doing so you have protected failures and incompetents at the expense of the troops and the nation. That would be at least unprofessional, and perhaps a dereliction of duty. 

General Brown also takes sharp exception to my description of the 1991 Gulf War, in which he fought. "I had been under the illusion that accomplishing all assigned missions with a minimum of casualties while liberating a friendly country and driving out a powerful adversary was a success -- but what do I know?" I would respond, It is not what you knew then, it is what you have learned in the last 22 years. What we do know now is that Saddam Hussein believed he had won that war, because he emerged from it as the sole Arab leader to take on the United States and its allies militarily and survive. (See page 386 of my book for quotes from his cabinet meetings about this.) Plus, the 1991 war never really ended -- we fought in Iraq for another two decades. Bottom line: If your foe thinks he won, and the fighting doesn't end, then I don't think you've won your war. Rather, I think you may have won your first battle and then ended the conflict prematurely.

General Brown also thinks the way I write about Generals Franks, Sanchez and Casey is "presumptuous." I thought I was just using plain English. Trying to say clearly what one really thinks is harder than it looks.

Oddly, Brown disregards the account at the beginning of my book about how I came to write it. He suspects I had "a portfolio of favorite stories" I wanted to tell. Rather, as I explained in a section beginning on page 7 of the book, I was puzzled by how the same U.S. Army that was so quick to relieve during World War II was so slow to relieve in Iraq, and it made me wonder if lack of relief is liked to lack of accountability -- and most importantly, if lack of accountability leads to lack of adaptivness

He also seems to have skipped my long section on the post-Vietnam rebuilding of the Army, saying that in my account, "American generalship involved in successes off the battlefield since World War II don't seem to matter."

Yet. Yet for all that, he emerges surprisingly enthusastic about the book. It ends, he says, "with some pretty respectable recommendations." His surprising conclusion: "The Generals will raise your blood pressure and expand your mind. I recommend it."

In related news, the Army War College library put The Generals on its new suggested reading list.

The Oxford historian and strategist was knighted the other day. But of course you expected that after Foreign Policy listed him recently as one of the 100 most influential global thinkers.

I just don't understand why Sir Mix-a-Lot was honored first.

That was the question that kept on coming back to me as I read Joshua Phillips' None of Us Were Like This Before. It is not a perfect book but it is an important one. 

Yes, there are ethical and moral reasons for conducting a comprehensive review of instances of torture of Iraqis, Afghans and others by American soldiers over the last 10 years.

But there also are practical reasons:

1. The damage torture does to those who inflict it. (Two of the soldiers in the unit Phillips examines killed themselves after coming home.)

2. The damage torture does to our war efforts-both in the host populations, and in world opinion.

3. The effect on the current force.

The questions I would like to see addressed include:

--Who tortured?

--Why?

--Who stopped torture?

--What were the characteristics of units that indulged in torture? And of those that didn't?

--How can we better train soldiers to deal with this?

--Are there continuing effects on the force that need to be addressed?

One final note: Phillips writes that, "I rarely met a detainee who had received an apology, or any acknowledgement at all, for the harsh treatment he had endured during U.S. captivity." 

By Rear Adm. John Kirby
Chief of Naval Information

Here are 15 books that have made an enormous impact on me, personally and professionally. Indeed, I can honestly say that each of these has affected not only the way I do my job, but the way I think about the way I do my job. 

These are books I have read and re-read several times and often give as gifts.

It's not an all-inclusive list by any stretch. I love to read lots of different stuff. There are no works of fiction on it, for example, and there are no works of naval history -- both of which I enjoy immensely. I chose, rather, specific books that have helped me make sense of the world around me and shaped the ways in which I try to communicate for the institution.

I claim no particular expertise in public relations. I've never received any formal education in the field. These books, then, have largely served as my reference library for a career built through "on-the-job" training. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.

1. On Writing Well, by William Zinsser

This is THE definitive book on how to write powerfully and clearly, everything from memoirs and travel pieces to science and technology articles. Right in the opening pages -- on page five in fact -- he talks about the unspoken transaction between a writer and his readers: "Good writing has an aliveness that keeps the reader reading from paragraph to the next, and it's not a question of gimmicks to ‘personalize.' It's a question of using the English language in a way that will achieve the greatest clarity and strength." If you want to write with clarity and strength -- and we should ALL want to do that -- this is the book you need to read. Then pick it up a few months later and read it again. 

2. Brave Men, by Ernie Pyle

War is messy and ugly, cruel and destructive. But it is also a STORY, a story of drama and skill and pain and suffering. It is tragedy and comedy all rolled into one, the exclamation point at the end of the human sentence. Nobody -- and I mean NOBODY -- tells that story better or more simply than Ernie Pyle did. Brave Men, first published in 1943, is a collection of his syndicated columns from the time he landed with our troops at Sicily until the liberation of Paris. He writes about World War II from the perspective of the troops, from the average Joe. There isn't a lot of strategy in this book, but there is an awful lot of heart.

3. Generating Buy In: Mastering the Language of Leadership, by Mark S. Walton

Adm. Mullen made me read this book before we left Naples to come back to DC. We both found it enormously helpful as he prepared to be CNO. It's not a big book, but it's full of big ideas about how to communicate effectively. I still consult it frequently. It's a MUST read. And don't let the title fool you. This is not some boring, new-age business book. It's about telling good stories and about being persuasive.

One of the chief lessons author Mark Walton -- a former CNN producer -- tries to impart conveys is the power of THREE. People typically don't remember more than three things at a time. That goes for messages, too. When you make a pitch, deliver a speech, or write a PA plan, keep it to three points and make them as personal as possible. Take the audience on a journey with you and you'll get "buy in."

4. The Eloquent President, by Ronald White

We all know that Lincoln was a powerful speaker, but what many people don't realize is just how hard he had to work to develop that skill and just how vital he considered it.

Examining a different speech, address, or public letter in each chapter, White explains the evolution of Lincoln's rhetoric from the lawyerly tones of the First Inaugural to the "immortal poetry" of the Gettysburg Address. He shows how hard Lincoln worked to be good at communicating. This is one of the best books I've read in the last five years, and it only reinforced for me the enduring power of the spoken word -- the speech --and the art form that is speechwriting.

5. The Savage Wars of Peace, by Max Boot

America has never really been an isolationist power. That's the premise of Max Boot's book. But just as critically, he says, we're pretty good at fighting "small wars."

We've had lots of practice, as Boot points out, basically staying "involved in other countries' internal affairs since at least 1805." And, let me tell you, THIS is a Navy-Marine Corps story: the Barbary Wars, Panama, Samoa, the Philippines, the Boxer Rebellion, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Beirut, Grenada. The list goes on. We were there.

You may take issue with Boot's conclusions about how and why such wars are fought, but his views deserve a hearing -- especially when we still have tens of thousands of troops fighting such wars in Afghanistan, Africa and elsewhere, even while we stay ready for the large ones which may yet loom.

6. Let the Sea Make A Noise, by Walter McDougall

OK, this is a doorstop-sized book. Let me just get that out there right now. But it is well worth the time it will take you to read it. McDougall tells the twisted and sometimes sordid international history of the North Pacific since about the 16th century.

He does this masterfully and, as one reviewer says, "with a special emphasis on the intertwined histories of the Americans, Russians and Japanese." But he also tells the story by dreaming up seminars hosted by ghosts: Father Junipero Serra, a Spanish missionary; Kaahumanu, consort of Hawaiian King Kamehameha; William Seward, Lincoln's secretary of state; Count Sergey Witte, prime minister to Russia's Nicholas II; and Saito Hirosi, Japanese ambassador to the United States. The ghosts argue with him and with each other, as they debate the relevant issues and try to derive lessons for us today. 

Diving into this book will prove useful for any Navy leader as we begin to focus more of our attention and intellectual capital on the Asia-Pacific region. It's a beast, but also a good refresher.

7. Other Men's Flowers, by Field Marshal Lord Wavell

I have become a big believer in the power of poetry. Poetry is not written for the eye. It's written for the ear, for the heart. It has rhythm and meter and symmetry -- the very things one needs to be a good communicator. It pulls you in even as it makes you smarter. 

This is my favorite collection of poems, selected by Field Marshal Lord Wavell, a veteran of both World Wars and a scholarly man. Here is Kipling and Sir Walter Raleigh and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Here is Browning and Asquith and G. K. Chesterton. Wavell collected these works for himself, to give him sustenance and comfort. "I have a great belief in the inspiration of poetry towards courage and vision," he said. "And we all want all the courage and wisdom at out command in days of crisis when our future prosperity and greatness hang in the balance."

8. Journalism Next, by Mark Briggs

I'm an old guy, which means I have very little imagination anymore. What I like about this little book is that it forces me to think about "what's next" in the field of journalism. I know enough to know that if I can't understand that, I'm dead in this business. I can't afford to stop learning.

Briggs does a great job laying it all out in simple, clear language -- complete with lots of graphs and pictures so the history major in me can get it. You'll learn the future of micro-blogging, how to edit digital audio and how to make news "participatory." It's a textbook of sorts for digital journalists, but PAOs and MCs can benefit a lot by reading it.

9. Counselor, by Ted Sorensen

I didn't like everything about this book, to be honest. At times I thought Sorensen was being way too self-serving. But then I needed to remind myself that virtually ALL autobiographies are self-serving. And it's a long read too, coming in at a whopping 896 pages.

But there is no denying that Sorensen was to John F. Kennedy what all good staff officers should be to their principals -- a MOST effective advisor. He didn't just write JFK's speeches (which were fantastic no matter what you think of Kennedy's politics); he advised the President on nearly all matters of state -- from the Cuban Missile Crisis to the decision to go to the moon.

Sorensen had plenty of chalk on his cleats. They were covered in it. We should strive for the same.

10. Profiles In Courage, by John F. Kennedy

Speaking of President Kennedy, I have always enjoyed re-reading this Pulitzer Prize winner of his. Artfully written, it tells the stories of eight U.S. Senators who defied constituent and/or party loyalties on conscience alone. He writes, for instance, of John Quincy Adams' break with the Federalist Party, Sam Houston speaking out against the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, and Nebraska Senator George Norris, who opposed the arming of U.S. merchant ships as a violation of our neutrality in the early days of World War I.

All of these men suffered politically -- and sometimes personally -- for taking these stands, but they took them anyway. They had moral courage. This isn't a book about being right. It's a book about doing the right thing. And it's a classic.

11. Freedom at Midnight, by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre

It wasn't until I read this book that I felt like I truly understood the turmoil we continue to see in South and Central Asia. Ostensibly, this is a book about the partition of India, which took place at midnight on 15 August 1947. And it tells that story exceptionally well. The book reads like a novel. Indeed, the movie Gandhi was based on it.

But it really takes the reader inside the psychology of the four men most responsible for dividing up the British Raj into modern-day India and Pakistan: Lord Mountbatten, Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Muhammad Ali Jinnah. It also reveals the utter brutality of that partition. It's a tragic story, but a critical one to understand if you want to understand why we still struggle with extremism in that part of the world.

12. Stride Toward Freedom, by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

I am ashamed to admit that I didn't read this book until only a few years ago. It ought to be mandatory reading for every high-schooler. Not only was Dr. King a brilliant writer, he was also a good storyteller. And in this small but powerful work, he tells the story of the Montgomery Bus boycott -- the beginning of the civil rights movement.

Why does it matter? Because that was a seminal moment in American history -- the moment when we finally started to grapple with just who really were the "WE" in "We the people." It traces the journey of an entire community, dedicated not just to each other but to a better future for their children, and shows how a young man with passion and natural leadership ability helped transform a nation.

We cannot function as good advisors if we ourselves cannot understand other perspectives. And I don't believe you can begin to understand other perspectives until you feel them. Dr. King made me feel them.

13. The Life of Reilly, by Rick Reilly

I was never much of a sports fan as a kid. I played a lot of sports, but I didn't follow them much. The details of sports coverage just didn't interest me. Then, in college, I took a part-time job as a sports clerk with the St. Petersburg Times. I got to know a bunch of sportswriters and came to appreciate how difficult their job really is. Sure, it's fun to cover sports, but making it interesting and fun for readers is a whole different matter. That takes talent.

There is no more talented sportswriter than Rick Reilly. His column graced the back page of Sports Illustrated for nearly 23 years. Even my wife, no lover of sports, loved to read HIS stuff. She would often get to the magazine before I could and go straight to the back page. When he left Sports Illustrated in 2007, we canceled the subscription.

This book is a collection of his best columns up to about 2003. Some are funny, some are sad, some are poignant. But all of them make you think, and all of them are crisp.

It's like he's talking to you. You don't READ Rick Reilly, so much as HEAR him. That's good writing.

14. Following the Equator, by Mark Twain

Twain has always been my favorite author. I love his humor, his wit and the ease and simplicity of his writing. Following the Equator captures his essence best, in my view.  It's a travel log of a trip he took around the world in 1897.

For Twain, the book was an attempt to make some badly needed money, but for his readers -- then and now -- it serves as a window into the world, a window we can still look through. He tackles racism and strip-mining and military adventurism. He lays bare the prejudices and the vices with which many foreign governments administered their colonies. And he does it all with the precision of a scalpel, making you think even as you laugh out loud.

Twain ends the work with this line: "Human pride is not worthwhile; there is always something lying in wait to take the wind out of it." A good lesson for us all.

15. Public Opinion, by Walter Lippman

Lippman was sort of the Tom Friedman of his day -- a columnist, a thinker, a provocateur. He wrote about pretty much everything: politics, social issues, the economy. He published this book in 1922 as a fundamental treatise on the nature of human information and communication. It is still very relevant today.

Divided into eight parts, the work covers such varied issues as stereotypes, image making, and organized intelligence. Though dense in places -- with examples that can be difficult for modern readers to follow -- Lippman lays out the cultural and psychological factors that affect the way people think about events.

"The analyst of public opinion," he writes, "must begin by recognizing the triangular relationship between the scene of action, the human picture of that scene, and the human response to that picture working itself out upon the scene." You don't have to look any further than today's headlines to see how true this phenomenon remains. We would do well to remember that it isn't just "what happens" that affects public opinion. It's what people THINK and FEEL about what happens. It's about the imagery those events call to mind.

From T.P. Cameron Wilson, who was killed in 1918:

. . .  The gates of Heaven were open, quite
Unguarded, and unwired.