(Assignment)
The United States’ war preparedness and strategies against powerful Japan is the theme for Miller’s book War Plan orange: The US Strategy to Defeat Japan. Unlike other books written on World War II, Miller’s views stand noticeably impressive, because this is the only book that has featured the orange Plan so well in great detail. The author has done wonderful research to convert the documentary evidences of the half-a-century-long rivalry between the two countries to a compilation of easily comprehensible writings. The title of the book refers to the pre-World War II American techniques of coding countries, locations, operation and equipment involved in the war. As the book implies, the color orange is Japan and blue is obviously the United States.
The success of every strategy depends on the effectiveness of its planning and the quality of think-tanks involved in the process of its designing. Miller, being an economic graduate and an enthusiastic business administrator, has applied his intelligence in economically evaluating the profitability of the War Plan Orange. This way he proves that War Plan orange was the most successful war strategy in the American history. The book highlights the development of Japanese invasion over the West Asian region, which happened due the defeat of Russia. According to Miller, the country’s growth evoked fear in the minds of American administrators. By this time, the United States had occupied Guam and the Philippines. Centralizing Hawaii islands, the US navy set eyes on Japan and closely observed its actions on Russia. The thematic diversion takes place in the book when Miller identifies the strategic conflicts between the Naval War College comprising of the old admirals and a formal body setup for drafting war plans.
The war strategy was that the US would focus on the Eastern Pacific belt covering Alaska, Hawaii and Panama at the first phase. The second phase action would take the American Navy to the islands in the Central Pacific region closer to Japan. As the third phase, the US naval force as a complete fleet would settle in the Philippines and seize the Japanese control on the ocean water. Miller sees it as a plan effective enough to reduce Japan into to small island that would have lost the powers in the Asian mainland while its futile attempts resists the enormous pressure from the US navy. As Miller asserts, the entire planning process was complex, and at the same time it was clearly American. Miller has successfully described each stage of the restructuring of the plans involved in the Pacific War through his critical evaluation of the reasons for the admirals’ choices for practical approach to the sea war. The book highlights the wisdom of old admirals whose guidance played a vital role in the relocation of each anchoring points that they thought would incur war expense for the United States.
Miller’s technical perfection in designing the literature to give life to a seemingly near-dead war planning topic is really praiseworthy. Miller describes how the combination of admirals and war strategists along with proposed and abandoned schemes and plans during the term of the Pacific war benefited the US, and this makes his book an exceptional reference material for naval officials and aspiring candidates. The book as a whole indicates the author’s proficiency in writing and his in-depth knowledge in history and administration. Although a good volume of books on World War II is available, Miller’s War Plan orange is unique in every respect. In a clear-cut way, the book is a compilation of technically sound and error-free records of strategic planning.
Bibliography
Miller, Edward S. War Plan Orange: The U.S. Strategy to Defeat Japan, 1897-1945. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1991.
