Book for Armor guys

panzergator · Post by **panzergator** » Sat Mar 21, 2020 4:25 am

Today, I received volume I of PRESS ON! The Selected Works of General Donn A. Starry. Thank you, Mike Robel, for bringing this work to my attention. Starry was likely the pre-eminent thinker in the US Army on mechanized warfare the last half of the Twentieth Century. If you are interested in armor and cavalry, these volumes are highly recommended, if somewhat intimidating. The first volume is 699 pages! As a young officer, Starry was aide-de-camp to Creighton Abrams, 3AD at Fort Knox, served in Germany (If you read The Lieutenants, by W.E.B. Griffin in the Brotherhood of War, Starry is the "Donn" to whom the book is dedicated). Later, 11th ACR in Vietnam, the Armor Center and Fort Knox, V Corps in Germany, and served in several other senior positions, retiring as a 4-star. Of particular interest are the papers dealing with the Fulda Gap, but there is a lot of meat in these books for Armor guys. The archivist for Starry's papers was Lewis Sorley, who wrote Thunderbolt!, a b biography of Creighton Abrams, and A Better War, covering Abrams and his command of MACV as the Vietnam War wound down. From the Combat Studies Institute. Spent about $60 from Amazon. Looking forward to this book!

PS The table of contents mentions an accompanying disc of Starry's book, Mounted Combat in Vietnam. It was not present in my copy, unless it comes in with Vol 2. I believe you can find the book at Amazon. No, you can't borrow my copy.

panzergator

mike robel · Post by **mike robel** » Sat Mar 21, 2020 4:29 am

What PzG fails to say is he was Starry's aide de camp at one point. Not an easy job. I don't think he's mentioned in the papers, but I haven't searched.

panzergator · Post by **panzergator** » Sat Mar 21, 2020 4:44 am

I will not be mentioned, Mike.

panzergator · Post by **panzergator** » Sat Mar 21, 2020 4:55 am

To whet your appetite, Starry's thoughts on tank platoon size -page 54, M60A2 tank page 74, the XM1 tank... See Page 140 - to the officers of the Royal Armoured Corps, Armor on the Modern Battlefield: The Way Ahead. Evaluation of the M551 (low opinion); The impact of the M1... Your eyes will be opened, your jaw will drop. You will have a much greater appreciation of what our guys do, the way they think, you will have the experience and thoughts of our smartest general. Ooooh, TASTY!

panzergator · Post by **panzergator** » Sat Mar 21, 2020 5:40 am

Having only perused/leaded through this volume, I ASSURE you, if you are an armor guy, this book is a "must read!". It will tell you how the issues were considered, how things came about, the advantages and drawbacks that were encountered. You will listen to the conversations between the movers and shakers of the Army in the last half of the 2 0th century, their evaluation of "our" stuff, "their" stuff, what we should do about where we were, where we wanted to be. DO NOT READ THIS WHILE SITTING ON THE TOILET! YOUR LEGS WILL FALL OFF before you can find a point you can get up!

mike robel · Post by **mike robel** » Sat Mar 21, 2020 7:36 am

There's a picture i could live without.