Did Patton write memoirs or letters that reveal his postwar thoughts and predictions?
Executive summary
George S. Patton left an extensive trove of diaries and letters that were collected and published after his death, and those writings candidly reveal his wartime thinking and personal philosophies but provide only limited, indirect evidence of formal "postwar predictions" because his papers end in 1945 and he died that year [1] [2]. The best-known published presentation of those documents—War as I Knew It—was assembled from his diaries and letters and offers retrospectives and aphorisms that readers often read as postwar commentary, but scholars note the material is primarily wartime in origin and editorially curated after Patton’s death [3] [4].
1. Patton wrote prodigiously in diaries and letters during his career
Patton kept diaries from 1910 through 1945 and was a prolific letter-writer; the Library of Congress describes volumes—especially 1942–1945—that document his daily activities, observations and candor about himself and his command decisions [1]. Multiple collected editions and scholarly projects draw on those diaries and letters, with two-volume compilations and editions titled The Patton Papers and similar works that include early-life correspondence and wartime entries [5] [6].
2. Postwar material is scant because the papers terminate in 1945 and he died that year
The Library of Congress notes the original diaries are dated through 24 March 1945, with annotated transcripts continuing to 3 December 1945; the institution also records that the Library did not receive the latter portion of the originals, which limits direct documentary evidence of any extended postwar reflections from Patton himself [1]. Patton’s premature death in December 1945 curtailed any possibility of a long postwar writing career, a point highlighted in later appraisals noting that the “post-war world lost its opportunity” for Patton’s sustained memoirs [2].
3. "War as I Knew It" and other posthumous publications present wartime diaries and letters, not a commissioned postwar manifesto
The widely read War as I Knew It was assembled and published in 1947 from Patton’s diaries and letters and has been treated as his memoir; the book draws chiefly on wartime material from campaigns in North Africa, Sicily, France and Germany and includes his leadership philosophies and battlefield recollections rather than systematic forecasts about the postwar geopolitical order [3] [4]. Book descriptions and reviews explicitly state the volume was compiled from diaries and letters after his death, undercutting any claim that Patton authored a reflective postwar program while alive and in full control of publication [2] [7].
4. What Patton’s writings do reveal — temperament, doctrine and occasional forward-looking judgments
Patton’s diaries and letters repeatedly expose his personal candor, tactical aggressiveness and beliefs about military leadership and the moral character of nations, and editors and biographers argue those documents give readers access to his wartime thinking and occasional forward-looking judgments about occupation, military policy and national character [1] [6]. Biographies and definitive studies relying on his papers treat his letters and diaries as essential sources for understanding his strategic mindset, yet they also emphasize that commentators and editors—such as family members and later historians—shaped how those writings were presented to the public [8] [9].
5. Conclusion: writings exist and illuminate, but they do not constitute a sustained postwar predictions corpus
Patton left diaries and letters that were published and have been mined by historians for insight into his views, and these volumes—compiled into memoir-like books—contain remarks often read as prescient or programmatic, but the documentary record ends in 1945 and his best-known publications were assembled posthumously from wartime material, so there is not an extensive, authorial corpus of explicit postwar predictions written and published by Patton himself while alive [1] [2] [4]. Alternative perspectives note editorial shaping and the involvement of family or publishers in assembling Patton’s writings, meaning readers must distinguish Patton’s original wartime texts from the postwar framing applied by others [8] [6].