Admiral Nimitz and the Pacific War

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.