The U.S. Army Combat Historian and Combat History Operations

World War I to the Vietnam War

Kathryn Roe Coker, Jason Wetzel

• Publisher: Casemate
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9781636243306
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military Biographies
• Index: History

"How is history useful for an operational commander or to soldiers in general? What role does history have for doctrine and training to the U.S. Army as an institution? These are questions this book answers as the authors narrate the development combat historian and the evolving role of combat historians as they develop history into a useful tool for informing training, operations, and doctrine development."—New York Journal of Books In World War I, Major General Pershing proposed the idea of establishing a historical office within the AEF headquarters. The War Department reorganized the General Staff to include a Historical Branch. Evidence shows that soldiers acting as historians went "down range," albeit not into combat. By World War II, the situation had changed—whether S.L.A. Marshall's popping out of a billet in Sibret as a shells exploded on the road; Forrest Pogue's typing "on a little camp desk under an apple tree;" Chester Starr's terrain reconnaissance in the Mediterranean theater, or Ken Hechler's command of a four-man historical team interviewing soldiers at the Remagen Bridge and searching through secret documents—the World War II combat historians were there behind and on the front lines with a notebook in one hand and their carbine in the other hand, ever ready to collect battlefield information. Eight historical service detachments were deployed to Korea. The youngest commander, 1st Lieutenant Bevin Alexander, noted "We were on the front lines the whole time . . . We would interview the people afterwards and create a battle study…." After the Korean War, the duties of the combat historian further evolved as what became the Center of Military History published doctrine about military history detachments (MHDs). As America's immersion in Vietnam escalated, there was concern regarding historical coverage. Chief of Military History Brigadier General Hal Pattison established a network of historical teams to collect information on the U.S Army in the war. A major development in the history program and in deploying MHDs came with the establishment of Headquarters, U.S. Army Vietnam (USARV) under General William C. Westmoreland's command. In 1965, the history office was organized at Headquarters, U.S. Army Vietnam (USARV). MHDs were deployed across Vietnam, conducting combat after action interviews, and collecting documents. This study focuses on U.S. Army historical programs during combat operations from World War I to the Vietnam War with particular attention on the combat historians, those individuals deployed to a theater of war with the mission of documenting the actions of that theater for current and future historical use.

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Dedication
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Chapter 1 World War I and the Beginnings of Army Combat Historians
• Chapter 2 Post-World War I Army Military History Operations
• Chapter 3 Developing the World War II Army Historical Program
• Chapter 4 Training the World War II Combat Historian
• Chapter 5 Organizing Historical Units and Assigning Combat Historians to Theaters
• Chapter 6 Army Combat Historians in the Pacific
• Chapter 7 Army Combat Historians in Europe
• Chapter 8 The Enemy Side of the Hill
• Chapter 9 Army Combat History Operations in the Mediterranean Theater
• Chapter 10 Post-World War II Army Military History Doctrine
• Chapter 11 The Korean War
• Chapter 12 The Vietnam War
• Afterword
• Appendix A Acronyms and Abbreviations
• Appendix B Selected Military History Detachment Lineage & Honors
• Endnotes
• Bibliography