La Place De LA Concorde Suisse

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Summary: A faithful rendition of the Swiss military tradition
Review: In German, La Place de la Concorde Suisse is rendered Concordiaplatz, and it is visible from the Jungfraujoch, which means "virgin saddle," and which is reached via funicular railway from Interlaken. Depending upon the season, one can either hike or ski from the Jungfraujoch down the Aletsch glacier to Concordiaplatz and view the redoubt containing the sunken armory described in McPhee's book. There may even be a visible contingent of soldiers guarding and maintaining it, just as their brethren maintain the explosives stashed in the outerworks of all key bridges in the country, or inspect the radar installations on key peaks such as the Weissflühgipfel above Davos. As one who lived and worked in Switzerland for eight years, and whose published memoir, Living Among The Swiss, is listed on this website, I can attest to the accuracy of McPhee's account. Most of my business colleagues were required to take annual two- or three-week military leaves, and one sees soldiers everywhere: on trains, in ski resorts, along low and vulnerable mountain passes such as those north of Sargans, and, increasingly, at airports. Their efficiency of organization has been admired not only by the Israelis, who imitated it, but also by the Russian defense minister, and McPhee accurately captures their esprit de corps - in the process expanding, as usual, the reader's vocabulary.

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Summary: A portrait of Switzerland
Review: La Place de la Concorde Suisse is about the Swiss army, but, as they say, when you talk about Switzerland, you talk about their defense. Because everyone in Switzerland is in the army, you are talking about their country. An incredibly rich country, and thus, an incredibly paranoid country. Although many people are now looking at the Swiss, and especially their banks, with new eyes following the revelations of Nazi war booty being hid within their anonymous, numbered accounts, McPhee put them in the spotlight a decade earlier here. While his light is not as bright as some of those today, he did discover some interesting bits which had been hid by shadows before, like their placement of explosives (or identification of where to place such) under each bridge into the country, a discussion of the surreptitious bombing they suffered under Allied planes in the war, and the old boys network that links the army and the industry. At the end, you don't necessarily emerge with a message, but rather a portrait of the country.

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Summary: My first time
Review: Reading a McPhee book that is. It was loaned to me by someone since he knows my wife is Swiss. LPDLCS was a great book of his to start with and I think is the quintessential McPhee book. His subject matter has always puzzled me. He goes to Iceland to document their fight against the lava flows, to Greece to learn more about Ophiolite sequences, and to the Alaskan bush to see how the last great "Pioneers" live. Of course in LPDLCS he travels with member of the French-Swiss military on their yearly excursions, but you learn so much more about things you never thought could be interesting. His books are as eccentric as they are fascinating. I have not yet read a bad book from this guy.

La Place De La Concorde Suisse is where several glaciers meet in the Swiss Alps. What a bizzare, but appropriate, title. Read this book.

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Summary: Swiss Freedom: a Number One Priority
Review: The latest reprint of John McPhee's 1983 La Place de la Concorde Suisse is a perfect complement to Stephen P. Halbrook's TARGET SWITZERLAND: Swiss Armed Neutrality in World War II. As a Swiss-American, in 1951 I saw the WW II defensive preparations: valley to valley anti-tank barriers; rail iron roadblocks that could be set up in minutes; gun emplacements covering roads and passes, and a Reservist army of every male still on maneuvers. Today most men have an automatic weapon or pistol and sealed packet of cartridges at home. Yet a national mentalite' - a word that may be translated as an accute sense of the responsibility inherent in possessing a gun - precludes the use of these weapons in criminal acts. They're registered, just as automobiles are, and private gun ownership is strictly regulated by cantonal laws. None protest that their to right to own guns is infringed! McPhee follows a reconnaisance patrol of French-speaking reservists as they cull information in the mountains: how many men can fit in a cable car? Are explosive charges in place under a bridge? How long would a relief force take to reach a certain village? (89 minutes.) The leader of this somewhat laid-back unit is a vintner in civil life - when pondering a problem he uncorks a bottle of his own wine and shares it with his men. He has no ambitions toward promotion, although many Swiss corporations see a correlation between the prestige of army rank and their executives' jobs. Swiss preparedness and determination deterred invasion in WW II by implementing the dictum, "Switzerland doesn't have an army, Switzerland is an army." Today, not everyone agrees, but the national attitude may summed up in a bumper sticker: "Everyone talks about wanting peace. Our army assures it." Albert Noyer; author The Saint's Day Deaths.

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Summary: As Well Arranged as a Swiss Army Knife
Review: This book (digressing from "Assembling California" and the omnibuses which include "Pieces of a Frame") finds its own unsuspecting terrain in a study of the Swiss Army. Perfidious, deft, exacting, and precise, the small civilian-based group which functions in the semineutral country makes high art of most everything associated with preparedness. There are leesons here on the complex of hidden caverns storing years' worth of food in teh event of the unthinkable, tales of unexploded discharges along routeways and the relevant merits of Swiss history to world culture (Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of the World Unite!). Each chapter is as well arranged and fits as compactly within the whole like an individual instrument in a Swiss Army Knife; as much a joy to discover as to contemplate its application. What makes this books significant is the lasting sense of an example (as with other books by the author. See e.g., "The Headmaster") both enduring and of interest. While those interested in confining themselves to studies as to how certain armies function -Thucydides and von Clausowitz- this book allows one to understand why they exist.

Rating:
Summary: As Well Arranged as a Swiss Army Knife
Review: This book -diverging from the writer's "Assembling California" or the omnibus which include "Pieces of a Frame"), finds its own unsuspecting terrain and subject in the days in the lives of the Swiss Army. Prefidious, deft, exacting, and precise, this group, decentralized and civilian-based in th semineutral country demonstrates several aspects as to why the Swiss play an instrumental part in European and world history (Cub Scouts and Girl Scouts of the World unite!); being prepared here is not so much a motto as High Art itself. There are descriptions of caverns storing entire food supplies for years (in end in the event of the catastrophic), highways where explosives remain hidden, and exactly the manner under which Swiss eat their lunch. Each chapter, always a surprise and of interest, holds togetherin the books compactness like an individual instrument in a Swiss Army Knife. What makes this significant is the way in which such example can (as with the author's other excellent studies; see e.g., "The Headmaster") are noteworthy and that beyond Thucydides or Clausowitz may prove enduring (i.e., knowing why as opposed merely what armies are for is of note)

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Summary: Prose As Precise As A Swiss Watch
Review: This is the first book I've read by Mr. McPhee, and I really enjoyed it. The author started out as a journalist and a lot of his pieces originally appeared in "The New Yorker." This background is apparent in the way he writes. He picks an unusual topic, or at least he looks at something from an unusual angle, and he is very economic with his words. This is not a criticism. You don't feel that you are being "shortchanged." Being linquistically economic allows Mr. McPhee to cram an awful lot of interesting information into a short book, in this case just 150 pages. We learn a lot about the workings of the Swiss Army and how it permeates the entire society. We get insight into the Swiss mentality and their philosophy of "neutrality." We also get a little history.....both concerning WWII and going back further, back to the days of the Swiss mercenaries. The famous Swiss precision even comes into play in the construction of bomb shelters: "....the Swiss started building one-bar (i.e.-being able to withstand a certain amount of pressure caused by an explosion) shelters to protect the extremely high percentage of the population that might survive explosions but without the shelter would be destroyed like the citizens of Hamburg and Dresden. Swiss calculations showed that something as thick as, say, a ten-bar shelter would be of negligible extra value, for the increased area of protection would be slight rather than proportional; for underground hospitals and command posts, three-bar construction was chosen." And even though Mr. McPhee is never wasteful with words, this doesn't stop him from occasionally inserting his dry sense of humor. Regarding the Swiss propensity for planning for all contingencies, and not being caught with their pants down, the author writes: "It would be very un-Swiss to wake up tomorrow to yesterday's threat and then attempt to do something about it. If Pearl Harbor had somehow been in Switzerland, a great deal of Japanese aluminum would be scattered all over the Alps." Now that I've dipped my toe in the water, I'm looking forward to reading a lot more by Mr. McPhee!

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Summary: Entertaining and enlightening
Review: When I first read this book (and for a long time thereafter), I had no idea who John McPhee was. Although I enjoyed his idiosyncratic and engaging style, it was the subject matter of this brief study that interested me most. I've read a couple of McPhee's other books since, and enjoyed those, too. But this one is my favorite, because it's still the subject, rather than the author, that intrigues me most.

It's been said that Switzerland is not a country with an army, but rather an army with a country. McPhee shows us how the militia-army concept -- the every-citizen-as-soldier idea that has been emulated by Israel, for example -- plays out in the lives of Swiss citizens like Luc Massy, McPhee's host on a series of military training exercises. The exercises are more like camping trips for the soldiers, but McPhee shows that behind the breezy attitudes, national defense is a deadly serious business for the Swiss nation and people.

Switzerland's pastoral countryside may never look quite the same again, once you realize that nearly every bridge has been fitted with explosives, the faster to destroy them in case of invasion. That any snow-capped peak may hide artillery emplacements or entire squadrons of fighter jets. That a silent glacier (like the title Place de la Concorde Suisse) may become a front-line airfield at the first sign of trouble. And that, of course, most every farmhouse contains firearms and men and women trained to use them.

Since this book was first published in 1983, there has been a spate of books about the Swiss in World War Two. Coming as it did before that storm, 'La Place de la Concorde Suisse' is a useful way to get a feeling for the Swiss militia system, uncolored (pro or con) by the strong feelings that arose a decade or so later. I recommend this book to anyone interested in a look at Switzerland's unique national defense system in practice.