The Fourth Star: Four Generals and the Epic Struggle for the Future of the United States Army

Journalists David Cloud and Greg Jaffe have attempted to provide a narrative of the U.S. Army from the end of the Vietnam War through the present wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by tracing the careers of four Army general officers. Using biographic sketches of Generals John Abizaid, George Casey, Peter Chiarelli, and David Petraeus, The Fourth Star seeks to show how the Army has changed doctrinally and developed its leaders. Cloud and Jaffe deliver a story that is engaging, although short on analysis, explaining how as an institution the Army adapted post-Vietnam

Playing War: Wargaming and U.S. Navy Preparations for World War II, by John M. Lillard

With the Navy’s recent efforts to rein- vigorate war gaming, there has been renewed interest in the interwar gaming conducted at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. In the Naval War College Review, Proceedings, and other maritime journals, war-gaming experts and enthusiasts alike have tried to characterize the nature and value of the Navy’s war games played between 1919 and 1941. John Lillard’s Playing War: Wargaming and U.S. Navy Prepa- rations for World War II is the latest contribution to this resurgence

Turning the Tide: The Battles of Coral Sea and Midway

The latest volume of the Britannia Naval Histories of World War II revisits the Royal Navy’s official histories of two pivotal naval battles. Taken from the previously classified battle sum- maries, numbers 45 and 46, this newly printed edition is a valuable aid to the study of two groundbreak- ing carrier battles in the Pacific War

The Gamble: General David Petraeus andthe American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2006–2008,

Thomas Ricks begins his latest chroni- cle of the American strategic experience in Iraq where he left off in Fiasco (2006). In this account, Ricks uses his familiar journalistic approach to de- scribe how the civilian and military leaders arrived at a change of policy and strategy, commonly known as “the surge,” in the war in Iraq. Ricks’s new book appears to be more even in its treatment of the leaders and the new strategy than was Fiasco, with its prose- cutorial tone. In spite of his upbeat as- sessment of the American leaders, however, Ricks ends this volume with measured, if not pessimistic, projec- tions for the future of Iraq

Robust estimation of bacterial cell count from optical density

Optical density (OD) is widely used to estimate the density of cells in liquid culture, but cannot be compared between instruments without a standardized calibration protocol and is challenging to relate to actual cell count. We address this with an interlaboratory study comparing three simple, low-cost, and highly accessible OD calibration protocols across 244 laboratories, applied to eight strains of constitutive GFP-expressing E. coli. Based on our results, we recommend calibrating OD to estimated cell count using serial dilution of silica microspheres, which produces highly precise calibration (95.5% of residuals <1.2-fold), is easily assessed for quality control, also assesses instrument effective linear range, and can be combined with fluorescence calibration to obtain units of Molecules of Equivalent Fluorescein (MEFL) per cell, allowing direct comparison and data fusion with flow cytometry measurements: in our study, fluorescence per cell measurements showed only a 1.07-fold mean difference between plate reader and flow cytometry data

Engineering the Empire City: West Point and the Rise of New York

Between 1825 and 1898, New York City evolved rapidly from being a vital Atlantic port of trade into the center of American commerce and culture. In the course of this commercial growth and cultural development, New Yorkers made the city the epitome of a nineteenth-century metropolis. While much of this urban transformation has been documented, the role of individuals educated at the United States Military Academy remains mostly unexplored in New York history. George S. Greene, Egbert L. Viele, John Newton, Henry Warner Slocum and Fitz John Porter all studied Dennis Hart Mahan\u27s engineering curriculum, served in the United States Army and then, as civilians, came to New York City to advance their careers and status through the creation of Victorian Gotham. At West Point, Sylvanus Thayer and Dennis Hart Mahan created the nation\u27s first engineering program that had a profound influence on American civil engineering, especially in New York. The West Pointers who were successful in Gotham leveraged their education and military experiences to become significant parts of New York\u27s social, economic, and political transformation before and after the Civil War. This study examines the connections among the three central experiences of the West Pointers--as cadets, military officers, and New Yorkers--and seeks to assess their effects on the transformation of New York City, the rise of professionalization, and the advent of Progressivism at the end of the century. While not the center of the research, each subject\u27s Civil War service is considered in the context of how that service determined postwar activities in the city. Additionally, this study focuses on the Croton Aqueduct construction, the creation of Central Park, the building of the Brooklyn Bridge, and the administration of New York\u27s municipal departments as key events where Military Academy alumni interacted with New York elites, politicians and civilian-trained engineers. As a result of these relationships, the United States Military Academy influenced not only the sense of New York identity, but also American civic identity at the end of the nineteenth century