Patton's hatchet man


Doing radio today, I started telling a story on Sully and Russ T. Nails' show that I didn't get a chance to finish. And so I'll tell the ending (briefly) here . . .

We were talking about how Patton dealt with his subordinates, and how he would occasionally humiliate them in front of others . . . but when it came time to fire them, he could be a bit of a wimp. He had to get Bradley - at the time his deputy commander - to fire Orlando Ward in Africa.

That was personally pretty tough for Bradley, as Ward had been one of his mentors (and, in fact, Bradley thought he simply hadn't received enough support). That was clearly an emotional moment for Bradley, but my guess is that it made it easier for him to replace general officers later on. In fact, Bradley was probably the toughest American commander when it came to cashiering generals. (As historian and friend Jonathon Jordan* points out, in a lot of cases later he was "simply" following their commanders' recommendations; still, he was the one who did it.)

Bradley does deserve the nickname "GI General." He cared very much for the individual soldiers under his command, and there are plenty of stories of small kindnesses toward them. But he was anything but soft, and he focused on results throughout the war.

(The url for Sully and Russ: http://bigbizshow.com/ They're a hoot.)

*You can get to Jonathan's excellent book on the relationship of Patton, Eisenhower and Bradley from this link. Definitely worth putting in your WW2 library.