Patton was antisemitic and not well educated

[JamesL]

Perhaps it would be helpful if we reviewed a copy of Patton's THIRD ARMY speech. With slight variations he gave this speech to a number of US Army units forming up in Great Britain for the Normandy Invasion. From what I can tell the troops loved it.

This version comes from The Sabre, a publication of the Gen. George S. Patton Organization, the Patton Museum.
http://www.generalpatton.org/Patton_Sab ... nter08.pdf
Winter 2008 edition, pages 3 & 7.

_________________


Excerpts from General Patton’s Address to the Troops, East Anglia, June 1944

You are here today for three reasons. First, because you are here to defend your homes and your loved ones. Second, you are here for your own self respect, because you would not want to be anywhere else. Third, you are here because you are real men and all real men like to fight.

When you, here, every one of you, were kids, you all admired the champion marble player, the fastest runner, the toughest boxer, the big league ball players, and the All-American football players. Americans love a winner. Americans will not tolerate a loser. Americans despise cowards. Americans play to win all of the time. I wouldn't give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That's why Americans have never lost nor will ever lose a war; for the very idea of losing is hateful to an American...

All of the real heroes are not storybook combat fighters, either. Every single man in this Army plays a vital role. Don't ever let up. Don't ever think that your job is unimportant. Every man has a job to do and he must do it. Every man is a vital link in the great chain. What if every truck driver suddenly decided that he didn't like the whine of those shells overhead, turned yellow, and jumped headlong into a ditch? The cowardly bastard could say, 'Hell, they won't miss me, just one man in thousands.' But, what if every man thought that way? Where in the hell would we be now? What would our country, our loved ones, our homes, even the world, be like? No, Goddamn it, Americans don't think like that. Every man does his job. Every man serves the whole. Every department, every unit, is important in the vast scheme of this war...

...One of the bravest men that I ever saw was a fellow on top of a telegraph pole in the midst of a furious firefight in Tunisia. I stopped and asked what the hell he was doing up there at a time like that. He answered, 'Fixing the wire, Sir.' I asked, 'Isn't that a little unhealthy right about now?' He answered, 'Yes Sir, but the goddamned wire has to be fixed.' I asked, 'Don't those planes strafing the road bother you?' And he answered, 'No, Sir, but you sure as hell do!' Now, there was a real man. A real soldier. There was a man who devoted all he had to his duty, no matter how seemingly insignificant his duty might appear at the time, no matter how great the odds.

And you should have seen those trucks on the road to Tunisia. Those drivers were magnificent. All day and all night they rolled over those son-of-a-bitching roads, never stopping, never faltering from their course, with shells bursting all around them all of the time. We got through on good old American guts. Many of those men drove for over forty consecutive hours. These men weren't combat men, but they were soldiers with a job to do. They did it, and in one hell of a way they did it. They were part of a team. Without team effort, without them, the fight would have been lost. All of the links in the chain pulled together and the chain became unbreakable...

There is one great thing that you men will all be able to say after this war is over and you are home once again. You may be thankful that twenty years from now when you are sitting by the fireplace with your grandson on your knee and he asks you what you did in the great World War II, you won’t have to cough, shift him to the other knee... No, Sir, you can look him straight in the eye and say, 'Son, your Granddaddy rode with the Great Third Army and a Son of-a-G _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _-B _ _ _ _ named George Patton.’

_________________

Blumenson pointed out that "His toughness, his profanity, his bluster and braggadocio were appurtenances he assumed in order to inspire soldiers and, incidentally, himself. He cultivated the ferocious face because he believed that only he-men, as he often said, stimulated men to fight. Like Indian war paint, the hideous masks of primitive people, the rebel yell, the shout of paratroopers leaping from their planes, the fierce countenance helped men in battle disguise and overcome their fear of death."

I seem to recall that Patton called one private soldier a son of a bitch. The soldier protested, claimed he was insulted and demanded an apology from Patton. Patton did apologize to that soldier.

[JKindred]

Have you seen Deliverance? kids with 4 hands playing the bajo!

Yes, but it is a fictional movie and I do not believe those are consider appropriate sources of documentation.

[South]

Good morning Bolshevik,

President Woodrow Wilson was born in the South (Staunton, Virginia) and had gotten a job as a university president (Princeton Univ, New Jersey). Geography is not a function of education.

(My screen name has absolutely nothing to do with politics or history.)

Bernard Baruch, President Wilson's financier, was from the South. His father was the Confederate Army's Chief Medical Officer (studied medicine in Richmond, Virginia). WWII's USMC General Chesty Puller's (born in West Point, Virginia) father was a Confederate officer. There was a war going on.

General Patton's persona and attributes are not geographic functions. I'm sure there are citizens in Cognac region France who distain Louis XIII cognac for Johnny Walker Blue Label.

Regardless of General Patton's prejudices or lack thereof, social history requires plotting this out against the environment of the time.

Warm regards,

Bob

[Marcus]

Three posts commenting on a banned member were removed.

/Marcus

[JKindred]

Three posts commenting on a banned member were removed.

/Marcus

Marcus,

Maybe those should have been left up to possibly deter others of the same mentality as the banned member? His entire premise was an attack not a search for information.

[Marcus]

No, we do not allow comments on banned members.

/Marcus

[Rob - wssob2]

Couple of clarifications

1. Patton was a Californian, born just south of Pasadena (specifically in San Marino/San Gabriel township)

2. Yes he had a lot of antecedents that fought for the Confederate side during the American Civil War

3. Patton was extremely well read, especially in military classics, and fluent in French.

4. Patton was not only antisemetic but also an Anglophobe - and the latter is probably a more important character trait in his biography.

5. Patton's attitudes about the superiority of white, Christian American culture were common in the USA in the 19th Cent. and are still prevalent today.

Drew Roberts in his book The Storm of War had this to say about Patton on page 509:

"...Patton was not a wholly attractive man. The obverse side of his intense racial pride in himself was his anti-semitism, and his belief in the Bolshevist-Zionist conspiracy was in no way lessoned after the liberation of the concentration camps. By the end of his career, the US Army had placed a psychiatrist on his staff to keep an eye on him, and were monitoring his phone calls."

6. Stanley P. Hirshson's Patton: A Soldier's Life raises an interesting theory that Patton's racist and anti-Semetic attitutes were exacerbated by his marraige to the fabulously wealthy Beatrice Ayer. The Ayers of course, were Yankee bluer-than-bluebloods and textile tycoons whose political leanings could probably be charitably described as a bit right of center.

The Claremont Institue has an apologist criticism of Hirshson's work by Victor Davis Hanson (see http://www.claremont.org/publications/c ... detail.asp) but also includes the following quotes

...
Even more seminally, Hirshson goes on to explain, Patton's own family and California upbringing were neither racist nor illiberal. Thus the blame for his later indiscretions properly belongs to his wife Bea—and her Ayer industrialist in-laws of Massachusetts: the "family operated woolen mills whose workers lived in tenements" and had a "role in creating the horrible slums of Lawrence." The Ayers, Hirshson has uncovered, had become famously wealthy by manufacturing patent medicines, and held bigoted views of minorities, Jews, and foreigners, befitting their narrow class interests. So there is no escaping nemesis: according to Hirshson, the reactionary politics that harmed General Patton during his proconsulship in Bavaria were due to his wife's family's pernicious influence.

...Concerning Patton's removal from the Third Army in October 1945 and his controversial postbellum governorship of Bavaria, Hirshson may be right that the old Ayer chickens came home to roost. Such family prejudices may have prompted his intemperate remarks and even his concern with order rather than with removing Nazis from postwar reconstruction, which policy led to his ouster. But just as likely the sixty-year old man, who had slept little for a year amid constant battle at the front, was worn out, and, like dozens of generals in the theater between June 1944 and May 1945, long overdue to come home permanently.

I'll end on a personal anecdote: when my father was a kid in the mid 1930's he saw Patton at the Myopia Horse Show in Hamilton, MA. (the Ayer family estate is in Hamilton) - Seeing Patton's dog, my father fell in love with the Bull Terrier breed (and our family ended up raising a bunch).

My father also described this incident: During a jumping event, Patton's horse spooked and apparently stopped or fell or otherwise would not or could not attempt this jump. My father in horror watched as an irate Patton whipped the horse with his riding crop across the head multiple times with a full swing and the full force of his arm, screaming obscenities at the top of his lungs. My dad chuckled that he learned every swearword in the English language from Patton that day.

[Carl Schwamberger]

[quote="Rob - wssob2"

I'll end on a personal anecdote: when my father was a kid in the mid 1930's he saw Patton at the Myopia Horse Show in Hamilton, MA. (the Ayer family estate is in Hamilton) - Seeing Patton's dog, my father fell in love with the Bull Terrier breed (and our family ended up raising a bunch).

My father also described this incident: During a jumping event, Patton's horse spooked and apparently stopped or fell or otherwise would not or could not attempt this jump. My father in horror watched as an irate Patton whipped the horse with his riding crop across the head multiple times with a full swing and the full force of his arm, screaming obscenities at the top of his lungs. My dad chuckled that he learned every swearword in the English language from Patton that day.[/quote]

That is interesting. Probably they are long lost, but the observations from private or Army stable hands might have told us something about Patton's character. A couple of highly sucessfull horse & dog trainers have told how the animals bad behavior reflects directly from the persons ability.

[Michate]

A couple of highly sucessfull horse & dog trainers have told how the animals bad behavior reflects directly from the persons ability.

Hehe, in case that has not already been done, I can easily imagine the topic of the 100,001st book on Hitler, providing a full depth analysis of his relationship with Blondie.

[kgbudge]

Rob - wssob2:

I don't have much of a dog in this fight, having no strong opinions on Patton, but the first paragraph in your quote seems to have been pulled out of context in a way that bothers me. The next paragraph, which you omitted, is awfully important:

Hirshson claims a few significant findings: General John S. Wood has been unduly overlooked as a key source about Patton's Normandy career—ironic since he, more than Patton, might have been the exemplar of swashbuckling use of armor in Normandy. Even more seminally, Hirshson goes on to explain, Patton's own family and California upbringing were neither racist nor illiberal. Thus the blame for his later indiscretions properly belongs to his wife Bea—and her Ayer industrialist in-laws of Massachusetts: the "family operated woolen mills whose workers lived in tenements" and had a "role in creating the horrible slums of Lawrence." The Ayers, Hirshson has uncovered, had become famously wealthy by manufacturing patent medicines, and held bigoted views of minorities, Jews, and foreigners, befitting their narrow class interests. So there is no escaping nemesis: according to Hirshson, the reactionary politics that harmed General Patton during his proconsulship in Bavaria were due to his wife's family's pernicious influence.

There are several problems with all this. First, is the matter of degree—the fallacy of magnifying something that may well be true about the man into the Truth about the great general. Take the case of John S. Wood. Hirshson strangely elevates Wood, an old friend whom Patton removed from command in 1944, into a foil to Patton throughout his entire biography, as if a division commander's observations about Patton's strategic lapses in commanding an entire army were, in fact, prophetic, rather than embittered. Yet, if anything, the aggregate of Wood's observations show far more disdain for Eisenhower and Bradley than Patton, who once called Wood "the best Division Commander I know."

[steverodgers801]

About 1923 Patton and Ike acquired a French tank, stripped it down to nuts and bolts and rebuilt it. They then colaberated on a paper on the future of tank warfare. They were told that such thinking was nonsense and to drop it.

[Carl Schwamberger]

About 1923 Patton and Ike acquired a French tank, stripped it down to nuts and bolts and rebuilt it. They then colaberated on a paper on the future of tank warfare. They were told that such thinking was nonsense and to drop it.

Not quite heard that version before Ike and Patton served in various capacities in the post war investigation of mechanization of Army operations during 1919, 1920 & 1921. At one point they worked together on a test project for tank machine guns. Ike mentioned this in his autobiography.

During 1921 & 1922 Congress rejected Peyton Marsh's plan for a modern US Army and cut the War Department budget back to prewar levels. An example of the effects of this was the reduction of the Army's motorized artillery regiments from eight to two understrength regiments during 1923. Production of the modern M1 howitzer suitable for motorization was tabled as too expensive. thousands of Liberty aircraft engines possesed by the Army were sold at scrap prices, which left insufficent spares for Air Corps training. Funds for development were cut to nothing by Congress & the Coolidge administration. Pershing and his sucessors had to steal money from other Army budgets to sustain their residual development efforts. All that during the prosperous 1920s.

[Rob - wssob2]

Hi kbbudge -

Thanks for your post - I take it that the crux of the matter is the historian Victor Davis Hanson claims that historian Hirshon has misused, misinterpreted and overephasized the observations of Patton's sacked divisional commander John S. Wood

I admit I have a hard time with Hanson's phrase "the fallacy of magnifying something that may well be true about the man into the Truth about the great general" - I'm not sure what that means - that is wrong to compare the characteristics of a person as they are in real life vs. their mythic/public persona?

Perhaps Hanson means something like "So what if Patton was antisemetic, it had little to do with his contribution to History as a great general" similar to "So what if Hitler liked dogs and little children, it had little to do with his contribution to History as a genocidal dictator."

I also ponder if Patton thought Wood was such a great divisional commander, why did he sack him?

I read Hirson's work and really liked it. I've read a bunch of Hanson's work too (most recently Mexifornia) and can cherry pick parts I really like but overall I get the sense that Hanson is bitterly nostalgic as to why America no longer looks like a Daughters of the American Revolution Christmas Card from 1961.

[kgbudge]

Perhaps Hanson means something like "So what if Patton was antisemetic, it had little to do with his contribution to History as a great general" similar to "So what if Hitler liked dogs and little children, it had little to do with his contribution to History as a genocidal dictator."

I think that's true in part, though I think another element is that anti-Semitism was not all that big a component of who Patton was, even if it was present. Kind of like saying that, yes, Hitler may have been a vegetarian*, but it isn't really one of the things that made Hitler, Hitler.

I've read a bunch of Hanson's work too (most recently Mexifornia) and can cherry pick parts I really like but overall I get the sense that Hanson is bitterly nostalgic as to why America no longer looks like a Daughters of the American Revolution Christmas Card from 1961.

If so, I'm not unsympathetic. There were some very unpleasant aspects of American civilization in 1961, but the effort to get rid of them seems to me to have sacrificed an awful lot that was good as well. I know: this is getting into a political discussion that is out of place here. I don't think it ruins Hanson's value as a historian and scholar.

* Yes, I know this is disputed.

[ChristopherPerrien]

About 1923 Patton and Ike acquired a French tank, stripped it down to nuts and bolts and rebuilt it.

An officer and a wrench ? correction Two officers with wrenches.

Believe me , if an officer grabs a wrench/tool near a tank, all enlisted nearby will get an immediate sense of dread, all sergeants will try to deter the officer , and any higher ranking officers will tell him to put it down.

An officer and a wrench simply does not happen, and for good reason. I would had prolly be thinking how to find a medic immediately,because one might be needed, or worry about what the fool might break, and how long it will take to fix

Need a source for this anecdote. And I note: the US Army had and had been using Renault Ft17 tanks since 1918 ,a French tank in the US Army in 1923, was nothing new and pretty much a rule at that time, 1000 Ft17's were built in America.