Abstract
This collection of essays describes itself as providing a previously untold story through an examination of both military history and disability history. The 11 chapters included within the nicely produced volume range in their coverage of history from the ‘Invalid Corps’ (later known as the ‘Veteran Reserve Corps’) of the US Civil War through to the Vietnam War, and considers how five different countries employed substandard troops in their armies at different times. As even the introduction notes, ‘these case studies might not truly be disability history because in many cases these men would not be considered disabled outside the military’ (p. 2). It is an important caveat as the examples raised are in most cases those of able-bodied troops, albeit with some suffering from serious medical ailments, whom the cover notes term as ‘the more average men’. This opening section represents an attempt by the editor, a historian for the US Army Medical Command, to justify his labelling. The reality is that ‘wars …increase manpower needs and threaten standards, which can be lowered or refined’ (p. 3), and these are stories of men who might normally have been rejected for ordinary service but found themselves fighting, sometimes within specific units but most often as part of the rank and file, because the regular forces had been expended. Hence this should more accurately be viewed as an interesting, indeed an important, volume that reviews how troops that might normally be viewed as substandard and overlooked for enrolment in military forces have been used when emergency or necessity requires.
Despite the legitimate claim that it is the elite units that tend to have been the most written about, some of the examples that have been chosen are well known. The editor has, however, assembled a collection of writers who can genuinely be described as authorities on the subjects, and this means that a lifetime of research and study is used to provide still compelling stories. Most obviously Peter Simkins, who was the long-time senior historian at the Imperial War Museum, has produced a wonderful account of ‘the Bantam Experiment’, a social and cultural aspect of the First World War that retains a particular resonance within the British psyche of this conflict. To be eligible to serve in Kitchener’s ‘New Armies’ men had to be 5 feet 3 inches tall, but, as his chapter reveals, with mounting casualties on the Western Front this requirement was relaxed to fill the gaps in manpower, and an entire division of ‘Bantam battalions’ was eventually created. The 35th (Bantam) Division forms the backdrop of the chapter and Simkins traces how, having completed its training, it was sent to fight in the Somme offensive (p. 84), but here it experienced mixed fortunes. The writer argues that ‘[a]ny objective analysis of the division’s performance on the Somme will confirm it was ill-used and that command shortcomings, especially at the army and corps levels, contributed to its woes’ (p. 89). With an exhaustive but balanced analysis of the relevant archival documents, the conclusion offered is that while it was a flawed experiment and there were deficiencies in the collective concept, at the individual level there was little essentially wrong with the Bantam fighting spirit.
Another particularly interesting study is provided by the renowned expert on Soviet military forces Colonel David M. Glantz. His is an excellent and sweeping overview of how during the Second World War the Red Army used several categories of substandard manpower in response to catastrophic casualty rates inflicted on it following the June 1941 attack by German forces. Within the text there are some extremely valuable tables assembled from various Russian-language sources which provide granularity about the composite nature of the country’s wartime military. One example will suffice to highlight their worth: an analysis of the ethnic composition and the death rate by nationality reveals that 34,476,700 troops saw service, and among the more than 8 million of them who died there were 2,400 Greeks and 40 Chinese (pp. 163–4). There is also an important discussion of the role played by women. Including auxiliaries the author assesses that anywhere up to 1 million served their country, and among these a still undetermined number performed combat duties (p. 170). Glantz’s contribution is perhaps the most impressive as it is truly holistic in terms of its examination of what would be considered by peacetime armies as substandard personnel – including not just women and ethnic groups but also convicts and penal troops – and the period it encompasses.
One other contributor might be highlighted for specific mention not least because he provides two highly instructive chapters. Professor Valdis O. Lumans has already demonstrated his expertise on the role of the wartime German minorities. His two chapters focus on the Volksdeutsche and expertly reveal how the ethnic German population which was reincorporated into the expanding Reich found itself increasingly pressed into combat roles, generally with the Waffen SS. Initially a combination of a fascist outlook and a strict adherence to racial purity had meant that these men were often overlooked, but an initially rigorous volunteer-based process progressively degenerated into ‘eleventh hour helter-skelter, press-gang seizures’ (p. 223), which in the process diluted the combat effectiveness of the German army. In considering in some detail the activities of the SS Division ‘Prinz Eugen’, where many of the Volksdeutsche were posted, he highlights both how they were viewed as inferior troops and their often brutal response in the fighting in which they were employed. His conclusion is still applicable today where men, women, and children find themselves forcibly pressed into service: ‘coerced, intimidated, demoralized and even physically abused men do not make good soldiers – especially when they do not accept the cause for fighting as theirs’ (p. 224).
This is an often fascinating and well-written collection which reflects most favourably on its editor and those who have contributed to it. Together they have produced an important study in how military organizations, which have at times displayed considerable prejudice in viewing elements within their own society, have employed these same substandard forces in order to be able to continue to wage war.