Huba Wass de Czege is a retired U.S. Army brigadier general who was born in 1941 in Cluj and came to the United States of America in 1951. Papi is his father, Wass Albert, the Hungarian Author who died on February 17, 1998, in Astor, Florida.
General Wass, author and since 1994 a frequent consultant to the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command for advanced warfighting experiments, wargames and other studies, was one of the principal developers of the Army's AirLand Battle concept and the founder and first director of the School of Advanced Military Studies, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. His family escaped communism in 1945, and became US citizens in 1957. He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1964, earned a masters degree in Public Affairs from Harvard University, attended the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, the Army War College, and the Capstone Course at the National Defense University.
His career included service with troops at every echelon from platoon to division in mechanized, airborne, and light infantry units, and teaching international relations at West Point and tactics, operations and strategy at the Command and General Staff College. During the Vietnam War he commanded an Airborne Infantry Company and a Vietnamese Ranger Battalion advisory team. A variety of staff assignments included serving as a special assistant to the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, and later to the Secretary General of NATO. He participated in two influential studies of officer midcareer education.
While on active duty he published articles and papers on tactics, operational art, doctrine, leadership, military education, and training.
General Wass says that his essay "celebrates the long and productive 90 years that [his father] served as an example and mentor... [It] was originally offered as an epilogue to the Szabad Tér Kiadó version of Wass Albert’s Voltam, a special collection published in Budapest in 2006 of
autobiographical writings Wass Albert began even before the Second World War, and
while still in Erdély. But, rightly, the editors thought it best to have Wass Albert be the
sole voice in that book."
He goes on to say that "This English version is prompted by my
participation in the XLVII Hungarian American Congress in Cleveland, Ohio on 23 and
24 November 2007, which was to a great extent dedicated to commemorating my father’s
work in America on behalf of the Hungarians left behind the Iron Curtain. This work is to
satisfy an immediate, and sincere interest in Papi’s life, and how we viewed his life and
work within the Hungarian American community."
