Yet despite this, in the last century only two notable histories of the war were written: Justin Smith’s venerable The War with Mexico, and K. Moreover, this acquisition had the effect of renewing the debate over the westward expansion of slavery in the United States, one that in the end was resolved only by four more years of warfare and the devastation of a large portion of the country. When it ended two years later, the United States had gained sovereignty over 800,000 miles of new territory that would go on to form all or part of eight states of the union. If weighted in terms of its impact, an excellent argument could be made for the war that broke out between the United States and Mexico in 1846 as the most understudied war in American history.
Johannsen, who introduces this Bison Books edition of The Mexican War, is a professor of history at the University of Illinois, Urbana, and the author of To the Halls of Montezumas: The Mexican War in the American Imagination (1985). Jack Bauer was also the author of Zachary Taylor: Soldier, Planter, Statesman of the Old Southwest (1985) and Other Works. This is an outstanding contribution to military history and a model of writing which will be admired and emulated."-Journal of American History. Problems of large numbers of untrained volunteers, discipline and desertion, logistics, diseases and sanitation, relations with Mexican civilians in occupied territory, and Mexican guerrilla operations are all explained, as are the negotiations which led to war's end and the Mexican cession. The events that led to war are described with reference to military strengths and weaknesses, and every military campaign and engagement is explained in clear detail and illustrated with good maps.
The coming of war is seen as unavoidable, given American expansion and Mexican resistance to loss of territory, compounded by the fact that neither side understood the other. Leading personalities, civilian and military, Mexican and American, are given incisive and fair evaluations. is the best military history of that conflict. "Much has been written about the Mexican war, but this.
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