Zeigler, Philip, Mountbatten, Collins, London, 1985
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
There are not all that many military historians about, and I owe a huge debt to those there are, most of them fellow members of the British Commission for Military History. Without exception, they have been unstinting in pointing me in all sorts of directions, many of them useful but all interesting. I have not experienced the oft-cited arrogance of academe, and have always found scholars of far greater eminence than myself to be unfailingly helpful, even those who have not necessarily agreed with my conclusions. They know who they are and I am grateful to them all.
There are, of course, some perks available to historians. One can be very fortunate and be invited to become an honorary research fellow of a university. The quid pro quo for a minuscule return (the occasional lecture) is, apart from a parking pass, access to libraries – and at a time when some books essential to the student of military history can cost up to £200 a volume,* this is an enormous help. Much thanks, therefore, to the Universities of Kent and Birmingham. Military history is but one aspect of history generally. It cannot, as I have also said above, be divorced from social, political and economic history – all are intertwined. Every so often, the question is raised as to whether schoolchildren and university students should be encouraged to study ‘useful’ subjects like engineering or chemistry, rather than ‘academic’ ones like literature or history. While in no way suggesting that engineering and chemistry are not vital to our economy (my own A Levels were in Physics and Pure and Applied Maths), history, it seems to me, is essential to our understanding of ourselves as a nation. It is rather like map-reading: how do you know where you are if you don’t know where you’ve been? And how do you know where you’re going if you don’t know where you are?
We are incredibly fortunate in the availability and standard of proven records and information in Britain. The British Library, the National Archives at Kew, the National Army Museum, the Prince Consort’s Library in Aldershot and the Imperial War Museum, to name but some, are veritable treasure troves of historical fact, as are the German Federal Archives in Koblenz, and their staffs have, as always, been enormously helpful and informative. I owe a particular debt to Alan Wakefield, curator of the Photographic Archive at the Imperial War Museum in London, to Professor Kearby Lyde of San Jacinto College, Houston, Texas, and to Michael Orr, late of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. I am especially grateful to Angus MacKinnon, my editor at Atlantic Books, who has become not only a professional moderator of my occasional purple prose, but a friend in the very real sense, and Caroline Knight, Margaret Stead, Orlando Whitfield, Sachna Hanspal, Mark Handsley, Martin Lubikowski, and of course Toby Mundy, Chief Executive and Publisher, all of whom have not only cooperated hugely in the preparation of this book but without whom it simply could not have appeared. As always, my wife has been my intelligent reader and has done her best to prevent me from becoming too pompous. That she has failed is no reflection on her.
INDEX
Aachen
Abbeville
Abd-el-Krim
abortions
Abyssinia
Action Française
Adachi, General Hatazo
Addison, Paul
Adige, river
Adowa
aerial bombardment
Afghan Wars
Afghanistan
Agincourt, battle of
aircraft
and battle of Stalingrad
gliders
jet aircraft
and Pacific naval battles
aircraft, types of Avro Lancaster
Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress
Boeing B-29 Superfortress
Brewster Buffalo
Bristol Beaufighter
Consolidated B-24 Liberator
Curtiss P-40
De Havilland Mosquito
Dornier Do
Douglas C-47 Dakota
Douglas SBD Dauntless
Fairey Swordfish
Fiat G
Focke-Wulf Fw
Focke-Wulf Fw
Focke-Wulf Fw 200C Condor
Grumman F6F Hellcat
Handley-Page Halifax
HawkerHurricane
Hawker Typhoon
Heinkel He
Heinkel He
Heinkel He
Ilyushin Il-2 Sturmovik
Junkers Ju
Junkers Ju
Junkers Ju
Junkers Ju
Kawanishi N1K Shinden
Lavochkin La-7
Lockheed P-38 Lightning
Macchi MC
Messerschmitt Bf
Messerschmitt Bf
Messerschmitt Me
Messerschmitt Me
Mitsubishi A6M Zero
Mitsubishi A7M Reppu
Mitsubishi J2M Raiden
Nakajima Ki-43 Oscar
North American B-25 Mitchell
North American P-51 Mustang
Petlyakov Pe-2
Reggiane Re
Republic P-47 Thunderbolt
Short Stirling
Supermarine Spitfire
Vickers Vildebeest
Vought F4U Corsair
Yakovlev Yak-9
aircraft carriers
aircraft industries
Akyab
Alam Halfa
Alaska
Albania
Albert Canal
Aleutian Islands
Alexander, Field Marshal the Hon.Sir Harold
and Far East
and Italy
and Middle East
Alexandria
Alfred the Great, King
Algeria
Algiers
all-arms tactics, British
Allfrey, General C. W.
Alsace and Lorraine
American Civil War
Amiens
Amoy
Anami, General Korechika
Anapo, river
Andaman Islands
Anderson, General Kenneth
Anglo-German Naval Agreement
Anglo-Japanese treaty
Annam
Anti-Comintern Pact
anti-Semitism
anti-tank guns
Panzerfaust
Antonescu, Marshal Ion
Antwerp
Anzio
Aosta, Duke of
appeasement
Arabs
Arakan
Arcadia Conference
Archangel
Arctic convoys
Ardennes
Battle of the Bulge
Argenta gap
Argentina
Armenia
Army Staff College
Arnhem
Arnim, General Hans-Jürgen von
Arno, river
Asquith
Assam
Astrakhan
Athens
Atlantic Charter
Atlantic Wall
atomic bombs
Attlee,Clement
Atu
Auchinleck, General Sir Claude
and Middle East
sacking
Aung San
Auschwitz
Australia
and Japanese threat
and treatment of deserters
Austria
Anschluss
Austria-Hungary
Austro-Prussian War
autobahns
Ava bridge
Avignon
Azerbaijan
Bach-Zelewski, Obergruppenführer Erich von dem
Bad Nauheim
Badoglio, Marshal
Baku
Balaclava heights
Balbo, Marshal Italo
Balck, General Hermann
Baldwin, Stanley
Balfour, Arthur
Balfour Declaration
Bali
Balkan Wars
ballistic missiles
Baltic Sea
Baltic States<
br />
Bank of England
Bank of France
Barclay de Tolly, Michael Andreas
Barnes, Ernest William
Barnett, Correlli
Barstow, General Arthur
Bastogne
Bataan Death March
Bataan peninsula
Batavia
Battle of Britain
Battle of Cape Bon
Battle of Cape Esperance
Battle of Cape Matapan
Battle of France
Battle of Leyte Gulf
Battle of Midway
Battle of the Atlantic
Battle of the Bismarck Sea
Battle of the Bulge
Battle of the Coral Sea
Battle of the Java Sea
Battle of the Philippine Sea
Battle of the Somme
battlefield radios
battleships
Bavaria
Bay of Bengal
Bay of Biscay
Bayonne conference
BBC
Beda Fomm
Bedell Smith, General Walter
Belfast
Belgium
German invasion
German occupation
neutrality
Belgorod
Belgrade
Belorussia
Bengal famine
Benghazi
Bennett, General Gordon
Benson, Admiral William S.
Berezina, river
Bergen
Berghof
Berghof conference
Beria, Lavrenti
Berlin
and allied advance
and Soviet advance
Berlin Olympics
Beveridge, Sir William
Bevin, Ernest
Bevin Boys
Biak
Bialystok
Biarritz
Bilin, river
Bir El Gubi
Bir el Hafi
Birmingham
Bismarck,Ottovon
Bismarck Archipelago
Bizerta
Black Death
Black Sea
Blamey, General Sir Thomas
Blaskowitz, General Johannes
Bletchley Park
Blitz
Blitzkrieg
Blood, General Sir Bindon
Blum, Léon
Bock, Field Marshal Fedor von
Bohemia
Boineburg-Lengsfeld, General
Baron Hans von
Bologna
Bond, Brian
Bône
Bonin Islands
Bonus Marchers
booby-traps, Soviet
Bordeaux
Bormann, Martin
Borneo
Borodino
Bose, Subhas Chandra
Bosnia
Bougainville
Bougie
Boulogne
Bourne, John
Boxer Rebellion
Bradley, General Omar N.
Brandenberger, General Erich
Brandenburg
Brauchitsch, General Walter von
Braun, Eva
Braun, Margarethe
Breda
Brenner Pass
Brereton, General Louis
Brest
Brest-Litovsk
see also Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
Bretton Woods Agreement
Brink, General George
Brisbane
Bristol
Britain
air defences
death toll
dependence on imports
domestic conditions
entry into war
and gold standard
and history
invasion threat
and peace moves
post-war
relations with USA
and Soviet Union
and Spanish Civil War
and universal suffrage
war economy
British Army
and Dunkirk evacuation
mutinies
organization
regimental system
British Empire
post-war
British Expeditionary Force (BEF)
Brittany
broadcasting
Brooke, General Sir Alan
and Cairo Purge
and Montgomery
Brooke-Popham, Air Marshal Sir Henry
brothels
Browning, General Frederick ‘Boy,’
Brunei
Brüning, Heinrich
Brusilov Offensive
Brussels
Bryansk
Buckner, General Simon Bolivar
Budapest
Budenny, Marshal Semyon
Bug, river
Bulgaria
Buna
bunkers, Japanese
Burma
allied defence
allied recovery
allied retreat
and Bengal famine
roads
victory parade
Burma Independence Army
Burma railway
Burma Road
Busch, Field Marshal Ernst
Busse, General Theodor
Buthidaung
Butt Report
Buyarat
Caen
Cairo
CairoPurge
Calabria
Calcutta
California
Callaghan, Brigadier Cecil
Calvert,Brigadier ‘Mad Mike’
Cambodia
camel trains
Canada
Canaris, Admiral Wilhelm
Canary Islands
Canton province
Cape of Good Hope
Caporetto
Caribbean naval bases
Carolines
Carpathian mountains
Carpiquet
Casablanca
Casablanca conference
Caserta
Casey, Richard
Caspian Sea
Cassione
Catania
Catherine the Great, Empress
Catroux, General Georges
Caucasus
Caucasus oil fields
Cavallero, Marshal Count Ugo
cavalry
Celebes
Cesarina
Ceylon
Chad
Chamberlain, Austen
Chamberlain, Neville
Chan, Admiral
Changi
Channel Dash
Channel Islands
Channel ports
Charlemagne
Charles II, King
Chennault, General Claire
Cherbourg
Cherkassy
Chiang Kai-shek, General
and Japanese surrender
and ‘Vinegar Joe’ Stilwell
China
death toll
Japanese invasion
and Japanese surrender
and Korean War
post-war
Qing dynasty
China Incident
Chindits
Chindwin,river
Chinese Nationalists (Kuo MinTang)
and Burma offensive
and Burma retreat
Chittagong
cholera
Choltitz, General Dietrich von
Christison, General Philip
Chuikov, General Vasily
Chungking
Churchill, Winston
and allied invasion
anti-communism
and Balkan Front
and Beveridge Report
and Coventry raid
and de Gaulle
and fall of France
and Far East
and Gallipoli
and General Dill
and general election
and Greece
and invasion of Soviet Union
and Japan
meeting with Slim
meetings with Roosevelt
and the navy
and North Africa
and Norway
and Orde Wingate
and the RAF
and SOE
and strategic bombing campaign
and US entry into war
and war crimes trials
Ciano, Galeazzo
Ciliax, Admiral Otto
Cividale
civilians, targeting of
and strategic bombing campaign
clandestine operations
Clark, General Mark
Clydeside
Cochin China
code-breaking
Cold War
collective punishments
Cologne
Colombo
Colville, John
Combat
Combined Operations Directorate
‘comfort women’
Commando Order
Commissar Order
communism and anti-communism
and Churchill
and invasion of Soviet Union
Communist Party of Great Britain
Conca, river
concentration and extermination camps
Condor Legion
Coningham, Air Marshal Sir
Arthur
Connelly, Mark
conscription
convoy system
Coolidge, Calvin
Copenhagen
Corbett, General Thomas
Cork and Orrery, Admiral the Earl of
Corregidor
Corsica
Corunna, retreat to
Cossack revolt
Cotentin peninsula
Courland peninsula
Coventry
Cowan, General David ‘Punch’
Cracow
Crécy, battle of
Crerar, General Henry
Crete
Crimea
Crimean Tatars
Cripps, Sir Stafford
Croatia
Croix de Feu
Crüwell, General Ludwig
Cuba
Cunningham, General Sir Alan
Cunningham, Admiral Sir Andrew
Curtin,John
Cyprus
Cyrenaica
Cyril, Prince, of Bulgaria
Czech Legion
Czechoslovakia
Dachau
Daily Graphic
Daily Telegraph
Dakar
Daladier, Édouard
Dalmatia
D’Annunzio, Gabriele
Danube, river
Danzig
Dardanelles
Darien
Darius the Great
Darlan, Admiral François
Darwin
Dawes, Charles W.
Dawna mountains
de Beers
de Gaulle, General Charles
and French North Africa
and French Resistance
and Madagascar
de Guingand, Brigadier ‘Freddie’
Decoux, Admiral Jean
Defence of the Realm Act (DORA)
Delhi
Dempsey, General
Denmark
German occupation
Jews
liberation and German surrender
Denmark Strait
Derna
desertion
Detroit
Deutsche Arbeitsfront
Deverall, Field Marshal Sir Cyril
Second World War, The Page 78