Book description
Gordon Corrigan's
Mud, Blood and Poppycock
overturned the myths that surround the First World War. Now he
challenges our assumptions about the Second World War in this brilliant,
caustic narrative that exposes just how close Britain came to losing. He
reveals how Winston Churchill bears a heavy responsibility for the state
of our forces in 1939, and how his interference in military operations
caused a string of disasters. The reputations of some of our most famous
generals are also overturned: above all, Montgomery, whose post-war
stature owes more to his skill with a pen than talent for command. But
this is not just a story of personalities. Gordon Corrigan investigates
how the British, who had the biggest and best army in the world in 1918,
managed to forget everything they had learned in just twenty years. The
British invented the tank, but in 1940 it was the Germans who showed the
world how to use them. After we avoided defeat, but the slimmest of
margins, it was a very long haul to defeat Hitler's army, and one in
which the Russians would ultimately bear the heaviest burden. The
author was commissioned from the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst in
1962 and retired from the Brigade of Gurkhas in 1998. A member of the
British Commission for Military History and a Fellow of the Royal
Asiatic Society, he speaks fluent Nepali and is a keen horseman.
