Reviews by
Amphibious assault- Sea Breezes Review can.jpg
Commodore Michael Clapp CB RN, Commander Amphibious Task Group
(co-author of Amphibious Assault Falklands: The Battle for San Carlos Water)
‘This is a timely and exceptionally interesting collection of articles and accounts of amphibious operations and the mind-set needed to plan and fight successfully. I wish it had been published before 1982! Written for Royal Marines it not unnaturally concentrates on the problems of the landing and subsequent land operations from a marine’s point of view. To a marine or soldier the landing is but an opening to further action. To the naval officers who command and execute the landings they are very much an end in themselves and carried out in a part of the sea that is full of hazards. These operations are often ‘joint’ or ‘combined’. Naval and, indeed, Airforce officers should study this history just as much as marines and soldiers’.
‘In 1943, having been Director of Combined Operations, Admiral of the Fleet the Lord Keyes stressed the need for a Navy that could achieve Sea Supremacy in its area of operations. He went on to write ‘The lessons of history are invaluable and the record of scores of amphibious operations - some brilliantly successful, others disastrous - are available from which to gain inspiration and guidance. But as a race we are slow to learn and quick to forget, and the lessons are often only learnt by trial and error and bitter experience in each successive generation’. This excellent and comprehensive book allows no such excuse to the modern serviceman. How I wish it had been available and read by many before 1982!’
Professor Geoffrey Till Professor of Maritime Studies, UK Defence Academy
& Visiting Professor at the Armed Forces University, Taiwan and Senior Visiting Research Fellow at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, Singapore.
'Modern Sea Power,' (London: Brassey's) 1987
'Seapower: Theory and Practice,' (London: Frank Cass) 1994
Geoffrey Till (ed.,) 'Seapower at the Millennium,' (Gloucester: Sutton Publishing,) 2001
'Seapower: A Guide for the 21st Century,' (London: Frank Cass) 2004
'The Development of British Naval Thinking,' (London: Routledge,) 2006
‘The 21st Century looks to be an expeditionary age, in which the emerging maritime focus will be on the projection of military power from the sea. Often this will take the form of humanitarian and disaster relief operations, but it should never be forgotten that the capacity to do this depends on the classic virtues of amphibious assault. The limitless ocean is the world’s greatest ‘manoeuvre space’ and, properly exploited, it confers an enormous range of operational possibilities both in peace and in war. In this book a highly distinguished group of military practitioners and insider academics brilliantly explain the past, present and the emerging future of the capacity to manoeuvre from the sea’.
Professor Eric Grove, (University of Salford, UK)
The Royal Navy Since 1815, A New Short History (2005)
Fleet to Fleet Encounters; Tsushima, Jutland and Philippine Sea (1993)
The Future of Sea Power (1990)
Vanguard to Trident::British Naval Policy Since 1945 (1987)
'This remarkable book provides comprehensive, in depth coverage of amphibious operations from the First World War to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The various authors provide an excellent compendium of clear and well illustrated accounts, which are put into a useful, up-to-date doctrinal framework. This most impressive – indeed, unique work – deserves the widest market. It is simply the best book on the subject’.
“In 2005 the Corps Tutor of the Royal Marines, Lt Cdr Tristan Lovering, produced a remarkable service publication. This was an extremely attractively presented, exceptionally well illustrated historical review of amphibious operations from the Dardanelles in 1915 to the operations against the Al Faw peninsula in 2003. The book has now been published for the wider audience, that it greatly deserves (with royalties going to RM charities).…This was always too good a book to be left to its intended internal service audience, excellent though the original volume was for its instructional and educative roles. As I said when asked to endorse it for publication, I consider it to be one of the finest books on amphibious warfare ever produced. Its standard of illustration alone is exceptionally good, with a multitude of extraordinarily well-reproduced original maps and diagrams. Amphibious Assault should be on the shelves of everyone with an interest in maritime warfare, past, present and future.”
‘The Grove Review’, Navy News (June 2007), p. 44.
Professor George W. Baer, former Alfred Thayer Mahan Professor of Maritime Strategy, U.S. Naval War College, Newport, and now Distinguished Professor of Strategy & Policy, U.S. Naval War College, Monterey.
(One Hundred Years of Sea Power: The U.S. Navy 1890-1990)
‘This excellent book will instruct all readers in the nature and value of manoeuvre from the sea. The authors analyze over thirty modern amphibious operations, and, for each, establish ‘lessons learned.’ The cases, clearly and reliably presented, and thoughtfully evaluated, comprise an outstanding introduction to this enduringly important feature of maritime warfare’.
Dr Philip Towle,Centre of International Studies, Cambridge University
'This wide-ranging and thoroughly researched collection of essays demonstrate clearly that amphibious landings are amongst the most difficult of military operations and can only succeed in the face of determined enemy resistance if they are immaculately planned, and employ appropriate equipment and highly trained troops. The collection is recommended both to military historians and to officers likely to be involved in such operations; it should be required reading for all politicians who feel the urge to launch amphibious forces against substantial enemies’.
Lieutenant Commander F.L. Phillips R.D., T.D., R.N.R, (Vice President, Council of the Navy Records Society, UK)
(The Royal Navy Day by Day)
‘Amphibious assaults are the most complex military operations to mount successfully and they present unique challenges to military planners. The first successful British joint force attack from the sea in modern times captured Quebec in 1759. Since then, ships and weapons have changed many times over but this capability to strike from the sea remains a key element in maritime warfare. Commander Lovering has assembled concise accounts by leading international military and academic experts of 33 amphibious operations since the “how not to do it” catastrophe at Gallipoli in 1915, through the great operations in Europe and the Pacific in the Second World War, in Korea, at Suez and down to the Al Faw landings in Iraq in 2003. Here is an indispensable “Lessons Learned” portfolio for the British Permanent Joint Headquarters and for all those involved in littoral warfare and in the planning and execution of amphibious operations. This book will also prove a key source document in the Service staff colleges and for all informed students of Twentieth Century maritime warfare’.
Lt Col Ewen Southby-Tailyour OBE,
Amphibious Assault 3
Review for Globe and Laurel July 2007
Amphibious Warfare is at the scholarship level of military operations: a fact ignored by the non-cognoscenti who believe that myths are perpetuated to keep specialists in employment. True, infantry battalions land across beaches, but many confuse a sea-transported manoeuvre with the ‘real thing’ and the ‘real thing’ is what this impressive publication is about: with such clarity, even the cynics will be converted.
Amphibious Assault dissects thirty-seven, mostly successful, operations and offers conclusions: operations that failed did so through miss-appreciation of the dangers, vagaries, complexities - and usefulness - of the sea flank; continuing proof that specialist ships, amphibious troops, continual training and experienced commanders remain vital for victory. Another conclusion: each generation ignores - then re-invents - the amphibious wheel when, in reality, there is little new. Only equipment and technology change - not principles - and yet governments and military staffs are often reluctant to accept Winston Churchill’s view that amphibious operations must fit together like a jewelled bracelet and, thus, tend to cobble together inadequate forces at the last moment to suit a current problem.
The British Army, Lord Fisher said, should be a projectile fired by the Navy and Tristan Lovering's masterly, definitive compilation explains what happened - should have happened - once that missile was deployed. His contributors do not discuss pre-assault, maritime operations nor such imponderables as tides, surf, gradients and trafficability but they do highlight post-landing operations including area- and inshore-defence, sea-based logistics and maintenance, casualty handling, special forces, naval gunfire and carrier-based air support: quite so, for Amphibious Assault studies the ‘projectile’ rather than the ‘gun’ and naval personnel, too, must appreciate what happens to the force that they have nurtured and landed. Additionally, everyone needs reminding that, in peace and war, the weather-prone inter-tidal zone is dangerous, laden men drown in six feet of water and the ‘chop’ of command will always offer a fraught watershed.
Before the second Gulf War a CGRM considered beaches to be passé but Amphibious Assault endorses why ports, airstrips and supply routes, even in this expeditionary, ship-to-objective era, will remain vital amphibious objectives themselves; especially as ‘host-nation support’ becomes less likely.
In 2005 Amphibious Assault was issued to every Royal Marines officer: now commercially available all royalties benefit the Royal Marines 1939 War Fund. This is an invaluable book that discusses a complicated form of warfare and, in doing so, supports a very special charity.
1. Navy News (June Edition 2007), page, 44
2. Nautilus UK Telegraph (June 2007)
WARSASH NAUTICAL BOOKS & MAINMAST BOOKS
'This is an outstanding piece of work that is impressive on many levels. A highly distinguished group of military practitioners analyse thirty-seven amphibious operations, "from the 'how not to do it' catastrophe of Gallipoli in 1915 to the Al Faw landings in Iraq in 2003". The period in between takes in, of course, World War II, Korea, Suez, Vietnam, the Falklands and the Gulf War. Although Tristan Lovering's book was written as a training aid for the Royal Marines, it is very accessible and makes fascinating reading. The presentation of the book is also superbly done and you should not be put off by the paperback binding. The typography is good and the featured photographs and maps are superbly reproduced. As to the relevance of the subject, Lovering points out, "All the wars fought by the English-speaking peoples in the 20th Century (and after) have been expeditionary wars nourished by seapower. This is one of the maritime books of the year. (2007). 528pp. 100s colour, b&w photographs. Maps. LBK. Large Format 305x230mm (Landscape)'.
