Product Description

There's a commonly held view that Douglas Haig was a bone-headed, callous butcher, who through his incompetence as commander of the British Army in WWI, killed a generation of young men on the Somme and Passchendaele. On the other hand there are those who view Haig as a man who successfully struggled with appalling difficulties to produce an army which took the lead in defeating Germany in 1918, winning the greatest series of victories in British Military history. Just as the success of the Alanbrooke war diaries can be put down to its 'horse's mouth' view of Churchill and the conduct of WWII, so Haig's Diaries, hitherto only previously available in bowdlerised form, give the C-in-C's view of Asquith - he records him getting drunk and incapable - and his successor Lloyd George, of whom he was highly critical. As Haig records the relationship it was stormy ('I have no great opinion of L.G as a man or leader' - Sept 1916). The diaries show him intriguing with the King (George V) vs. Lloyd George. Additional - and never previously published - are his day by day accounts of the key battles of the war, not least the Somme campaign of 1916. 'I found Foch (Allied C-in-C) most selfish and obstinate. ... Foch suffers from a swollen head, and thinks himself another Napoleon.' Haig is revealed as an early admirer of the tank and of the 'airoplane'. He revels in turning the well-meaning BEF under Sir John French into the professional fighting force that eventualy one the war.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #273711 in Books
• Published on: 2005-03-24
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 480 pages

Tom Kyle, THE DAILY MAIL
'edited by two distinguished military historians, they reveal a man very different from the stereotypical warmonger of Left-wing mythology.'

Review
'A re-examination and new selection of the wartime diaries is overdue and now comes in a handsome and uncommonly well-edited edition.' (Max Hastings SUNDAY TELEGRAPH )

'Thanks to the editors' sterling efforts haid emerges from his diaries neither as a hero nor a villain but as a human being vividly aware of the frailty of his role in shaping history..... This is a major and much-needed addition to the historiography of one of the most contentious periods in English history.' (Trevor Royle THE SUNDAY HERALD )

'edited by two distinguished military historians, they reveal a man very different from the stereotypical warmonger of Left-wing mythology.' (Tom Kyle THE DAILY MAIL )

'These personal writings reveal an intelligent, humane individual doing his best under impossible conditions.' (Betty Tadman THE SCOTSMAN )

'their (Sheffield and Bourne) excellent and succint introduction to these diaries......if anything emerges from these diaries and letters it is that Haig was perfectly human.' (Allan Mallinson LITERARY REVIEW )

'this comprehensive, unexpurgated edition, which throws completely new light on his career.' (HISTORY TODAY )

'Magnificiently edited' (Raymond Carr THE SPECTATOR )

'Thanks to excellent editing, much new light is thrown on Field Marshal Haig... an enthralling contemporary account.' (THE GUARDS MAGAZINE )

HISTORY TODAY
'this comprehensive, unexpurgated edition, which throws completely new light on his career.'

Customer Reviews

First rate piece of work gives much food for thought
Well, this is a tricky one.

On the one hand,the editors are to be congratulated on providing us with the first ever comprehensive-ish volume of Haig's diaries that attempts historical scientific rigour. Consequently, it is a fascinating read - far beyond what one might normally expect of a diary.

On the whole, this is a work that exonerates Haig from the wilder accusations flung at him over the years. For he was, in reality, an educated, intelligent man; a professional soldier and an excellent general officer who was, in many ways, years ahead of his time - he was so good, in fact, that he was obviously several levels above almost all of his contemporaries in tactical and strategic thinking.

And yet... well, of course, this work is Haig's own writing, and so,although there is no great evidence for showmanship and recrafting of events on his part (indeed, this would not be in character), it is nevertheless only one side of the story. And he is also a man of his times, in his bigotries and Victorian piety, and in his adherence to class.

There is a lot to be read between the lines that leads one to ask further questions, not least about the strange dichotomy in Haig's ever-present enthusiasm for 'the breakthrough leading to mobile operations' (upon which much of his love for technology is founded) and his strategic assessment from the very beginning that the war would be one of horrendous attrition, and that victory could only go to the contender who blinked last.

Given that Britain was hardly a massively populated nation, it is hard to see how anyone could suggest that the British would be the victors in such a scenario.

But Haig was right, although his conviction led to an acceptance of human loss that others could not contemplate - this being the source of his spectacular falling out with Lloyd George, although, reading here, one will be amazed to read of the Prime Minister's skulduggery bordering on treason. I always suspected LG to be not entirely as heroic as popular history has painted him, and here, it seems is proof in spades.

So the debate will continue, although surely it must be admitted that no-one else could have done any better, at least. Haig was a first rate soldier trying to do an impossible job with the single aim in mind of defeating his enemy. His only problem really was that no-one (on either side) knew how to execute this mission without killing tens-upon-thousands of men at a time.

I don't think that is Haig's fault.

Now read him in his own words, and judge for yourselves
The name General Haig certainly arouses great passions to all historians of World War I, many blame him directly for the deaths of millions of our boys on the western front, many of whom were only 14 years old, that he knew underage boys were taking part in active service and turned a blind eye and sent them to an early death, whilst others argue that he was doing a difficult job that was never going to be free from criticism and that we couldn't have won the war without him, whatever the modern reader thinks, here they have the oppurtunity to read his personal diaries and gage his own thoughts and opinions on the situation of the time, what he thought of PM's Asquith and Lloyd George and his close relationship with his No.2 Lord Kitchener, the original diaries fill many many volumes, so complete publication may never be possible, but here you have the nearest thing with a selection of his letters to boot, they are unique in the sense that here we have the diary of a man that was no.1 in the chain of command of WWI. This review is not intended as a judgement on the charachter of Haig, that is something left to you, but whatever your thoughts are, there is no denying it is one of the most interesting reads of a brutally destructive and savage period of the 20th Century, one which continues to shock and shame us all

the whole truth?
This is a 25% edit of the diaries, which is quite proper given the amount written by Haig. However the edit avoids dwelling on Haig's more bizzare flurries. So many other works quote critical material that damns Haig that is not reproduced here. Even so what is printed shows Haig as having written a self-serving yet naive account. What is ommitted leaves the reader asking whether the ommission was one of Haig's or the current editors' and reading between the lines still leaves the reader struggling to account for Haig's bombastic, egotistical and empty military mind. One cannot help but feel that the authors have tried to make a silk purse from a sow's ear. A valliant attempt to soften the indictment.