Admiral Nimitz and the Pacific War with Craig L. Symonds | John Batchelor

Only days after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt tapped Chester W. Nimitz to assume command of the Pacific Fleet. Nimitz transformed the devastated and dispirited Pacific fleet into the most powerful and commanding naval force in history. Craig Symonds's "Nimitz at War" captures Nimitz's composure, discipline, homespun wisdom, and most of all his uncanny sense of when to assert authority and when to pull back. As this absorbing, dynamic, and authoritative portrait reveals, it required qualities of leadership exhibited by few other commanders in history, qualities that are enduringly and even poignantly relevant to our own moment.

John Batchelor is the host of CBS Eye on the World, a hard news-analysis radio program featuring interviews with authors and reporters on a range of topics, from current events and world history to the natural sciences.

00:00 Nimitz at War
00:49 Pearl Harbor
03:03 Ernest J. King (COMINCH)
04:32 Husband E. Kimmel
05:27 Nimitz's personality
07:20 Brown shoes vs black shoes
08:23 Calculated risk
10:18 Doolittle Raid
11:53 Decrypting radio traffic
13:10 Battle of the Coral Sea
14:39 Raymond A. Spruance
15:59 Marc Mitscher
18:15 Guadalcanal
21:12 The Walkers
22:57 Nimitz in Honolulu
24:47 Robert L. Ghormley
26:55 Frank Jack Fletcher
28:43 Replacing Ghormley
30:57 William Halsey Jr.
33:57 Douglas MacArthur
36:02 South or Central Pacific?
38:31 Landing at Tarawa
41:52 John Henry Towers
44:42 Mitscher's second chance
45:50 Battle of Kwajalein
47:57 Battle of the Philippine Sea
51:10 Battle of Leyte Gulf
53:53 Halsey's tantrum
56:55 December 1944 Typhoon
01:00:43 Nimitz in Guam
01:03:29 Nimitz and FDR in DC
01:04:46 Okinawa
01:07:23 A second typhoon
01:09:22 Blockade vs invasion
01:12:04 A special weapon
01:13:23 V-J Day, a promotion for Nimitz
01:15:10 Spruants and the Naval War College
01:16:36 "Sea Power: A Naval History" and E.B. Potter

"Nimitz at War" by Craig L. Symonds on Amazon: https://a.co/d/cCdq3mQ

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