The War to End All Wars: The American Military Experience in World War I

by Edward M. Coffman

Book Overview

" The War to End All Wars is considered by many to be the best single account of America's participation in World War I. Covering famous battles, the birth of the air force, naval engagements, the War Department, and experiences of the troops, this indispensable volume is again available in paperback for students and general readers.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 029910964X
• ISBN13: 9780299109646
• Release Date: January 1986
• Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
• Length: 440 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.1" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

A War To End All Wars

Excellant....very readable....best WWI I've read....author thorough....like to see him do one on Korean War... Ray Hufnagel

Great History of US Role in WW 1

I learned a great deal of the US involvement in World War 1 from this book. I have been trying to research my grandfather's service in WW 1 and found this book very useful. While it is somewhat drawn out in certain sections, it is very informative in other sections. From the information I had, I was able to piece together where my grandfather served and the battles he was involved in while there. I would reccomend this book only to those seriously looking at the US role in WW 1.

A Scholarly and Brilliantly Written Tour de Force!

In recent decades, social historians have strayed from the study of key historical figures and prominent events and instead focused their efforts on the common folk. Incorporating the methodologies of sociology and other disciplines within the social sciences, historians have made tremendous strides in promoting a better understanding of the masses. A few military historians have followed suit. Instead of writing solely about battles, campaigns, and the generals who plotted the strategies and won or lost, they turned their attention on who made up the rank and file. Edward M. Coffman dominates this breed of new military historian. His book _The War to End All Wars: The American Military Experience in World War I_ is a scholarly and brilliantly written tour de force; his collective group study: the American citizen soldier.First published in 1968 at the height of America's involvement in Vietnam, Coffman set the president for this new style of military history. His work is now a classic. As the subtitle suggests, Coffman tells the story of the whole American experience beginning in the spring of 1917 up to the signing of the Armistice. Throughout the book, Coffman remains focused on the American soldier and the planning, administration, and organization of his primary fighting force; the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF).As a result, the political machinations of coalition warfare and high level strategic decisions receives only enough attention to place his subject in proper perspective.The creation of the AEF, the largest American armed force ever sent to fight on foreign soil up to that time, is a marvel in and of itself. Coffman covers all aspects of this tremendous achievement. General John J. Pershing sailed for France with what amounted to a understrengthed division: the 1st Division. The AEF grew to a corps sized force, and evntually the First and Second Armies. In April 1917, the AEF consisted of 200,000 soldiers. By November 1918, it contained nearly 4,000,000. In addition to discussions on the War Department in 1917, and the stateside expansion of the United States Army, the author also covers with clever succunctness other important topics. These subjects include: the meteoric sculpting of the massive AEF command and supply structure in France; the disagreements between the General Staff in Washington and Pershing's Headquarters in Chaumont, France. Coffman also includes separate chapters on the American Navy and the air war. Coffman ties these themes together with a flowing battle narrative of the major campaigns the AEF fought in France as well as, some of the lessor known battles. It is the topics relating to the social history of the American soldier, however, that Coffman excels. The author covers such topics as the draft, procurment of officers, the controversial amalgamation of Negro troops into French units early in the war (Pershing venomously fought attempts by the British and French to amalgamate American soldiers as ca

An excellent account of the US in World War I

Coffman provides an interesting perspective on the First World War. His reader will find no discussion on the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand or information of the Schlieffen Plan. He will instead find details on the Selective Service Act and the famous American air ace Eddie Rickenbacker. Throughout this work, Coffman shows the United States as an important player in the Great War, and refreshingly he does not rehash the European aspects of the war about which so many others have written. Furthermore he is effective in his task, and his reader will have a better understanding of the American World War I military experience. Primarily Coffman examines the US Army, but he also devotes time to the Navy, Air Force, and the Marines. The book gives glimpses at the performance of each branch, and gives brief amounts of information about technological innovations during the war - especially in the realms of naval and air power. As one would expect, Coffman also writes about the major American military leaders such as John J. Pershing and William J. Donovan, but more interesting than his accounts of these men are his vignettes of common soldiers. Coffman obviously devoted a great deal of time conducting interviews with and reading the journals and letters of veterans. These portraits allow the reader to gain a real sense of the military experience of the Americans who fought in the war. Coffman's monograph is an excellent account of the United States during World War I. It is well written and researched, and it even includes enough maps that descriptions of battles can be understood. Its only drawback, and a minor one at that, is that the reader must already have a general understanding of the events in the Great War. Of course Coffman did not set out to write a general history of the war, but a general reader would need more background in order to truly gain the sense of America's wartime experience about which he writes.