Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military
From: illgen@hq.af.mil (Keneth..Illgen)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Tom Clancy
Message-ID: <12144@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 9 Dec 89 00:40:30 GMT
References: <12095@cbnews.ATT.COM>
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From: illgen@hq.af.mil (Keneth..Illgen)

In article <12095@cbnews.ATT.COM> willner@cfa203.harvard.edu (Steve Willner) writes:

>From: willner@cfa203.harvard.edu (Steve Willner)
>Fans of Tom Clancy should read the article by Scott Shuger in the
>November issue of the _Washington Monthly_.  Mr. Shuger's main point is
>that Clancy writes about how weapons are _supposed_ to work and how
>they are _intended_ to be used, but that these bear very little
>relation to the reality of actual combat.


     I have to agree with Mr. Shuger wholeheartedly. Mr. Clancy has a great
capacity for absorbing information and presenting it very well on paper for
our entertainment but if there is one area where his lack of any true 
military experience shows it is in his presentation of how weapons are
utilized (not physically used) in combat. I felt his first couple of times
at bat he gave us just enough to make it (the book) more interesting but in
his last few works there has been too much of a reliance in weapons to simply
resolve crisises in themselves. History proves that this is rarely the case
(although they do make a helluva good starting point).

>Mr. Shuger makes another assertion that is frightening indeed, if
>true.  He says that high government officials make policy on the basis
>of Clancy's novels.  While I am skeptical on this point, I have to
>admit that the article makes a good case for it.


     I really feel that Mr. Clancy's publisher came up with this. With the 
exception of his latest he has rarely come up with a point of policy in 
his books. I'm referring to the development of policy; not the implement-
ation. Clancy is very good at describing the implementation process. 
     Even though Ronald Reagan appeared on one of his book jackets as
an avid reader I can't imagine his (or the present) administration
referencing a Clancy novel to determine policy.

>If you want to see this sort of thing done right, read _The Third World
>War_; it's by a retired general and is much more convincing.  (My copy
>has somehow disappeared, so I can't give author's name or publisher,
>and there is some chance the title is slightly wrong.  It was published
>in the early 1980's, I think.)

     That was General Sir John Hackett (apoligies on the spelling maybe).
By far the best and most realistic apprasial of combat readiness and
order of battle in this decade. I thought he sorta fell flat with the ending
but how can one man pick a favorite nuke target. That's an ending that any
one would have a problem writing. After reading that book it finally sunk
into my head why exactly I was spending all those years in Europe.