Years of service 1938–1952 Rank Colonel | Name Trevor Dupuy | |
 | ||
Born May 3, 1916
New York City ( 1916-05-03 ) Buried at Arlington National Cemetery Allegiance United States of America Battles/wars World War II
• Burma Campaign Awards Legion of Merit
Bronze Star
Distinguished Service Order (UK) Died June 5, 1995, Vienna, Virginia, United States Education United States Military Academy Place of burial Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia, United States Battles and wars World War II, Burma Campaign Books A genius for war, The Evolution of Weapo, The Harper encyclopedia of military, Land Battles - North Afri, Future wars | ||
Service/branch United States Army | ||
Trevor Nevitt Dupuy (May 3, 1916 – June 5, 1995) was a colonel, United States Army, retired, soldier and noted military historian.
Contents
- Early life
- Military career
- Academic and research career
- Family life and death
- Quotes
- Books and publications
- References
Early life
Born in New York, the son of noted military historian, R. Ernest Dupuy, Trevor followed in his father's footsteps.
Military career
Trevor Dupuy attended West Point, graduating in the class of 1938. During World War II he commanded a U.S. Army artillery battalion, a Chinese artillery group, and an artillery detachment from the British 36th Infantry Division. He was always proud of the fact that he had more combat time in Burma than any other American, and received decorations for service or valour from the U.S., British, and Chinese governments. After the war Dupuy served in the United States Department of Defense Operations Division from 1945 to 1947, and as military assistant to the Under Secretary of the Army from 1947 to 1948. He was a member of the original Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) staff in Paris under Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower and Matthew Ridgway from 1950 to 1952.
It is as a military historian and a theorist that Trevor Dupuy would make a lasting mark on the world. He is perhaps best known for his massive book The Encyclopedia Of Military History (co-written, like many of his books, with his father R. Ernest Dupuy). Starting from the beginning of history and going up the present day the book tries to cover all the major (and minor) military conflicts in world history. Usually each entry (arranged chronologically and by region) gives little more than the names of the commanders and (often) very rough estimates for the size of the forces involved in the campaigns. Dupuy was not afraid of expressing an opinion and he classified some of his subjects as Great Captains (such as Alexander the Great, Hannibal, Julius Caesar, Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, Frederick II of Prussia and Napoleon). Like most Western reference works it spends far more time dealing with wars in Europe and the United States than the rest of the world, but it does at least try to cover the entire world. The Encyclopedia Of Military History has been revised (and updated) several times, most recently in 1993. It can be found in the reference section of most American libraries.
Academic and research career
After Dupuy left active service in the Army in 1952, Harvard University appointed him as a Professor of Military Science and Tactics, where he helped found the Harvard Defense Studies Program (directed from 1958 to 1971 by Henry Kissinger). He left Harvard in 1956 to become director of the program in military studies at The Ohio State University. After retiring from active military duty in 1958, he served as a visiting professor in the International Relations Program at Rangoon University (now Yangon University) in Burma. From 1960 to 1962 Dupuy worked for the Institute for Defense Analyses, a government-funded think tank.
In 1962 he formed the first of his research companies dedicated to the study and analysis of armed conflict, the Historical Evaluation and Research Organization (HERO), and served as President and Executive Director until 1983. From 1967 to 1983 he was also President of T. N. Dupuy Associates Inc. (TNDA), which became the parent organization for HERO. In 1983, TNDA sold its assets (including HERO) to a new corporation he formed called Data Memory Systems, Inc. (DMSI). Trevor was the president and largest stockholder in DMSI. In 1990, Dupuy resigned from DMSI, sold his stock and reactivated TNDA. In 1992 TNDA was closed out, and he established the non-profit The Dupuy Institute (TDI).
Dupuy's main contribution to military operation analysis is the assessment method Quantified Judgment Method or QJM, where the outcome of a battle is predicted using a fairly complicated multiplicative-additive formula in which various factors relating to the strength and firepower of the fighting parties as well as the circumstances are taken into account. Dupuy and his associates adjusted the parameters of his model by using known statistical facts of several recorded battles.
Family life and death
Dupuy committed suicide by gunshot at his home in Vienna, Virginia on June 5, 1995. He had learned three weeks earlier that he had terminal pancreatic cancer. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. During his lifetime he wrote or co-wrote more than 50 books.
When he died, he had been married five times, with his last wife being Zhang Yun. He fathered nine children – six boys and three girls.