While admitting that Haig was no genius, revisionist historians have argued that by 1918, he was able to co-ordinate successfully all elements of military force – artillery, armour, airpower, and infantry – to achieve a decisive victory in the series of operations known collectively as ‘The Hundred Days’. Does this argument stand up to critique? Chris Bambery tests the case.
world war one
They Shall Not Grow Old
Taylor Downing reports on Peter Jackson’s new WWI centenary film. New Zealander Peter Jackson is known to cinema-goers for the lavish spectacles in which he specialises in breathtaking digital effects, including The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-2003) and The Hobbit trilogy (2012-14), both adapted from the novels of J R R Tolkien. He has now just released a remarkable […]
MHM December 2018
The December issue of MHM, the British military history magazine, is now on sale. To subscribe to the magazine, click here. To subscribe to the digital archive, click here. In this issue: Crimea: the last great charge of the redcoats, 1854 Only the incompetence of the enemy prevented it from becoming a national disaster. Neil Faulkner revisits the British […]
The Hundred Days Offensive – Whose Victory?
A century ago, between 8 August and 11 November 1918, after four years of trench stalemate, the Allied armies on the Western Front went onto the offensive, broke through the enemy line, and maintained their advance for three months until the German Army had been brought to final defeat. How was it done? Debate has raged ever since about the combination of factors that delivered Allied victory in the autumn of 1918.
MHM November 2018
The November issue of MHM, the British military history magazine, is now on sale. To subscribe to the magazine, click here. To subscribe to the digital archive, click here. In this issue: The legend of Roland at Roncesvalles, AD 778 Fred Chiaventone takes a closer look at the medieval Chanson de Roland and debunks the myths relating to Charlemagne’s […]
In Pictures: William Kentridge’s The Head and the Load
William Kentridge’s The Head and the Load brings to light the experiences of 1.5 million African porters during the First World War. Seema Syeda reports. The past year has seen a whole raft of performance art, poignant memoir, and academic enquiry proliferate across the world stage in commemoration of the centenary of the end of the […]
WWI: Pershing on the Western Front
No general in American history held the kind of absolute power General Pershing wielded. With complete backing from President Woodrow Wilson and Secretary of War Newton D Baker, Pershing could shape the American Expeditionary Force, due to deploy on the Western Front of the First World War, as he saw fit. But how successful was his military strategy?
Shell shock cover-up at Passchendaele
Taylor Downing reveals an official cover-up of mental illness in the later years of the war. It was not just the scale of the physical casualties that overwhelmed the British Army in the summer of 1916 on the Somme, terrible though these were – 38,000 wounded to be processed through medical facilities on the first day […]
Kaiserschlacht, Spring 1918
Could the Germans have won the First World War in 1918? Almost certainly. A quarter of a century later, the tide of war would turn irretrievably against Hitler’s Third Reich in 1942/1943. The massive industrial power of the Soviet Union and the United States combined – still rising towards a wartime peak –guaranteed eventual defeat. The outcome was far more open in 1917/1918.
MHM 90 – March 2018
The March issue of Military History Monthly, the British military history magazine, is now on sale. In this issue: THE FIRST BLITZKRIEG This month our 17-page special feature looks back on Kaiserschlacht –General Ludendorff’s great offensive of spring 1918. Kaiserschlacht ushered in a new tactical doctrine of speed, surprise, and infiltration that almost won the war for Germany. In our first […]
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