rapidfire In Review
Pacific: Silicon Chips and Surfboards, Coral Reefs and Atom Bombs, Brutal Dictators, Fading Empires, and the Coming Collision of the World’s Superpow- ers. By Simon Winchester. Harper, 2015. $28.99. ISBN 978-0-06-231541-0.
DoD Prompts Review I
n December 2015, DoD forwarded to Congress a legislative proposal to reform the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), the statutory framework of the military justice system. The proposal is based on recommendations of the Military Justice Review Group (MJRG), which conducted a detailed analysis of each article of the UCMJ, including historical back- ground, current practice, and comparison to federal civilian law.
In October 2013, then-Secretary of Defense Chuck
Hagel, in response to a request from the senior uni- formed leadership, directed the review of the UCMJ and its implementation in the Manual for Courts-Martial. Each of the military services detailed military personnel to serve as members of the MJRG. This proposal is the fi rst comprehensive military
justice reform package submitted to Congress by DoD in more than 30 years. The proposed legislation in- cludes 37 additions to the UCMJ and amendments to 68 current provisions. Among major reforms, the proposed legislation would: strengthen the structure of the military justice system; enhance fairness and effi ciency in pretrial and trial procedures; modernize military sentencing; streamline the post-trial process; reform military appellate practice; and update punitive articles. The full report of the MJRG, the legislative proposal
forwarded to Congress, and a section-by-section analy- sis of the legislative proposal can be found at
www.dod .gov/dodgc/
mjrg.html.
22 MILITARY OFFICER MARCH 2016
Best-selling author Simon Winchester follows his excellent Atlantic
with this stunning perspec- tive on the Pacifi c Ocean. He presents the Pacifi c’s geography, geology, and history of early exploration and colonial infl uences, fo- cusing mainly on the Pacif- ic’s past 75 years, calling the Pacifi c “an ocean of secrets” and “dirty business.” This is a blend of science, geopolitics, economics, and climatology, as Winchester tells of the devastating ef- fects of nuclear-weapon testing on the ocean and Pacifi c Islanders, how pol- lution has created vast dead zones, and of the current dangerous geostrategic competition for control of its natural resources. Best are his descriptions
of the Pacifi c’s increas- ingly destructive weather, “the greatest of all security threats in the region,” as well as discoveries of hy-
drothermal vents, abyssal heat sources, and untapped mineral wealth found in “black and white smokers.”
1916: A Global History. By Keith Jeffery. Bloomsbury, 2016. $30. ISBN 978-1- 62040-269-6.
British his- torian Keith Jeff ery’s 10th book is an excellent portrayal of World
War I as a truly global war, a much more revealing mili- tary and political history than just the trench warfare on the Western Front. Jeff ery focuses on the 12 months of 1916 to show the war’s global reach, involv- ing combatants and civil- ians, nationalist revolts, the collapse of European colo- nial empires, and obscure battles and campaigns. The signifi cance of icon- ic battles like Verdun and the Somme is discussed, but Jeff ery’s emphasis is on battlefi elds like Gallipoli in Turkey, the Isonzo River in northern Italy, and Moro- goro in German East Africa. He describes the causes and eff ects of the Easter Rising in Ireland, the Arab Revolt in Arabia, and bitter fi ght- ing in Greece and Iraq, as well as little-known Chi- nese and Japanese involve- ment in the war. — William Bushnell
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK
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