Beacons in the Night: With the OSS and Titoâ (Tm)S Partisans in Wartime Yugoslavia

by Franklin Lindsay

Book Overview

At midnight on May 14, 1944, the blinking of a flashlight in mountainous, German-occupied Yugoslavia signaled the parachute drop of four American OSS (Office of Strategic Services) officers who were met by a group of Tito's Partisans. One of the OSS officers was Franklin Lindsay. Only with the declassification in the 1980s of wartime American and British archives could he undertake to reconstruct his day-to-day experiences in a war area of constantly...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0804725888
• ISBN13: 9780804725880
• Release Date: January 1996
• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

pretty good BUT!!!

The author does not really spend his time with Tito's Partizans which weere mainly based in Bosnia. He is posted in Solvenia, which experienced a no less bloody and brutal but very different conflict. Slovenia had a very unique experence during the Balkan war. Slovene Partizans were heavily influenced by, but not entirly controled by Tito until later in the war. Slovenia was, and still is, an ethnically homogenous area it did not experience civil war to the degree that was seen in Bosnia or Croatia. Here the Partizans were hell bent on their chief goal of expeling the occupying fascist powers of Italy/Germany and all assosiated with them.

A Preview of 21st Century Warfare

I read this book specifically because I wanted to see what I could learn about partisan warfare from the military liaison point of view. I specifically wanted to see how many lessons might be applied to the situation in Afghanistan. While I realize that one can not simply substitute the name "Afghanistan" for "Yugoslavia," I wanted to know if one could draw some more general lessons from our past experience - and who better to write about our past experience in such warfare than Franklin Lindsay!Certainly the American news media is at a loss to explain not only the current dynamics but more significantly what tasks must yet be completed before we can hope for a stable, prosperous and free Afghanistan. By in large, the American media has not been able to get over the significant cultural differences. They simply aren't equipped. And so I read Lindsay's book looking for far more than a ripping good adventure - and found it! While I can't claim to "understand" what to expect next from Afghanistan next, that is due more to the lack of good information. What I have now is a list of questions I believe critical to the overall success American foreign policy. I have a starting point. I have a framework, and I credit "Beacons in the Night" with helping identify for me the various key dynamics associated with fighting a numerically superior enemy and securing effective control over a large and diverse population. America look out! The ground we trod has been crossed before. Listen and learn - the pitfalls are huge, but we can indeed succeed. Yugoslavia stands to serve as a beacon toward success - and a stark warning against failure.What research! What an education! What a great introduction to the topic! What solid and enjoyable writing! This book was everything I'd hoped it would be - and more. I recommend this book to anyone who wants a glimpse at the light at the end of the current terrorist-tunnel. This book isn't just history - it's an unflinching preview of 21st century warfare. ~Robert

Fascinating - True Adventures

Lindsay was an OSS military advisor who fought with Tito's partisans in Slovenia against the Nazis in World War II. His account is a highly-readable thrilling adventure story - climbing snowy mountains with the Germans in pursuit, crossing streams in the night, directing parachute drops, organizing Allied supplies to the Partisans. Lindsay's matter-of-fact prose is effective and adds credibility. He disdains the frequent Allied advisors who are overly pro-Partisan, never losing his distrust of communism. But he clearly has a lot of respect for the Partisans' organizational skills, intelligence, courier lines, and tactics.Some of the most interesting material discusses the inability of the US, UK, or Soviets to either create or find or support any indigenous resistance groups in Austria. Why? Several reasons, including the inescapable fact that Austrians were not so dissatisfied with the Nazi government, were less courageous than their counterparts in Yugoslavia, and were far more willing to lay low and wait for liberation rather than risk anything at all to hasten it.The strongest chapters are the early ones, with Lindsay in the mountains of Slovenia, where he participates in the events he discusses. The book becomes noticeably weaker as the war winds down and Lindsay moves to Belgrade and is kept isolated by Tito and is unable to witness much of what he reports on. He does a game job of reconstructing events from other sources, but much of the immediacy and some of the credibility of the early material is lost.The postwar political struggle for the (now-Italian) city of Trieste is fascinating. Tito coveted the city and its Adriatic access. The Yugoslavs were dogged, single-minded, and happily willing to engage in deceit to seize the city in the postwar settlements. Finally, Lindsay is entirely plausible in presenting the view that only the U.S.'s 1950 intervention in Korea prevented Stalin from attacking and subjugating Yugoslavia in the wake of Tito's break with the Soviet Union.This is a strong book, not without flaws, but certainly enlightening and useful to scholars of the Balkans and World War II as well as to those who just enjoy a fascinating war adventure.

Well-written, informative

One of those books that demonstrates how reality is usually more interesting than fiction. Lindsay's account of his activities as an OSS operative in the former Yugoslavia during World War II is a much better read than most Cold War spy fiction. The text is very readable and hightly informative - not only about wartime events in Yugosalvia but also about the policies of the Allied governments and military in dealing with them. The book also provides a good deal of information on a topic that is covered very little in the English language: the struggle of the Slovenian Partisans against the Nazis. Lindsay points out that some of the first territories liberated within the Third Reich itself were in fact in the Slovenian provinces. Linday's observations of Tito and his senior staff just after the end of the war are also quite revealing. The text is, however, weaker where Lindsay does not speak about events he did not directly witness or take part in. Thus, he often cites rather uncritically a number of secondary sources on specific events in wartime Yugoslavia. Even so, the book as a whole is an excellent read and a valuable source of information on the subject and period that it covers.

Required reading to better understand today's balkans

This book is required reading for people who want a better understanding of today's Balkans and the nature of Guerrilla warfare. Mr. Lindsay's book educates on several topics. The effectiveness or ineffectiveness of Partisan warfare and countermeasures. The political nature of Partisan warfare. The effects of such warfare in the Balkans and the difficulties that military advisers have in influencing Partisan leaders who's interests quite often are different from the adviser's country. This well written book should be on every Military Adviser's shelf. Politicians, beltway bureaucrats and Military critics need to read this book and take to heed it's lessons on the limited effectiveness on Military advisors being able to control the heated passions of people fighting in far off lands.