Right man in the right place

LARRY ANDERSON
Larry Anderson

Bill O’Reilly, the intellectual behind The O’Reilly Factor on Fox News, has been rolling like an army through a wheat field. Not only has he cheerfully earned the disdain of the Left for his refusal to buy baloney as an answer, Bill has the highest-rated news program in cable.

O’Reilly has also written a remarkably successful series of historical books, beginning with Killing Lincoln, a huge best seller. He followed that effort with Killing Kennedy and Killing Jesus, which were also sales whoppers.

All are written in the spare narrative style of a journalist and read in a flash.

O’Reilly’s most recent investigation is Killing Patton: The Strange Death of World War II’s Most Audacious General. The book rose to No. 1 non-fiction best-seller in the world.

As with his other efforts, O’Reilly presents insight into his subject within a turmoil of significant events and people. Some, FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Churchill, Hitler, and Stalin, are given almost as many pages as Patton, but all had a significant part in shaping Patton’s career as America’s most pugnacious and successful general.

He had his influence on them as well. Patton is the general they loved to hate.

It is interesting to see how the interaction of these leaders not only defined Patton and the outcome of World War II, but how the modern world was shaped by their decisions and mistakes.

Some of the factual presentation is fairly common knowledge, but the interweaving of characters and swirling events dramatize outcomes. Killing Patton is one of those books that will have you saying to yourself, “I didn’t know that!”

George S. Patton was a soldier’s soldier. A West Point grad, he soon had a battlefield command in France during World War I where he excelled in taking real estate. On at least one occasion, his troops were provided artillery support by a battery under the command of a Missouri-born captain named Harry Truman, who later become Patton’s commander-in-chief, if briefly. Patton’s contempt for his superiors is well-documented and colorful in O’Reilly’s book.

Patton is somewhat overshadowed by Dwight D. Eisenhower’s success in France, but it must be noted that Eisenhower never had a field command during his career. While Eisenhower’s strength was in bringing personnel and materiel to bear where needed, Patton excelled on the blood- and-guts battlefield.

Patton’s strategy was move fast, hit hard, and never let up. This is how he took Sicily back from the Germans at a speed greater than expected and enabled him to move so fast in France he had to be ordered to halt before he extended his supply line too far.

Patton has been criticized for his battlefield style, but most historians and military figures agree his hard-driving strategy saved lives. Patton limited opportunities for the enemy. Languishing, second-guessing, and over-thinking were not his approach. His military acumen is unmatched in his era, even if his personal demeanor was hard to take at times.

Patton had a view of the world that was filtered through a totally military mindset. He was impatient, critical, profane, and aggressive, but he won battles, put fear into the hearts of his enemies, and aptly demonstrated he was the right man in the right place at the right time.

Patton’s greatest success occurred during the Battle of the Bulge.

High command had concluded Germany was teetering, but Patton thought otherwise. He believed a push was imminent, and he was right. In December, 1944, the Germans drove deep into Belgium, threatening important seaports and halting American momentum.

Patton was prepared. In a remarkable maneuver, he swung his Third Army north and within days relieved the besieged town of Bastogne where Americans had succeeded in stalling the Nazi drive. Patton’s foresight and military ability saved much.

A few month’s after the war’s end, Patton’s staff car was struck head-on by an American military truck. Paralyzed, the general hung on briefly before expiring shortly before Christmas, 1945.

Foul play was speculated. Patton had accumulated enemies, including Stalin. There had been close calls, strange circumstances, and Patton’s own feeling that he had played out his string.

The evidence that Patton was murdered is interesting, but not compelling.

O’Reilly’s position is the general was likely assassinated by the Russians who feared Patton could engineer a war against them in their occupied countries.

Perhaps, but O’Reilly’s call for a new investigation into Patton’s death isn’t likely to spark interest on the part of the government.

Larry W. Anderson believes it is important for Americans to know their history.