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History Of The Second World War

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Captain Basil Liddell Hart was the most famous military historian of the 20th century. Everything he wrote is worth reading, and this is one of his best.

His style is clear, direct, and easy to read. He leaves you in no doubt as to what he thinks. He loves to say "I told you so", and was in a better position than most to exercise that unbecoming character trait. I don't know of any other historian who can say, as L.H. does:

"When in November, 1933, I was consulted as to how our fast tank formations - which the War Office was just beginning to form - could best be used in a future war I had suggested that, in the event of a German invasion of France, we should deliver a tank counterattack through the Ardennes. I was thereupon told that 'the Ardennes were impassible to tanks', to which I replied that, from personal study of the terrain, I regarded such a view as a delusion - as I had emphasized in several books between the wars."

Guderian's tank attack through the Ardennes in 1940 and the German Ardennes tank offensive of 1944 fully justify L.H.'s right to say "I told you so."

This is a straightforward chronological history of the military operations of the major belligerent powers of the Second World War, so much is left out that appears in more general histories. Also, it was written before the "Ultra" and other secret operations were declassified, which is a drawback. However, current thinking is shifting on the subject of just how much these operations actually contributed to Allied victory (see John Keegan's recent "Intelligence in War", for example), so that his commentary on the strategic and tactical mistakes of the various combatants is still very much worth reading. His "Epilogue", though controversial, is a brilliant and valuable summation of the overall course of the war.

He ends the book on a pessimistic note, clearly very disappointed that a war fought to defend Eastern Europe from a totalitarian power ended with a similar power in occupation of those countries:

"Thus the train of European civilization rolled into the long, dark tunnel from which it only emerged after six exhausting years had passed. Even then, the bright sunlight of victory proved illusory."

If we accept L.H.'s analysis, the Second World War didn't really end until 1989, with the demise of the USSR and the end of its long occupation of Eastern Europe.

Any student of politics, history or warfare, and anyone interested in how our world came to be the way it is, should be familiar with the writings of Basil Liddell Hart, including this book.

Highly recommended.

Liddell Hart was one of the great military thinkers of this century. His theories of strategy and mobile warfare influenced generals on both sides in the Second World War. In this volume, he applies his powers of strategic analysis to the events of that war to provide a coherent and compelling narrative. Liddell Hart's was the first general history of World War II that gave me a sense of the overall logic of events rather than simply a collection of battle stories.

From the outset a presumably simple question needs to be posed and answered, due to the attributed authoritativeness of author Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart. Does this history of the Second World War give an exact account of the global war between the Axis Powers and The Allies from 1939 to 1945?

The answer is emphatically yes, but a distinction must be made. This book took me two months to read, taking into account its length this was not especially poor for a general history reader. But I believe the reason behind the prolongued read is precisely because it is not an account for general readership but for the reader of military history - it is in short, a military and strategist's view of the Second World War. An important categorization that I hope is understood.

This does not mean however that its worth is negated for the general reader. Liddell Hart's history is as thorough and epic in scale as the war itself, authored by an experienced military strategist who bore witness to its prosecution, it holds unique and valuable insight. Of particular value is the inclusion of German accounts of the war from interrogations and interviews made by the author.

Great eruditeness is also shown in describing the varying campaigns, invasions, battlefields, and military plans of all sides. The sheer detail he offers is immense and because of this nothing is gleaned over, of considerable use in gathering a full account of actual fighting. In addition, something of the art if essentially chaotic nature of the war and indeed warfare as a whole is infused into the reader's mind.

Yet, all this could have been achieved with much greater effect and with less long-winded and relentless detail if it had contained more frequent accounts from the protagonists involved. Indeed if the participants in the theatre of operations were taken account of at all, this history would have added a worthwhile human dimension above the confusing tactical and strategic aspects which tended to dominate the retelling.

If it had, this account would surely have become an unsurpassable tome leaving fellow historians of WWII to fight it out for the scraps of academic esoteric obscurity that is Hitler's dietary needs and "confused sexuality".

Yet despite my craving for some sort of personal narrative, which is probably unfair in view of Liddell Hart's obvious interest and authority on strategic and military matters, this book did provide me with the knowledge of the Second World War that I had sought from the outset. It is so thoroughly detailed that it covered all of the theatres of war with particular emphasis on the campaigns in North Africa, Italy and the Battle of Britain/Atlantic.

Readers from the United States may be disappointed however at the focus of the war upon British and Soviet battles in contrast to their own vital contribution to the Allied victory, namely in the Pacific Ocean, which I might point out in mitigation was one of the strongest sections imparted. But I consider that Liddell Hart has emphasized overall fairness, the Allies together defeated the Axis powers, it was not one partner exclusively, although the Soviet Union's all-important recoiling of Hitler's invasion has been given deserved focus in the book.

I would also put forward certain caution if any readers approached this conflict without any prior knowledge of its main events, you will undoubtedly lose track of any timeline, as I occasionally did. The narrative swerves from North Africa to the Russian Steppes and the Burma jungle, with no clear indication of its importance in relation to other theatres of the war.

My judgement upon this book ultimately has to be that of conflicting middle ground however. As an account of any war it has to be regarded as a classic. As a military history of the Second World War I doubt whether the understanding of Liddell Hart or his analytical brilliance shall be surpassed, and as an historian of the Twentieth Century he is rightly regarded as amongst its most esteemed.

This book however does not fully meet the requirements of modern readers to understand the Second World War beyond the concept of armies, war production figures and "losses". It rarely goes beyond a history of the conflict that is simply one of strategic/military problem and solution. Indeed, it neglects to emphasize at all that the war involved massive human taking up of arms with the resultant consequences. A history of war without human context bears no resemblance to the actual war itself and thus I believe this book is not as authoritative as it once seemed.

History has always fascinated me and in modern times, the Second World War (along with the Civil Rights movement) intrigue me most as a history major - both are periods of great social change (although thankfully one occured with much less bloodshed).

This book analyzes the numerous campaigns of the Second World War covering them very completely. If you want a detailed overview of the war this is it - it covers every level of the war - from the steppes of Russia to Pearl Harbor, from the air war to the Battle of the North Atlantic. There were a number of maps, some of which were quite helpful in following the course of battles.

I only have a few complaints with the book. The first is that Hart goes to great lengths to explain why what he would have done in certain historical situations would be better. I disliked this because hind sight is 20/20 and it seemed that Hart almost was claiming he could have ended the war quicker. While pointing out what makes a campaign (ex. Barbarossa) unsuccessful is great, injecting what you would have done is not.

The only other aspects I didn't like was the emphasis on Britain (I would have liked seeing a bit more U.S. battles in the Far East) and his writing about the Atomic Bomb - because as an earlier reviewer stated, it is entirely editorialized and doesn't attempt to look at the social mood in the Western world at the time.

Overall though a great overview, with many details that you begin to appreciate in the reading.

First off I should say that I don't like this book. Liddell Hart is a pessimistic braggart who never stops pointing out how he would have done everything differently. That said, there is a very real possibility that he was right. Just reading the quotations he includes from his various articles written during the war, you can see that he had a very good understanding of how to fight modern wars. I don't doubt that he is avoiding the articles where he was wrong, but that he is right so many times is spooky. Whatever else can be said about him he was certainly smart. It is also pretty clear why nobody listened to him. Apparently, at one point in the war Winston Churchill even tried to put him under arrest. It also seems that he was intentionally deceptive about the origins of blitzkrieg. He claims to have invented the principle himself which is at best willful misinterpretation of the facts.

Now on to the good points (and there are many). The book is about as thoroughly researched as it is possible to be. Liddell Hart interviewed many of the participants himself which is something that you don't find in many history books. His understanding of tactics and strategy is exceptional and rarely implausible. The writing style is competent, direct, and to the point. He has barely an unnecessary word in the entire book.

Now for more bad points. The book is ENTIRELY a Military History. Any politics or personalities are mentioned in passing if at all. The few interpretations of his that I strongly disagreed with were in his interpretation of politics. He views it from very much a military point of view as a battle to win as much power and security as possible. Any other factors such as principles or popular opinion are ignored or ridiculed. Fortunately there is not much time spent on politics, but there is enough that anyone who starts off with only this book is likely to be confused. For example, from a purely military point of view Hitler comes off as a good ruler until he invades Russia. No mention is made of his many atrocities or his genocidal policies. For what it is, it serves as an excellent look at the war as a whole. Going in expecting that and you won't be disappointed. Look for anything else and you will be. If you're looking for a history of the war in all its aspects then a better book would be Martin Gilbert's The Second World War: A Complete History or John Keegan's The Second World War. They might not be quite as brilliant as Hart in military matters but they are very good writers and are able to include more than just the bare military facts. And since they were written more recently they are able to draw on and include any of Hart's interpretations that they see as relevant. This book is useful as a reference but I can't really recommend reading it.

History of Second World War proves to be a well written and highly insightful book on the Second World War. The author, Capt. B.H. Liddell Hart was a well known military analysist and proponent of armor theories between the two world wars and when he died in the 1970s, he was known as the "Captain who taught generals". He was also British so it will not be surprising that the book take a British-centric view of the war (many American authors often take an American centric view as well).

The book covers all aspects of the war although it pretty heavy where the British military was involved in the most. I read this book back in 1975 when it was initially available to me and I was surprised by its originality that maybe today's readers may not notice. The book was one of the first to be heavily criticial of many of the decisions made by FDR and Churchill. The book supported the concept that Hitler's invasion of Russia wasn't a mistake but what he did after the invasion was. There were other pretty original thoughts written here which turned out to be matter of facts today to a well read reader. I didn't mind Liddell Hart's 20/20 Monday morning quarterbacking since its a job of any historian to judge the actions of the past and make an analysis of what went wrong or right. In this, the author did an excellent job.

The author, who also wrote a well received and well regarded book titled "Strategy" which advocate the "indirect strategy" approach, often harped on this element in this book. He praised highly to those who uses elements from "Strategy" and lamented those who do not.

The book is extremely readable and on the whole, pretty fair in outlook. I agreed with one of the previous reviewers that by Liddell Hart's perception, the war really didn't end until the fall of the Soviet Union. Cold War was World War II: Part II.

When I first read it back in 1970s, I thought it was one of the greatest books on the war. Now, it still worth reading although there are better books out there.

Liddell Hart's powers of analysis are put to full use in this book. He offers a coherent and engrossing account of the Second World War. His organization and style make reading the book a delight. Nevertheless, this book is still inferior to its predecessor, the History of the First World War written and published almost 50 years before this volume saw the light of day. Captain Liddell Hart's strategic insights are informative especially because much of what happened in WW2 was in keeping with his own predictions before the war. However, he sometimes shows a lack of appreciation for political and tactical details, such as his treatment of the dropping of atomic bombs. He turns that issue into a very clear-cut, unnecessary, morally reprehensible action, but his argument never expands much beyond editorialization. Regardless of the reader's own opinion on the atomic bomb, enough work has been done by other authors since the 1970s to make the historical verdict far more complex than Liddell Hart argues. Otherwise, an excellent book.

Sir Basil H. Liddell Hart can be fairly introduced as the premier British 20th Century military historian to have been a career, as opposed to a temporary wartime, officer. He emerged from the First World War much disillusioned, as was hardly uncommon, but remained in the military world through his long working life as critic, historian, and strategist. He applauded the British Army's tragically abbreviated experiments in tank strategy (the tank is a British invention and for a while in the 1920's Britain looked to seal her position as the master of tank use). During and after the Second War he interviewed a number of German POW senior officers; from this he developed probably the most complete sense of German military thinking on the Allied side. "The History of the Second World War" was the last of his many considerable works, finished very shortly before his death in 1970.

The History (712 pp. of fairly dense print) is a general history of the War in all theaters. It has its fair share of slugging from battle to battle, though Sir Basil penetrates the fog of war better than most and as well as any. To most readers its most interesting chapters will likely be near the beginning and the end.

Sir Basil's contempt for the gyrations of the British and French governments' early attempts to deal with Hitler is comprehensive and mordant. Unfortunately, he is probably right. It was always clear, and is now accepted, that the opportunity to stop Hitler was at the moment of his reoccupation of the Rhineland in 1936. That this action could have been challenged by a single French division is clear, and that this in turn would have destroyed most home confidence in Hitler's still young regime is a close certainty. Sir Basil keeps his still greater ridicule for the eventual Polish line in the sand (which actually precipitated WWII); Britain and France had no means of stopping Hitler in the East in time to save Poland--the only force that could have done so was Stalin's Russia, which the British and French (not entirely wrongly, to be sure) had already alienated.

Thus, "It is only too evident that [Churchill], like most of Britain's leaders, acted on a hot-headed impulse--instead of with the cool-headed judgement that was once a characteristic of British statesmanship."

For though Sir Basil had been a general supporter of Churchill in the late 1930s, he is very far indeed from joining the customary hosannas to the hero. He does not stop at Churchill's more obvious blunders (so starving Singapore's defenses that her fall to the Japanese was inevitable, the connected loss through lack of air-defense of the battleships Prince of Wales and Repulse, the obsession with the Africa campaign, the hideously expensive and generally useless second front in Italy, and many others). He goes straight to a point: Britain's lone stand against Hitler was doomed, and was thus a fraud.

This is not entirely original. It was set forth by Churchill's predecessor, Joseph Chamberlain. Britain and France, to Chamberlain, lacked the military force (by 1940) to win a quick war against Hitler and lacked the economic resources to fight a long one. Victory, if it ever came, would leave Britain, France, and their empires shattered and drained of all power for the future. This, obviously, went twice for Britain standing without France and four times for Britain standing without France against not only Germany, but Russia as well. It was believed by many Englishmen, since branded as moral cowards. Hitler, it appeared and may well have been true, had little interest in war with England; his desired sphere was the Continent, more especially the Slavic east. England should reach a modus vivendi with Hitler and continue with her trade and her empire. Churchill was positioning his country for inevitable, and more or less pointless, destruction. England was saved by dumb luck.

This deserves serious attention, as the truth, or the very near truth, always does. To one who grew up, as I, in the limping and subfusc England of the late 1940s and most of the 1950s it demands serious attention, indeed.

And yet...Sixty years after the last shots England is one of the most prosperous nations of the world. Her institutions have come through largely intact. Her foreign posture may leave much to be desired, as her apparent lack of will to deal with her Muslims, but there is still a good deal of the old lion left, very different from the cowardice and moral relativity of France, Germany, and the Low Countries. The United States' entry into the war was not so sure as Churchill, Consuelo Vanderbilt's son, liked to think--but it was not very unlikely. Hitler's Germany was far more demonic that it might have seemed in 1939. And Hitler's self-defeat could somewhat have been profesied of a monster.

Sir Basil has much of interest to say over the anatomy of the fall of France--but I will not enter into that here.

His parting shot is Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is the present consensus that that the Bomb was justified or that its use, given its existence, was made inevitable by the Japanese Empire's evident refusal to accept defeat and by the hideous cost, to Allied troops and to the Japanese civilians, of an invasion of Japan.

This is a good argument. It becomes a bad argument if it can be shown that the Japanese government had, by that time, on the contrary, accepted that defeat was inevitable and was in fact trying very hard to surrender.

It is this that Sir Basil tries, not without evidence, to put forward. Japan had apparently made, with the Emperor's blessing, overtures to Russia (with whom she was not then at war) to arrange talks of surrender. Stalin, with hopes of territorial larceny, sat on these. But further attempts by Japan did finally come to Western ears. They were largely ignored, or pushed aside by Truman's insistence on unconditional surrender. There is evidence that voices in the American and British military felt that they had high stakes in the dropping of the Bomb, in part as a warning to Stalin, and that any Japanese hesitation whatever made for a very good excuse.

Sir Basil has not completely convinced me here--possibly only because I have heard the contrary argument too much.

But like everything in this book, his ideas are trenchant, very well researched, and come out of a mastery of his subject and period. This is a major book. It is not a small project for the reader (I found myself turning past some pages of the endless tank battles in Russia, the complexities of Burma, among others). But this is the last work of a great man and should be read by anyone who takes the history of the 20th Century seriously.

Lidell Hart can be overrated, and this book is a good example. It gives a good review of the operations in WW2, but often in a potted manner that sounds like a (gifted) high school term paper. There's not always the necessary effort to think about what events in the war mean for the big picture. To his credit, when he DOES connect the dots, it's interesting, as in his claim that Churchill's preoccupation with the African campaign led to Singapore's being undersupported.

And where his hobbyhorse gets rocked, as most flagrantly with his factually inaccurate section on the decision to drop the A-bombs, L.H. is positively pernicious. (See Richard Frank's excellent "Downfall," which I will go review after this.) I'm also surprised, given his obvious anger that the Soviets were left with half of Europe, that he doesn't go into some depth on whether the Allies should have pushed for Berlin.

Nevertheless, its scope and analysis make this a good book to have on the shelf, particularly if you're interested in the British campaigns. There is much more attention to the sideshow in north Africa than any non-Brit could justify, tho since Liddell Hart edited Rommel's papers, this was probably to be expected.

(If anyone reading this review can suggest a superior *military* history of the war, please do!)

Anyone who can competently write the whole history of World War II, while repeatedly getting a point across- the best way to accomplish an objective is to go about it indirectly- is truly a gifted writer.
One does have to laugh at the British bias. You read about the Soviet Army covering hundreds of miles in a few sentences, but in Africa you read about the placement of individual Commonwealth battalions!