General Mark Clark

General Mark Clark is one of the four menalong with Eisenhower, Patton, and Bradleywho historian Martin Blumenson called the essential quartet of American leaders who achieved victory in Europe. A skilled staff officer, Clark rose quickly through the ranks, and by the time America entered the war he was deputy commander of Allied Forces in North Africa. Several weeks before Operation Torch, Clark landed by submarine in a daring mission to negotiate the cooperation of the Vichy French. He was subsequently named commander of U.S. Fifth Army and tasked with the invasion of Italy.

“[The World War II campaign] of the Mediterranean Theatre - the ‘soft underbelly of the Axis’ as Churchill so wrongly called it - was compounded of elements reminiscent of the heyday of the Foreign Legion - intrigue, suspense, a secret mission to a secret seaside villa in Algeria... the strange but necessary alliance with Darlan, and then the bloody, muddy and most unexpectedly long and difficult Italian campaign where the roster of troops sounded like the roll-call of the allied nations. These are elements to make any book interesting, and, if past history, still exciting, and General Clark has capitalized fully on them. There are sketches of Churchill, of Eisenhower in his difficult coordinating position, of the war’s lesser known heroes, the officers and enlisted men of the battle command Clark wanted and finally received. And there is the series of almost fatal blunders which followed the taking of Rome when the Western Allies seemed almost determined to play into the hands of the Russians. Tito might have left the Kremlin’s orbit sooner, and the present list of satellite nations might have been smaller. And when Clark was made American high commissioner of Austria he experienced more of the same lack of foresight and he concludes with a political sophistication not common to the military – ‘We celebrated a victory when in reality we had not won the War’. Honest, forceful, colorful, this is one of the best books to come from World War II’s top brass.” — Kirkus “Calculated Risk deals in large part with events and situations in which General Clark and I were not only close associates but friends and comrades. But even if I am, therefore, a prejudiced witness, I cheerfully and unhesitatingly prophesy that thousands will find the book as accurate and as completely absorbing as I did.” — Dwight D. Eisenhower “[F]orthright, hard-hitting stuff... This book [...] should be widely read... A high-powered, high-tempered man [...] afraid of nothing and no man, [Clark] was consistently given tough assignments. His superiors always seem to have had complete confidence in his ability to carry out these assignments and always gave him their full moral support... The whole Mediterranean Campaign, he says, was a calculated risk. The North African Campaign was an extremely perilous military adventure. Aside from possible French and probable German resistance in North Africa, there was always the threat of Spanish or German attack via Spanish Morocco on our extended lines of communication, an attack which might well have been fatal... a fascinating book.” — Richard E. Danielson, The Atlantic

Mark W. Clark was a major figure in World War II. He was prominent as one of the top American commanders. Together with Dwight D. Eisenhower, Omar N. Bradley, and George S. Patton, Jr., Clark was widely regarded as being responsible for victory on the European side of the conflict. - from the introduction One of the great World War II memoirs by a legendary American general in charge of operations in North Africa and Italy. General Mark W. Clark recounts his wartime exploits and tells the story of the battles in Tunisia and Italy with verve and attention to key detail. An unparalleled account by a great military leader.

Although not nearly as well known as other U.S. Army senior commanders, General Mark Clark is one of the four menÑalong with Eisenhower, Patton, and BradleyÑwho historian Martin Blumenson called Òthe essential quartet of American leaders who achieved victory in Europe.Ó Eisenhower nicknamed him the American Eagle. A skilled staff officer, Clark rose quickly through the ranks, and by the time America entered the war he was deputy commander of Allied Forces in North Africa. Several weeks before Operation Torch, Clark landed by submarine in a daring mission to negotiate the cooperation of the Vichy French. He was subsequently named commander of U.S. Fifth Army and tasked with the invasion of Italy. Fifth Army and Mark Clark are virtually synonymous. From the September 1943 landing at Salerno, Clark and his army fought their way north against skilled German resistance, augmented by mountainous terrain. The daring January 1944 end-run at Anzio, although not immediately successful, set the stage for Fifth ArmyÕs liberation of Rome on 4 June 1944, after ten months of hard fighting. The war in Italy was not over, but the taking of Rome intact was a tremendous achievement. Pitted against one of HitlerÕs most able commanders, Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, Fifth Army spent another ten months in ferocious combat from the Gothic Line to the Po Valley, as Clark moved up to head all Allied ground forces in Italy as commander of 15th Army Group. The brutal Italian Campaign has been long overshadowed by D-Day and the campaign across France and into Germany. Likewise, the senior U.S. commander in Italy has been largely overlooked when one thinks of the great captains of the war. The author, Mikolashek remedies this situation, shedding much needed historical light on one of AmericaÕs most important fighting generals in this Òwarts and allÓ biography. It also demonstrates the importance of the Italian Campaign, paying tribute to the valorous soldiers of U.S. Fifth Army and their Allied comrades. Jon Mikolashek is a history professor at the U.S Army Command and General Staff College branch at Ft. Belvoir, VA, and also teaches history at American Military University.

On 9 September 1943 the United States Fifth Army landed at Salerno, commencing a lengthy and costly campaign that would transit the Italian Peninsula. Lieutenant General Mark W. Clark commanded this army. His many supporters, including Winston Churchill and General Dwight D. Eisenhower, considered him a brilliant staff officer and trainer. His detractors, including General George S. Patton, considered him overly ambitious and self serving. Clark had been promoted ahead of many senior and experienced officers, some of whom were now his subordinate commanders within the Fifth Army. His army would come under the jurisdiction of the Fifteenth Army Group, a combined American-British Headquarters commanded by General Harold Alexander, an Englishmen. Clark would command a number of foreign troops, including the British X Corps, the New Zealand Corps and the French Expeditionary Corps. Throughout this campaign, Clark would face the complexities of coalition command, tactical in nature but with strategic consequences. This thesis contends that the command arrangements within Fifteenth Army Group, together with biased perceptions, greatly influenced the decision making of General Clark, an accomplished staff officer yet inexperienced army commander.

A biography of the World War II army commander who led American troops across North Africa and into Italy, encountering battles at Anzio, Rapido and Cassino. Includes material from Clark's diaries on Eisenhower and George Marshall and reveals that Clark was essential in keeping Austria out of the Soviet orbit after the war.

A history of the Allied coalition in Italy during World War II. The US Fifth Army first saw action during the Salerno Landings in September 1943. While commanded by US Lieutenant General Mark Clark, from the outset one of its two Corps was the X (British) Corps; the other V1 (US) Corps. The multi-national composition of Fifth Army is demonstrated by the French Expeditionary Corps, the Brazilian Expeditionary Force, the South African Armoured Division, the Italian Co-Belligerent forces, formations from the New Zealand Corps and the 4th Indian Division. Clark’s Fifth Army was itself part of the Fifteenth Army Group, commanded by Field Marshal Alexander. Alexander’s light and diplomatic touch oiled the wheels of this uneasy arrangement but inevitably there were tensions and disagreements that threatened success. The low priority accorded to Italy as compared with OVERLORD and NW Europe did not help matters. Seen as a backwater, crack units were taken away and insufficient resources allocated to the Italian Campaign. This combined with the tenacity of the Germans, the difficult terrain and the harsh climate caused real problems. Allied morale was at times particularly brittle and desertion rates worryingly high. This superbly researched book objectively examines the performance of Fifth Army against this complex and troublesome backdrop. The author’s findings make for authoritative and fascinating reading and give food for thought about multinational cooperation in more recent conflicts.