John Laffin (1922–2000)

A damning indictment of British generalship in WWI. Douglas Haig comes in for the most criticism. The level of appalling disconnectedness and callous disregard for immense casualties in the prosecution of a pointless and stupid war is deservedly called out. The cover ups and blame shifting are worthy of the worst Corporate politics of today - only the victims were not employees but the poor common soldiers. Anyone thinking the Laffin is too hard on Haig need only remember the 20,000 dead on show more the first day of the Somme or the whole Passchendaele debacle from end to end. There was simply no excuse for what Haig and the other high ups allowed to happen to millions of British and Empire troops. show less

An easy enjoyable read which is much deeper than it seems for such a short book. What I found interesting is that this book would be good for someone new to Australian military history or to someone well read. It walks that fine line between too little and too much information. Highly recommended.

I respectfully disagree with earlier reviewer - I checked just ONE battle: Grunnervaldt on page 187. Not only 3 sentences about such big battle but more absurd then I could ever imagine in such a short space. I use this example as a joke sometimes. For starter: wrong/badly misspelled name of the place, wrong year, very wrong King and absolutely wrong winner! I can only suspect that author intended to write about Battle of Grunwald.
Then, on page 418, same battle but under name Tannenberg I show more (this name was 'invented' by Imperial Germany's propaganda in 1914 :) ) is described again - this time date and 'winner' is right, King 's name 'improved' and that's all what is OK in this 3 (again) sentences!!!
After this 'journey', I cannot trust anything in this book - for obvious reasons I believe...
I found exactly same absurd (as on page 187) in another 'source' - The Cabinet Cyclopaedia, Volume 28, published in 1831 in Chicago. Did J. Laffin used 150 years old popular encyclopedia as a source!? What is even more funny, I found a number of 'serious' websites repeating this 'information' in myriad variations :) Maybe it's time to send 'corrections' ? ;) show less

Useful for teaching historiography of WWI, especially when put up beside the work of more traditional academics. A book to be nibbled on, but one should not swallow it whole