Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- 1 The creation of myths after 1945
- 2 British policy and strategy
- 3 British generalship in the two world wars
- 4 At the sharp end: combat experience in the two world wars
- 5 Attrition in the First World War: the naval blockade
- 6 Attrition in the Second World War: The strategic bombing of Germany
- 7 The transformation of war on the Western Front, 1914–1918
- 8 The British Army’s learning process in the Second World War
- 9 After the wars: Britain’s gains and losses
- Appendix
- Select bibliography
- Index
Appendix
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- 1 The creation of myths after 1945
- 2 British policy and strategy
- 3 British generalship in the two world wars
- 4 At the sharp end: combat experience in the two world wars
- 5 Attrition in the First World War: the naval blockade
- 6 Attrition in the Second World War: The strategic bombing of Germany
- 7 The transformation of war on the Western Front, 1914–1918
- 8 The British Army’s learning process in the Second World War
- 9 After the wars: Britain’s gains and losses
- Appendix
- Select bibliography
- Index
Summary
A selection of provocative remarks about the First World War that prompted me to write this book.
‘And that’s why we lost the First World War.’ Lady novelist in a radio discussion on the harmful influence of the public schools in Stop the Week, 21 February 1987. None of the panellists queried this opinion.
‘Watching Field Marshal Haig up a ladder, steering more Tommies towards senseless slaughter, you’re inclined to laugh in disbelief.’ Review of Oh! What a Lovely War in Newcastle. Daily Telegraph, 24 March 2010.
‘We are still defined by that pointless war.’ Simon Heffer, Sunday Telegraph, 2 August 2009.
‘The worst war that ever happened.’ Review of television presentation of Birdsong, Daily Telegraph, 23 January 2012.
‘Arsenal imploded at Newcastle, while Field Marshal Haig also failed to produce a Plan B.’ Caption to photograph in a report by Brian Moore, Sunday Telegraph, 10 February 2011.
‘It was suicide warfare by 19th century armies equipped with 20th century weapons. If it weren’t for the Americans plunging in the war would have been won by Germany. Yet all leaders – Wilson, Lloyd George, Clemenceau . . . not to mention that arch-criminal Haig – should have been shot in the back as cowards who had sent young men to die for Dolce et Decorum Est.’ Taki in The Spectator, 28 January 2012.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Britain's Two World Wars against GermanyMyth, Memory and the Distortions of Hindsight, pp. 177 - 178Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014