Monthly Retrospective
What we did in November of 2023
As the month dedicated to the history of the US Marine Corps comes to a close, I would like to provide a short review of the things that happened here at The Tactical Notebook during November of 2023.
Articles
The two “conference problems” set in the days after the battle of Belleau Wood proved less popular than most of our previously published games. I hope, however, that they provided readers with a window into the more pedestrian (and thus unsung) aspects of a famous battle and, at the same time, gave a sense for the sort of exercises engaged by students at the Marine Corps Schools in the early days of that institution
The series on “French artillery at Belleau Wood” also failed to garner the sort of interest enjoyed by other pieces on the history of the US Marine Corps. That said, I hoped that it helped build a three-way bridge between the world of my fellow Marines, enthusiasts for French military history, and students of artillery in the twentieth century.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to write the piece on the “mystery of the Small Wars Manual” that I promised at the start of the month. (Doing that, I have discovered, will require the consultation of used-to-be-a-tree documents in a couple of honest-to-goodness archives.)
As long-time readers of The Tactical Notebook know, we have more material on the history of the Marine Corps that can fit into a single month. Thus, the year to come will see the publication of a great deal of material on that subject.
Benefits for Paid Subscribers
On 20 November 2023, The Tactical Notebook began a partnership with the Warfare Mastery Institute that provides paid subscribers to The Tactical Notebook with access to a large number of first class videos, e-books, articles, and interactive maps on such subjects as military aviation, naval operations, and the campaigns of the Second World War. (You can get a sense of these by perusing the WMI Status Board.)
On 23 November 2023, The Tactical Notebook began its program to provide paid subscribers with access to higher-quality copies of the low-resolution digital materials (whether texts, photos, or maps) on file at the Military Learning Library.
Paid subscribers enjoy the right to comment on articles about controversial subjects, particularly those related to the ongoing war in Gaza.
Paid subscribers are also able to suggest topics for articles. (Needless to say, our ability to write articles depends upon the availability of sources.)
Paid subscribers may purchase signed copies of any of the books written by Bruce Gudmundsson that remain in print. (The price for each book is the cost to me for obtaining it from the publisher plus the cost of postage. I am, of course, happy to provide a suitable dedication.)
Administration and Logistics
I have begun a number of small initiatives which serve to make our “back catalogue” of articles easier to access and enjoy. These include:
the continual refurbishing of older pieces, whether by reformatting illustrations, adding new material, adding links, or correcting errors.
a program to replace some of our aggregator pages (which are not sent out via e-mail) with navigator articles such as this one (which go out to subscribers in the same way as other articles.
I really enjoyed the conference exercises. The solutions were illuminating of what is required from a leader. Having no military experience, I refrained from proposing a solution. I will take a risk next time. Similar exercises for business leaders would improve our work.
This is one of my absolute favorite Substacks. Way to go Tactical!