John Costello's book "The Pacific War"

[Canoerebel]

I've been fiddling around reading John Costello's massive The Pacific War (1981) to fill in gaps in my knowledge about the Pac war. (How vast and many those gaps are - I know next to nothing about ABDA, India and Burma, I've come to find out).

I've been surprised at the number of errors I've encountered in the book thus far. There are numerous times when he writes "east" when he means "west." He refers to the "4th Marine Division" on Bataan many times. He says that the American cruisers Chicago and Perkins left Pearl Harbor. Nagoya is a destroyer.

This guy badly needed a Forumite to serve as a fact checker. Have any of you read this book? Are these "small" errors mere blemishes on a work that is otherwise full of merit or are they indictative of rot. IE, am I wasting my time?

P.S. I stopped reading Neptune's Inferno a year ago due to a number of mistakes indicating poor fact checking.

[dr.hal]

I think the fact that there are errors is regrettable, however I wouldn't throw out the baby with what ever. I find almost every book has an error or two (just finished Willmott's book "Battleship" where I found a few errors and having known Ned and his ability to dig for details I certainly wouldn't expect it, but it happens). However I don't allow that to over-shadow the other nuggets that the author might shed some light on.

[Bo Rearguard]

As others have mentioned in past posts about this book before, there are simply too many silly errors-- such as the refloating of the first 'Lexington' in late 1943, the reappearance of the 'Shoho' long after it was sunk, or the Hellcat divebomber (F6F Hellcats could divebomb but the plane was designated a 'fighter'). Some of these errors were so egregious that I laughed out loud. Every several pages there was a goof regarding a name, place, or equipment.

[dr.hal]

To be clear, I've not read the book in question, but was making a general statement about looking at the broader contribution a work makes, rather than focus on the detail, no matter how silly (and yes I agree, some of them do make me groan!). Hal

[DD696]

I have the book sitting within my view now. Bought it about 3 years ago on a whim, and was quite disappointed with the number of errors it has. Been awhile since I read it, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone as a serious treatment of the Pacific war.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I've been fiddling around reading John Costello's massive The Pacific War (1981) to fill in gaps in my knowledge about the Pac war. (How vast and many those gaps are - I know next to nothing about ABDA, India and Burma, I've come to find out).

I've been surprised at the number of errors I've encountered in the book thus far. There are numerous times when he writes "east" when he means "west." He refers to the "4th Marine Division" on Bataan many times. He says that the American cruisers Chicago and Perkins left Pearl Harbor. Nagoya is a destroyer.

This guy badly needed a Forumite to serve as a fact checker. Have any of you read this book? Are these "small" errors mere blemishes on a work that is otherwise full of merit or are they indictative of rot. IE, am I wasting my time?

P.S. I stopped reading Neptune's Inferno a year ago due to a number of mistakes indicating poor fact checking.

Hi Canoerebel,

I read Costello's "The Pacific War" probably 15 years ago. I hadn't noticed the factual errors you cite.

I thought it was a good (not great, but good) single-volume summary of the Pacific War, kind of a Reader's Digest version of same. At the time, I enjoyed the read for the summary format, which you can't find in too many other good one volume books.

You're just getting too smart for yer britches. [;)]

[Nikademus]

Costello's book has a number of small factual errors, such as mis-spelled ship names or mis-labeled ships. He could have used a better editor.

however this doesn't detract from the book's true strength which is a 1st class analysis of the Trans-Pacific situation and the origins of the Pacific aspect of WWII. The sections on China are also well done and expose an oft neglected portion of the war.

Its worth a read.

[HansBolter]

Strange this should arrive on the forums just as I dusted it off the shelf for a reread.

I agree strongly with Chickenboy and Nickademus.

In spite of getting details wrong he does a good job of presenting a summary in one volume and a particularly good job of presenting a review of the source of the conflict.

[Canoerebel]

Thanks for the input.  I know from experience that little errors have a way of creeping into even the most carefully edited publications.  But sometimes an avalanche of small errors undermines the credibility of a book - if you can't trust the small things what makes you think you can trust the big ones?
 
That was the position I was in.  I was surprised by the growing number of errors, which indicated an unusual level of sloppiness, which left me wondering whether it was worthwhile to read the book.  From the insight of the knowledgeable and helpful folks who have posted here, I see that it is.  I'll finish it.
 

[dr.hal]

Canoerebel,

Let me know how you like it (and how it ends). As I indicated above I've not read it, but have it in my library and thus on my queue. Hal

[Canoerebel]

I started the book years ago but got bogged down in the geopolitical background to the war.  (I confess, I was looking for carrier battles and hitting the beaches and Burt Lancaster rolling on the beach with a pretty babe.)  So I put it down until about a week ago.  I picked it up and started at ABDA.  I've since made it to Midway.  I've found the book enjoyable, readible, and yet with sufficient depth to be rewarding.  I think my favorite part has been the depth given to intelligence and code breaking.  So I give the book a thumbs up since I now know (thanks to you guys) that its sloppiness isn't indicitive of inaccuracy.

[leehunt27@bloomberg.net]

Costello's book is great for a single volume on mostly the American point of view, but a more interesting one for the Japanese fanboys could be John Toland's The Rising Sun. Its nice to see a single volume from the other sides' point of view. Also you can see how crazy things got in the Imperial government at the very end, when all was lost there were still near coups etc

[Lecivius]

ORIGINAL: Bo Rearguard

As others have mentioned in past posts about this book before, there are simply too many silly errors-- such as the refloating of the first 'Lexington' in late 1943, the reappearance of the 'Shoho' long after it was sunk...

Having not read this, is this serious?!? [&:]

[dr.hal]

Thanks...

[Canoerebel]

We could have a contest:  Forumites agree to read "The Pacific War" and to list every error found (no use of Google or other reference tools).

P.S.  Just kidding.  But I bet the number or errors would exceed 100. 

[Numdydar]

You mean '... of errors ..." instead of "... or errors ..." correct Canoerebel [:D]? See even in such a short post there can be small errors so I cannot imagine the number that a big book would have [:)]

[Canoerebel]

That's just a typo.  To make it analogous to what Costello did, I'd have to have written something on the order of:  "...the number of escargots would exceed 100."

[DaveConn]

That's just a typo. To make it analogous to what Costello did, I'd have to have written something on the order of: "...the number of escargots would exceed 100."

Finding all those errors would proceed at a snail's pace! [:D]

[msieving1]

The strength of Costello's book is his descriptions of the political and diplomatic aspects of the war. The errors, which are real enough, are generally trivial, but if you're mainly interested in detailed descriptions of battles it's probably not the book for you.

[Blackhorse]

In accordance with the long-established rule of speakers, that, "everything that needs be to said has been said, but not by everybody who needs to say it," I'll agree with the emerging consensus that Costello gets a lot of the (especially military) details wrong; regiments are divisions, ships mis-named, etc.

But he also does a bang-up job in a one-volume treatment of the geo-political issues. He is the first writer I've come across who speculates that the reason the allies were expecting an attack in late November/ early December, but were surprised that Pearl Harbor was the target, was because the British had cracked a particular Japanese naval operational code. Messages sent in the code warned fleet units to prepare for hostile action, but only mentioned the DEI, Malaysia, etc. as targets.

He was also the first writer I found who suggested that the US government knew and approved of Quezon's gold payment to MacArthur and members of his staff.

All in all the book was a good read, with some interesting and original insights, but not a trustworthy military analysis.