July 22, 2025 • 23 mins
In this episode, I spoke with author William Nester on his book "General George S. Patton and the Art of Leadership: One of America’s Greatest Ever Generals". For General George S. Patton, “Leadership is the thing that wins battles. I have it—but I’ll be damned if I can define it. Probably it consists in knowing what you want to do and then doing it and getting mad if anyone steps in the way. Self-confidence and leadership are twin brothers.”
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello everyone, and welcome to the Ernie Pyle World War
Two Museum Podcast, your podcast of Ernie Pyle, the voice
of the American soldier during World War II. My name
is Doug has and if you're tuning into the Ernie
Pile World War Two Museum Podcast, what we do on
this podcast is share with you pieces of piles life
from this humble beginning on the Indiana farm to becoming
a polite surprise winning an American journalist and war correspondent
(00:38):
who is best known for his stories about ordinary American
soldiers during World War Two. But today we have a
very special guest with us today, author of William Nestor,
and he is here to talk about his book, General
George S. Patten and the Art of Leadership, one of
America's greatest ever generals, William. Welcome to the Ernie Pole
(00:58):
World War Two Museum pot.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Thank you, Doug. It's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Well, thank you, and thank you for spending a few
minutes out of your busy schedule to be with us today. Now,
I know most people hopefully would get an idea of
what the book's about based on the title, but we
always like to allow our author to just kind of
talk about the book in his or her own words.
(01:23):
So if you don't mind just kind of sharing us
a little bit about the book.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Yes, Well, the key is the art of leadership, and Adden,
through his writings and through his behavior, is a fountain
of insights into that theme. And so there have been
some other great biographies, a really comprehensive one. This gets
to the essence of what made him a great leader.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Now, Patten was one of those individuals that was loved
and hate hate exactly in terms of that, both by
his men, by fellow generals, leadership, and even the enemy.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
I think we could even say he was loved and hated.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
I loved him since that he was feared and admired
in somebody that they didn't, you know, just take for
granted in terms of that. What do you think was
one of Patten's greatest assets as a leader?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Okay? Probably the key one was leading by example and
from the front. Okay, it's just incredible. His courage. He
was as a major general and later a lieutenant general
in North Africa, in Sicily, across France and even into Germany.
He was frequently under fire, He was straved, he was bombed,
(02:48):
he was mined. Occasionally snipers took fire at him, and
so he led from the front and by example, also
by appearance, okay, he tried to exemplify the general as
a sort of an ideal, so immaculately dressed and he
insisted the soldiers do the same, which was one of
(03:09):
the reasons why Medi hated him, because he would find
them if they weren't wearing like their helmet, even if
they were behind the lines where they didn't have a
tie on. So that was part of the part of
Pattern that was not popular. But at the same time,
it builds morale ity, it builds cohesion. It forces people
into routine so that they automatically do things rather think
(03:31):
about it or do the opposite. So and his personality
was abrasive. He was a narcissist and a braggart, but
fortunately he lived up to his boast. In fact, the
more he boasted, the more he tried to excel and
(03:54):
what he had previously accomplished. Okay, but that's he's complex character,
that's the public patent. Okay. With his friends, his good
friends like Eisenhower. Eisenhower and Pattern were deep friends, even
though at times of course during the war, Patten would
(04:15):
do things that really irritated and tested that friendship, but
they thoroughly enjoyed each other, and behind the scenes, when
his stage persona if you will, was off, he could
be a charming and very sophisticated, articulate individual. So he's
(04:39):
a fascinating character from so many different directions. But the
bottom line was his brilliance as a combat general, and
I rank him up there with and very similar to
Nathan Bedford Forrest and Stillwell Jackson as a hard hitting,
fast movie decisive general. Okay, ruthless, but in that ruthlessness
(05:06):
you save lives, You save your own lives by inflicting
maximize the most importantly psychological defeat on the enemy. You
want to demoralize the enemy. And Pattern was brilliant at
that and successful success. And even if soldiers initially are skeptical,
if they can succeed where they have failed before under
(05:27):
previous leaders, that's going to give them the confidence to
try even harder. So that's the good side of Pattern,
and the good far out weighs the negative, there's no
question about that. And the bottom line, once again is
he was brilliant at war, and not just during World
War two as a lieutenant, he was with Persian's Mexico
(05:52):
expedition and he was an aid to Blackjack Persian and
he let a patrol I think he had about a
dozen men and several rickety cars of that time, they
got this this tip that Ponta Villa's right hand man,
General uh Cardenas, was at his ranch. So they show
(06:15):
up at the ranch and there's this wild West shootout
with Patten. He shot at he kills Cardenas, maybe another man,
and one of his soldiers killed a third man, and
the other guards of Cardenas take off. And throughout his
life he would express, you know, he always struggle with courage. Okay,
(06:40):
in this particular one, he was so satisfied with how
he performed because he said, I didn't worry. Everything happened
as if in an abstraction. I did exactly what I
needed to do, Okay. In World War One he was
a tank command. He was our first field tank commander,
(07:00):
and once again he led from the front. And now
they had those I'm sure you've seen those little Renault
French tanks. Two man tank. One guy's a driver, the
other guy's a gunner, and so he is literally, they
didn't have radios. So he's dashing from one tank to
the next, urging them on, banging on the sides, tell
(07:21):
him to go in different directions. He's urging on his men.
He's under constant fire. Now, that was in the first
battle sam Ma Hill, Okay, and that was initial battle
before MirZ are Gone, which is the longest battle that
we fought during World War One. And here again he
was leading from the French front, much to the ire
(07:44):
of his commander, General Rockenbach, who said, no, you've got
to stay in the rear and direct things from Well,
if you don't have radios, you can't really do much
but hope for the best. And Paton knew you got
to get out front and inspire people. Well, in that
second one he was grievously wounded. A bullet shot him
right in a hip and that put him out of
(08:05):
action on the second day. But again that's the type
of commander he was. He was more than bragg He
led from the front, He fought valiantly. He won a
number of different medals, every medal except for the Medal
of Honor, which he probably deserved in that particular instance.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
Yeah, you know, and you bring up a great point
where he was as a leader a little different in
the fact that he led from the front, where a
lot of people, especially in war, like you said, are
leading from behind, and that put him at odds with
some of his superiors because I think they were afraid
(08:42):
he was going to get killed or shot.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
And whether you loved or hated Patten, you had to.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
Respect his brilliance of war in his mind, and I
think in a lot of cases they wanted to make
sure that he was being protected because they wanted to
keep that mind function and you know, and I think
that really irritated a lot of his superiors in the process.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
But I don't think that really bothered Patten much.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
I mean, he was going to do what Patent was
going to do right, exactly right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:14):
Yeah, Which is interesting.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Well, we talked a lot about, you know, leading from
the front in terms of what do you think was
some of his least.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Attractive assets as a leader.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Well, I mentioned he could be a braggart and he
was always trying to steal the stage. But those are
personality defects, they're not character defects, right, His character was solid,
even if his personality could be very abrasive and irritating.
But one of the things I like most about pattern
(09:50):
is the rivalry with other generals, especially for Montgomery and
completely different generals, and time after time had just showed
up Montgomery, but he had to deal. He was not
just rival with Montgomery. Eisenhower, in trying to keep Allied command,
tended to favor the British, especially Montgomery, who was another
(10:13):
show book. All right, so you've got those two narcissists,
Montgomery versus Patten. It was like Godzilla versus that other monster.
But Patten repeatedly he won the race to Messina. In
the campaign for Sicily, he was given a secondary role
(10:34):
in that Sicily campaign. Seventh Army was supposed to guard
the flank of eighth Army, which landed in the southeast
of Sicily and drove north Well. Montgomery immediately got bogged down,
and Patten was able to stretch his orders to eventually
overrun the rest of the island. Is His campaign to
(10:56):
take my Palermo up in the north coast was masterly
minimal casualties because again it was like like General Forrester
in Civil War. You're racing ahead and you're demoralizing the enemy.
And they're just giving up, and he did the same.
It was tougher going from Palermo east along the coast
(11:16):
in the interior. I mean, I've traveled there many times.
That's really rugged terrain. It's mountainous drain. The coast road
is winding above cliffs, across above the sea. But still
he made it into the sine of the day before
Montgomery's eighth Army. So that's part of the fun, part
(11:37):
of the drama of bat I mean, out of that,
it's a healthy rivalry in a sense, each trying to
do better. And it's great that one guy like Batten
succeeds so well, because in the bottom line, you want
to win as quick as possible with as few as
casualty as possible while decisively beating the enemy. And then
(12:01):
they're all the what ifs, all the what ifs, especially
in France. But let me go through the real quick. Yeah,
North Africa, all right, Eisenhau's in charge, but he's not
really in charge. He's got the Combined chiefs of Staff
above him, and the combined chiefs of staff have Roosevelt
(12:21):
in Churchill. Okay, so Patten gets a beach, but it's
the in Morocco, the furthest away from the Germans. Okay,
and what would have happened had Paten been assigned into
Algeria right, because as it happened, the Allies got into
(12:42):
Tunisia just a week after the Germans massively began to
reinforce it. Okay, had pattern gone there a week earlier
against weak German resistance, you might have captured Tunisia quicker.
That would have cut off Brammel, who's retreating after Ala
Maine through Libya, and so that that entire front could
(13:05):
have been six months, could have been a victory earlier. Okay.
In Ciccil I already mentioned well. The initial plan for Sicily,
until Montgomery forced them to change it was seventh Army
was going to land near Port Lambo, Okay, up on
the north coast, and eighth Army Montgomery's down in the southeast,
(13:29):
and then they would drive towards Messina, which is a
sensible plan. Montgomery convinced Eisenhower and the Joint and the
Copine chiefs to make seventh Army sort of the shield
to his spear, heading north in across France. Okay, across
France at the Lay's Gap, I'm sure you're familiar with that.
(13:49):
After Patton, Third Army breaks south thanks to First Army, Hodges,
First Army and Beins racing one corep races west over
un Britney, but three other core race east, and then
the decision to cut north. One core north to cut
off the Germans still left in Normandy, and there was
(14:10):
a nineteen mile gap between the designating stopping points of
Third Army and the First Canadian Army. Patten want into
First Canadian was blunted by the Germans, and had pattern
been allowed to close that gap, at least forty thousand Germans,
more than the total would have been captured. Another one
(14:34):
was was racing east. Padden gets another day, Well, let
me let me cut off the Germans northward again. He
tries to get permission to do that. Not allowed. Across
the Sane River okay again, thrusting north not allowed. You're
you're intruding into the It's almost like a gang war
right of Montgomery, right uh, and there they're First Army
(15:00):
group okay. During the Battle of the Bulge okay. Patten
anticipated that German attack. He was both highly intelligent and rational,
but he had this great intuition for war, and he
sent something that was going to happen up there, and
he also got some interesting intelligence reports, so a combination.
So he had a contingency plan for shifting initially three
(15:25):
divisions and then his entire army north. So when that
actually had to happen, he was ready, which is how
he got into Bostonia the day after Christmas. Okay, But
then having gotten into Bestone, the key, the hub of
the of the bulge, he said, okay, I want to
swing east and cut off the Germans at the base
(15:46):
of the bulge, all right, whereas Montgomery took another two weeks,
he was given the north side of that battle. He
took another two weeks to build up as he always did,
and he convinced Eisenhower to hit from the center and
push in the nose of the Bault. So it's these
sort of things, these what ifs of history will never
(16:09):
know of course, yeah, definitively, but we can come up
with relatively plausible to less plausible scenarios. So again that's
part of his greatness.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
You know, something that I personally think Patten gets overlooked
on is his the way he studied past armies Now,
I understand every military is going to study to a degree,
but I think Patten really took it to the nth
(16:41):
degree and really doved in and studied longer, harder, better
than a lot of other generals. And I'm not trying
to say anything negative about them. They did their job,
but I just don't think Patten gets the credit that
he deserves in terms of really going above and beyond
studying past military campaigns exactly right.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Now, he was a true student military history. But here's
the key to being a good student. You recognize that
there are lessons from the past, but every situation is unique, correct,
So you can there are similarities, but it's never the same.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
Right.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
And here's a good example of where Churchill, despite all
his brilliands, he too was a student military history, but
he was really refighting the Napoleonic Wars against Hitler, Okay,
with his Mediterranean strategy, which made sense during that time.
It made no sense that emphasis on the so called
(17:44):
soft under belly of Europe, which was at an ironcast
armor in World War Two. So Churchill both were students
of history, hadn't successfully apply had the lessons to the
unique current situations.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Churchill did Yeah, absolutely, no, I think that that's an
excellent point. I know we're getting closer on time. But
what surprised you during the writing and the research of
this book?
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Did anything?
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I was quite familiar. He's been a hero of mine
since I was a book and you know, I read
all the major biographies and I'm writing this leadership series
for Pen and Sword Publications in England, and so it
was just so fun to do patent, okay. But going
into the details of his life, one thing I didn't
(18:37):
quite get was were his insecurities and his self doubts. Okay,
but behind the facade of the of the you know,
the tough guy, a lot of self questioning in there,
and again the strength of character he overcame his self
doubts okay. So again the distinction a debatable personality in
(19:04):
some ways, but a rock solid a rock solid character.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
And one of the things that you know wasn't diagnosed
at the time, but he had dyslexia exactly. And I
think that's a key point to be made because that really,
I mean, so many people could have easily given up
at that time because they didn't have the testing and
hoped but to be able to have dyslexia and then
(19:32):
to carry on and read as much as he did studied.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
I think that really goes back.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
To who he was as an individual, not only as
for the dyslextiona, but even for his commitment to I mean,
he was a great He was an athlete, he was
in the Olympics, he was a competitor, and I think
all that adds up and it starts back to you know,
early childhood when he couldn't read. He was not going
to let something get the best of him. He was
(19:59):
going to fight to the very end.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Exactly right. Yeah, that it said that a lot of
dyslexics overcompensate. They've got that inadequacy. It hants even if
you're not aware of it, right. I mean, I don't
know about you, but I'm sure I run into dyslext
all the time. I used to teach, and my students
might well law and I would not know that superficially,
(20:27):
but they know that, you know, and they're they're always
self conscious about that. But here good example, great example
of character. You take a flaw and you transform it, Okay,
you make the most of it, You transcend it into
something better. And so again, that's it's a great point
(20:49):
you make about his dyslexy and how critical that was
to his whole life and how it turned out to
be as much more an asset than a liability for Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Well, and we could go on to where you know,
he went to West Point, he flunk.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
You know, he wasn't the top athlete or excieming that athlete,
but the top academic student there.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
But to me, with Patten, you.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Didn't want to count him out on anything. You know,
you give him a roadblock or two that wasn't going
to probably stop him. You were going to probably have
to put up ten or twelve roadblocks if you wanted
to slowly stopping exactly.
Speaker 2 (21:29):
Well, that's about his genius. Was always trying to outflank
the enemy, right, Yes, well compared to someone like a
Montgomery who always was you know, overwhelming force, a steamroller
at that. I mean, Patten was a horseman. He was
a calverman. That was really true.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
So certainly in an age of rifles as we saw
the Civil War, calvary goes from the center to the periphery,
right right, but you can decisive in going around the enemy,
hit him in the rear. As he and then he
adapted that to tanks.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
Yes, yes, no, yeah, because he saw where that was
tanks was the future. And again I think that goes
a little bit to his brilliance of being able to
see into the future a little bit. Not everybody can
do that is seeing where you know, what are the
team leaves saying, and where is the future going to be?
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Exactly?
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Well, Bill, I know we're getting closely on time, but
I just want to say thank you for coming on
spending a few minutes talking about your book, General George S.
Patten and the Art of Leadership, one of America's greatest
ever generals. You can pick this book up at Amazon
or wherever you purchase your books at. I highly recommend this.
I'm a big fan of patent as well as well
(22:48):
of our as well as our author William. But again,
thank you so much for coming on spending some time
with us today and sharing a little bit about Patten
and his Art of Leadership.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Thank you it was a pleasure and wish you all
the best.
Speaker 3 (23:02):
With everything well.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Absolutely, and if you ever get to Dana, Indiana, please
stop buy.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Too, definitely will Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Thanks a museum. Now I know that Pyle and Patton
didn't really see I uh with one another, one being
a journalist, one being a general. But you know that's
all right.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Everybody had a job to do during World War Two
and they did. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Thank you again, Dog all the best.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Well, thank you, and thank you to our listeners for
listening to this episode.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Again, Please go out and get a copy of William's book,
General George S. Patten In the Art of Leadership, one
of America's greatest ever generals. You're not going to be
disappointed learning a little bit more about George Patten General Patten. Again, William,
thank you so much, and thank you to our listeners
for coming on and listening to this episode of the
Ernie Poe World War Two Museum Podcast
Hello everyone, and welcome to the Ernie Pyle World War
Two Museum Podcast, your podcast of Ernie Pyle, the voice
of the American soldier during World War II. My name
is Doug has and if you're tuning into the Ernie
Pile World War Two Museum Podcast, what we do on
this podcast is share with you pieces of piles life
from this humble beginning on the Indiana farm to becoming
a polite surprise winning an American journalist and war correspondent
(00:38):
who is best known for his stories about ordinary American
soldiers during World War Two. But today we have a
very special guest with us today, author of William Nestor,
and he is here to talk about his book, General
George S. Patten and the Art of Leadership, one of
America's greatest ever generals, William. Welcome to the Ernie Pole
(00:58):
World War Two Museum pot.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Thank you, Doug. It's a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
Well, thank you, and thank you for spending a few
minutes out of your busy schedule to be with us today. Now,
I know most people hopefully would get an idea of
what the book's about based on the title, but we
always like to allow our author to just kind of
talk about the book in his or her own words.
(01:23):
So if you don't mind just kind of sharing us
a little bit about the book.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Yes, Well, the key is the art of leadership, and Adden,
through his writings and through his behavior, is a fountain
of insights into that theme. And so there have been
some other great biographies, a really comprehensive one. This gets
to the essence of what made him a great leader.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Now, Patten was one of those individuals that was loved
and hate hate exactly in terms of that, both by
his men, by fellow generals, leadership, and even the enemy.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
I think we could even say he was loved and hated.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
I loved him since that he was feared and admired
in somebody that they didn't, you know, just take for
granted in terms of that. What do you think was
one of Patten's greatest assets as a leader?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Okay? Probably the key one was leading by example and
from the front. Okay, it's just incredible. His courage. He
was as a major general and later a lieutenant general
in North Africa, in Sicily, across France and even into Germany.
He was frequently under fire, He was straved, he was bombed,
(02:48):
he was mined. Occasionally snipers took fire at him, and
so he led from the front and by example, also
by appearance, okay, he tried to exemplify the general as
a sort of an ideal, so immaculately dressed and he
insisted the soldiers do the same, which was one of
(03:09):
the reasons why Medi hated him, because he would find
them if they weren't wearing like their helmet, even if
they were behind the lines where they didn't have a
tie on. So that was part of the part of
Pattern that was not popular. But at the same time,
it builds morale ity, it builds cohesion. It forces people
into routine so that they automatically do things rather think
(03:31):
about it or do the opposite. So and his personality
was abrasive. He was a narcissist and a braggart, but
fortunately he lived up to his boast. In fact, the
more he boasted, the more he tried to excel and
(03:54):
what he had previously accomplished. Okay, but that's he's complex character,
that's the public patent. Okay. With his friends, his good
friends like Eisenhower. Eisenhower and Pattern were deep friends, even
though at times of course during the war, Patten would
(04:15):
do things that really irritated and tested that friendship, but
they thoroughly enjoyed each other, and behind the scenes, when
his stage persona if you will, was off, he could
be a charming and very sophisticated, articulate individual. So he's
(04:39):
a fascinating character from so many different directions. But the
bottom line was his brilliance as a combat general, and
I rank him up there with and very similar to
Nathan Bedford Forrest and Stillwell Jackson as a hard hitting,
fast movie decisive general. Okay, ruthless, but in that ruthlessness
(05:06):
you save lives, You save your own lives by inflicting
maximize the most importantly psychological defeat on the enemy. You
want to demoralize the enemy. And Pattern was brilliant at
that and successful success. And even if soldiers initially are skeptical,
if they can succeed where they have failed before under
(05:27):
previous leaders, that's going to give them the confidence to
try even harder. So that's the good side of Pattern,
and the good far out weighs the negative, there's no
question about that. And the bottom line, once again is
he was brilliant at war, and not just during World
War two as a lieutenant, he was with Persian's Mexico
(05:52):
expedition and he was an aid to Blackjack Persian and
he let a patrol I think he had about a
dozen men and several rickety cars of that time, they
got this this tip that Ponta Villa's right hand man,
General uh Cardenas, was at his ranch. So they show
(06:15):
up at the ranch and there's this wild West shootout
with Patten. He shot at he kills Cardenas, maybe another man,
and one of his soldiers killed a third man, and
the other guards of Cardenas take off. And throughout his
life he would express, you know, he always struggle with courage. Okay,
(06:40):
in this particular one, he was so satisfied with how
he performed because he said, I didn't worry. Everything happened
as if in an abstraction. I did exactly what I
needed to do, Okay. In World War One he was
a tank command. He was our first field tank commander,
(07:00):
and once again he led from the front. And now
they had those I'm sure you've seen those little Renault
French tanks. Two man tank. One guy's a driver, the
other guy's a gunner, and so he is literally, they
didn't have radios. So he's dashing from one tank to
the next, urging them on, banging on the sides, tell
(07:21):
him to go in different directions. He's urging on his men.
He's under constant fire. Now, that was in the first
battle sam Ma Hill, Okay, and that was initial battle
before MirZ are Gone, which is the longest battle that
we fought during World War One. And here again he
was leading from the French front, much to the ire
(07:44):
of his commander, General Rockenbach, who said, no, you've got
to stay in the rear and direct things from Well,
if you don't have radios, you can't really do much
but hope for the best. And Paton knew you got
to get out front and inspire people. Well, in that
second one he was grievously wounded. A bullet shot him
right in a hip and that put him out of
(08:05):
action on the second day. But again that's the type
of commander he was. He was more than bragg He
led from the front, He fought valiantly. He won a
number of different medals, every medal except for the Medal
of Honor, which he probably deserved in that particular instance.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
Yeah, you know, and you bring up a great point
where he was as a leader a little different in
the fact that he led from the front, where a
lot of people, especially in war, like you said, are
leading from behind, and that put him at odds with
some of his superiors because I think they were afraid
(08:42):
he was going to get killed or shot.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
And whether you loved or hated Patten, you had to.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
Respect his brilliance of war in his mind, and I
think in a lot of cases they wanted to make
sure that he was being protected because they wanted to
keep that mind function and you know, and I think
that really irritated a lot of his superiors in the process.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
But I don't think that really bothered Patten much.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
I mean, he was going to do what Patent was
going to do right, exactly right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:14):
Yeah, Which is interesting.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Well, we talked a lot about, you know, leading from
the front in terms of what do you think was
some of his least.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Attractive assets as a leader.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Well, I mentioned he could be a braggart and he
was always trying to steal the stage. But those are
personality defects, they're not character defects, right, His character was solid,
even if his personality could be very abrasive and irritating.
But one of the things I like most about pattern
(09:50):
is the rivalry with other generals, especially for Montgomery and
completely different generals, and time after time had just showed
up Montgomery, but he had to deal. He was not
just rival with Montgomery. Eisenhower, in trying to keep Allied command,
tended to favor the British, especially Montgomery, who was another
(10:13):
show book. All right, so you've got those two narcissists,
Montgomery versus Patten. It was like Godzilla versus that other monster.
But Patten repeatedly he won the race to Messina. In
the campaign for Sicily, he was given a secondary role
(10:34):
in that Sicily campaign. Seventh Army was supposed to guard
the flank of eighth Army, which landed in the southeast
of Sicily and drove north Well. Montgomery immediately got bogged down,
and Patten was able to stretch his orders to eventually
overrun the rest of the island. Is His campaign to
(10:56):
take my Palermo up in the north coast was masterly
minimal casualties because again it was like like General Forrester
in Civil War. You're racing ahead and you're demoralizing the enemy.
And they're just giving up, and he did the same.
It was tougher going from Palermo east along the coast
(11:16):
in the interior. I mean, I've traveled there many times.
That's really rugged terrain. It's mountainous drain. The coast road
is winding above cliffs, across above the sea. But still
he made it into the sine of the day before
Montgomery's eighth Army. So that's part of the fun, part
(11:37):
of the drama of bat I mean, out of that,
it's a healthy rivalry in a sense, each trying to
do better. And it's great that one guy like Batten
succeeds so well, because in the bottom line, you want
to win as quick as possible with as few as
casualty as possible while decisively beating the enemy. And then
(12:01):
they're all the what ifs, all the what ifs, especially
in France. But let me go through the real quick. Yeah,
North Africa, all right, Eisenhau's in charge, but he's not
really in charge. He's got the Combined chiefs of Staff
above him, and the combined chiefs of staff have Roosevelt
(12:21):
in Churchill. Okay, so Patten gets a beach, but it's
the in Morocco, the furthest away from the Germans. Okay,
and what would have happened had Paten been assigned into
Algeria right, because as it happened, the Allies got into
(12:42):
Tunisia just a week after the Germans massively began to
reinforce it. Okay, had pattern gone there a week earlier
against weak German resistance, you might have captured Tunisia quicker.
That would have cut off Brammel, who's retreating after Ala
Maine through Libya, and so that that entire front could
(13:05):
have been six months, could have been a victory earlier. Okay.
In Ciccil I already mentioned well. The initial plan for Sicily,
until Montgomery forced them to change it was seventh Army
was going to land near Port Lambo, Okay, up on
the north coast, and eighth Army Montgomery's down in the southeast,
(13:29):
and then they would drive towards Messina, which is a
sensible plan. Montgomery convinced Eisenhower and the Joint and the
Copine chiefs to make seventh Army sort of the shield
to his spear, heading north in across France. Okay, across
France at the Lay's Gap, I'm sure you're familiar with that.
(13:49):
After Patton, Third Army breaks south thanks to First Army, Hodges,
First Army and Beins racing one corep races west over
un Britney, but three other core race east, and then
the decision to cut north. One core north to cut
off the Germans still left in Normandy, and there was
(14:10):
a nineteen mile gap between the designating stopping points of
Third Army and the First Canadian Army. Patten want into
First Canadian was blunted by the Germans, and had pattern
been allowed to close that gap, at least forty thousand Germans,
more than the total would have been captured. Another one
(14:34):
was was racing east. Padden gets another day, Well, let
me let me cut off the Germans northward again. He
tries to get permission to do that. Not allowed. Across
the Sane River okay again, thrusting north not allowed. You're
you're intruding into the It's almost like a gang war
right of Montgomery, right uh, and there they're First Army
(15:00):
group okay. During the Battle of the Bulge okay. Patten
anticipated that German attack. He was both highly intelligent and rational,
but he had this great intuition for war, and he
sent something that was going to happen up there, and
he also got some interesting intelligence reports, so a combination.
So he had a contingency plan for shifting initially three
(15:25):
divisions and then his entire army north. So when that
actually had to happen, he was ready, which is how
he got into Bostonia the day after Christmas. Okay, But
then having gotten into Bestone, the key, the hub of
the of the bulge, he said, okay, I want to
swing east and cut off the Germans at the base
(15:46):
of the bulge, all right, whereas Montgomery took another two weeks,
he was given the north side of that battle. He
took another two weeks to build up as he always did,
and he convinced Eisenhower to hit from the center and
push in the nose of the Bault. So it's these
sort of things, these what ifs of history will never
(16:09):
know of course, yeah, definitively, but we can come up
with relatively plausible to less plausible scenarios. So again that's
part of his greatness.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
You know, something that I personally think Patten gets overlooked
on is his the way he studied past armies Now,
I understand every military is going to study to a degree,
but I think Patten really took it to the nth
(16:41):
degree and really doved in and studied longer, harder, better
than a lot of other generals. And I'm not trying
to say anything negative about them. They did their job,
but I just don't think Patten gets the credit that
he deserves in terms of really going above and beyond
studying past military campaigns exactly right.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Now, he was a true student military history. But here's
the key to being a good student. You recognize that
there are lessons from the past, but every situation is unique, correct,
So you can there are similarities, but it's never the same.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
Right.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
And here's a good example of where Churchill, despite all
his brilliands, he too was a student military history, but
he was really refighting the Napoleonic Wars against Hitler, Okay,
with his Mediterranean strategy, which made sense during that time.
It made no sense that emphasis on the so called
(17:44):
soft under belly of Europe, which was at an ironcast
armor in World War Two. So Churchill both were students
of history, hadn't successfully apply had the lessons to the
unique current situations.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Churchill did Yeah, absolutely, no, I think that that's an
excellent point. I know we're getting closer on time. But
what surprised you during the writing and the research of
this book?
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Did anything?
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I was quite familiar. He's been a hero of mine
since I was a book and you know, I read
all the major biographies and I'm writing this leadership series
for Pen and Sword Publications in England, and so it
was just so fun to do patent, okay. But going
into the details of his life, one thing I didn't
(18:37):
quite get was were his insecurities and his self doubts. Okay,
but behind the facade of the of the you know,
the tough guy, a lot of self questioning in there,
and again the strength of character he overcame his self
doubts okay. So again the distinction a debatable personality in
(19:04):
some ways, but a rock solid a rock solid character.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
And one of the things that you know wasn't diagnosed
at the time, but he had dyslexia exactly. And I
think that's a key point to be made because that really,
I mean, so many people could have easily given up
at that time because they didn't have the testing and
hoped but to be able to have dyslexia and then
(19:32):
to carry on and read as much as he did studied.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
I think that really goes back.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
To who he was as an individual, not only as
for the dyslextiona, but even for his commitment to I mean,
he was a great He was an athlete, he was
in the Olympics, he was a competitor, and I think
all that adds up and it starts back to you know,
early childhood when he couldn't read. He was not going
to let something get the best of him. He was
(19:59):
going to fight to the very end.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Exactly right. Yeah, that it said that a lot of
dyslexics overcompensate. They've got that inadequacy. It hants even if
you're not aware of it, right. I mean, I don't
know about you, but I'm sure I run into dyslext
all the time. I used to teach, and my students
might well law and I would not know that superficially,
(20:27):
but they know that, you know, and they're they're always
self conscious about that. But here good example, great example
of character. You take a flaw and you transform it, Okay,
you make the most of it, You transcend it into
something better. And so again, that's it's a great point
(20:49):
you make about his dyslexy and how critical that was
to his whole life and how it turned out to
be as much more an asset than a liability for Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Well, and we could go on to where you know,
he went to West Point, he flunk.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
You know, he wasn't the top athlete or excieming that athlete,
but the top academic student there.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
But to me, with Patten, you.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Didn't want to count him out on anything. You know,
you give him a roadblock or two that wasn't going
to probably stop him. You were going to probably have
to put up ten or twelve roadblocks if you wanted
to slowly stopping exactly.
Speaker 2 (21:29):
Well, that's about his genius. Was always trying to outflank
the enemy, right, Yes, well compared to someone like a
Montgomery who always was you know, overwhelming force, a steamroller
at that. I mean, Patten was a horseman. He was
a calverman. That was really true.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
So certainly in an age of rifles as we saw
the Civil War, calvary goes from the center to the periphery,
right right, but you can decisive in going around the enemy,
hit him in the rear. As he and then he
adapted that to tanks.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
Yes, yes, no, yeah, because he saw where that was
tanks was the future. And again I think that goes
a little bit to his brilliance of being able to
see into the future a little bit. Not everybody can
do that is seeing where you know, what are the
team leaves saying, and where is the future going to be?
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Exactly?
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Well, Bill, I know we're getting closely on time, but
I just want to say thank you for coming on
spending a few minutes talking about your book, General George S.
Patten and the Art of Leadership, one of America's greatest
ever generals. You can pick this book up at Amazon
or wherever you purchase your books at. I highly recommend this.
I'm a big fan of patent as well as well
(22:48):
of our as well as our author William. But again,
thank you so much for coming on spending some time
with us today and sharing a little bit about Patten
and his Art of Leadership.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Thank you it was a pleasure and wish you all
the best.
Speaker 3 (23:02):
With everything well.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Absolutely, and if you ever get to Dana, Indiana, please
stop buy.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Too, definitely will Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Thanks a museum. Now I know that Pyle and Patton
didn't really see I uh with one another, one being
a journalist, one being a general. But you know that's
all right.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Everybody had a job to do during World War Two
and they did. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Thank you again, Dog all the best.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Well, thank you, and thank you to our listeners for
listening to this episode.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Again, Please go out and get a copy of William's book,
General George S. Patten In the Art of Leadership, one
of America's greatest ever generals. You're not going to be
disappointed learning a little bit more about George Patten General Patten. Again, William,
thank you so much, and thank you to our listeners
for coming on and listening to this episode of the
Ernie Poe World War Two Museum Podcast
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