historian and journalist note that we got both of those terms in their historian and journalists rick atkinson and rick will talk about the long history of citizen soldiers in american history. certainly, not just in world war ii but in a range of conflicts and joining him is our own senior historian, dr. robert citino in this conversation. so with that i'm anxious to hear this. i'll be quiet and turn it over to rob. thanks so much. rick it's always a treat to be with you on a stage or frankly anywhere. i always feel a heck of a lot smarter after we've talked for an hour, you know, there's a false dichotomy between so-called scholarly history and so-called popular history and my friend rick atkinson here is someone who's completely obliterated that distinction because he's a one of the preeminent scholars of the us army in world war ii and a lot of other things and he's also extremely popular in a way that many of us are jealous. so it is really really wonderful rick. thanks for coming. robert's always a pleasure to be with you anywhere on stage stage or offstage great. so you've written the f

rick atkinson has obliterated that distinction because he is one of the preeminent scholars of the u.s. army and world war ii and other things and he is also extremely popular in a way that many of us are jealous. it is wonderful, rick, thanks for coming. >> rob, always a pleasure to be with you, anywhere on stage or off stage. >> great. so you have written the first volume of a trilogy now on the american revolution, it is entitled the british are coming. if you don't own it yet you will at some point in your life. i am confident. it is brilliantly written, brilliantly researched. how different is it researching a book on the american revolution from a book on world war ii. you have been in the george the third archives. you spent a decade talking with eisenhower and patton and the figures of the u.s. army in world war ii. how different is it talking to george the third? >> he has a funny accent. one of the reasons that i decided as a writer to leave world war ii and go back in time to an earlier century and our first war as a nation was i wanted to understand better where our 20th ce

given mccullough and rick atkinson can sit around and really work on their craft as writers. they are not teaching three courses a semester, they're not writing papers, they are not sitting in for our meetings about this or that administrative item, and i don't have to be in the classroom. i would also just add to that that there are some really good historians who are writers out there. it's just can sometimes feel, like, really difficult to find them. and so, i think one thing that historians can do is we can make it easier for people to find our stuff. and that, though, requires and hearing to the mechanics of the social web. in other words, you have to work within the twitter ecosystem and the facebook a foot go ecosystem, and the google ecosystem, to get people to find your stuff, which means you have to kind of work with the devil a little bit. and then hopefully it will lead to people reading your books. but again, i go back to the fact that so far there's not a lot of evidence that's happening. so that's why i say, it'd be great if we could design a new set of incenti

journalists get the opportunity to do or independent writers get to i mean david mccullough and rick atkinson can sit around and really work on their craft as writers. they're not teaching three courses a semester. they're not grading papers. they're not sitting in four hour meetings about this or that administrative item inside of an academic classroom. i would also just add to that that there are some really good historians who are writers out there. it's just can sometimes be like really difficult to find them. and so i think one thing that historians can do is we can make it easier for people to find our stuff. and that though requires adhering to the mechanics of the social web in other words you have to work within the twitter ecosystem and the facebook ecosystem and the google ecosystem to get people to find your stuff, which means you have to kind of work with the devil a little bit. and then hopefully we'll lead to people reading your books. but again, i go back to the fact that so far. there's not a lot of evidence that that's happening. so that's why i say it'd be great if we could

journalists get the opportunity to do or independent writers get to i mean david mccullough and rick atkinson can sit around and really work on their craft as writers. they're not teaching three courses a semester. they're not grading papers. they're not sitting in four hour meetings about this or that administrative item inside of an academic classroom. i would also just add to that that there are some really good historians who are writers out there. it's just can sometimes be like really difficult to find them. and so i think one thing that historians can do is we can make it easier for people to find our stuff. and that though requires adhering to the mechanics of the social web in other words you have to work within the twitter ecosystem and the facebook ecosystem and the google ecosystem to get people to find your stuff, which means you have to kind of work with the devil a little bit. and then hopefully we'll lead to people reading your books. but again, i go back to the fact that so far. there's not a lot of evidence that that's happening. so that's why i say it'd be great if we could

crane gerhard weinberg rick atkinson and and rob all have that distinction. which is i mean, it's all inspiring it just based on the body of their professional work. so rob has been our also our lead faculty with our master's degree program in world war two studies. which we deliver in partnership with the arizona state university. i understand. we have some of our recent graduates and current students from that program. i can't see you out there there. hey, yeah, raise your hands. there's your hey, wow, that's born we heard perfect. hey, i'd really like to meet all you guys and get some feedback on how we can make that even better. so well done if you haven't graduated let yet good luck in the program. and that's not going to mean the great any any softer there up. good luck on the paper next year. the amazing experts on the war dr. john mcmanus and toll and james scott. so with that i'll turn it over to rob now and let's go fantastic. thank you mike. thanks to everyone for being here again. we had great day yesterday talking about pearl harbor both reality