HISTORICAL OFFICE
OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
What's New
February 2013
February 4, 2013 — Dr. Edward L. Ayers is currently the President of the University of Richmond and a historian specializing in the Antebellum South. Prior to his appointment at the University of Richmond, Dr. Ayers was a professor at the University of Virginia from 1980–2007 and served as the Buckner W. Clay Dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences from 2001–2007. He is the author and editor of 12 books, including "In the Presence of Mine Enemies: War in the Heart of America, 1859–1863," winner of the Bancroft Prize and The Promise of the New South finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and National Book Award. Dr. Ayers is also an editor for the Papers of Abraham Lincoln and is the co-host of "BackStory with the American History Guys," a weekly radio show that examines the historical roots of contemporary issues.
January 2013
January 22, 2013 — The 2012 edition of Key Officials is now available online. The document is a compilation of information about the organization of and senior officials in the Department of Defense since its establishment in 1947. Key Officials encompasses the upper echelons of the department, including civilian officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the military departments as well as the top leadership of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Combatant Commands, and certain field activities and agencies. It shows all officials who have held a listed OSD position since the inception of the department and indicates where positions have been superseded by new titles or organizational changes.
To keep the information current, the Historical Office is publishing Key Officials online and will revise it every month to reflect the latest information. The Historical Office will print a limited number of hard copy versions every four years, generally late in the inaugural year of each administration (after the vast majority of changes in senior officials occur). The online version can be found at: http://history.defense.gov/pub_ko.shtml.
January 9, 2013 — National Park Service Historian Frank O'Reilly will discuss the Battle of Fredericksburg at the next Department of Defense History Speaker Series event on Wednesday January 9, 2013. Mr. O'Reilly has for many years been an interpreter and historian at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, and his familiarity with the grounds, tactics, and order of battle provides him with considerable knowledge of the events that occurred in December 1862. Although the Battle of Fredericksburg is remembered for the massacre of Union soldiers at Marye's Heights, Mr. O'Reilly suggests that the fighting between General Stonewall Jackson and Union Generals George G. Meade and John Gibbon was the battle's most decisive, as the Union broke the Confederate lines. Mr. O'Reilly's publications include Stonewall Jackson at Fredericksburg and The Fredericksburg Campaign: Winter War on the Rappahannock, which won the 2002 Capital District Book Award, the James I. Robinson, Jr., Book Award, the Daniel Laney Book Award, and the Richard Barksdale Harwell Book Award. Currently, Mr. O'Reilly is researching the Seven Days Campaign and the Battle of Malvern Hill.
December 2012
December 3, 2012 — Dr. Allan Millett's presentation is entitled "Korea November 1950" and will discuss the month in which U.S. forces first encountered China's People's Volunteer Army (PVA). The U.S. Arm’s encounter with the PVA resulted in a series of defeats and retreats leading to the lowest point in the war. Currently, Dr. Millett is the Director of the Eisenhower Center for American Studies and the Stephen E. Ambrose Professor of History at the University of New Orleans. He is a specialist in the history of American military policy, military institutions, and twentieth century wars. Dr. Millett's most recent book is The War for Korea, 1950–1951: They Came from the North (2010) and he is the author six others including Semper Fidelis: The History of the United States Marine Corps (1980), Their War for Korea (2002), and The War for Korea, 1945–1950: A House Burning (2005).
October 2012
October 23, 2012 — This presentation recognizes the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, when the United States and the Soviet Union probably came closest to engaging in World War III. While the story of the 13–day confrontation is well known, Professor Coleman pays particular attention to the largely ignored period immediately afterward, when the Kennedy Administration had to ensure that the Soviets and their Cuban allies actually followed through on the agreements reached to avert war. That process proved exceedingly difficult and contentious, not least because domestic considerations came to the fore after the threat of nuclear conflict seemed to abate. Dr. Coleman directs the Presidential Recordings Program at the University of Virginia's Miller Center and has been working with and writing about classified White House tapes for
13 years. He is also an Associate Professor at the University of Virginia and
teaches classes in the History Department on American political history, Cold War history, and nuclear history. He has published widely on U.S. politics, nuclear strategy, and the Cold War. His most recent book is Real-World Nuclear Deterrence: The Making of International Strategy (2006), co-authored with Joseph M. Siracusa.
September 2012
September 27, 2012 — Dr. Marolda is a faculty member at Georgetown University and the former Senior Historian of the U.S. Navy. He holds a PhD in history from The George Washington University and served as a U.S. Army officer during the Vietnam War. He has authored, coauthored, or edited twelve books on U.S. naval history. Dr. Marolda will discuss the impact of U.S. maritime power on the modern history of Asia based on his "Ready Seapower: a History of the U.S. Seventh Fleet," recently published by the Naval History and Heritage Command. Since its birth in World War II, the Seventh Fleet has served as one of the primary instruments of U.S. foreign policy in the vital but volatile region, buttressed America's Far Eastern alliances, protected oceangoing commerce, and battled America's foes in World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and the Arabian Gulf. Today, and indeed throughout the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the fleet has also worked to deter armed aggression and to defeat piracy, terrorism, and weapons' proliferation. Fleet units have often acted quickly to help Asian peoples recover from typhoons, volcanoes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters. There will be time for questions and audience participation.
September 4, 2012 — Dr. Thomas Clemens is a retired professor of history who has long specialized in the Battle of Antietam, to include leading regular tours of the battlefield. He has edited, annotated, and published a two-volume study of the campaign originally researched and written by Ezra Carman, a regimental commander in the battle. The Maryland Campaign of September 1862 is widely regarded as one of the best accounts of the pivotal operation. The battle of Antietam is often called a tactical draw, but a strategic victory for the Union forces. Dr. Clemens’ presentation will examine the army which George McClellan led, what he did with it, and his advantages and disadvantages. Much is often made of the logistical challenges faced by Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, but few have studied the similar constraints faced by McClellan in this campaign. This reappraisal is long overdue and the conclusions may surprise those accustomed to the traditional "bumbling and cautious" interpretation of the man Lee called "the most able general I faced.
August 2012
August 28, 2012 — Dr. Birtle is chief of the Military Operations Branch at the Army Center of Military History. He is the author of U.S. Army Counterinsurgency and Contingency Operations Doctrine, 1860-1941 and a companion volume covering the period 1942-1976, and is currently writing the Army’s official history of its advisory program in Vietnam covering 1961-1965. General Zinni’s 35 years of service in the Marine Corps included two tours in Vietnam, as a company command and as an advisor to a Vietnamese Marine Corps battalion. His last active duty billet was Commander in Chief of U.S. Central Command during 1997-2000. Dr. Willbanks retired from the Army as a Lieutenant Colonel with twenty-three years service as an Infantry officer in various assignments, to include a tour as an advisor with a South Vietnamese infantry regiment during the 1972 North Vietnamese Easter Offensive. He has been on the faculty at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College since 1992. His published books include Abandoning Vietnam; The Battle of An Loc and The Tet Offensive: A Concise History. Dr. Birtle will open the program with a brief overview of the U.S. advisory effort in Vietnam. General Zinni and Dr. Willbanks will then talk about their experiences as advisors in Vietnam, any conclusions they drew from that experience about the overall advisory effort, and their observations that might be relevant to the recent effort in Iraq and the current effort in Afghanistan.
July 2012
July 17, 2012 — Christopher George was born in Liverpool, England, in 1948, and became a U.S. citizen in 1995. He admits to “divided loyalties on the War of 1812” but strives to take an objective view of the war. Author of Terror on the Chesapeake: The War of 1812 on the Bay, he has served as editor of the Journal of the War of 1812 since 1996, as well as coordinator of the National Symposium of the War of 1812 series held annually in Baltimore in October. His presentation will explore the causes of the war and the political conditions that pitted President Madison's ruling Republican Party against the Federalists, with consequent affect on the American war effort in the opening months of the conflict. Mr. George also will contrast the initial U.S. failures on land with a more successful record at sea based on the victories of U.S.S. Constitution, as well as American privateers preying on British commercial shipping.
June 2012
June 15, 2012 — Robert Krick, retired Chief Historian for the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, will give a presentation which will focus on Jackson's initial operations in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley in 1862 and explain how his success there catapulted him to national and international prominence. His highly drilled infantrymen covered ground so fast in moving from one battle to the next that they soon were dubbed "foot cavalry." Despite being outnumbered 3 to 1, he maneuvered his forces skillfully and made them appear to be numerically much stronger. He would prove to be one of the most effective commanders for the South until he died in action at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863.
May 2012
May 10, 2012 — This presentation launches the OSD Historical Office’s just-published book Rearming for the Cold War, 1945-1960. This is the first volume of five in the Defense Acquisition History series. The project began several years ago under the auspices of the Army Center for Military History and has received support from the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology & Logistics, as well as the service history offices. The OSD Historical Office now has oversight. Although numerous studies have looked in depth at particular weapons programs, this series is the first to provide an overarching account of defense acquisition from 1945 to the end of the 20th century. Dr. Elliott V. Converse III, a retired Air Force officer and author of the book, will lead off and talk about his project. Professor Benjamin F. Cooling of the Industrial College of the Armed Forces will set the book in the overall historical context of defense acquisition. Dr. Jacques S. Gansler, a former Under Secretary for AT&L, will follow with perspectives on the topic based on his experience managing DoD acquisition. Dr. Roy L. Wood, dean of the Defense Systems Management College, will moderate the panel and the question and answer session with the audience that will close out the presentation.
April 2012
April 11, 2012 — Dr. Ethan Rafuse, a widely published author on the Civil War, will give the inaugural presentation of the DoD Historical Speaker Series at 1130 on 11 April in the Pentagon Auditorium. His talk will assess the opening months of the conflict President Lincoln called "A People's Contest." The ongoing program is planned and coordinated by the historical offices of OSD, the Joint Staff, and the four military services. A primary theme will be the commemoration of our nation’s past conflicts, to include the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812 (1812–1815), the 150th anniversary of the Civil War (1861–1865), the 100th anniversary of World War I (1914–1918), and the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War (1956–1975).
April 10, 2012 —The OSD Historical Office recently released its newest publication and latest addition to the Secretary of Defense Historical Series--McNamara, Clifford, and the Burdens of Vietnam, 1965-1969. In conjunction with the National Archives and the Vietnam Center at Texas Tech University, the office is sponsoring a program about the book. The author, Dr. Edward Drea, will join with noted Vietnam historian George C. Herring and former Secretary of Defense Harold Brown to discuss the book and pertinent issues related to the Vietnam War and the direction of that war effort coming from the Department of Defense. The program will begin at noon on Tuesday 10 April at the National Archives.
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