The Hinge Factor: How Chance and Stupidity Have Changed History [Hardcover]

Erik Durschmied (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1559705159 | ISBN-13: 978-1559705158 | Publication Date: March 22, 2000

From the wooden horse of Troy to the Gulf War, military history has been as much marked by chance and error, as by gallantry and heroism. Many conflicts have been decided by the caprice of weather, bad intelligence, heroism where it wasn't expected, or individual incompetence. In military terms, the incident which can swing a battle from victory to defeat in a moment is known as the "Hinge Factor". The "Hinge Factor" vividly describes battles which demonstrate this phenomenon - including the circumstances behind the loss of the Holy Cross, through to the attack of African war bees in 1914, to Star-War weaponry described in the Gulf War. This enthralling book demystifies the general belief that battles are always won due to the brilliance of a general and will both inform and entertain a wide audience.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

What if it hadn't rained at Agincourt in 1415 and the French had, as expected, won the day? What if one of Napoleon's most trusted commanders had spiked Wellington's guns with a handful of nails at Waterloo in 1815, providing his emperor with victory? What if Hitler hadn't paused for three vital days during his invasion of France in May 1940, allowing the British Expeditionary Force precious time to evacuate from Dunkirk? Moments like these, argues Erik Durschmied, provide the hinge factor in history: examples of stupidity, chance, or accident that have irrevocably changed the outcome of human history, for better or worse.

Drawing on his extensive experience as a war correspondent with the BBC and CBS, Durschmied moves from ancient Troy and the Trojan Horse to Iraq and Operation Desert Storm, offering a persuasive and at times wry account of the ways in which chance affects the unfolding of history. Recounting 17 key moments in human conflict and warfare, The Hinge Factor is not just an amusing meditation on what might have been; it is also a poignant and vivid account of the brutality and stupidity of war. More than just an account of accidents in history, this is a thoughtful and absorbing book. --Jerry Brotton, Amazon.co.uk

From Publishers Weekly

What decides victory in battle? Superiority--in numbers, leadership, strategy or fighting ability--is certainly a factor. Military historian and war correspondent Durschmied, who lives in France, reminds us that chance--known in military terms as the Hinge Factor--can also play a decisive role. In this fast-paced study, Durschmied (Don't Shoot the Yanqui, etc.) analyzes battles both famous and obscure, showing how chance has enabled inferior armies to defeat superior opponents, thus changing the course of history. Serious readers will approach some chapters with tongue firmly in cheek. Few might accept, for example, that a slap on the face set in motion events that brought on the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia or that a parcel containing three cigars extended the American Civil War for four years. Other episodes are more plausible. Durschmied makes a good case that a swarm of angry bees decided the outcome of a key battle between British and German forces in German East Africa in 1914. Similarly, he shows how weather, which has bedeviled field commanders throughout the ages, played a decisive role in the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. The author concludes each chapter with a series of provocative questions designed to draw armchair strategists into a spirited game of What-if? More entertaining than scholarly, this will nevertheless please military buffs. Maps. (Mar).
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Arcade Publishing (March 22, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559705159
• ISBN-13: 978-1559705158
• Product Dimensions: 9.9 x 6.5 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,657,021 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The What--If Factor, November 19, 2000

By 

charles falk (Novato, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Hinge Factor: How Chance and Stupidity Have Changed History (Hardcover)

"The Hinge Factor" is an exercise in historical Monday-morning quarterbacking. In it Erik Durschmied, a former television war correspondent, describes 18 critical military engagements beginning with the Trojan hourse in 1184 BC and ending with the Gulf War. He then, equally briefly, gives what he thinks is the single "hinge factor" on which the battle turned. His subtitle "How Chance and Stupidity Have Changed History" gives a clue to the kind of hinge he is talking about. In TV jargon I think this is called a hook.

Durschmied tells a good story -- quickly and yet colorfully. He shows us parts of the action through the eyes of specific participants -- including bits of dialogue that lend flavor to the scenes. (I was left wondering if these were authentic; they sound almost too cinematic for words found in soldiers' letters and diaries.) The best sections of the book are those Durschmied covered as a journalist himself -- especially the fighting in Hue during the Tet Offensive.

Durschmied's assessment is sometimes colored by his enthusiasms and his need for a hook. His description of the battle of Antietam mostly features courageous Confederates slaughtering ill-led Union troops. Some readers may be unprepared for his revelation at the end that Confederate casualties were substantially higher than those suffered by the Union army. He concludes it was a moral victory for General Lee. He ignores the fact that Lee lost an irreplaceable quarter of his army in a battle he needn't have fought, that he was forced to retreat back across the Potomac in the middle of the night nearly losing his entire artillery reserve in the process, and that his objective of fomenting an uprising among Confederate sympathizers in Maryland was thwarted by the battle. Durschmied compresses the complex motivations and movements of Russian and German forces that clashed in Prussia in August 1914 to just 17 pages. He distills the reason for the Russian defeat down to a single personality clash. When studied in detail, the history of great events is seldom that tidy.

Durschmied is clearly not writing for the serious student of history -- military or otherwise. The maps he provides are inadequate. They contain little topgraphical detail and geographic points mentioned in his text do not appear on the accompanying map. There are errors of fact that should have been caught by his editors. His bibliography is sketchy.

30 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This entry is fantastic!, March 2, 2000

By 

Al Krieger - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Hinge Factor: How Chance and Stupidity Have Changed History (Hardcover)

I bought this book because a friend said I would love it. He was right. The author takes some of histories greatest battles, and makes you relive them, one wonderful moment after another. The suspense never lets up. I could not put this book down. Once he has related the events, he clues you in on the stupidity, and then the moment of the battle which hinged on success or failure. This author has given me a completely new way to look at battles which I thought I really knew. It is refreshing, alarming, and yet captivating reading. Once he gets your interest in a new battle, he never lets up, and you can't stop reading. A must for military history buffs. Well worth twice the asking price.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Creative, interesting, but apparently written in haste, April 16, 2006

By 

Alejandro Contreras - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Hinge Factor: How Chance and Stupidity Have Changed History (Paperback)

A friend of mine told me about the premise of this book: that the outcome of many (even important) battles throughout history has been defined not by the military brilliance of the winners, but by the human weakness of the losers or just by luck.

I was intrigued by it, and read it (that is to say, I am not an specialist versed on military or history readings - you can see that if you click on my "other reviews").

I will be brief. What I liked about this book was:
- Nice set of chronologically ordered events, starting from Troy and finishing with the fall of the Berlin wall.
- The premise seems to be correct in most of the examples provided: yes, human beings are weak and, well, human. So, many battles were lost by arrogance, by abrupt changes in weather conditions, by miscommunication, etc.

The issues that bothered me whilst reading it were:
- Convoluted story-telling. The description of some battles was very difficult to follow. Sometimes I read them once, twice, could not fully understand the movements of the players, and at the end, just quit and kept going, following the major points but missing in some of the details that Mr. Durschmeid failed (imho) to convey appropriately.
- Horrible use of footnotes. I won't get into details here, but let's just say it's not clear to me who was thinking what about the footnotes in this book. Some are iterative, some could be in the text, some are inocuous references, some are translations and some are pretty much incomprehensible.
- Translations: in many instances Durschmeid failed to translate quotes from French or German military officers. So, his point was completely lost.
- Maps: yes, it is very convenient to use maps to help the readers understand the movement of troops in the battles; but, no, it is not wise to use a poorly designed and schematized map for each battle. Their value was many times diminished.

The four issues above seem like details, but their comeuppance again and again in this book make me feel as if was written in haste. I don't understand what was the rush, but clearly someone could have helped Mr. Durschmeid in making it more intelligible, more sharp, more thorough.

Read this if you're curious about the role of stupidity in warfare. It opens your eyes. In some occassions you may even laugh at what happened.

But, unless you're a scholar, or have the patience to read and re-read some paragraphs, you might feel dissappointed by the lack of quality in the book's form (not its content, which is fine).