Customer Reviews

The Defeat Of Imperial Germany, 1917-1918 (Major Battles & Campaigns)

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Rod Paschall has written a very tidy piece of military history which goes a long way towards showing how many of the conventional beliefs concerning WW1 are totally innaccurate. He dosen't diminish the loss of life but he does show that the generals in charge were no less capable than their WW2 counterparts. Much of what was practiced in WW2 started in WW1. Pascall builds a compelling case that the generals on both sides invented ingenious new strategies that simply failed in the context of a war of attrition. An outstanding contribution to the body of knowledge of World War One.

I found this to be a great explanation of the evolving tactics and strategy in Western Europe as World War I drug on. I have always enjoyed the descriptions of the von Schlieffen Plan and Germany's invasion of France and Belgium, but like the war I always got bogged down in the trench warfare. I found this to be a very readable description of how the opposing armies attempted to find a new way to fight the war after Verdun. The author does a masterful job of weaving the political situations into the military strategy. Finally, he described the American contribution. It was disheartening to read about how the Americans failed to take advantage of what the Allies had learned during three years of war, and instead depended on rifles and courage rather than machine guns and small unit tactics.

Paschall's book focuses in part on the role of the American Expeditionary Force in the ultimate defeat of Germany along the Western Front in 1918. As such, it is a useful tool as an introduction to an easily neglected area of study. In addition, Paschall provides good descriptions of the battles of 1917 and 1918 along the Western Front (I thought Cambrai was his best). My only qualm with Pachall is that he seemed to have neglected scholarship available to him regarding certain aspects of his work (e.g. German tactical doctrine and industrial capacity). But overall, I would recommend it as an introduction to the last two years of the war.