Desert War Debate From The Pages of the Australian Army Journal

Discussion in 'North Africa & the Med' started by Charley Fortnum, Jul 8, 2018.

  1. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    I thought that those whose interests lie in the Desert War might find the following texts interesting. I stumbled across one letter in the (Australian) Army Journal by chance while reading about the Gazala Gallop of Jun 1942 and traced the argument back and forwards to reveal a bit of a ding-dong that took place back in the 70s. It seems to be one of the numerous skirmishes that took place in the wings of the post-war 'battle of the biographies' that involving Monty, Auchinleck, De Guingand, Chink Dorman, Liddell Hart, John Connell, Correlli Barnett and others (including the official historians).

    The chronology runs as follows:-

    1. June 1974
    :
    Lieutant-Colonel P. Varma pens Operations of the Eighth Army In North Africa, August 1942 to May 1943. In this fairly long essay he praises both Monty's highly competent leadership and Rommel's 'genius' (particularly in his handling of armour and general manoeuvre)

    2. August 1974:
    Alexander Graeme-Evans, Lt. RCMF writes to object (in detail) that the fact that Rommel was able to conduct a relatively orderly retreat from Alamein to Tunisia is in itself a point against Monty's generalship.

    3. April 1975:
    Lieutenant-Colonel A.E. Cocksedge R.A. [Rtd] contributes to defend Monty robustly and offers a rebuttal (at times line-by-line), championing Monty's organisational skills and justifying the necessity of the series of post-Alamein battles. He drags in a lot of extra material including references to the pre-Monty Eighth Army and the air war.

    4. July 1975:
    Alexander Graeme-Evans writes to defend his thesis (his 'final reply'). He is not, in my humble opinion, that convincing.

    5. February 1976:
    Cocksedge writes back again and is growing quite snippy now about his interlocutor's lack of experience and knowledge--it is long response, which again covers a lot of ground.

    I have edited these files to include only the article and the four letters detailed above--full texts are available online. Parts 01 & 02 are uploaded page by page owing to file-size limits; Parts 03, 04 & 05 are attached here as full .pdf files.

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    Last edited: Jul 8, 2018
  2. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

  3. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    PARTS 3, 4 & 5

     

    Attached Files:

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