Sobel enlisted in the Army on 7 March 1941 and volunteered for the paratroopers. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant. Promoted to first lieutenant, Sobel commanded Company E for all of their basic training at Camp Toccoa, Georgia. He trained his men intensely, and was eventually promoted to the rank of captain in recognition of his ability as a trainer. However, Sobel was despised by his soldiers for being petty and vindictive. After a period of training in the United Kingdom before the Normandy invasion, Captain Sobel was reassigned from command of Easy Company to command the jump school at Chilton Foliat. First Lieutenant Thomas Meehan replaced Sobel, and was one of several officers to succeed him in that post before the end of the war. Sobel jumped into Normandy and earned a Combat Infantryman Badge as part of Regimental Headquarters Company. Sobel was assigned as the regimental S-4 officer on 8 March 1945.
Sobel returned to the United States in 1945, and was honorably discharged from the Army on 18 March 1946. He worked as an accountant before being recalled to active duty during the Korean War. He remained in the Army National Guard, eventually retiring at the rank of lieutenant colonel. He later married and had three children. In 1970, Sobel shot himself in the head with a small-caliber pistol in an attempted suicide. The bullet entered his left temple, passed behind his eyes, and exited the other side of his head. This severed his optic nerves and left him blind. Soon afterward, he began living at a VAassisted-living facility in Waukegan, Illinois. He died there of malnutrition on 30 September 1987. No memorial services were held for him.
Legacy
Sobel was portrayed as a petty and capricious martinet in the television series Band of Brothers, generating much debate. Stephen Ambrose gives numerous examples of this in his book. Since the series, his son Michael Sobel has spoken out on his behalf. In interviews, some Easy Company veterans have acknowledged the part Sobel's training played in the company's later successes. Writing of him in their autobiographies, he is recalled with little fondness by fellow officers, who regarded him as a in the practical matters of ground combat, particularly due to his pronounced lack of understanding of common infantry field craft such as land navigation and basic infantry combat tactics, as well as a refusal to listen to the advice of fellow officers or NCOs.
