In his book, The War Between the Generals, David Irving wrote about an important meeting, that few people know about, at the time that the Battle of the Bulge was at its height in December 1944/ January 1945:

In Washington, after lunch on December 27, Stimson walked back to the War Department and slipped into Marshall's office for a long private talk about an unthinkable possibility: what if the Germans pulled this gamble off? Marshall had been thinking the same thought. Rain and sleet lashed the office windows as they talked. Basic to both men's worries was the fear that they had created an army too small for the job — and that in consequence the infantry was becoming battle-fatigued. The German armies facing the Allies still equaled them in divisions. Should the United States begin raising new divisions now, for autumn 1945?…. the people of the United States [were going to have to] decide whether they wanted to go on with the war enough to raise the new armies which would be necessary to do it. . . 

Men – the GI’s – that was the topic that Dominick Graham and Shelford Bidwell next turned to in considering the American Way of War in their book Coalitions, Politicians and Generals.

Tag words: GI; The War Between the Generals; David Irvin; Battle of the Bulge; Henry , Stimson; Secretary of War; General George C Marshall; Dominick Graham; Shelford Bidwell; Coalitions, Politicians and Generals; Montgomery; US Army; manpower; George Patton; General Dwight DEisenhower; General Bradley; General Hodges; General Simpson; Russell Weigley; Eisenhower’s Lieutenants; cross-Channel invasion; US Army; Eastern Front;